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Missing the point: REPORTING ON STUDENT ACHIEVEMENT TO KOREAN PARENTS AT ONE NEW ZEALAND HIGH SCHOOL

Simon Crosby and Hyoung-Kuen Kim
Abstract: 

How effective is school reporting, particularly for parents of international students? Schools spend considerable time and effort in reporting to parents, but little research has been conducted on reporting, or its ability to raise achievement. This article looks at how one high school reports on student achievement and how those reports are interpreted by students and parents whose first language is not English.

Journal issue: 

Missing the point
REPORTING ON STUDENT ACHIEVEMENT TO KOREAN PARENTS AT ONE NEW ZEALAND HIGH SCHOOL

Simon Crosby and Hyoung-Kuen Kim

Schools spend considerable time and effort in reporting to parents. However, there appears to be a paucity of research on the issue of reporting to parents (Timperley & Robinson, 2004, p. 93), and little acknowledgement of the efficacy of such reporting in improving student achievement (Hattie & Preddie, 2003; Preddie, 2000). Since international students are now arriving in New Zealand in significant numbers, the time appears appropriate for a study on how one high school reports on student achievement and the way those reports are interpreted by students and parents whose first language is not English.

The site for this research was a suburban New Zealand high school. The school has more than 2000 students, who come from diverse backgrounds and ethnicities. Thirty-three different language groups and more than 50 different nationalities are represented in the student population. The school reports on achievement to parents on nine separate occasions in the course of a school year: five written reports and four verbal reports. These include written initial progress reports for the whole school and two sets of written achievement reports in a school year for both juniors and seniors. The school also holds two separate verbal report evenings for juniors and seniors.

Method

This research project takes as its focus Korean parents and students. There are 106 students at the school who identify themselves as Korean (about 5 percent of the total school population). Because the parents of the Korean students constituted a discrete group, the research used a case-study approach. Data were gathered by means of focus groups and individual interviews, which were conducted in Korean. The composition of the focus groups is given in Table 1.

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A set of four questions was used to guide the discussions in the focus groups and interviews. These questions were:

•&&To what extent do the reports inform the Korean parents about the achievement of their children?

•&&To what extent is the information meaningful to Korean parents and students?

•&&What barriers, if any, do the Korean parents identify as impeding the use of reports to improve student achievement?

•&&What improvements, if any, would Korean parents like to see in the reporting processes and products?

The data were analysed co-constructively by both the English-speaking and Korean-speaking researchers. The authenticity of the research is a function of the relationship between the researchers, who were both colleagues and friends. English was the language they had in common and the Korean researcher was fully bilingual. However, “the pull of two languages in one head is reciprocal—a balancing play of forces” (Saussy, 2001, p. 3). While acknowledging the mediated character of knowledge (Nisbett, 2003), the researchers did endeavour to provide accurate translations of the interviews. Some of the delicate nuances of language may have been lost in translation, but the aim was to provide direct verbatim translations of the focus-group discussions and the interviews, taking care to avoid paraphrasing.

The researchers looked for general trends and themes that emerged from the data. The participants’ words were transcribed verbatim to exemplify or highlight a particular theme or trend.

Findings

Verbal reports

In many respects the verbal report evening is the most significant point of contact between the school and the majority of its parents (McKinley, 2000; Preddie, 2000). This applies equally to the Korean parents:

Whenever I am informed [about parent– teacher evenings] I try to attend and participate without fail, and changing other appointments … So I attended every time whenever there is a parent interview. Attending parent evening is my highest priority. (Korean father)

However, for many of the parents in this study, the reporting evening was a frustrating and demoralising experience that tended to build barriers rather than bridges:

New Zealand student can communicate to teachers and parents very well. But Korean student, there is fence between teachers and parents. There is no connection. (English-speaking Korean mother)

The issues raised by parents included constraints in the areas of building professional relationships, the use of language, the length of time for each interview, and the place where the interviews were conducted.

Professional relationships

Building effective and productive links between home and school is important in improving student outcomes (Epstein, 1990, 1995, 2001; Griffiths, 1996; McIntyre, Kyle, Moore, Sweazy, & Greer, 2001; Walberg, 1999). However, for parents who do not share the language and culture of the teachers, effective communication becomes difficult:

I have to show my gratitude to the teachers, but I can’t speak English well and the way of approaching is different. We don’t know the way to build the relationship with teachers. It is very hard. (Korean father)

Language

Parents found that the way many teachers expressed comments on student progress was difficult to understand and follow:

I don’t know whether it possible or not the school can ask all the teachers to speak slowly and use easy expressions when they are talking with Asian parents. I think they can find easier ways, simple ways. When they speak in this complicated way I’m lost. I want to give up listening to what she is saying. I mean I just smile and say, ‘OK’. (English-speaking Korean mother)

Some of the participants used their children as interpreters during the verbal report evenings. This gave rise to the suspicion that in some instances the children reinterpreted teachers’ comments for their own advantage, so causing further miscommunication:

When I get the report I tell my daughter to translate because I can’t translate, but there is space for the child to manipulate. (Korean mother)

Time and place

Parents whose first language is not English felt disadvantaged by several aspects of the reporting processes. During verbal reporting, parents felt an interview time of five minutes was simply not long enough for fruitful discussions:

We are given three or five minutes for the interview. What kind of interview can we have in that time? It is a kind of formal show … I prepared but [the answer] can be long and I have to ask unexpected questions which I hadn’t prepared for. If so, the time is not enough to ask deep questions. Five minutes goes really fast. It means I can show may face and say I am this child’s mum. (Korean mother)

The parents were impassioned about the constraints placed on them by the school. They felt the space was too crowded, which meant that concentration was difficult. The extraneous noise was a significant factor for those parents for whom English is an additional language:

It was much loud I had to think about next people and too noisy. I couldn’t concentrate that’s the problem. Most of parents very disappointed about this. (English-speaking Korean mother)

The Korean parents were dissatisfied with a number of aspects of the verbal report evenings. They felt that the first report evening (held in Term 1) was too soon. Teachers did not really know the students well so early in the school year, and there had not been enough opportunities to develop relationships between parents and teachers. The parents felt constrained by language difficulties and wanted teachers to be clearer and more direct in their comments on achievement. Using children as interpreters was not wholly satisfactory, as the children tended to reinterpret teachers’ comments in their own interest. The conditions in which the interviews took place were also a cause of complaint. Five minutes in a crowded, noisy space was not conducive to understanding.

Written reports

The school reports in writing on each student three times in each year. All students receive an interim progress report early in Term 1. Juniors and seniors receive achievement reports in Term 2 and seniors receive a further achievement report at the end of Term 3. Juniors receive their final achievement report at the end of the school year in Term 4. The issues raised by the Korean parents who participated in this study included the timing of the reports, their purpose, the nature of the comments, the nature of the assessments, and the differences in reporting expectations.

Timing

Many of the Korean parents who participated in this study felt that the first written reports were given too early in the year:

Don’t write comments within three months because it’s meaningless … Teachers don’t need to waste their time and we don’t suffer the stress with that [early] report … Write the report when students are better known [to the teachers] … In six months teachers can find out the students. (Korean mother)

The nature of the comments

Parents wanted reports to give them information about achievement and advice on how their children can make progress in particular subjects:

I want to know what my child needs to do and how to study to get there. But I can’t get those things from this report. (Korean mother)

Parents felt the comments were too positive and lacked detailed constructive information:

Sometimes the comments are only compliments. That’s not what we need. We can’t pick up the information we need because of the compliments … Please get rid of the compliments because there are a lot [of] things that need to be exposed and written about. (Korean mother)

Assessment

The parents wanted more clarity about the way teachers assessed students’ progress and how they used assessment to report on achievement:

I don’t understand the difference between good and satisfactory. I can’t judge what the level for merit is. I wonder what the criteria are for the step by step judgements [that teachers make]. (Korean mother)

The parents wanted some way of relating the academic performance of their children to the class, the year cohort, and national cohorts. Where there were gaps in achievement they wanted to know how they could help their children:

The main reason why I want reports is to know how well my child achieves and then I can find out what I can do to help … I thought about Korean reports. In Korea the parents can find out ranks in class in subjects and year level, so it’s easy to find out clearly from the report what subjects need to be improved. However, with this report I can just find out if my child has achieved or not. Those parts need to be developed more. (Korean mother)

Language

Parents found the use of technical and idiomatic language particularly difficult to understand:

When I got this report I could not understand this sentence: ‘He must ensure he has completed his work to a standard that reflects his obvious ability and not one of mediocrity.’ I couldn’t understand this sentence. I asked one of my Kiwi friends. I was wondering if this is negative or is this positive. I could understand each individual word but I couldn’t figure what it really means. I asked my friend, she told me it was quite negative. (English-speaking Korean mother)

Reporting expectations

The reporting process also revealed some discrepancies between the participants’ expectations of learning in Korea and learning in New Zealand. Nisbett (2003) suggests that the different schemas of knowledge between Asian and Western cultures may be responsible for different approaches to learning. This is certainly a fascinating area of study, but beyond the scope of this research project. Suffice it to say here that the Korean parents did find the curriculum expectations different:

Curriculum is very different. Teachers just give food to the mouse and they eat it, but this one teacher just give guideline and students have to find food. That’s difference. That’s why Korean students not achieved. Many fail because they don’t know how to adjust. (English-speaking Korean mother)

Although the Korean parents who participated in this study felt that reporting in Term 1 was too early, they were happier with the later reporting on achievement. They wanted detailed comments on their children that focused on what was needed to improve achievement and how this could be done. They felt that reports too often contained only positive comments, and wanted honesty in reporting. Many wanted to be able to make comparisons with other students’ achievement in terms of class and cohort. The parents wanted assessment processes to be made explicit and clear, so that they could see the link between assessment, achievement, and reporting. They felt that the language used in written reports was ambiguous and difficult to understand. This included both the comments and the achievement descriptors. Finally, there were discrepancies between the curriculum content and reporting expectations for many of the Korean parents who took part in this study.

Conclusions

In terms of verbal reporting, the findings of this study support the research of Preddie (2000) and McKinley (2000), in that parent–teacher interviews were the one occasion when parents made coming to the school a priority. However, for the parents who participated in this study the experience was not wholly satisfactory. For many, the experience was one of frustration, anger, and resentment (Power & Clark, 2000).

The participating parents felt humiliated and belittled by their experience of verbal reporting. They had little idea how to relate to the teachers, they did not understand the comments, they had little time to frame questions (and no time to respond to teachers’ comments), they felt pressure from other parents waiting behind them, and the noisy, crowded space made it difficult for them to concentrate and comprehend the information they were given. All told, the parent–teacher evenings were occasions “fraught with personal and institutional danger” (Walker, 1998, p. 176). The way the verbal report evenings were structured tended to enhance the participants’ feelings of inadequacy, so that reporting became a disabling rather than an empowering experience (Cummins, 1986; Finders & Lewis, 1994). The power imbalances inherent in the situation were further compounded by the fact that the participants had to rely on their children to interpret teachers’ comments.

As in verbal reporting, participating Korean parents wanted written reports that were honest and reliable. This is in keeping with a number of other studies that have found a general overinflation of student performance (Hattie & Preddie, 2003; Preddie, 2000; Timperley & Parr, 2004; Timperley et al., 2004). The participating parents wanted reports to focus on achievement.

The parents wanted reports that clearly indicated the level of achievement in relation to recognised local and national benchmarks (Hattie & Preddie, 2003; Preddie, 2000; Timperley & Robinson, 2000). They wanted to be able to make comparisons with other students so that their children’s areas of strengths and weaknesses would become apparent. Without this information the parents felt disabled by the reporting process (Cummins, 1986).

In wanting the achievement of their children to be made explicit, the participating parents wanted a better understanding of assessment and the link between assessment and reporting. The parents wanted to be sure that the assessment measured what it purported to measure, and that the assessment process was fair to all students—in short, they wanted assessment to be reliable and valid (Black & Wiliam, 1998). There was a feeling among the participants that the assessment criteria were not made explicit and that the assessment process might in fact be disadvantaging their children (this concurs with the findings of Timperley and Parr, 2004). The parents found the criteria by which students were assessed difficult to understand. Even those who had been in New Zealand longer than a year had difficulty in understanding the wording of some of the criteria. We believe that there is a professional imperative to keep the reporting audience in mind, particularly when that audience is using English as an additional language (Power & Clark, 2000; Timperley & Parr, 2004).

Not only did the participating parents want to understand the assessment criteria, they also wanted to understand the comments in the written reports. They found the language used in the reporting to be too technical and idiomatic. Failure to understand the nuances of language led to some misunderstandings. Timperley and Parr (2004) suggest that here teachers are caught in a professional dilemma. Teachers want their reports to be understood, but they also want them to be couched in professional terms. However, unless their reports are understood by and meaningful to parents and students, schools are merely reporting to themselves (Timperley & Robinson, 2004). Teachers must take into account the literacy skills required to read and interpret reports. Defining such literacy skills is beyond the scope of this study, but it is certainly an area worthy of further research.

References

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Simon Crosby is Head of the Department of English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) and Vertical House Dean at Pakuranga College.

Email: cro@pakuranga.school.nz

Hyoung-Kuen (Stephen) Kim is the Dean of Korean students and teacher of Japanese at Pakuranga College.

Email: kim@pakuranga.school.nz