To think too much is expected of teachers these days

@LovelyLady. What you’re suggesting is that the educational needs of children with disabilities is not as important as those of able bodied children. Thought we’d moved away from these attitudes in the 21st century.

That's a different debate though, between ritalin and diagnosis. A lot of the adults who werent diagnosed properly tell stories of lives filled with difficulty often involving prison.

valdali that's an interesting point. I once attended a course about ADHD and the course leader pointed out that a lot of private businesses are started by people with ADHD because they are the risk-takers, so even though one business fails they will start another. He wondered what will happen when todays children medicated with Ritalin grow up. Will they still be the entrepreneurs and risk takers?

As many posters have said, its healthy that education is so much more inclusive than was the case in the 40's and 50's. But I do think that many parents are over-eager to have any behaviour of their child that deviates from the "norm" labelled and if possible labelled as something that will qualify them for a SEN plan. They see classmates entitled to extra support or longer at tests, and think their child has similar needs. So in the 50's parents were under peer pressure to hide any problems their child had, now the pendulum seems to have swung to any child who isn't popular, academic,sporty & well behaved has to have a label to "explain" this. It must dilute the care and support for children and their parents who have intractable physical, intellectual or mental health issues. Also everyone is different, we're not all high-flyers or all-rounders, having a medical label for your personality quirk must be unhealthy for some. Is it just me that worries about this?

That's funny Lucca!
Little children can't really assess their teachers to the same degree, but the greatest compliment is when they come up to your desk and innocently say "Mummy, what is .... ?"

trisher

Lucca that's interesting I believe in Japan it is usual for students to assess their teacher. I knew someone who taught EFL and had a class of Japanese students she was very surprised when at the end of their course they presented her with carefully written assessments. These were teenagers so not sure when it starts.

When arranging a foreign exchange trip years ago each student had to fill in a form about their family, hobbies etc. Then there was a section entitled Teacher Comment for me to write something relevant eg he is quite shy . One boy thought it meant he should comment on me...... he wrote “she is quite small and old but I like her because she helps me a lot”. I have rarely laughed so much. (Obviously I didn’t tell him).

I’m with Eazybee, My granddaughter is Down’s syndrome and schooled in main stream. She makes a darn nuisance of herself and disrupts classes which is not fair on her, the other children or the teachers. I think she would have been more comfortable at a special school, where she would not have felt the odd one out. She is very sensitive and prone to abscond if she gets upset. That’s too much responsibility for a teacher with 29 other children to consider.

Lucca that's interesting I believe in Japan it is usual for students to assess their teacher. I knew someone who taught EFL and had a class of Japanese students she was very surprised when at the end of their course they presented her with carefully written assessments. These were teenagers so not sure when it starts.

There a lot of time and money wasted on assessing teachers. Obviously we should be accountable, but casually, spontaneously.
I always thought they could save a lot of time by asking the students ! They always knew who was a good teacher Even if said teacher was strict etc

So how can teachers these days be good at their job if they don't enjoy it? I listened to a lifeboat coxswain on the radio the other day and he said his crew were only great at their sea rescues because they enjoyed them.

I'm guessing all teachers love the children, but are very disillusioned with the actual work involved.
I know the mention of private schools ruffles feathers on here but I am grateful that teachers there can be so much more free and innovative in their teaching. They can be flexible that if a particular lesson isn't going well you ditch it and spontaneously come up with something different. I agree with Lucca that too much rigidity and too many imposed techniques do not bring about the best results, nor make the best teachers.

What a loss you were to the profession Stilton but I can understand how you must have felt.

Well exactly. It’s things like “imposed” curricula which take the joy out of teaching.
Such a shame. I loved teaching, being in the classroom with young people, helping them, learning from them as well. I especially enjoyed when I could teach in my own way without someone coming along to tell me my lesson fell short of “outstanding” because I didn’t include this or that latest buzz word technique! E.g. I didn’t “demonstrate progress” every five minutes.

3 years ago I was made redundant so decided to fulfil a lifelong passion and do a PGCE to become an English teacher. I lasted 8 months.

It wasn't because of OP's issues, I'm fully on board with all of the pastoral requirements. It's the curriculum. From aged 11 onwards each lesson is structured to show how to write in a specific way to pass the GCSE. None of it engendered a passion for literature or the wonders of words, just rote comprehension and structured requirements.

I think if I was a 12 year old now, I'd be on my phone every evening and not trying to read a novel under the bedclothes. There's no passion for reading when you're being taught to read even great literature in a specific, mind numbing way.

Well I’ve looked at the links and it doesn’t reflect my school so I’ll definitely be sending a compliment about budget management to the governing body, via the Head.
I don’t know about the secondary school provision.

Sorryeasybee I didn't need to quote that, don't know why it happened.

eazybee

Ignoring funding and TAs, the Faculty of Dental Surgery has urged schools to supervise tooth-brushing lessons among children, because, guess what, parents haven't been doing it during the pandemic.

adaunas www.tes.com/news/agnew-accused-funding-tory-areas-expense-poor

Thanks for the link. I’ll have a look.
I suspect no staff division would have been acceptable for your point. Most of our teachers are on UPS 2 some on UPS3 or leadership pay scale and most of the newer, I won’t say younger because it’s not true are at M6. TA age/experience tends to be higher.
I’m still interested to know if we would be getting more if we were under a Tory council.

Ignoring funding and TAs, the Faculty of Dental Surgery has urged schools to supervise tooth-brushing lessons among children, because, guess what, parents haven't been doing it during the pandemic.

That's still quite a few younger staff adaunas which helps. If you are interested look at the schoolcuts site and see if you have lost money

Never asked about how we fund it trisher, though we are warned that we should not be profligate in our use of resources because of budget cuts.
The staffing could be split into 3 almost equal parts:
Less than 5 year’s experience. (The latest NQT will be RQT by the end of this year.)
6-15 years experience and more than 15 years.
We have enough welfare and cleaning staff and a site supervisor.
Our area is a Labour council and our MP is Labour.
Perhaps I should congratulate the governors on managing our budget.
If you’re saying that under a Tory run council we would have suffered fewer cuts, I wonder if we are being short-changed.

Theres more info about cuts here schoolcuts.org.uk

adaunas

Sorry Trisher, my school is a local county primary, not an academy. It is in a mid-range area, not affluent but not seriously deprived.
Our TA numbers have increased since 2012 and employing a learning mentor, although an additional expense has been really worthwhile. This is true of all the primary schools in the area, though one does receive extra funding for deprivation.

So how has your school funded these things adaunas . I can only think of a few ways- lots of NQTs or young teachers who cost less. Lack of cleaning/caretaking staff.
Of course you may just be in a Tory run area where funding hasn't been cut as much. In my area most of the Primary schools are suffering serious cuts to their funding totalling over £200 per pupil per annum. How can they afford TAs on that?

Sorry Trisher, my school is a local county primary, not an academy. It is in a mid-range area, not affluent but not seriously deprived.
Our TA numbers have increased since 2012 and employing a learning mentor, although an additional expense has been really worthwhile. This is true of all the primary schools in the area, though one does receive extra funding for deprivation.

adaunas

MaizieD

^ There was no army of teaching assistants to help us, and large classes were normal.^

There is no 'army of teaching assistants' in schools any more, Riggie. The number of TAs was greatly increased under Labour from 1997, but since 2010 the tory's austerity measures meant cuts to school budgets and TAs have gradually disappeared. Along with a number of the support services which schools tried to offer.

I am firmly of the opinion that too much is expected of teachers as per the OP.

I had a mixed year class of 39 or 40 children in the 1990s with no TA. Now all the classes where I work have 29 or 30 children and have a TA at least in the morning in KS2 and all day in KS1 along with various support assistants.
We have a SENDCo and mentor who deals with social problems and works with children and families. Things are far better than they were up to 2010.

I think you re mixing things up a bit. In the 1990s schools wre in dire straits thanks to Thatcher and the Tories. Buildings were literally faling to bits and class sizes were huge. One of the best things the Blair governement did was invest heavily in education (although the PFI buildings are questionable they were better than the leaking and uninhabitable classrooms they replaced). Class numbers were limited and classroom assistants increased. Things were in fact getting better. I was still teaching then and I saw the money poured in to support students. Unfortunately that all came to a stop with the Tories returning power. In an effort to break the ties with local authorities schools became responsible for what had always been the LEA's responsibility. The resulting shortage of money reduced support staff numbers, meant experienced teachers lost out to cheaper junior colleagues and generally reduced provision in schools. Easiest of all to get rid of were the support staff.
I suspect your school is an Academy, they were given more funding for the same political reasons. I know you are not typical.

MaizieD

^ There was no army of teaching assistants to help us, and large classes were normal.^

There is no 'army of teaching assistants' in schools any more, Riggie. The number of TAs was greatly increased under Labour from 1997, but since 2010 the tory's austerity measures meant cuts to school budgets and TAs have gradually disappeared. Along with a number of the support services which schools tried to offer.

I am firmly of the opinion that too much is expected of teachers as per the OP.

I had a mixed year class of 39 or 40 children in the 1990s with no TA. Now all the classes where I work have 29 or 30 children and have a TA at least in the morning in KS2 and all day in KS1 along with various support assistants.
We have a SENDCo and mentor who deals with social problems and works with children and families. Things are far better than they were up to 2010.

Buffy is only speaking about the reality of girls wearing skirts that barely cover their butts - yes in an ideal world girls and women should be able to wear anything they like without unwanted male attention. Unfortunately this is not the case. My mother would not have let me out the door at that age wearing a skirt so short!