Flower Arranging to Bloom Again

Standards are not parents' top priority

Inspectors keep quiet about findings that may surprise ministers.

Clare Dean reports

PARENTS do not share ministers' high level of concern about academic achievement in schools, an unpublished Office for Standards in Education report reveals.

The report, which OFSTED has no plans to publish, shows that most parents are very supportive of their child's school. Where there was dissatisfaction no link was found to quality of education.

What does concern parents, it finds, is homework, assessment and the curriculum and-in secondary schools-behaviour.

Just last month the Department for Education and Employment issued draft guidelines on homework which said that modest amounts were "essential" to the drive to raise standards in literacy and numeracy.

The report is based on the confidential responses of a quarter of a million Parents to the questionnaire which is sent out by OFSTED as part of the inspection process.

Parents are asked to respond to 11 statements about their child's school. These range from how it handles their complaints to the way it enables their child to achieve a good standard of work.

Schools are encouraged to collect the parents' responses in sealed envelopes to ensure they respond frankly and in private to inspectors.

According to the report, dissatisfaction with standards of achievement is uncommon and few parents feel their children do not like school. There was more concern generally among the parents of primary pupils than those with children at secondary school.

But said the report: "High levels of parental dissatisfaction are unrelated to school quality as judged by inspectors' grades. Case studies of 20 schools - both good and bad - confirmed the statistical finding that there was no direct link between parental dissatisfaction and quality. In fact, according to OFSTED, in some cases high achieving schools were criticised more.

Chris Thatcher, vice-president of the National Association of Head Teachers, said: "Standards are a priority for parents but they are not in a high position.

"Parents are very much aware of the complex nature of what a school is about - it is not just satisfaction about performance in tests or academic achievement it is just as much about how their children are settled and happy.

"Most parents will tell you that the most important thing for them is that their children have to be, and are going to be, in an environment where they are relaxed."

Junior English drive slowing

By Nicholas Pyke

THE RAPID progress made in junior school English is slowing down, which could jeopardise the Government's national literacy target.

Test results due next week show that after three years of impressive gains, England's ll-year-olds have only managed a slight advance this year of between two and three percentage points. Boys are continuing to fare badly. In response, ministers intend to point out that schools taking part in the National Literacy Strategy are performing significantly better than average.

The new test results show that between 65 and 66 per cent of 11 year-olds are now at the target level, with four years to go. If this slow rate of progress is maintained, then the 80 per cent target will be missed.

Until now the improvement in English overall has been extremely encouraging. Underlying this, however, is a big difference in the achievements of boys and girls - girls far outstrip boys.

There is also a worrying gap in performance between the two main components of the test: reading and writing. More than 70 percent of 11-year- olds already read at level 4; but less than 60 per cent hit that standard in writing.

In order to achieve further progress, ministers will have to consider how to encourage boys, particularly in the field of writing.

Family focus on maths

By Nadene Ghoui

THE GOVERNMENT is to spend £1 million on helping deprived families improve their maths.

The cash will fund 500 family numeracy projects in some of Britain's most disadvantaged areas in an attempt to raise numeracy levels in pre-school children before the National Numeracy Project begins next year.

Twenty-two per cent of the adult population are functionally innumerate - one of the highest figures in Europe.

The scheme is due to be announced next week. Last year the Government ran 14 family numeracy pilots. More than 500 disadvantaged families were referred by schools. social services or health visitors. The children who took part in the projects scored an average of 20 per cent higher in number, mathematical language and reading in baseline assessments than similar children from a control group.

The schools which took part in the pilots all had lower attainment in mathematics at the end of key stage 1 and 2 than the national average and a higher than average number of pupils receiving free school meals.

Three-quarters of the parents were unemployed, 69 per cent were under the age of 35 and almost all half had no formal qualifications. However, by the end of the pilot 84 per cent had gained a City and Guilds accreditation. One parent said: "I'm far more into it all. I've made a lot of progress with my own maths and suddenly some of the pennies have dropped. I never knew what the decimal point was for. I never realised it's the same as money."

Alan Wells, director of the Basic Skills Agency, which ran the pilots, said: "Just like literacy, numeracy programmes are an effective way of preventing early failure in children. But they also have another very real benefit in improving the numeracy skills of adults. If we can build on what we now know works, we can make sure fewer children struggle with maths at school. And just as importantly stop being one of the few countries where people boast that they are no good with figures."