To think an English teacher should know poems that AREN'T on the examination syllabus?

[Shiningbaubles]

And be familiar with Shakespeare plays other than Romeo and Juliet?

Friend is training but 'hates poetry" and 'hates Shakespeare.'

Or am I being harsh?

Watership Down was on my sixth form extracurricular reading list as a novel about different kinds of society. It was one of my favourite books as a child and young teenager too (note 'was' although I still enjoy it). That shows why teaching well is so important - it's possible for a good teacher to make a good lesson out of any text at all, but if the teaching is average or below average, which obviously a lot of it will be, at least if you are teaching a good text, you're doing something worthwhile.

I am the opposite: an English teacher who loves to teach Shakespeare, poetry and a wide variety of novels.

But I'm not allowed to. I'm required to teach just two scenes of R&J at KS4, two extracts of scenes from Macbeth at KS3 and Of Mice and frigging men to everyone, regardless of ability. I'm not allowed to teach Mockingbird.

There are no books for KS3 students except one crap, unchallenging play. The only books at KS4 are exam set texts. There are lots of iPads, MacBooks and iMacs though.

I hate it. I'm leaving.

Yes, and I think the opposite is true too - bad teaching makes something that's good lose its shine, which is probably what happened with us.

And it's not 'teacher bashing' to say so, I don't think. No one sets out to be a bad teacher, or wants to defend being one.

I agree it isn't teacher bashing.

Lapsed, I can sympathise with all that.

I don't think I'll go back. I would if I could teach Watership Down though

My point being, btw, that the OP's friend would get on just fine in some schools. A love of literature is actively discouraged, it seems to me.

I'm required to teach just two scenes of R&J at KS4, two extracts of scenes from Macbeth at KS3 and Of Mice and frigging men to everyone, regardless of ability

Surely you have to do the whole of those plays?Just to gain context?

I'm guessing it's Act 3 scene 1 of R & J, Lapsed?

I accidentally hit a kid teaching that scene

Lapsed it sucks. I don't teach in schools any more but I get a LOT of tutoring work helping kids prepare for Shakespeare assessments after only being taught two scenes. It is utter madness.

Even 10 years ago you could get them through the whole of Mockingbird, the whole of Great Expectations and the whole of Romeo and Juliet, plus the Crucible and poetry. You could still have fun with it then. I have no idea what happened .

While I find the idea of doing two scenes from a play just as depressing in the context lapsed gives, I teach two sections of a poem in isolation from the rest, and I don't think it's awful in itself?

If you were doing lots of other things, and lots of full plays, it might be ok to study a couple of scenes out of context. But this just sounds so relentlessly cut back to the smallest amount possible.

No, Orlando, and without that context the scenes are confusing and meaningless. I have never come across a class that actually didn't enjoy Shakespeare once they felt they were getting to grips with the language.

Where I'm currently teaching, we basically just teach variations on the same mind numbingly dull PowerPoint five times over ks4. And more if they don't do well the first time.

Needless to say, behaviour is appalling and attainment is mediocre.

God how awful.

I have to say if I had to choose I would say make all children perform Shakespeare rather than study it, though ideally both. ds has already been in a school production of R&J in year 6 via the Schools' Shakespeare Festival - again highly selected bits, but still more than two blinking scenes.

What level are you talking about here OP? My DS didnt even touch shakespeare until he was midway through secondary. He actually liked it (i have no idea why, I hated it)

As for poetry, I find it rather airyfairy and didnt get that either.

Say what now? You teach scenes rather than the play? That's like teaching full stops without doing capital letters. Utterly bonkers. I don't womder you're leaving Lapsed. but also

There's no time Lonny. The syllabus is freaking enormous. You're right, but it's nothing to do with rubbish teachers.

Apart from the one in the OP. She does sound rubbish.

Worded that wrong - I know you didn't say anything about rubbish teachers!

Lapsed, that is so sad. I'm sorry you are having to teach like that.

Is this normal nowadays?

At my non-selective comprehensive (South Yorkshire) 20 years ago, we had a very good and rich English Literature syllabus. I'd be sad to think that current students weren't getting the same.

Lapsed, that's so sad.

As hectic as it feels at times, I found the Au system really stimulating, where no text stays on an exam list for more than four years. Books change regularly in lower school too. I can't think of any year where I haven't been teaching something new.

A lot of this is because, even apart from the exam text changes, all books are bought by the parents, not the school, so if a text isn't working, we change it.

Didn't that used to be the case here? Well not for individual schools, but set texts? Mockingbird, mice and R&J seem to have been on the syllabus since God was a lad, but dH remembers set texts changing from year to year. And how does that work with national exams Echt?

All three pressure is on the magic C grade. Not on getting them to love literature. And that filters down from government to ofsted to SLT to teachers.

Some of our English teachers are amazing and inspiring. Others are like robots. Trained to speak in levels, data and ofsted speak. At least one of our English teachers does not understand the correct use of apostrophes.

YANBU. With the exception of the last 200 odd years most of English literature is poetry. Your friend will be imparting her ahistoricism and general ignorance to the next generation.

Yes it's sad, frustrating and depressing. Nothing I can do about it due to nepotism and corruption so I'm really struggling to bite my tongue for the next twelve weeks. However I'm not leaving teaching. Just moving to a school with actual book cupboards and a library that gets used.

When I did Higher English, a million years ago in the 70's, we got through (what I can remember) Hamlet, Merchant of Venice, The Crucible and Death of a Salesman, The Birthday Party, some Orwell short stories, The Lovesong of J Alfred Prufrock, several Larkin poems, a couple of Plath poems and at least one poem by DH Lawrence (The Snake, which I can still vividly remember discussing in class). We also briefly covered the plays we were going to see at the Citizens Theatre in Glasgow beforehand. The novels we were given to read but never discussed in class were Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and The Power and the Glory. Dd did Macbeth, Great Gatsby and a poem, that's it. The curriculum is killing English as a subject to enjoy and turning it into an exam passing machine, dissecting and regurgitating a narrow slice of accessible literature.

However, we were lucky to be in the top set. I remember sitting in on a lower set where their teacher implored his class not to go to the theatre because it was riddled with homosexuality (paraphrasing his exact words), so poor English teachers have always been around.

My experience was the same chemenger. I also bloody loved the Citizen's.

The curriculum is killing English as a subject to enjoy and turning it into an exam passing machine, dissecting and regurgitating a narrow slice of accessible literature

I bet the same could apply to many other subjects.

I teach History and there are some periods which don't interest me particularly. I still teach them (well, I hope).

However, I agree with the OP that her friend doesn't sound like she will be an especially inspiring teacher.