Are we asking too much of schools?

[Radio4Rocks]

When my grandfather was a teacher at the turn of the 20th C the job was to teach children to read, write and add up. A little music and a foreign language thrown in was a bonus.

The list of things schools are expected to do has expanded considerably.

Many subjects in enough detail to pass exams.

Plus all these extras -
Road Safety
Cycling proficiency
Basic cooking
Nutrition
Swimming
Water safety
Comparative religion
Safeguarding
Staying safe online
Anti bullying
Managing money
Birth control

There are lots more but these are just off the top of my head.

It used to be that parents sent their children (non SEN) ready for school.

Toilet trained
Able to dress and undress themselves for PE
Able to fasten shoes and clothing
Use a knife and fork
Sit still and listen
Have basic manners
Be able to use basic tools, like pencils
Know their letter sounds
Count to 10.

Now some parents expect the school to do that last list.

Is it right or should teachers be able to go back to basics instead of trying to wear so many hats?

@AliceMcK, it’s one thing noticing and reporting safeguarding issues. We all do that. Having to be responsible for organising and managing the support, any fall-out and the impact it can have in the child and the rest of the class is the step beyond reasonable expectations.

Parents used to, in the main, take instructions from and respect teachers.

I have a lot of respect for my child’s teachers and a good working relationship with them. In no way am I going to take instruction from them, what an incredibly archaic way of thinking.

There a should be a good relationship with school and home, but a partnership not a dictatorship.

@AliceMcK you're missing the point. We all look for signs of various things and report them . The issue is what happens after.

I'm just a TA but I do dyslexia interventions, SALT intervention, extra reading interventions, pastoral care interventions, supervise SW meetings with a child, have had meetings with the police and/of SWs. That's without the support needed daily for children with many issues that have nothing "official" in place. On top of it all I also have to do my actual job, be in the classroom, mark,support a group,prepare resources whatever.

In a week I am responsible for the progress in various areas of 7 children , some in more than one area. There's only one of me, only a certain amount of hours in the day and they also can't miss too much of the actual lesson and neither can I, as my job on paper is classroom based.

I passed my A-level 29 years ago and the only two things on your list I didn't learn about in school are: Staying safe online and Anti bullying. Money management was just a bit inbetted in Maths but it was there.

Everything else was covered in primary and/or secondary.

I think school is a lot more than the three Rs and a bit of MFL.

I don't mind the concept of schools being used as hubs for child and family support, but there should be non teaching staff devoted to dealing with it.

In terms of financial, sex education etc again, I've no problem with those things being covered but ultimately those sorts of life skills should be part of parenting ideally. Schools only have the time to touch on those sorts of things quite briefly and in a theorietical, hypothetical way. The parents are the ones there on the actual day a girl starts her period, or decides she wants to save enough money to buy a certain item.

@Sansaplans

What did people in his classes go on to do? My grandad worked down the mines as soon as he left school because that's what the rest of his family did. Now it's great that there is more variety and children have access to more of a variety of subjects. The issue is in part that they haven't received the additional funding/resource as the demands and expectations placed upon them have risen.

I've been debating this with my husband.

On the one hand it's good that there's choice, but on the other, there's a limit to the benefits of choice that come through education.

Everyone needs sufficient training to engage with the democratic process, carry out a job that gains them income, and basically manage their life and care for their children.

I think there's a lot to be said for paring back education up to fourteen to literacy, numeracy, life skills and learning skills (which can all be taught through other subjects anyway), then allowing young people to specialise - and learn that knowing that you don't know something and can defer to an expert is OK.

As it is, pupils are statutorily required to learn things they'll never need at the expense of more time on what they will need, and I think that's a bit crap.

I think some people are missing my point. My grandfather was a teacher in the early part of the 20th century, when all he was required to do was teach.

Since then, slowly and insidiously, a long list of other responsibilities have been added. Some things on the list I did while at school but my mother and father didn't. And teachers are just expected to get on with the added responsibilities. We are neither trained nor qualified to do some of the things expected of us. That isn't fair on teachers or on the children.

Don’t forget we have to spot radicalisation as well and report

Maybe if you can’t change with the times and understand that teachers have a big part to play in safeguarding children then you need a career change.

Actually, @AliceMcK, I see each class of 27-32 children for 50 minutes twice a week.

I think some people are missing my point. My grandfather was a teacher in the early part of the 20th century, when all he was required to do was teach.

The world has turned quite a few times since then though. If you look at any other profession I’m sure you’d see huge changes in what is now expected of people because we’ve developed as a society, our understanding of what people need has changed, our understanding of practice has changed hugely.

I imagine if you spoke to a nurse, their role has expanded hugely with real changes in responsibility. Some professions didn’t even exist in a coherent way at the start of the 20th century, and child protection/safeguarding was barely considered anyone’s job outside of the third sector.

Some changes are as a result of societal change and increased knowledge, some as a result of cuts in public services but comparing any profession now to 120 years ago is unrealistic.

AliceMcK doesn't seem to understand the difference between being expected to spot and report that a child is coming into school hungry every day, and being expected to feed that child.

Maybe if you can’t change with the times and understand that teachers have a big part to play in safeguarding children then you need a career change

Absolute rubbish. We don’t need good teachers leaving the profession just because the government poorly fund other areas and they happen to have noticed!

I want to have someone to refer the children in my school onto for support, when there is a problem. I want support from Sure start, children’s centres, CAMHS, OT, SaLT, school nursing team, support for children with parents in prison etc etc to be readily available when I refer-not for it to just be yet another thing that schools have to do.

@Howshouldibehave

Exactly.

Yes.100%. Every time some issue or other is discussed on the news you hear the phrase 'needs to be addressed on the school curriculum.'

THERE IS NO MORE TIME. SCHOOLS DO NOT HAVE THE RESOURCES!!

@noblegiraffe

AliceMcK doesn't seem to understand the difference between being expected to spot and report that a child is coming into school hungry every day, and being expected to feed that child.

Not at all. The comment I responded to said teachers should just teach, that’s it, all other responsibilities should be left up to others. I totally disagree with that. Children have been abused and neglected for decades with teachers knowing and there defence for not doing anything about it, including reporting it, has been, well it’s not my job I’m a teacher. That is what I disagree with.

Not one teacher at my DCs school feels like this. I know exactly what safeguarding training the teachers have done as ive done it with them as part of my role as school governor. Every teacher at the school feels very strongly about the safety of all the pupils. Yes there is a reporting procedure they follow but that dosnt mean they then wipe their hands of it, every single one of them will tell you that they are there if you need them and they genuinely mean it. They also understand that teaching isn’t just about changing times tables over and over, teaching cover many many areas of life.

My grandfather was a teacher in the early part of the 20th century, when all he was required to do was teach.

Ok, and at that point in time it was considered fine for teachers to beat and abuse their pupils.

Whereas now we actually think children should be protected from that and as a consequence anybody working with children, whether in a paid or voluntary capacity, has child protection and safeguarding responsibilities. Rightly so.

In 2008 I did a degree in Primary Education and three years and a BA couldn’t have prepared me for the expectations of teaching. I absolutely loved teaching and, nine times out of ten, my lesson observations were graded outstanding but I’m sad to say I just wasn’t cut out for the health and social care aspect of the job.

On a completely ordinary day I would be using my teaching time to make breakfast for those who hadn’t eaten or providing care (showering children and washing and drying filthy clothes, etc.) I did enough placements to know changing a little accident is part of the job but our mainstream school was taking on children with complex needs, some of them medical, and expected everyone to get on board with no support whatsoever.

Providing care for a child with a rare blood disorder that can cause death alongside 51 other children was just untenable. We were told this little girl could not, under any circumstance, fall over or bump into anything or hurt herself in any way. I spent that entire year on the verge of a breakdown and, in the end, I went to hospital with her four times. Luckily they were all just precautions but being [medically] responsible for this child was really not what I signed up to as a teacher.

The comment I responded to said teachers should just teach, that’s it, all other responsibilities should be left up to others. I totally disagree with that

Yeah, no teacher thinks they shouldn’t flag up safeguarding concerns so you’re arguing against a straw man.

One further thought... I think the worst thing about providing extra care wasn’t that I minded doing it - I really didn’t. But if you’re spending x amount of time feeding and showering children because they’re coming to school so dirty then accept that’s part of modern teaching and cut some slack on all the targets and observations and moderation.

I simply couldn’t provide 5 hours of quality teaching and push every child to their full potential if I’m also out of the room making food and washing clothes.

I learnt to swim at school. I think some people on MN are so middle class they forget that other people are actually poor, too poor to afford £60+ a month for swimming lessons per child. There’s no shame in learning to swim through the free lessons provided by school, it’s really expensive.

I’m a teacher and I accept children need to learn a broad range of subjects in order to thrive and succeed. It isn’t enough to purely teach them to read, write and do sums. It may have just about been enough when kids left school at 12 to work but it isn’t now.

Don’t forget we have to spot radicalisation as well and report

I remember hearing this on the radio a few years ago saying teachers were being asked to look out for ot or be given avenues to report it, and my first thought was FFS havent they got enough other stuff to do.

Although I agree that all the extra responsibilities shouldnt be a teachers responsibility, i actually feel (as a mere parent , with no experience of education from the inside) that the some of curriculum itself feels overwhelming and not geared to the joy if teaching or learning.
English especially.
I have one child in year 6 and 1 in year 10 and the stuff they were each doing in lockdown , described as "creative writing" was about the driest, formulaic and uncreative thing I've seen. Year 6 stuff seemed to be all about grammar and each paragraph must include x y or z, of gramatic terms.
The year 10 creative writing had to include sentences of no more than 15 words!
In both cases, I had to wonder if a teacher noticed or cared what the subject matter was, or whether it was an good, or interesting piece, once they had checked all the formula for the grammar, spellings, and counted the words in every sentence!!

I have one child in year 6 and 1 in year 10 and the stuff they were each doing in lockdown , described as "creative writing" was about the driest, formulaic and uncreative thing I've seen.

You have Michael Gove to thank for that

Yanbu. There's a lot of problems in modern society and the solution seems to be "oh they should learn x in school, let's put that expectation on to schools". School teachers are expected to be social workers, nutrition coaches, mental health guides, OTs, behaviour therapists etc etc. No wonder teacher burnout rate is so high. It's not a realistic expectation, something has to give.

I think some people on MN are so middle class they forget that other people are actually poor, too poor to afford £60+ a month for swimming lessons per child.

It’s £20 per term in a London borough that I live in. That’s scandalous if other councils charge £60 per month. So sorry.

@Monkeytennis97

Yes.100%. Every time some issue or other is discussed on the news you hear the phrase 'needs to be addressed on the school curriculum.'

THERE IS NO MORE TIME. SCHOOLS DO NOT HAVE THE RESOURCES!!

I think the best response to this is "ok and what should come off teachers current workload in order to make space for that?".

I don't teach in England (thankfully, the system seems hellish for teachers) but I've adopted this as my response to the latest flash in the pan programme that's being encouraged. Funnily enough, they can never tell me what it should replace...