Can 'teach first' really be doing this?

The lazyarse system where according to DfE figures, primary school teachers work on average 59 hours a week and secondary teachers work 56.

So very lazy.

What current lazy arse system is that then? Have you been reading The Daily Wail?

You would not believe how hard most of the teachers I know work, both TF and non-TF. Many of the staff at my school are in by 7.30 everyday and many don't leave until 6.00 (I must admit, I am always out by 5 but am often in before 7.30).

I'm not sure I would be happy with Meryl 10 years down the line!

I'd be very happy for my children to be taught by Meryl.

You mean the cause for concern Meryl with the utterly chaotic classroom and no control over the students? Seriously??

Or do you mean Meryl a year down the line when she hasn't just been dropped in the deep end with very little training and not very good support?

People here have mentioned the 6 weeks intensive training at the start as being very good. The issue I have there is that it is all theoretical. You can learn your Piaget and whatnot over the summer holiday, but you can't really learn how to plan an effective lesson when you aren't actually immediately teaching those lessons and reflecting on how they went. You can't learn to manage behaviour effectively until you are having to manage behaviour. On my PGCE we had a lot of lectures before we were put into schools, but once we were in schools we at least had the time to learn how to plan, mark, assess alongside teaching classes because we started off fairly gently. I can't imagine having been put straight onto an 80% timetable. There just aren't enough hours in the day on that timetable for the teaching and the learning how to teach which requires you to be on the job.

I think it's probably a good thing that so many teachers dislike/hate the TF programme. We need the current lazy arse system to be disrupted.

Curious - your points 1 and 2 are at odds. Either you can attract well qualified/proper teachers or you can't, no? Presumably if the teachers you're getting aren't proper then TFers are more qualified?

I think schools tend to use TF when they are struggling to recruit - i.e. the alternative might be a string of supply teachers. (This is based on 5 year old knowledge so practises may well have changed now.)

I'm not totally convinced that Oxbridge education is important, so I'm not sure why it has been so emphasised. For what its worth proportion of Oxbridge candidates in DH's year was about 25%.

I work in a school which has a lot of tf students. I hate the programme:

1. it masks the problem that we can't get proper teachers in to inner london.
2. they're not more qualified than other teachers.....but have been led to believe they are. This does cause divisions.
3. They're as bad as you'd expect somebody with very little training to be, but are in charge of somebody's education. Very unfair on the kids.

The statistics are interesting. Of our many tf students, I reckon about half stay in teaching at the end of the two years (about a quarter never make it past thefirst year), but a very very large proprtion of those go into the private sector. The ones that remain are generally brilliant......but it's a tiny proprortion. Loads seem to go on to work for tf.

Meryl was taken off "cause for concern" in the end. She made a big improvement through the intensive support she was given.

She was still batty though :-)

I'd be very happy for my children to be taught by Meryl. I wish I could say that about all teachers I've encountered during my years as both a parent and a student.

NQTs are not fully qualified as your have to pass your NQT year in order to continue to teach. NQTs are given lots of support and additional CPD to an experienced teacher as well as a mentor and reduced timetables

Sorry, Givemeabreak but that's absolute bollocks. My fantastic PGCE student last year was worth 10 Meryls.

And get your facts right - nowhere in the TF literature does it say that it takes only Oxbridge/RG grads.

As with everything, it comes down to individuals.

read through this thread with interest as I entered through a different route as my degree included QTS and I spent 2 years of my degree gathering school experience whilst also gaining my subject knowledge.

I think my route is one that should be adopted more. As I had several placements with increasing amounts of lessons to teach I was able to observe far more, learn far more in the practical environment that I have ever witnessed a PGCE student.

I was very concerned watching the programme (I do realise it was heavily edited) that these young people were basically thrown in the deep end, with huge responsibility with such little training. I can't comment on reality as we have not had any TF in the schools I have worked in.

And I would qualify with my qualifications to join TF!

This thread is making me laugh! IME, even the worst TF candidate can outshine a run of the mill PGCE student. The requirements for TF go far beyond a 2:1 from Oxbridge or Russell Group universities. The selection process is ruthless and only those who are resilient enough to cope succeed to the programme.

The BBC documentary - as will any such documentary - does not give the full picture. The 6 weeks' training given is far more valuable and effective than anything the regular PGCE route can offer. That is not to say that traditional route teachers are less able - but the results are certainly mixed: in my school there were 5 NQTs (i.e. fully trained and qualified) and 2 TF (6 weeks's training and never taught before): who struggled and failed to deliver on targets, who never contributed to the wider school life, who struggled to produce any lesson plans let alone effective ones despite being on lighter timetables and not having any of the academic learning to cope with on top of the full time day? Not TF. They are not unsupported as you might have gathered from the documentary.

And OP - no, I can agree that having your child taught by someone who is deemed cause for concern is not ideal - but the same can occur for regular NQT's - in fact probably more regularly. The difference being that calibre of the TF teacher means that they will go that extra mile to succeed and to make sure that the students do not suffer. Everyone has to learn, and therefore there will always be glitches in the quality of education at any given point in the process. But at least with a TF teacher you know that the quality will shine through in the end. In my school there are 3 teachers in my department who are "highly experienced" - and highly useless. (They have been there for years and offer nothing of any value to their students. If you thought the English teacher in the documentary was inadequate, you would have rather your children be taught by her than by any of these ones - at least she had an intelligent brain). And there is 1 TF teacher who has been graded outstanding. In his first year.

IMHO it is a fantastic programme that delivers - the kids that are taught by these young people are phenomenally lucky. Elitist? Unashamedly, yes. And long may that continue. Because the children are benefitting massively. Not because of the educational background - there are plenty of highly qualified teachers from other programs - but the commitment to addressing educational disadvantage permeates all that they do. I totally understand the fear that has been aroused but the documentary did not do the programme justice. Sorry for the ramble.

noble of course you are right. We'd need to read the research in more detail to see what extra variables were controlled for.

You put it far better then me noble... I didn't enjoy watching it at all. As a parent of a13yr old, it made me worry slightly. I found myself asking her if she had heard of TF or if she had any TF teachers! She has a science NQT who seems very very good.

I thought that school was pretty shoddy all round to be honest . When I was on my TF placement if I struggled with a class I was supported. Just as any teacher would be supported when they are struggling.

I thought it spoke volumes that the children didn't behave when the head was in the room. Poor TFTC candidates seemed to be the least of their problems.

I've had bad PGCE students in my department. The difference between them and from what I saw of Meryl on the program was that the PGCE student had far fewer classes, for a far shorter period of time, therefore their impact was substantially lessened. When the relationship between a PGCE student and a class broke down, as Meryl's did with her bottom set Y10, the class was removed from them and the normal class teacher restored. There are more options and back-ups with a PGCE student.

Tbh, I'm a bit about a teacher with no experience being given a bottom set GCSE group to deal with on their own. Even an experienced teacher would have found that class tricky, I'm surprised that Teach First would allow it.

Well, I didn't think the English teacher, in particular, came across as a teacher that anyone would want for their child. She was put onto 'cause for concern' before the first term was finished! For someone's child that meant a whole term of, I think, Y8 English wasted. I would prefer to have a teacher who has had experience controlling and inspiring a group of teenagers over someone that has had none. Maybe if you had been filmed in your first term/year, I would have a different view.

Anais, from your BBC link

"They found a significant correlation between participation in Teach First and improved pupil achievement, one to two years after the teachers start at the school."

As a maths teacher I feel compelled to point out that correlation does not equal causation. What else happened in these schools alongside hiring new teachers? Could it be that other measures to improve achievement were introduced at the same time? A school doesn't suddenly decide to sign up to a new recruitment programme in isolation, I suspect.

"Researchers used a complicated points system to measure this and concluded the average improvement equated to a third of a GCSE per pupil per subject."

But what about improvement in the subjects which the Teach First candidates were teaching? It sounds like they could be ascribing an improvement in maths results to a Teach First candidate teaching geography.

Perhaps the original research clears up these questions, or maybe, if it was commissioned by Teach First, not?

At my school most teachers , if not all, have the same qualifications as a TF teacher, if a 2:1 is all they need.

is it so difficult to believe that anyone might have valid objections and concerns re:teach first?

apparently so- this is at least the second time someone has said posters with objections are bitter. now it is suggested that the bitterness stems from general incompetency and jealousy

Anyway, I already said that mine did. Did you assume I was lying?

I am sorry One4therd that you think I am not good enough to teach your children. I actually have some of the best results in my school, I seem to be good be good enough for them.