To expect teachers to be clever?

[CJ2010]

I was visiting a friend, who has a 12 year old DC and she was telling me how unhappy she was about the school and her DC's education, or lack of. She showed me her child's workbook that contained comments from the teacher. My friend is getting really concerned because her DC's spelling and grammar mistakes are not being picked up by the teacher. She then told me to have a read through and to take a close look at the teachers comments, I did, and they were littered with spelling errors and poor grammar.

It got me thinking. I know a couple of teachers; we all went to school together and are still mates now. One is a primary school teacher, the other secondary. Both teachers only managed to get a Grade C for Maths at GCSE. One of them also got a few Grade D's in other subjects (not English or Science). IMO, GCSE's are a basic qualification and being taught up to GCSE level only really gives a broad, general knowledge of a subject. If they are only coming out as average / or below at this level, regardless of subject, are they really qualified to educate the next generation? They are not very clever are they?

I fear, that this this average educational ability amongst techers is quite common and wide spread. My DC's have yet to start school, but it is worrying for the future. AIBU?

I expect teachers to be qualified for their job.

By virtue of the fact that they are teachers, they must be qualified.

You will find, as in all professions there's many different types of teacher. One may not be able to spell accurately, but may be completely inspirational and prod ce excellent results from the children becuase of that.
I think YABU.

Yanbu, but you'll be surprised how many people disagree.

I wouldn't want my child being taught by someone who was too stupid to pass a decent set of GCSEs. Frankly, unless you've got SEN, getting a C at GCSE should not be difficult for anyone of reasonable intelligence.

YANBU

How is a child meant to learn spelling and grammar if their teacher doesn't have a firm grasp on the basics? They'll be getting one message at home and another at school. And what happens when you correct their speech/spelling and they say, "well my teacher says it this way"?

My sister had to do a degree in maths for her teaching qualification as all other places were full. She scraped through. She now runs an autistic unit and is absolutely fabulous at it.

In amongst any large group of people you will get people who are less abl than others. However, ability is complex as is teaching. Teaching is as much about emotional intelligence than any other kind - you would be a very poor teacher with straight A's but no compassion or empathy.

Not every mistake gets 'red pen' anymore as many pieces of work ask the children to focus on one aspect alone. The grammar and spelling mistakes in the teacher's work might be a result of that hotter being at the bottom of a very large pile. Not brilliant but that's life sometimes.

Don't worry about your child - it is really easy to get concerned but I genuinely believe that the vast, vast majority of teachers are perfectly able people who will teach your child well. Also, it can be a great learning experience for a child to work with someone who is not infallible - different mindset to being at school in the 70's and 80's though.

A teacher who needs to work on his or her own spelling might be fabulous at 100 other things. The children's spelling won't be forever damaged.

You will be an involved and engaged parent - your child will be fine

YANBU, but how many clever, well-educated people want to become teachers these days? They are poorly paid, work very long hours, are over-burdened with bureaucratic demands, are subject to inspections by people who don't know about education, are micro-managed by senior management, are subject to whimsical changes of policy by government, have to put up with violent and abusive pupils and violent and abusive parents, and then are subject to constant criticism and ill-informed attacks by journalists in national newspapers.

I disagree Chaos. In many other jobs, it probably doesn't matter, say for example if an Estate Agent failed their Maths exam or a Nurse failed their History exam.

However, If someone is being paid to educate across all subjects like teachers do in Primary school then they should be able to pass basic level qualifications with flying colours. IMO, they need to be a 'good all rounder' at GCSE level, at the very least.

Good post Passmethecrisps. You've said what I would want to say but in a much better way.

Being able to spell and have perfect grammar is not "clever" that's quite different, and in my book linked to intellectual enquiry as a basic mindset; intellectual, if you like.

I expect ALL teachers to have perfect grammar and spelling, however someone will be along to point to an inspirational sub-literate. Oh, they got there first.

I think you can have both good technical accuracy and good teaching, and the educational system should require the former as the baseline.

YANBU

I very much agree with hackmum.

For a teacher to be making basic mistakes in spelling and grammar is not good enough.

I used to work as a teaching assistant in an infant school, and several times had to watch and bite my tongue as the teacher taught the children something that was just plain wrong

eg "the sun produces light but the stars and the moon don't" (the sun is a star)

"The sun is so bright because it is the biggest star"

"Let's look in this book about mammals and see what we can found out about penguins"

That said, she was a very effective teacher in the basics - reading, writing, maths - and the children loved her. I just used to wonder what the parents thought when their children came home and told them what they had learnt at school.

OP YANBU

I'm constantly shocked by the fact that most teachers are not actually very bright and I've come accross many ex school friends who were very mediocre and are now teachers and even a deputy head. Whilst I agree with some posters that teaching involves more than just knowledge I believe that you have to have a very sound educational background to enure that you can pass on the correct information to children and answer their questions. I was very worried to hear that a newly qualified teacher (offspring of another teacher) is dyslexic! How n earth is she supposed to help children with spelling and grammar?

WTF has 'cleverness' got to do with GCSEs? A trained monkey could get a GCSE pass if they have the determination and the ability to remember things. I have 2 kids in secondary. DS1 is heading for Cs and maybe the odd B. DD has been forecast As across the board. She is no cleverer than he is. Maybe not as clever in some ways. I'd be more concerned about your childrens' future teachers' ability to 'teach', empathise and understand the subjects they are teaching at the levelthey are teaching them. If my sons yr 10 teacher didn't get a good maths GCSE I'd be very worried. If my other son's yr 4 teacher only got a 'C' I'd be fine.

Chaos - you have far too much faith in qualifications

boggler someone will be along very soon to tell you how this is to the advantage of the child.

It won't be me.

Why is a 12 YO still in Primary? Or is this just as excuse to bash teachers?

*an excuse

My SIL is dyslexic and a primary school teacher. She works her socks off to make sure that her difficulties don't impact on her work. She's got good qualifications from GCSE onwards, and as an added bonus can empathise with her kids when they find things hard, and demonstrate that problems can be overcome.

I think everybody should be good at whatever their job entails: if you are employed as a French teacher you should be able to pronounce French, if you are employed to teach children to write you should be able to spell and express yourself in grammatically correct sentences, if you teach maths you should be numerate at whatever level is required. In fact, to be a good teacher I think you need to be confident at what you teach, which probably means being able at a slightly higher level than you actually teach.

And quite frankly, someone who struggles to get a C in English probably doesn't have the everyday writing skills required to teach bright primary school children.

Being inspiring is hardly enough if you inspire your pupils to learn the wrong thing.

And tbh it's not that inspiring to constantly be made to reproduce things that you know are wrong and not be able to question them because you don't want to be rude to a teacher. Being made to learn spelling lists where at least one spelling is wrong every week can do a lot to undermine a child's learning experience.

But then there are the realities of recruitment...

How does a D in art impact on someone's ability to teach chemistry?

What if the teacher's comments are badly spelled because they are dyslexic? Should people with dyslexia be banned from becoming teachers? Is that not more than a little disablist?

Can I use any punctuation mark other than a ?

FFS: "eg "the sun produces light but the stars and the moon don't" (the sun is a star)

"The sun is so bright because it is the biggest star"

"Let's look in this book about mammals and see what we can found out about penguins"

That is shocking! All that stuff is pretty basic.

MY DH is a teacher he has NO GCSEs (ok you can alll pick yoursleves up off the floor now)

YANBU, which is why this is such a damn good idea, despite the criticism.

Can I just point out that if you are teaching secondary school pupils you have to go to Teacher Training college to ensure you are fully qualified to teach. One of my friends is a secondary school teacher and actually has an MA in her specialised subject. That said, she is made to teach subjects like English, which is not what she was trained in so I suppose the OP does have a (slight) point. IMO if the teacher has been trained to teach, doesn't that automatically override whatever GCSEs he/she may or may not have? If he/she doesn't pass the training, then he/she wouldn't get a job anyway - competition in teaching is extremely fierce

All teachers have to pass a set of tests called 'QTS Skills Test' in numeracy and literacy which are attempted after GCSEs, A levels, degree and PGCE or, in other words, years or education and examinations.

".. When can I take the Skills Tests? You will only be able to take your tests in your final year of study (except those on felxible study programmes) ..."

Trainee teachers do fail these very basic tests and some have to repeat them several times!