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?

ha. "a good enough language skills". Oops.

YANBU OP.

We got our son's learning journey back from his nursery, as he's due to go to school in September. He has SEN, so it was quite a detailed folder of all the progress he'd made throughout the year.

I was shocked at the grammar and spelling used to describe basic activities he'd done, and things he'd said. I realise at 4 he's not using workbooks or having spelling corrected, but I still thought that the teachers would be able to spell.

YABU

I don't think you can judge somebody's intellect by their GCSE results. At school, i had some problems that resulted in me losing my enthusiasm, and i finished school with only a C grades in Maths, English and Science. I got a B in English Literature but that was my highest grade. I got D's in Electronics and Graphical Design, and an E in Religious Education. All, IMO, well below my potential.

However, things got better for me. I graduated with a first class honours degree in Psychology and Philosophy, then i did a PhD in Psychology specialising in cognitive neuroscience. I now work as a scientist researching in this field. I earn ok money and i do something i love. I regularly lecture post-graduate students in the fields of computer science, artificial intelligence and psychology as part of my job.

Not bad for someone who got grade C in my maths GCSE, eh? I need to use fairly complex maths in my work, so i'm sure that if i revised some of the stuff i don't use daily (trig, etc) then i could get an A* with my eyes closed if i were so inclined.

My brother was in the lowest class in school, he was the class clown and whilst not as stupid as his classmates they put him in the lowest class because his behaviour was so unruly. He totally failed maths at GCSE and had to resit it. Later in life, he got his act together and graduated with a 2:1 in Software Engineering. He now works for a company that designs critical system software for use in military aircraft. Again, not bad for someone who failed their GCSE's.

Finally, please consider the paltry wage that teachers tend to earn and the amount of hours they have to put in. My friend's wife is an English teacher who teaches year 7 to A-level, as it happens she's a very intelligent woman and i can tell you she works hard! People think it's easy sailing with loads of holidays but every time i see her she's working constantly during the evenings and weekends marking work and writing class material, even during her holidays she's working in some way. She works in a very upper-middle class school full of high achieving students with pushy parents... she constantly has to deal with mothers who think they know how to teach better than she does and who cannot accept that perhaps their child just isn't an A* student (not everyone can be top of the class, afterall). And for what? £25k a year or so i think it is. Some would say that being a teacher is just not worth the hassle.

If you pay peanuts, you'll get monkeys. Many of the brightest graduates figure that they can earn more working for private companies. Many of the people in my graduating class work for IBM, Fujitsu or NUDT designing ways to make supercomputers think in a more human way... their job is intellectually stimulating and they earn HUGE money, why would they ever become teachers? They could litterally earn £100k more per year doing what they do. I work where i do because i like that i have more influence over what i research than i would working for a corporation and i enjoy teaching students. I'm willing to accept much less pay for these benefits, but i'm in the minority. Even if you consider non-PhD graduates, someone with just an undergraduate degree can generally earn much more working for a private company than they can being a teacher.

If we paid teachers more, then i'm sure we'd attract better people. As it happens, i think many teachers sort of fall into that career because they don't really know what else to do. I know a few people who graduated in Psychology from university and didn't have the energy in them to do a PhD nor any idea of what else to do (you can't really get a career in psychology without a PhD of some sort)... so they did a PGCE and taught Psych A-level. If we paid more, and if parents stopped making teacher's lives hell by thinking they know better all the time, then i'm sure more super-bright people would actually go to university with the wholehearted intention of being a career teacher.

I've done a bit of part-time lecturing in my profession. Its one which requires a lot of "A"s to get into at university. So I'm therefore repeatedly shocked when a sizable number of students' take home assignments are littered with very basic spelling, puncuation and grammar errors.

This is nothing to do with cleverness or getting Cs in Maths - its attention to detail, and since attention to detail is essential for a level of competency in most fields, its worrying.

My DH is an engineer, and his and other companies repeatedly struggle to fill vacancies despite qualified engineers applying. His company provides a small test (eg basic software programming and maths for an IT programmer) at the interview stage, and the number of graduates in a relevant field who fail it is horrifying. The last two employees taken on have not been British.

I was also a bit surprised to find out that DN (I do not have children yet myself) at primary, along with her classmates, was spending two days per month baking and preparing for a coffee morning run by the school, and recently spent an entire day weeding the school grounds as part of "nature conservation". Very nice, but something she could do at home surely, while the school concentrates on providing the basic academic skills to enable further learning in the future?

When confronted with an assignment littered with serious spelling, grammatical and puncuation errors, if its borderline, I generally mark it down a grade. So a borderline first would become a 2:1, a borderline 2:1 becomes a 2:2 and so on. The external examiner has never, ever disagreed with my marking.

I also agree with Clarinet's post about university students never having been criticised or told they are wrong at school, and therefore being unable to cope with it. The student who complains when they fail is a well known type.

I didn't make that assumption. My issue is that anyone who has any difficulty with spelling/writing (which is the case for all dyslexics) really shouldn't presume to teach those skills to others in a classroom context.

It depends on how the dyslexia afects you though. I teach 16+ and I'm dyslexic. This means I prep everything, and spell check.

It also means my classroom is dyslexia friendly. I will never write on a white board and ask people to ccopy, or ask them to copy from a presentation.

I will give gapped handouts and question sheets.

Personally I would not teach primary because if aa child asks 'Miss, how do you spell .............', I'm not conficent enough to give the right answer.

Sp Bonsoir, you are IMHO opinion right that some dyslexic teachers should not be primary teachers, others will be excellent in the role.

If you pay peanuts, you'll get monkeys
so true. and the pay scale causes resentment. my young team don't understand why my salary is twice theirs - i have a few ideas but they don't have the level of understanding of the job yet to appreciate that - and they know there are few opportunities for advancement.

Geegee

"its attention to detail, and since attention to detail is essential for a level of competency in most fields, its worrying."

I do not think this is the case. Some people either have a natural difficultly with grammar (but not necessarily to the extent that it would be diagnosed as dyslexia though) and others simply did not learn gramatical rules as a child. No amount of attention to detail is going to improve somebody's written work if they have never learnt how to properly utilise language.

I went to a really awful primary school, and grew up in a household with no books and with one parent (my father) who couldn't read or write at all (my mother could, but dropped out of school when she was 15 so her education was minimal). It wasn't until the age of 21 when i bought a book titled something like "What i used to know from school" that i finally learnt the difference between a verb and a noun, or what a homonym was. For people like me, or people who have difficulties at a cognitive level with words, a poorly written essay or report is not indicative of a below par level of attention to detail.

Proficiency in writing is not relevant in most fields. Apart from the necessity to write reports, the bare bones skills of doing tasks in most fields is not dependent on writing ability. Mathematicians, physicists, engineers, psychologists, etc... the ideas and problem solving of these people is not inhibited by poor grammar. Many people with poor writing and comprehension skills have gone on to great success, including: Alexander Graham Bell, Leonardo da Vinci, Thomas Edison, Albert Einstein, Michael Faraday and John Horner. Both Bill Gates and Steve Jobs had literacy problems.

Would you want Bill Gates, Albert Einstein or Michael Faraday to teach reading and writing to your 9 year old child? Probably not.

But they're well placed to teach Computer Science, Physics and Chemistry!

Haven't read entire thread, but kind of agree with OP.

I'm a teacher and consider myself to be reasonably bright!

As someone else said, you do need to have a qualification to teach, so that in itself requires an element of intelligence. I did a PGCE so have a degree in another subject too (not saying that makes me better, but perhaps more rounded).

I have met some really dopey teachers, but also some really amazing ones.

CogPsych the people you mention with poor reading and writing skills are the exceptions. Would you advise ignoring reading and writing skills because those exceptions exist?

Don't get your point. This is about teachers.

And what makes you think that Bill Gates, Einstein or Faraday would make a good teacher of any kind whatsoever. Really? Evidence, please.

I am a teacher.
I don't believe that GCSE results really have much bearing on a teacher's capabilities. Teaching requires a large range of skills, and a first class degree would not necessarily predict a first class teacher.

What does worry me is teacher training institutions passing PGCE and BEd students who do not possess the skills needed, in order to keep their own percentages (and therefore Ofsted ratings) up. This means that there are NQTs who I would class as currently inadequate out there. Hopefully they will get weeded out at interview or in their NQT year, but it's very frustrating.

cog, agree with your post but only to some extent. I agree that to be intelligent does not mean good at written English. To be a good teacher one does need to be an excellent communicator though. 2 different things.

I can tell you now that a Primary teacher who only got a 'C' in maths GCSE would be unable to teach my 10yo DS1, as his ability would outstrip theirs. At home he is working on higher paper GCSE maths on Mymaths.

It's why his Y3 and Y4 teachers had no idea how to set his extension work. So they didn't. Thankfully, his current Y5 teacher has a Maths degree. So at least DS1 is getting taught something in school for the hour a day they do Maths...

Worried about next year already!

What do these primary teacher's who only got a 'C' do when they are faced with a child who needs extension work that is above that level? Do they ALL just ignore the DC needing extension work like the less-qualified teacher's here, or is that just the ones at my DS's school?!

It would be very, very unusual to teach a primary aged child beyond level 6 - it's beyond even G and T territory. Certainly I have never taught a child working beyond level 6 in 20 years - the school would need to seek help to teach the child, perhaps from a secondary school. It would be a very rare circumstance.

It's 'teachers', not 'teacher's'. Sorry. It's a compulsion.

Gosh, another (largely) teacher bashing thread...can't think why kids don't respect them...

IM (limited) experience, teachers now have to have a MINIMUM of GCSE C (or above) grade in English, Science and Maths.

They also have to have A-levels, or their equivalent, in order to either

1. Gain entry to and pass a first degree course (BSc, BA etc) - generally a 3 year course.
2. Gain entry to a BEd course (generally a 4 year course)

If option 1 was chosen, the individual then has to complete a 1 year PGCE course, either funding themselves for a year of study, or 'training on the job' with a reduced timetable, a small salary and a LARGE amount of responsibility.

Then, if the PGCE or BEd is completed to a satisfactory level, the individual obtains Newly Qualified Teacher status, when they have to apply for a job.

If they then manage to get a job, they are an NQT for 1 year, during which they have a slightly reduced timetable, more training and seminars and further close supervision (in general, although no system is perfect...)

If they pass and complete (to a satisfatory level) their NQT year, they THEN become fully qualified teacher.

After this there are your annual CPD reviews, plus teaching observations, book trawls, monitoring of your results, pay related target setting, pay review, commitment to ongoing training, engaging in school and class initiatives, not to mention all the helpful stuff the government send out to schools, dealing with and supporting parents (some of whom are picky very concerned parents, who obviously understand that all teachers HATE children...) helping some children come to terms with and deal with their outside of school lives, friendships, family tragedies, becoming the hub and centre of all childrens services, watching out for signs of child neglect or abuse, making sure children are fed/watered/suncreamed/looking after themselves/developing/growing as individuals/experiencing the wonder of the world/learning....,

I could go on...

Gosh, so many people must just 'fall into' that...with no thought or consideration beyond the HUGE paid holidays (oh no, the pay is pro-rata and just split over the 12 months, I have never actually BEEN paid for August, I have only ever got the money evenly split over the 12 months) and the gold plated pension

Plus there's the interview process before you get on a PGCE or BEd course...

Then there's the 50% who 'fall' out of the profession within 5 years....

CouthyMow - the teachers SHOULD have been able to set him challenging work. My B in GCSE Maths is just a letter. It is many years ago and my maths is now better than it was then anyway. However, even if it wasn't - I know who to ask, where to look, which books to consider, how to use the internet, who to refer to, etc in order to provide children with more challenging work. I cannot understand the thought that teachers are not able to do this - okay, if we are talking about A levels, but in primary school this really should not be an issue.

I disagree, Hula - if he is working at level 7 or level 8, the school should be looking for extra support for him. It would be a very. very rare case though.

I do not think there is anything wrong in expecting teachers to be bright , they should be drawn from the brightest and have an excellent sense of empathy and be able to evaluate.

I don't see much wrong with saying that teachers should have a 2:1 , minimum grade C ( I would prefer a B ) in core subjects and an A in their own at GCSE and A Level. Yes people may miss out but I think it could raise the profile of teachers, improve the respect in which they are held, which would encourage parental support and therefore raise standards .

I think it is highly insulting to teachers and those on lower wages to say that teachers are monkeys working for peanuts.

I agree Feenie, one of the things I'd be doing is liaising with the secondary school to ensure that a primary child working at GCSE maths levels was being supported appropriately, as well as accessing outside support from the G&T or inclusion teams that were operating in my area. He sounds exceptional.

But you can inspire them and be bright. It matters to my Oxbridge candidates that I can fully stretch them in my specialist subject. My first and the fact that I am constantly updating my subject knowledge is highly relevant there.

The requirements for teacher training are not massively high. That's true. There was some talk of restricting entrance to first and upper seconds and that would hugely limit the number of people eligible.

Some of course will be very clever and, as a group, they are probably cleverer than the general population. /But it's not a high fliers' career. It doesn't pay well enough and it isn't prestigious enough and you don't even get brownie points for being a good person, like nurses do. They will have degrees but you don't have to be that clever to get a degree.