Parents asking how their child is getting on
Parents pay for coaching, and they want to know how their child is progressing. Some ask the coach at pick-up, which is the worst time for a proper answer. Some never ask and assume nothing is happening. At the end of each term, you would love to send a short report per child: what they have worked on, how they are doing and what is next.
You tried once. Coaches spent evenings writing sixty reports each in Word. Some were brilliant, some were one line. It never happened again.
Why reports do not happen
- Writing a report per child from scratch takes too long.
- Coaches have no record of how each child did through the term.
- There is no shared set of skills per age group, so reports vary by coach.
- Getting reports to parents means emailing attachments one by one.
- Reports are not linked to anything, so there is no history.
What the silence costs
Parents who do not see progress are the ones who stop paying. A short, specific report is one of the clearest signs that your academy takes their child seriously, and it gives parents something to share with family.
It also helps coaching. When coaches assess each child against the same skills, they see which children need more support and which are ready for the next group.
Quick assessments that become reports
- For each age group or level, you set a short list of skills and qualities, in your own words.
- In the last weeks of term, coaches rate each child on their phone during or after sessions, in a few taps per child, with an optional short comment.
- The system builds a report per child from the ratings, the skills and the comment, in your academy's style.
- Coaches can review and edit before sending, and a head coach can check a sample.
- Reports go to parents by email or through their account, and are kept so parents and coaches can see progress over time.
- Children who are ready to move up a group are flagged from the ratings, so you can offer them a place.
| Part | Coach effort | Parent sees |
|---|---|---|
| Skills list | Set once by the head coach | Skills their child worked on |
| Ratings | A few taps per child | Where their child is on each skill |
| Comment | One sentence, optional | A personal note |
| Next focus | Chosen from a list | What happens next term |
Where it helps, a language model such as OpenAI or Anthropic Claude can suggest wording for the comment from the ratings, which the coach edits or ignores.
Reports that go out every term
In the last three weeks of term, coaches spend a minute at the end of each session rating a few children. By the final week, every child has ratings and most have a comment. The head coach skims them, and reports go out on the last day of term.
The ratings also give the head coach something they have never had: a view across every group of how children are progressing against the skills you set. If one age group is consistently weaker on a skill, the programme for next term can give it more time. If a coach's ratings are all at the top of the scale, the head coach can have a conversation about what the ratings mean.
Parents get a short, specific report about their child. Several reply to say thank you. Re-enrolment for next term goes a little more smoothly because families can see progress.
Would progress reports help you?
- Parents ask coaches about progress at pick-up.
- You would like to send reports but coaches do not have time.
- Past reports varied a lot between coaches.
- There is no record of how each child progressed.
- Children ready to move up are not always spotted.