Let's get back to a time when students, not teachers, could be blamed for exam performance

Oh dear god the twitter rows that rage on about this...

Sorry, I get that, but 'child-centred' is clearly a significant factor in why teachers have been handed too much responsibility for the child.

Will be interesting to see how poster-school Michaela works out. Too extreme for my liking, but it often takes an extreme to make a point clear and my tenner says they will make their point.

JustRichmal "was not aware that not being disruptive in class was a sign of a mental disorder, but you have obviously studied the subject more than me."

DD is very 'high-attaining' and school-side is always a bit stuck for curriculum things to put in the to-improve part of their reports, so we've had quite a few references to her quieter, studious and introverted character. Not enough hands-up etc.

I expect few front-line teachers think her character equates to a mental disorder (and introversion isn't an official one now in current DSM), but despite being a near-perfect model pupil in terms of actually learning stuff she's not a great fit for the ideological 'progressive', child-centred, constructivist classroom.

Ofsted have stopped doing it in recent years, but used to enforce the latter. Children were supposed to be noisy/engaged by permanently exciting teachers and something like having the whole class with their heads down quietly reading for more than 10 minutes was frowned upon.

All this takes the burden off school teachers, of course...

Yes. The shadow education market is huge and flourishing in France! There are massive tax breaks for employing home tutors.

The French DC I know often do revision courses that have nothing to do with their schools. Our experience is that this is great for getting a different perspective to the one their school has, and can raise awareness of issues their own school has overlooked.

DC say the later are super helpful, the former, not so much.

At DC's school there are revision sessions and clinics.

So pupils expected to revise and identify problem areas which can they be dealt with in groups at sessions or individually at clinics.

I haven't read the thread but just wanted to say that I mark exams (not UK) and the influence of teachers is very easy to spot. A whole group can get poor grades because the teacher has not identified the correct hoops to jump through.

I think the problem lies mainly with the exams though, students taught how to pass the exam (when teachers have a good understanding of how to do this) do best. Knowledge and critical thinking won't get you very far if your teacher can't tell you where the hoops are. That's wrong.

noblegiraffe In schools I've worked in, revision sessions were an expectation - from SMT as much as pupils. I think there's a growing recognition that, in a society which places such value (rightly or wrongly...) on how much knowledge you can force into your head for the month of June when you're 16, children shouldn't be disadvantaged if, for whatever reason, studying isn't their top priority at that time. If we can help them out just a little bit, we should.

However, that doesn't mean the teacher should then be blamed if it still doesn't work out for them. It's the teacher's responsibility to support kids to maximise their potential, but not all will.

I think that teachers are blamed for a lot more than they should be.
If the child is left on an iPad at home or ignored or education isn't considered important to the parent then no amount of inspiring teaching is going to work.
Kids copy their parents behaviour during their early years. If mum never a reads then it is a bit much for anyone to expect the child to want to learn. Some might it it is unusual.
The shame is that some teachers write off bright kids who have little support at home.

Our DC have mostly had quite good reports so I don't have first hand experience of a softening of tone in French schools. However, DP is in his seventh year as a parent rep at the DC's secondary school and the stuff he repeats to me about what is said about students in the conseil de classe isn't especially lax! And this is a small Catholic school that has always been "bienveillant" relative to others. Several DC will be chucked out due to performance/behavioural issues at the end of this year.

Sagely that's interesting. Did you do the CAPES or are you at an international school?

Sorry the first paragraph was meant to be bold as I copied it from another OP upthread.

Unfortunately they sometimes get my back up by participating in the 'modern' culture of selling themselves by 'bragging' about their achievements, obsessing about uniforms etc, while failing to address important problems such as drugs being sold on the premises, horrendous sexist language and inappropriate use of mobile phones etc. No wonder so many teenagers have mental health problems.

This is an issue for both staff and pupils imo.
Pupils often don't get the academic and support focus they need because staff are focussing on the children who 'make the school look bad'
But I also know many staff want to help the students and many don't agree with this ethos of 'image' but are bound by the demands of senior leadership and governors.

I truly believe that is why the staff turnover in the local academy is so high.

They failed my ds massively due to their ethos and luckily after a school move he's improved massively in his MH.

I think teachers should be tasked with providing motivating and engaging lessons differentiated to their cohort.
If a student is t motivated or engaged there should be a different person/department dealing with that. It's unfair on all involved in the classroom when 1 pupil is disruptive or takes up more teacher time.

Also I think setting should be more evident. It's really unrealistic to expect children with 3/4 years difference in academic ability to all be engaged quality in an hours lesson. It's no wonder some become disruptive - it's usually frustration.

In conclusion I think some of the responsibility does need to be taken off teachers. I think they are held far too accountable for things way beyond their control due to budget cuts and are fighting against a tide of so called raises standards and accountability.

And I'm not a teacher!

Cauliflower I agree with you! But since the educational reform things in France are getting more like the UK...we now have a policy of 'bienveillance' in secondary schools and are a lot less blunt in our school reports (I'm an English teacher in France). The relationships between parents and teachers seem increasingly strained, and French teenagers are more and more likely to be 'special snowflakes' if you'll excuse the term...also as repeating a year has become almost impossible, behaviour and attainment are slipping...

I'm held to account by SLT on an individual student-by-student basis if they don't achieve their target. The target is often based on their mathematical ability (so not my subject), based on a SATs test they were taught to for at least a year, age 11. I have to produce evidence of my 'intervention'. I spend far too much time recording my 'interventions' loading my evenings with marking and prep. I do fear burnout/extra monitoring if my results ever drop (there's always a first time). SLT fear Ofsted.

I also have had parents say 'My child wants an A*, what are you doing to ensure that? What extra revision classes are you running? Can they have some one to one support?'

The problem is long-term it does the students no favours. But they're caught up in this high pressure exam system too - and I worry about their mental health. My own DC1 has absurdly high targets based off his SATs - poster child for his primary school - pita target-wise for his secondary school. It's a very fucked system.

I don't welcome students failing but there needs to be an easing of pressure and expectations.

I also think that school reports tend to be far more direct in France. At the lycée where I worked the bulletins scolaires seemed quite harsh "big gaps" "no progress" "pathetic efforts". I wondered if things had perhaps softened in the years since I was there, but in fact we had a boy transfer from the lycée français in London to our school a few years ago and his report was absolutely dreadful. Not one tiny iota of softening of anything. When my Headteacher asked me to translate it her eyes were like saucers by the end "appalling concentration" "constantly disruptive in class" "zero desire to improve" etc. He came and was absolutely fine, no problems at all. So the standards at that school must be sky high!! There's no way a UK report would have anything like those comments. "Occasional lapses in concentration" would be about the limit. But then you ask yourself why. And the reason is that 1) I think UK parents tend to think of their kids as princes and princesses and any negative comment is a direct challenge on their parenting which they take very personally and 2) a lot of parents would blame the school: "what are YOU doing about it?"; "there must be a personality clash"; "he's never like that at home" etc.

And the irony is that the more over-protective they are and the more they excuse and deflect away the behaviour, the less of a favour long term they are actually doing to their children. Why don't they get it.

CauliflowerSqueeze - in France, that way of treating DC is a given in much of society (at least in the French more traditional bit - it comes down through the generations) and typically all adults a DC encounters will have a similar approach. The whole thing only works where expectations are consistent.

My DP, who is French through and through, thinks nothing of telling a visiting child to hold his knife and fork properly, close his mouth when eating, say goodnight and good morning properly (Bonjour, FirstName, plus a kiss). French DC think it's perfectly normal to b reminded by the adults around them to do these things.

I completely accept that cauli.

There has to be a buy in of the ethos by first the parents, then laterly the students.

Where schools don't get that buy in, I don't blame teachers one jot for poor performance.

Yes however there are schools that could do the "punishment and email home" and it would make zero difference: parents would either not receive or ignore emails, and actively create reasons why their child should either be exempt from punishment or say their child has a "dentist appointment" to get them out of it.

It's only with supportive parents that schools can make the most difference.