to be horrified at the behaviour in bohunt school

[SEsofty]

Just watched the programme about Chinese teachers in uk. Whilst I appreciate that it is reality tv and thus exaggeration for effect I was still horrified with the apparent number of children who were talking in class.

I'm not that accident and went to a very normal school but talking whilst teacher did simply didn't happen. I don't agree with the Chinese methods but talking whilst someone is trying to teach you is simply rude.

bertrand yes my DC went to school in the UK and still do.

I'm sorry- I must have you confused with someone else- who was it whose children were taught in mixed ability classes in an elementary school til they were 14? I was meaning to ask what country that was in and I forgot.

maths I think she's a yank.

Summer born children will indeed tend to be at the bottom table and over years will increasingly not be taught the same curriculum as the higher sets. They are left behind over the years.

You explained the issue - teachers are afraid that the pushy parents of more able children would vote with their feet, so you teach at the pace that keeps them happy, which you describe as targetting the middle. This implicitly admits that the national league table results reflect the children, or rather the parents, than the teaching, and that you don't have the confidence you could to teach any better. Otherwise why would you worry about Johnny's mum? You could focus on your middle and lower sets and bring them to higher standards?

The Mastery method aims to improve the teaching, so teachers could take lower set through the same curriculum and at the same pace as the higher set, at least in primary. If there were significant differences, you could stream them in the secondary school. But of course Johnny's mum wouldn't want that change.

Math is in America, I'm pretty sure but she's Irish, I'm also pretty sure.

Once again Vanilla have you taught a mixed ability class of 30 or more children?

You have twisted my words so magnificently I can't begin to correct.

It is a fact that summer born birthdays are top heavy in special needs- Google the statistics for yourself. This does not mean the they are written off, this does not mean they stay there, this does not mean that all summer birthdays are at a disadvantage. For some it is a huge advantage.
It merely means that it would be good to have a more flexible school entry and not be so rigid with the cut off date.
My summer born, lower set DS got the same curriculum as everyone else. He had to for the exams. He got level 4 in yr 6 SATs - he got 8 GCSEs with C and above. He achieved this with appropriate teaching. He wasn't wriitten off at the bottom of a mixed ability class. I was looking around for another school in YR 7 when the school was not meeting his needs, but they got their act together, got him on an IEP and he was able to learn.
Every child is an individual and needs appropriate teaching.

I will just give reply to one point. Why does Johnny's mum not get listened to? Why do we sacrifice one child for the common good? Why not teach all children according to their ability? Why not let the boy I know take Maths GCSE when he did in year 8 - why wait for him to be bored stiff until year 10 rather than go into the A'level class?

I was a pushy parent- thankfully for me my parents were pushy. Your child gets one chance of a particular year at school and you can't afford to write it off. All children deserve the best. All parents need to be listened to- they know their child best.

Have you not read all my posts Vanilla about doing mixed ability maths. What would you do if when marking the books you discover that 6 children didn't get the lesson but 24 had an excellent grasp and we're ready to move in? Do tell me.

No ignoring future posts- need to get out.

Move on -not move in.

I wonder if you have something against clever children getting too clever, Vanilla- you seem very down on them, and their parents.

The Mastery method aims to improve the teaching, so teachers could take lower set through the same curriculum and at the same pace as the higher set, at least in primary.

This is utter bollocks. You are not taking the lower set through the same curriculum as the higher at the same pace. The same topics does not equal the same curriculum. So if you are doing fractions, the Mastery method suggests that the better students do the topic in more depth and apply the skills to more demanding problem solving, while the lower set is still figuring out the basics. The lower students would not be attempting the harder questions.

You seem to be suggesting that only if teaching were improved, all children could learn the same stuff in the same time. Anyone who has actually taught maths would know this is nonsense.

Why does Johnny's mum not get listened to? Why do we sacrifice one child for the common good? Why not teach all children according to their ability? Why not let the boy I know take Maths GCSE when he did in year 8 - why wait for him to be bored stiff until year 10 rather than go into the A'level class?

This is not what I am suggesting. Running the education according to Johnny's mum is not teaching based on ability. We don't test the ability of children in lower set in year 1. We don't know whether they are really less able or simply disadvantaged by the teaching method. Currently we are sacrificing many perfectly able summer born or less confident children for the sake of Johnny's mum. Real prodigies are very rare. I don't recall the name, but one respected psychologist said that he never saw gifted and talented children, but many parents of gifted and talented children.

Little Johnny could very well have personalised extension activities. It does not require that 40-30% of population leave education without qualifications. I never heard the likes of Johnny's mum to support unemployment and housing benefits for the unskilled unemployed. She wants tax cuts I guess.

Eventually, this perverse effect drags down education for the able and the middle classes too. My eldest DC selective academy has cut an entire subject and sacked a dozen of teachers for lack of funding. So much for liberal arts Bertrand is worried about. It is in the news that 6 form colleges are closing science and language classes due to funding cuts.

Currently SN system is a refuge, but looking at the government plan to shame patients for receiving free prescription drugs by printing “Funded by the taxpayer” on the packages, I guess in a few years some newspapers will be arguing that SN children don’t deserve the money and readers will be better off with tax cuts.

At some point it will become a simple choice of tutoring /going private or failing your DC. Not very different to Shanghai system you deplore.

one respected psychologist said that he never saw gifted and talented children, but many parents of gifted and talented children.

I've got one up on that respected psychologist then, because I have. Least pushy parent, astonishingly able child.

Vanilla, you are talking as if ongoing assessment of children doesn't happen, and as if teachers teach to some arbitrary curriculum rather than teach the children in front of them.

So if you are doing fractions, the Mastery method suggests that the better students do the topic in more depth and apply the skills to more demanding problem solving, while the lower set is still figuring out the basics.

This sounds to be a perfectly good method to me. Why is it nonse? . All children get to master essential concepts like fractions. The more able are going to develop more depth and solve more difficult problems. ‘Mastery’ is not what is currently taught in this country. What happens here is that the more able sets move on before the lower sets get to master the basics. By the time of GCSEs the lower sets don’t’ get taught certain units at all. They are permanently disadvantaged and get diminished opportunities, not necessarily because of ability, which is not tested, but because they are born in the summer, or they have the wrong parents or the wrong learning style.

All children currently get the chance to master essentials like fractions, just not at the same time and not in the same classroom.

Bottom sets spend ages going over fractions again and again throughout secondary. Top set don't need to and move onto non-essentials like solving quadratic equations. If they were in the same class, what would they be taught? Fractions again, or quadratic equations?

If you want all children to be taught all topics that would mean teaching quadratic equations to children who can't solve linear equations.

And if you think that teachers don't assess the ability of their students every time they teach them, then that's a bit insulting.

I am not saying gifted and talented don't exist. They certainly do, but there are few of them and pretending that they make the weather in education is a little bit misleading IMO. Some make it sound like the only problem with education is that the gifted are not stretched enough...

So do we teach our class quadratic equations or more fractions, vanilla?

My dd was in a year 7 maths class with an ability range of 4a to GCSE. Ow could she have got an A and her friend an A level if they had been taught together?

Bottom sets spend ages going over fractions again and again throughout secondary.... If you want all children to be taught all topics that would mean teaching quadratic equations to children who can't solve linear equations.

Well for me this the ideology of a second rate educational system.

Quadratic equations are basics in Maths terms. In high performing systems quadratic equations are taught at 13-14. At 16 they do calculus and the more able are doing polynomials and Pascal number theory. If fractions are taught in secondary, surely it is a failure of the system. When do those DC doing fractions in Y9 going to do equations? This means they do not learn to think analytically and to solve problems. This is worse than rote learning. Those learning by rote, due to flexibility of the brain would/could learn patterns and thinking / problem solving methods by practicing examples with the teacher. Those that cannot translate a word problem into an equation and solve it are truly illiterate for the 21 century.

Calculus might be difficult and require certain ability. Fractions are not a measure of ability, but of the of arrogance and complacency of an educational ideology that is based on the assumption that there is an undeserving group they don’t need to cater to.

Students doing fractions in Y9 also do equations, they don't spend the entire year on one topic

That they are doing fractions in Y9 isn't due to a failure of the education system but a spiral curriculum that sees them revisiting topics from previous years, and extending them to a higher level.

Do you think that a system that only teaches fractions in primary means that students remember how to do fractions come GCSE time?

What does 'doing polynomials and Pascal number theory' involve?

Do you think that a system that only teaches fractions in primary means that students remember how to do fractions come GCSE time?

I am not aware of the system that considers fractions as an isolated skill to be leaned in primary and revised at GCSE… This is rote learning. Real maths teaching involves getting children to understand and master fractions and then integrate fractions, like addition and multiplication, into all the following more complex concepts. Surely if fractions are perceived as an isolated skill, DC do not really understand any of the Maths, they don’t think mathematically ?

The Mastery method seem to aim to develop deeper, integrated understanding of maths and enable more flexible usage of the skills.

Have anyone actually questioned whether it is the UK system that is rote learning, rather than the Chinese one? I mean honestly.

You're not a maths teacher are you, vanilla?

Of course fractions aren't seen as an isolated topic and are incorporated into other areas but if you want kids to be able to do arithmetic with fractions, then every so often you're going to need a solid review of arithmetic with fractions. Otherwise your solving linear equations lesson is just going to get bogged down with fraction misunderstanding and teaching the minute you introduce an equation with a fraction as a solution.

My ds did quadratic equations in year 9.

What position are you speaking from, vanilla?

I taught my top set calculus at 16. I'm not sure about polynomials and Pascal number theory though, because I don't know what vanilla means by it.

I'm a TA in primary school and yes the kids talk when the teacher is a lot. I don't like it. This is with a teacher who is otherwise good and very experienced. My observation is that to stop it teachers need to be very strict and occasionally shout.

I do lunch duty in the class and insist they are quiet when I talk or their names go on the board. If they persist they miss some of break - only need to do that a few times, once they know you mean it they behave! It is a hassle though.