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.

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.

This statement is an obvious admission that there is a persistent misunderstanding. It is also an admission that it is expected and accepted. The children never properly understood and mastered fractions in the first place. It was just superficial rote learning , no deep learning occurred. Instead of repeating how the Chinese learn by rote, (we don’t know really, do we? We didn’t live there, we don’t speak the language), we should look harder at what is happening here. Fractions to Maths are as fundamental as addition and multiplication. It is an idea, not a technique. If they don’t understand fractions, they are not thinking mathematically, they don’t get any of the maths, just churning model questions by rote.

The discourse about ability is basically blaming the children for inadequate methodology underpinning Maths education.

Kids forget stuff, vanilla

And sometimes they don't properly get something the first time around, but it lays the groundwork and the second time they understand it better. Have you ever given up on something that you're struggling with, then came back to it another time all fresh, and succeeded?
Maths can be like that. Sometimes flogging a dead horse is not the most productive way to progress.

What position are you talking from, vanilla?

Sitting on a sofa position, facing South-West, Bertrand.

Why is that horse so dead for so many for so long that there is no time left for them to cover some of the more advanced concepts and they just sit lower level paper and get an E?

There is no accountability in the system to the children, to bring them to certain minimal outcome by 16. There is an obvious accountability to Johnny’s mum, but not to those for whom the method doesn’t work. The system blames the children, or rather makes it their problem. If the children are lucky to have the right parents, the latter will find a way around the system.

Low ability, low IQs, are as rare as gifted and talented and one cannot explain 30% failure rate by special needs. Many SN DC are doing quite well out of the system, rightly so.

There is no questioning or discussion in the profession about the purpose of education, the methodology. Professionals come across quite insular, defensive and obsessed with stereotypes about far away places on which they will not be challenged.

Nobody wants to engage the harder question whether UK method is designed to develop the deep learning of Maths, whether it is as evolved from ote learning as it claims to be.

I believe my DC, and many others would benefit from the Chinese method and would get much deeper learning from it. I want the profession to be accountable to me in equal measure that it is accountable to Johnny’s mum. Instead of insular denial, I would expect a profession to undertake serious research into learning styles and teaching methodology, rather than fighting tooth and nail and discounting the children they fail as undeserving.

"Sitting on a sofa position, facing South-West, Bertrand."

Oh, for fuck's sake.

There is no accountability in the system to the children, to bring them to certain minimal outcome by 16.

You are joking, yes?

Why is that horse so dead for so many for so long that there is no time left for them to cover some of the more advanced concepts and they just sit lower level paper and get an E?

There's a paucity of qualified maths teachers so kids are taught by people who don't know what they are doing, kids have learning difficulties, kids have home issues, kids have mental problems, kids miss large amounts of school, kids refuse to learn. Some of the issues I can think of.

Why are you so sure that the 'Chinese teaching method' is the reason for success, and not the 12 hour school days, extensive tutoring and incredibly compliant attitude of the students?

Instead of insular denial, I would expect a profession to undertake serious research into learning styles and teaching methodology

Serious research has debunked learning styles, btw.

Of course serious research is being done into this stuff. Actually, I'm going to the ResearchEd conference in September which is exactly about this sort of thing.

The idea that teachers are resistant to change and new teaching ideas is laughable, by the way. Things are changing all the time, including how we teach. But we are rightly wary of things being peddled as the new cure-all, especially when the evidence-base isn't there.

Unless I misunderstand Vanilla you stated that your eldest is at. selective academy. In that case they never have to have mixed ability teaching because they are all above average.
I am not sure why you then want other people's children to be in mixed ability classes when you have chosen not to subject your own children to it.

I will have to take it that you have never taught a mixed ability maths class yourself and you just have the theory.
I am disappointed to find that you didn't answer my question.
You do an hour's work with a class and they all seem to get it. You mark the work and find that 6 have not understood anything. What do you next? Do you repeat the lesson when 24 understand it perfectly or do you move on?

Of course the teaching profession is accountable for all parents. Where do you get the strange idea that they favour some above others?

You are not going to get them to teach the Chinese way when they know that it simply won't work. Not in mixed ability classes. Shanghai does not have mixed ability classes- it is a nonsense to say that they do. Parents are trying from nursery to get their children into the elite schools. Parents are paying for private tutors to make sure they end up at elite universities.

Well said noblegiraffe - you saved me from having to write it!

I don't think there is any country which truly does completely mixed ability classes from secondary age onwards.

Finland does not select by school, but it does has different maths classes for different levels by secondary age (contrary to what some media reports suggest).

Countries like Japan (where I live) do not usually "set" within schools, BUT the very best students are off to private schools and "toritsu" (highly selective municipal state schools) by 12. Then there is another big division at 15 when students go to senior high school; if you are serious about getting into a good university in Japan, you pretty much have to go to a private SHS from 15. The public ones are for people who plan to go to a low-level university or into something less academic. I guess that Shanghai is probably similar.

I do however think that Britain makes a big mistake by having its ghastly "ability tables" (WTF??) from such a YOUNG age. In Japan, maths at ELEMENTARY age is taught to the whole class. Children who are struggling have their teachers talking to the parents, giving them extra work to do at home, and tutoring may be advised. I know it sounds a bit harsh/pushy, but over all I greatly prefer it to the British method of putting children onto different "ability tables" so that the teacher can "differentiate to different levels" (translation: younger and poorer kids get given easier work and lower expectations, and fall further and further behind each year).

Letting kids bump along the bottom is not doing them a kindness in the long run.

The physical setup of British primary school classroomstudents groups chattily around "tables"almost certainly exacerbates the problem and increases the falling-behind issue. Children tend overall to be more off-task and to exhibit more behavioral problems with table seating, and the lower-attaining a student is, the more greater the impact of table seating on their behavior and learning. The highest attaining students do about equally well regardless of whether they sit in tables or in rows, but the lowest attaining students behave and perform a lot worse when seated around tables. The inevitable result is that the lowest attaining pupils will straggle further and further behind the highest performers.

www.corelearn.com/files/Archer/Seating_Arrangements.pdf

But some of the younger children are the clever ones!
They don't stay at the bottom and get wider and wider gap and have low expectations- otherwise my lower set son couldn't have ended up with top grade in public exams.
You make it sound as if every primary school is the same with the same seating. That varies even within the same school. They are just as likely to be in rows or horseshoes or other formations.

That was quite a masterclass in blaming the children Nobble. All those reasons apply to all countries and all schools, including top performing Public ones. I don’t think there are children who don’t want to learn. It is a natural human instinct. There maybe some that are playing out being badly let down by the current system -it is teachers fault, not theirs. Really disappointing from you, I didn’t expect that.

If you are so keen on mixed class teaching why is your child at a selective school?

It is obvious that there is no way to engage and get through to that lot. Unaccountable, armour plated insular denial it is. They don’t even have empathy. Children they fail are just chip coming out of woodwork.

My child is at a non selective primary. The other is in a selective 6 form.
My point was I believe my children and many others in this country will benefit from Chinese style Mastery method and sitting arrangements, not nevessarily 12 hours day though.

It wouldn't work because british teachers are so indoctrinated by the time they hit the classroom, that they would never give a fair chance to that method.

vanilla - are you a politician? I love the way you espouse holding back other people's bright kids in a mixed ability class while sending your own to a selective school

That was quite a masterclass in blaming the children Nobble. All those reasons apply to all countries and all schools, including top performing Public ones

Eh? The first item on my list was teachers who don't know what they are doing. It's a huge problem in this country and doesn't apply to all countries and certainly shouldn't apply to top public schools.

I'm not sure why you think the rest of my list is blaming children. Why is saying some children fail their GCSEs due to mental health problems blaming them? Or if they miss school?

Kids refusing to learn was the last item on my list. They do exist, and it's not always just the teachers' fault.

I find it irritating if people are very emphatic about other people's children and then you find that they have gone down a selective route for their own.

Rather like the Shanghai system- put forward the mixed ability teaching- having made sure they are at an elite school to begin with!

What I find irritating is people who appear to speak from a position of knowledge but refuse to say what that knowledge is.

I think we have established that Vanilla has never taught a mixed ability clas of 30 or more. I haven't even been told what you do when 24 children got the maths, are ready to move on and you have 6 who need the lesson again. Unlike the wealthy Chinese they are unlikely to get the private tutor to fill them in. What would she do?

I would be more inclined to take note if I didn't know that the wealthy Chinese in Shanghai hadn't worked since birth to get them into elite schools.
They certainly haven't got a cross section and thousands of 15 yr old are missing from the results. Those missing ones are not at school with the children of the rich and powerful.

Anyone out there setting up a Mastery method type school where DC are sitting in rows and teachers are accountable and committed to teach all children, not just the top set?

Any school that was just committed to teaching top set would be closed for failing to meet floor targets, vanilla.

what you do when 24 children got the maths, are ready to move on and you have 6 who need the lesson again

You start from the principle that all children can achieve in maths.

They probably didn’t understand and were left behind on a few preceding, more basics concepts. What you do is you don’t let that happen from Reception onwards.

You change the methodology that underpins the maths teaching, from rote learning repetitive narrow examples, which some learning styles may find meaningless, to learning fundamental mathematical concepts in different context. You teach them to think, not to do exercises. You respect their learning style, people learned sitting in rows for centuries and turned out all right.

You teach them to derive satisfaction from learning new ideas. New ideas from the teacher at the front are more interesting than the rubbish joke from the disruptive attention seekeing peer at "the bottom table". Teach them to respect themselves and others. Yes, let them explore , ask questions and find their own answers as part of the mix, but in a structured way, when they are ready.

The Mastery method is clear – you don’t wait the assessment to find out they are behind, but do rapid intervention when they are struggling, so they are ready to move on with the others. Yes, you work more in depth with the others and take time to teach the children that don’t get it the fundamentals until they really understand.

One lesson is a very short time in a 13 year school career. It is a lesson that lays foundation for their success in the following school learning and in their lives. They are worth it. Teaching them is what teachers are for.