I have a question for both parents and teachers. To the teachers, how many of you send written reports home to the parents during the year about how your pupil is doing? What do you usually tell them? To the parents, what do you want to know? I havnt done this before and I was going to do one before christmas, and another around may/june. I dont usually get to talk to the parents as they usually just drop the kids off and collect them and rarely come in. Im teaching piano by the way. Thanks in advance for any replies....

I write a written report twice-yearly as not all parents come in and I think they need to know how their children are progressing.

Things I include are aims over the next few months or year, how happy I am with the child's progress, their concentration during lessons and any problems I think the parents could help with, i.e., pupils forgetting books, not practising, timekeeping etc.

Hope this helps.

I always offer to do written reports and only 1 person so far has taken me up on it - and he was a Guardian to an Asian student and so I guess he sent the report home to Korea.

Most of the parents pop into the last lesson of the term (if they don't stay each week) and are happy to spend 5 minutes of the lesson asking questions about progress.

For something like forgetting music, or not practising I would probably phone the parents to nip it in the bud.

I give reports to parent of private students if they ask for it. All my students have a practice diary so everything is noted in that - especially if there are any problems. Exam results usually give them what they want to know too - that they aren't wasting thei money!

Yes, formal written reports for all pupils still in school education system (or 6th form college) twice-yearly (end of Autumn and end of Summer terms). Each gets two copies of the report and pupil and parent are asked to sign to say they've read it and to feed back any comments they wish to make, returning one copy to me at the start of the new term.

I break the report down into sections: technical, theory, aural skills, practise etc. plus an overall comment. Each pupil gets a grade (A, B etc) for effort and one for achievement.

At the end of the shorter Spring Term I enclose a paragraph with the fees invoice just saying how the term has gone in general.

It's a lot of work but feedback is most parents appreciate the care and have a better understanding of how things are going. I judge this necessary given I rarely meet most of them except on the doorstep as child is handed over in one direction or another and that quite a few of them bring themselves so I never see the parent(s).

I just write reports for school generally, as I have little or no contact with these parents. Private pupils don't get reports, as most parents drop off/collect their kids and the majority of them I know around town anyway, so they'll usually stop me and ask if they're concerned about anything. I did fully intend to write private reports, and managed to get around to it once (just after I did my CT course years ago!!!) but it fell by the wayside! I should maybe start again, but possibly only for the parents I don't see so often - a lot of them get a weekly report anyway!

I must be honest, I don't bother... I see every parent after the lesson so I usually run down everything their child has to practice during the week.

I'd like to start an annual report, I think its a good thing. I'm just not sure how parents would take it. Most of them don't understand what I'm talking about anyway.

I do reports for my (younger) private pupils twice a year. I decided I couldn't cope with reports in the run up to Christmas, so I started out doing twice yearly rather than once a term. This works out at about half-way through the school year (February) and at the end of the school year in July / August.


The report starts out by a factual resume of what we've achieved in the past six months in topic form, followed by a list of pieces completed, and then comments, good points and not-so-good, then finally advice for improvement and what I hope to achieve in the next six months. Most of a sheet of A4 for each pupil.

As a teacher I don't do reports but I do address comments in the book sent home by pupils I teach in schools each week to the parents e.g "*** concentrated really well this week but still needs to do work on the scales this week". I also give my phone number and encourage parental feedback. With private pupils I see the parents each week so do it verbally and via the practice book.

As a parent who wants to encourage productive practice I would want to know things they should be doing each week - but also if there were any areas of weekness / excellence - the same as any report I guess. I am the sort of parent who wants to feel involved and informed about what my children are doing as opposed to excluded, and of course if you're paying for the lessons you want the best from them (or I do anyway!!)

I do not prepare written reports because I have such close contact with the parents of my pupils - a lot of them attend the lessons, whilst I talk regularly to the rest.

Steve