Page 12 | To think something has gone wrong in schools? https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cz0m2x30p4eo

RebelBabybel · 2024-11-21T17:34:47+00:00

From the BBC : school exclusions have doubled in the last 10 years. I’ve worked in schools for 30 years : KS1/Early Years. When I first started I was expected to do : hand written, detailed plans. Assessments. Handwritten reports. I had no TA. I had a blackboard. Children had books. I had to be firm with behaviour, schools had very clear behaviour policies in place, and the head would have an overview, was visible, check classes, be the ‘go to’ person if anything was difficult to manage. Over the years, particularly in the Early Years things have changed massively. My latest role has involved a manager who is mostly on the computer and rarely interacts with the children. No planning, no assessment. Resources are put out, but there is an ethos that it’s ‘wrong’ to show the children how to use them. Therefore children don’t use jigsaws as puzzles, they take the pieces out and transport them round the classroom. A doctors role play is set up, but with no input as to what the resources are there are for or how to role play ‘being a doctor’. There is an expectation, a ‘box’ of what constitutes ‘normal’ behaviour : even with very young children. Any child who is outside this box, is often labelled ‘I think they’ve got autism, I think they’ve got ADHD’ without a formal assessment. These children - rather than getting to know them, or putting clear strategies in place, are quickly labelled as difficult : and fall into a stereotype that causes a negative cycle. There seems to be little ‘fault’ addressed to the teaching style, and the ‘fault??’ is centred on the child, I’d also argue that it is NOT a fault. It’s called being a child. Children seem to be very readily excluded from schools without the adults fully questioning their teaching style and whether that might be at fault. To be completely honest, teaching was far easier 30 years ago. Children were better behaved, and there was far better, stronger support from senior management. It felt more like a team, rather than: an SLT who are in meetings, on a computer, off to conferences, in the staff room, pushing ‘new’ initiatives and criticising their staff.

noblegiraffe · 21/11/2024 20:02

Appuskidu · 21/11/2024 20:00

Yes, I had Breakthru’ sentence makers in my first KS1 classroom with no TA as well.

If I compare this to the Y1 class in my current school, there are some very clear differences though.

What I didn’t have in my 1990s classroom was 2 pupils with severe ASD-both non verbal and in nappies. I didn’t have pupils with SEMH needs who threaten others with scissors and throw chairs at staff when they are dysregulated. I didn’t have children with physical needs that require a hoist for toileting and PEG feeds twice daily. I also didn’t have a phonics screener to get all my class through by the end of the year, that I/we would be judged on for the following year.

Those children still existed, but they attended specialist provisions, not mainstream classrooms.

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Think you should try just being a bit firmer with those kids, Appu. Or tell them how to do a jigsaw.

EdithGrantham · 21/11/2024 20:02

RebelBabybel · 21/11/2024 19:51

@Sherrystrull

It just didn’t happen! Any noisy class, and the head would storm in!

I had 30 Year 1 kids using these sentence makers, with no TA.

And do what with the noisy children? Besides, people aren't just talking about children being noisy. I had a child in reception a couple of years back who tried to stab other children and staff with a pencil, there has been at least one child in each cohort since that has displayed similar behaviours, that is in addition to the noisy children. The way you word your posts makes me think you are no longer a class teacher, if you were I don't think you'd be framing things as if it's teachers who are to blame for not managing behaviour.

Appuskidu · 21/11/2024 20:00

RebelBabybel · 21/11/2024 19:45

@Appuskidu

Again, KS1 - but I was doing assessments. I had something called a ‘Sentence Maker’ as well!!! Bloody hell, imagine using that today. It was a folder with 100 words in, and if one child dropped it on the floor - all the words fell out and they’d have to put them all back in.

Yes, I had Breakthru’ sentence makers in my first KS1 classroom with no TA as well.

If I compare this to the Y1 class in my current school, there are some very clear differences though.

What I didn’t have in my 1990s classroom was 2 pupils with severe ASD-both non verbal and in nappies. I didn’t have pupils with SEMH needs who threaten others with scissors and throw chairs at staff when they are dysregulated. I didn’t have children with physical needs that require a hoist for toileting and PEG feeds twice daily. I also didn’t have a phonics screener to get all my class through by the end of the year, that I/we would be judged on for the following year.

Those children still existed, but they attended specialist provisions, not mainstream classrooms.

Quercus30 · 21/11/2024 19:56

RebelBabybel · 21/11/2024 17:58

@cansu

I’m not so sure. There seems to have been a movement away from planning with children. It seems a lot more lax. With the youngest children, we used to have clear roles for each adult in the classroom.
One adult would play a board game, or teach how to use scissors.
Now these things are put out, but with no guidance. So the board game is distributed around the classroom and pieces lost - while the adults cut out Twinkl signs or are called out to a meeting, leaving one person trying to cope with behaviour.

Edited

I've noticed a lot of it is all about appearences now. Twinkle displays on the walls; CP being full of lovely looking table displays, and, an obsession with having something in their books and it highlighted in various different colours. It's time consuming and doesn't feel like actually teaching any more, but window dressing.

Tangledmane · 21/11/2024 19:53

RebelBabybel · 21/11/2024 17:49

@Tangledmane

My first 10 years of teaching was in a school in a deprived area. We had a very strong, visible head with a clear behaviour policy. I can’t remember one child who was ever excluded.

I think it’s a combination of factors? Were those children you taught:

living in temporary accommodation aka shipping container?

Being neglected at home, but not removed because there were literally no foster carers / moved into care 500 miles away because it was the only foster placement available

Watching violent porn at age 11

Stuck in their bedrooms all evening and weekends on devices because there are no heap or free youth activity or social clubs, or no transport to get them there.

Contactable 24/7 through social media / smartphones, and riddled with anxiety.

Living in poverty but watching influencers living heavenly-looking lives, daring to dream it might be possible for them before reality hits.

Brought up in a home where adults interacted with their personal screens more than their children.

Hearing messages every day about how humans are killing nature, the world is on fire and at war and robots will soon rule the world and take all the jobs.

And, yes, taught in overcrowded, understaffed schools by burned out teachers trying to achieve the impossible and tightening the iron fist of control in a desperate but futile attempt to get things ‘how they use to be’…

TeddyBeans · 21/11/2024 19:52

LizzieBowesLyon · 21/11/2024 17:54

You’re not wrong. And things are also utterly toxic at Local Authority level where the rhetoric seems to be to apply incredible financial burdens on schools, fail to meet their duties both to schools and to children, and then blame the parents.

My child’s school was excellent for SEN, and became something of a local hot spot for SEN kids. But SEN kids are expensive and not particularly easy, and then add to that, reduced resources and catastrophic cuts to associated services such as OT and Speech therapy and there’s a sudden cohort of kids who aren’t even able to access a basic education. And demoralised exhausted teachers who can see how the children are being failed.

This sounds just like the school I work at now. It's a good day when I don't have to write a cpoms report!

Original poster

RebelBabybel · 21/11/2024 19:52

Except worse, because there was about 100 words in the folder…

OP posts:

Original poster

RebelBabybel · 21/11/2024 19:51

@Sherrystrull

It just didn’t happen! Any noisy class, and the head would storm in!

I had 30 Year 1 kids using these sentence makers, with no TA.

To think something has gone wrong in schools? https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cz0m2x30p4eo

OP posts:

hellooooooomama · 21/11/2024 19:50

I definitely did extra maths sessions as it wasn't quite my best subject. Base 10!

This was in the 80s.

Sherrystrull · 21/11/2024 19:47

RebelBabybel · 21/11/2024 19:39

I just remember it being - this is your class, you differentiate your planning. The head, or year group leader would oversee additional help - but I think the onus was on me as a teacher to ensure they were accommodated. No TA.

How do you accommodate a child hitting you, hitting other children, throwing things at windows and kicking chairs and tables over?

Downtherabbithole19 · 21/11/2024 19:46

It's horrendous teaching in schools at the moment, and I absolutely agree with everything you've said.

We have SLT who are nowhere to be seen, a head who is rarely in the building, or in meetings. Who is seemingly disengaged in all the staffs wellbeing. And absolute rocket in behavioural issues. We are now running on 1 TA across two class year group's, because one is always out on Behaviour management. Which means no interventions get done, no reading, no support for the SEN children or those who struggle academically.

Then the teachers and staff are then criticised when the targets aren't met. Because you physically can't support 60 children to one adult. It's the absolute Pitts.

jennybluetree · 21/11/2024 19:46

Poverty, Ofsted, large class sizes and lack of money. Also education is a political football. Useless testing and focus on this in the classroom. If only the actual education experts designed the curriculum and expectations!

SquirrelSoShiny · 21/11/2024 19:46

Appuskidu · 21/11/2024 19:42

The curriculum has narrowed so much with such a focus on testing that the joy has been sucked out of education. The war on attendance has been the icing on the cake. You’ve got to go every day, whether you are ill, miserable, your mum is dying, you’re homeless etc etc

Whereas 30 years ago, you could go to school and be a bit quirky or different and that was fine, you could probably muddle through regardless and you’d find subjects you liked and were good at. Now, you have to be learning exactly the same as everyone else, you are tested to the nth degree continually on maths and English and if you aren’t doing well enough, you’re taken out of the fun subjects you enjoy, to do more maths and English. Once you’ve done 11 years of that every day, you are probably given a handful of grades that mean you still have to keep resitting maths and English till you’re 18. There’s no wriggle room for anything other than ‘achieving what the average child should be able to achieve’.

Traits of ADHD would have made you a sought-after hunter in years gone by! Those skills just don’t translate well to sitting at a desk filling your head with enough facts so that you can pass maths, two English, three sciences, a humanity and a language exam at the end of your school career. It’s that or nothing-there’s no alternatives, no creativity, no fun.

Exactly this.

Original poster

RebelBabybel · 21/11/2024 19:45

@Appuskidu

Again, KS1 - but I was doing assessments. I had something called a ‘Sentence Maker’ as well!!! Bloody hell, imagine using that today. It was a folder with 100 words in, and if one child dropped it on the floor - all the words fell out and they’d have to put them all back in.

OP posts:

Appuskidu · 21/11/2024 19:43

RebelBabybel · 21/11/2024 19:32

I don’t think there was even such a thing as a SENCO 30 years ago.

I started teaching in 1996 and there were SENCos at every school I did teaching practices in.

Original poster

RebelBabybel · 21/11/2024 19:42

But I also didn’t try to segregate, label or pigeon-hole anyone who needed additional help. They were very much part of the class.

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Appuskidu · 21/11/2024 19:42

The curriculum has narrowed so much with such a focus on testing that the joy has been sucked out of education. The war on attendance has been the icing on the cake. You’ve got to go every day, whether you are ill, miserable, your mum is dying, you’re homeless etc etc

Whereas 30 years ago, you could go to school and be a bit quirky or different and that was fine, you could probably muddle through regardless and you’d find subjects you liked and were good at. Now, you have to be learning exactly the same as everyone else, you are tested to the nth degree continually on maths and English and if you aren’t doing well enough, you’re taken out of the fun subjects you enjoy, to do more maths and English. Once you’ve done 11 years of that every day, you are probably given a handful of grades that mean you still have to keep resitting maths and English till you’re 18. There’s no wriggle room for anything other than ‘achieving what the average child should be able to achieve’.

Traits of ADHD would have made you a sought-after hunter in years gone by! Those skills just don’t translate well to sitting at a desk filling your head with enough facts so that you can pass maths, two English, three sciences, a humanity and a language exam at the end of your school career. It’s that or nothing-there’s no alternatives, no creativity, no fun.

Original poster

RebelBabybel · 21/11/2024 19:39

I just remember it being - this is your class, you differentiate your planning. The head, or year group leader would oversee additional help - but I think the onus was on me as a teacher to ensure they were accommodated. No TA.

OP posts:

Original poster

RebelBabybel · 21/11/2024 19:35

Now every school it’s a major role, and we have an explosion of ‘unteachable’ children.

What on Earth has happened??

OP posts:

Original poster

RebelBabybel · 21/11/2024 19:32

I don’t think there was even such a thing as a SENCO 30 years ago.

OP posts:

Bushmillsbabe · 21/11/2024 19:22

RebelBabybel · 21/11/2024 18:13

@Teacherprebaby

That’s just not true.

Number of special schools
The number of state-funded special schools has been increasing slightly in recent years. In England, the number of schools with SEN units increased from 373 in 2023 to 392 in 2024.

And that isn't the whole picture.
In the london borough I work in, the total number of special school places has doubled over the past 8 years. 1 new school, plus existing special schools have significantly increased their places, set up satellite sites.

My daughters mainstream school used to have 2 classes in their SEN unit, now they have 4

The number of SEN places across the country is increasing every year, but still somehow unable to meet demand. It's really worrying, both for the future of these young people, and the economy.

At the special school I work at, a place costs around 60k per year, a standard mainstream place costs around 6k I think.

crumblingschools · 21/11/2024 19:21

One of our local Primaries has a recently opened SEN unit, it has 10 places. Doesn't touch the surface.

SquirrelSoShiny · 21/11/2024 19:20

ImaginaryHorse · 21/11/2024 19:18

The official figures haven't increased much. 1.45 million in 2005 and 1.7 million in 2024. Definitely an issue with SEN not being recognised but I can't imagine that's a bigger issue than it was 20 years ago?

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If anything I'm seeing more children being labelled with ADHD and autism when if anything they have trauma and / or neglect.

Editing to add that sometimes this is the only way of getting children ANY help in school.

Sherrystrull · 21/11/2024 19:18

20 years ago I had a class of 24. I now have a class of 34.
20 years ago I didn't have anyone swearing, shouting, pushing, refusing or hitting. Now I have many.
Two children in wheelchairs would cause me no problems
20 years ago all of the children in my class said please and thank you. Now I have 4 and the rest need reminding.
Children increasingly find it hard to do anything for themselves and need cajoling through everything.

ImaginaryHorse · 21/11/2024 19:18

hellooooooomama · 21/11/2024 19:14

I think SEN has increased, whether officially recognised or not.

And yes OP of course special school places have increased. So has the population! It hasn't kept up with the explosion of SEN though, has it?

Can't believe you used an example of wheelchair users to compare. Disgraceful imo.

The official figures haven't increased much. 1.45 million in 2005 and 1.7 million in 2024. Definitely an issue with SEN not being recognised but I can't imagine that's a bigger issue than it was 20 years ago?