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Primary education

Stop Schools Cheating Please

452 replies

twiggles · 20/01/2013 11:17

Whatever your child is like, some primary schools and nurseries are pretending children start off at the low end, so they can pretend to inspectors of private and state schools that the child has developed only because of their teaching. If your child's advanced , some schools in rich areas take it out on the child. They won't bother giving the child attention, because the child's advanced, so they let the child coast downwards. But they give reports in writing about the child that pretend the child has started off at a low point in development and then got much better because of the teaching at the school....when the fact is the child was able to read or write when the child started at the school and as the school is giving the child little attention, the child has coasted downwards. Tha's what many schools do so they can pretend they've developed everything in the child, they want all children to be the same standard, like a photocopier. Poor children. Some teachers admit they're cheating and don't take the reports seriously and write them to impress inspectors. This is happending all over the show and I can't understand why inspectors are allowing them to get away with it. If parents start grading teachers in the school every three months the teachers won't be able to hide what's going on to the inspectors and teachers who are pretending might stop. Teachers that aren't giving inspectors the facts need to be stopped...they're not giving children an honest education.

OP posts:
ChippyMinton · 20/01/2013 11:19

And you know all this because...?

JustinMumsnot · 20/01/2013 11:21

That, OP, is a load of unmitigated bollocks.

twiggles · 20/01/2013 11:24

....Teachers doing this don't seem to care what they say to parents who can't do much about it. Teachers like this only care about making themselves look good for inspectors.

OP posts:
Level3at6months · 20/01/2013 11:27

Highly offensive to teachers, OP. Nothing like a good bit of teacher bashing on a Sunday morning... Not sure whether to go back to my planning now or to spend a couple of hours making stuff up about the children in Nursery to make me look good Hmm

mrz · 20/01/2013 11:31

If your child is truly advanced they don't "coast downwards" secure knowledge and skills don't drop out of a child's head. If your child can read before school they won't forget no matter how poor the provision especially if they come from the type of home that allowed them to enter school already reading.

mrz · 20/01/2013 11:33

I wonder how the OP would view teachers grading parents every three months Hmm

Elibean · 20/01/2013 11:43

I have sometimes wondered how everyone else who happens to be responsible for children's development gets graded, but parents escape Grin

twiggles · 20/01/2013 12:01

What I'm saying will make some teachers, the ones who do this, defensive because they know it's true and they won't want to admit what they're doing because it won't make them look good. It won't make them look impressive. It won't help give a school a good rating. When you hit a nerve, sparks fly, and this is a nerve.

If a child's advanced in reading or writing in any class, they might be advanced because they're quick, no other reason. Some teachers look on a child who is more advanced than the others as a bad thing rather than letting the child move on from where they are. They'll do what they can to make the child fit into their rigid plan of how they think children should be not how they actually are and all they want to do is to impress inspectors, they'll do anything to look good, make the school look good, make it look as if they've developed the child. Teachers like this try to make children the same. Are children all the same? I don't think so. And how does a child feel if a teacher doesn't let the child move on at their own pace? Crestfallen, probably. To make a point...how would you like it if you had a baby who could walk confidently and someone looking after your baby full time wouldn't allow them to walk at all.

OP posts:
Phineyj · 20/01/2013 12:03

What would your solution be OP?

Thatssofunny · 20/01/2013 12:04

Twiggles...how about you homeschool? Since teachers are only getting into their job to make stuff up about other people's children Confused in order for them to look good in the eyes of an inspector, perhaps you should extend your parental duties and teach your offspring yourself. I'm sure the teachers wouldn't mind, if you take your advanced child out of their care in order to match their statistics. Hmm

I'll allow parents to grade my performance as soon as I am allowed to grade theirs.

mrz · 20/01/2013 12:09

"If a child's advanced in reading or writing in any class, they might be advanced because they're quick, no other reason." regardless of how "quick" they are if they can securely do something before school they don't forget how to do it just because the teacher isn't focusing on that skill.

Snorbs · 20/01/2013 12:10

As ChippyMinton said, you know all this because...?

I'm not saying you're wrong. I'm not a teacher, I'm a concerned parent. If what you're saying is true then it is something that needs to be addressed. But I'm going to need at least a bit more to go on than you just saying it's happening.

Thatssofunny · 20/01/2013 12:11

Darn,..better get back to my planning and STOP my potential Level 5s from getting there. They need to wait until the Level 2s have caught up! How dare they move on and use figurative language in their writing? How dare they start to calculate fractions and percentages to express the probability of outcomes, while most of my class still try to spell the words right?

Shock Oh no!!

Seriously,...have you never heard of "differentiation" (the inspectors would be so miffed, if they couldn't see any)? There's some in most lessons. Why? Because there are advanced and not so advanced and some quite normal children in every class. It's an utterly ridiculous idea to propose that teachers are holding children back to make sure everyone progresses at the same pace. What decade of the last century are you stuck in?

mrz · 20/01/2013 12:14

My son started nursery able to read. The nursery didn't teach any reading in the two years he attended ... but he could still read. He then entered reception class at a different school where the policy was not to teach reading in the first half term ... but he could still read.

Heavywheezing · 20/01/2013 12:14

Why your beef?

What have teachers done to you or your children?

Bunnyjo · 20/01/2013 12:15

This reply has been deleted

Message deleted by Mumsnet for breaking our Talk Guidelines. Replies may also be deleted.

MrsDeVere · 20/01/2013 12:16

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Feenie · 20/01/2013 12:19

Whatever your child is like, some primary schools and nurseries are pretending children start off at the low end

Evidence please, for 'some'.

I suspect you mean 'one', and from that your perception of what has happened to 'one' PFB child.

Judgements are monitored and moderated constantly by schools, SMT, LEA, OFSTED, etc, etc.

teacherwith2kids · 20/01/2013 12:20

Twiggles, if that is what is happening in your school, to your child, then that is a crying shame - and because it is so unusual, there is an easy thing for you to do about it - move school, finding one that genuinely differentiates for children of different abilities.

Had your post been a specific 'there is a problem with my child's school because', then i would give your worry the time of day.

To couch it as a general occurrence needing a national solution is simply ignorant of realities.

I am not defensive, simply incredulous. I have no experience of a school doing as you describe, despite a wide experience across schools as a parent and as a teacher. I HAVE encountered a school which failed to provide adequately for a very bright child, but not for the reasons that you describe at all, simply due to endemic problems within the school and issues with the specific teacher (since addressed) and the response was as I have advised, to move schools. And I would agree with mrz that the bright child did not cease reading fluently, or calculating using negative numbers, just because they were not taught that in Reception.

Level3at6months · 20/01/2013 12:22

The only nerve you've hit, OP, is that yet again someone is making sweeping generalisations about the teaching profession.

sausagesandwich34 · 20/01/2013 12:24

If your child's advanced , some schools in rich areas take it out on the child

what an absolute load of utter bollocks

and why 'rich areas' -do poor areas not have advanced children at entry?

as a parent of 2 'advanced' personally I just call them children children, who could both read and write before they started nursery, all I can say is that school recognised their ability within the first half term and they were on the G&T register from this age so no dumbing down

they have been challenged to achieve their best all the way through school and school has bent over backwards to provide them with oportunities for 'enrichment'

nothing like a huge bollocks generalisation on a sunday

teacherwith2kids · 20/01/2013 12:24

And OP, if your child is 'drifting downwards', might it perhaps be that they were not as advanced as you thought in the first place?

A genuinely bright child will not 'lose' those key skills, in fact will probably pick up extra ones in an 'untaught' way (child cited earlier could add and subtract 3 digit numbers on entry to school, added negative numbers to that repertoire in mid-Reception through looking at football league tables). However a child 'tutored to appear advanced' or 'put through hoops that they aren't really secure in' by a parent may well 'seem to drift downwards', because their undersranding was not secure in the first place.

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LynetteScavo · 20/01/2013 12:24

Parents grading the teachers every three months. How will that work then?

Inspectors on come about once every three years, and as far as I'm aware, teachers track children to make sure they are making progress. If the child isn't making progress, then they will have to answer to the HT as to why not.

And I'm yet to meet the child who is brilliant at everything. IME, children who can read and write and are able with numbers when they start school are the ones who may well struggle socially. The teacher will be focusing on the whole child in such a case, not just advancing their reading and writing. If I hadn't seen that was the case with DS1, I may as well home educated him.

teacherwith2kids · 20/01/2013 12:25

"IME, children who can read and write and are able with numbers when they start school are the ones who may well struggle socially. The teacher will be focusing on the whole child in such a case, not just advancing their reading and writing. "

Agree.

LynetteScavo · 20/01/2013 12:25

OP, if you are speaking from personal experience of your child, I suggest you move schools or home educate.

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