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.

I went to this school. It's a crap hole, always has been.

In what way is it a craphole? It looked like a lovely well maintained building with by and large intelligent and relatively well behaved middle class students and nearly 90% come out with 5 good GCSE's. I'm sure improvements could be made but it didn't strike me as a craphole in any sense

Excellent post from Macklin.

Mehitabel In my school the majority of parents will, if finding out their child has had a detention or other sanction for things such as forgetting homework or books, being repeatedly late to class or being sent out of class for talking, will email the teacher to apologise, send their son or daughter to apologise and punish the son or daughter at home (usually grounding, or taking away phone or iPad). It´s a private school and we are abroad, in Spain, where parents are more "old-fashioned" and amongst our students there does seem to be a good level of discipline instilled at home. No school is perfect, students, teachers and parents are all human. For us, chatting is a problem, as, culturally, it´s very Spanish (sorry for the huge generalisation) and I do see some of the problems described by Macklin.

back at you BertrandRussell

"and private tuition/ retakes/ tutorial colleges."

My point was that if you are middle class and fuck up your education your parents will probably have the resources to let you have another go. But thanks for jumping down my throat and suggesting that I don't think the school gets the results it does fairly.

Apart from the usual low level rubbish, it was the twisting of the Chinese teacher's words I didn't like. The woman stated that Chinese students do better because they don't muck about. This was somehow twisted by Sophie into "she said I'm dumb".

In reality, this would be relayed to the parent and all hell would break loose for the poor teacher.

Vis a vis behaviour - year 9 is waaaaay different to year 7, (or KS2!). You wait.....

Pretend: I'm not talking about KS2. I'm talking about 14/15/16/17 year olds.

(Sorry I name changed. I was MackLin)

I don't believe for one second that education should be all chalk and talk from the teacher at the front, and I believe that the UK is now very good at encouraging children to think laterally. However, the Chinese teachers were clearly surprised and frustrated by the lack of respect/attention from the pupils. As a teacher myself, I notice this trend throughout schools. I teach Reception/Year One, and often experience children making fun of me or laughing in my face when I confront their behaviour. I do NOT put this down to poor classroom management. The children that behave this way come from a range of social economic backgrounds, with the similarity between them being that they rule the roost at home and have no understanding of why they should behave respectfully to other people, adults and children alike. If this behaviour is such a problem when they are so young, no wonder secondary schools in this country have problems with behaviour! I think that the problem is largely cultural, with UK parents sometimes misunderstanding concepts such as 'child led' and 'choice', resulting in children behaving in an over-entitled manner. We negotiate too much sometimes.

We were thinking about moving to Liphook specifically for that school. Now pleased we didn't.

Not the behaviour as such, but the up themselves attitude.

af2000
ilovechristmas1 I would love it if some of the parents of kids I teach came and saw how their children behaved in lessons! You sound like a great parent!

thank you,i think that schools should invite the parents of the children disrupting the lessons,may make them see what a hard job it is and how disruptive their little darlings can be

"Apart from the usual low level rubbish, it was the twisting of the Chinese teacher's words I didn't like. The woman stated that Chinese students do better because they don't muck about. This was somehow twisted by Sophie into "she said I'm dumb".

Have you met many 13 year olds? There is always a smart arse in any class......l

I was talking to a teacher the other day. She teaches at a different school to DS's. One of her pupils used the "c" word, she teaches YR . The child was sanctioned accordingly. Next thing she knows the parent has made a complaint against her. Parent's attitude was that her special snowflake could use any word she could as long as she knew the meaning of the word. As she knew the meaning of it, it was fine for her to use it.

Pity the parent as well as teaching her child such words couldn't teach her that there is a time and a place for such language.

The teacher now has to go through the head if she needs to sanction that child again

Agree with cremedecacao. Also the individual teacher may be very good but if s/he is operating in an organisation that doesn't have clear behavioural policies and lines of communication,( especially at secondary level ) the kids will soon see that ultimately the teacher isn't in charge.

Drudge, yes, as soon as children realise there is a limit as to what a teacher can 'do' boundaries will be pushed by some! I do not think that punishments need to be harsher, just that children need to have more of a sense of respect in the first place!

Ineedaholiday- sounds familiar. I tried to have a serious conversation with a parent about her child's continuous behaviour issues and her response was- "oh, x must be tired, I'll try co-sleeping with him"... NO no NO!

"The teacher now has to go through the head if she needs to sanction that child again"

I am sure there has been a misunderstanding somewhere here. This really isn't how it works.

Following on from cremedecacao´s excellent points, have any other teachers been asked by parents to discipline their child for them?

I´m not talking about lazy parents, but desperate ones, who have somehow, over time, reached a point at home where the child rules the roost and the parents cannot discipline them.

Often, when talking to parents of, say, Year 9 or 10 students, I will say, "It´s really important that they are reading every day, and dedicating themselves to studying for next month´s exams. otherwise they are going to fail." Parent then replies, "Please will you tell them that? They listen to you; they never listen to me."

I´ve even had parents literally asking me to do their job, "Can you tell my son to stop smoking?" "Can you tell my daughter to come home at her curfew?" (Obviously, the school educates students as to the risks of smoking and dissuades them from smoking, but if they are smoking outside of school hours and location, unless spotted by a teacher, we would say it is the parents´ place to deal with that).

And I am talking about middle-class professionals here, with two parent families. Not ones that the Daily Mail would snidely expect to have problems disciplining their children.

BertrandRussell It most definitely does.

If parents complain about a teacher´s assessment of their child (e.g. you give them a D because the work they produced is in line with the band on the examination board´s mark scheme that equals a D grade and your colleague who moderated the work agreed, parent thinks the child should have got a C or a B) or punishment (you say homework was plagiarised from the internet and provide the evidence to prove it; they say it´s coincidence), then in order to appease the parent, the school will prevent the teacher from making any decisions about that child´s assessment or discipline in future and instead refer it upwards to a Head of Department, Head of Year or overall Headteacher. Or the child will be moved to the group of a teacher who is happy to capitulate to the parent rather than treat the child the same as the other children at the school.

Err...BertrandRussell. I am a very experienced Secondary school teacher. I have met and squashed many smart arse kids. I have also known colleagues to have their words twisted so, yes it is how it works.

Smart arse is one thing but I would consider Sophie to be devious and one to watch.

I was only repeating what the teacher told me. And to be fair I don't think the parent should have been complaining about the teacher in the first place. My god if DS used that word now,and he is 10, in the classroom, never mind YR, I would have been apologising to the teacher not complaining

Ok, I've just watched this on catch up. Omg, the attitude of some of the 'naughty' ones is astounding, and very sad to know that this seems common place (reading some of the comments here).

There were some very encouraging comments though, like from the 2 girls about finally understanding equilibrium and Joe having the confidence to lead the class in solving the ring problem, and the class enjoying the morning exercise.

I grew up in a v similar situation (not china but close enough) and yes, indeed there was a lot of competition. V disheartening too when you go home with a 90% grade and your parents ask what happened to the other 10% or you find out that 90% is actually middle of the class and something like 40% got 100%. But it meant that we had to work hard. We had to listen and not goof about.

I was having this exact discussion with a group of mothers from our children's class recently, and it was clear that it was a cultural expectation. V few children goofed. If you did, you get called out immediately and punished (detention or otherwise. Parents called in etc). You don't ever want mum or dad to be hauled to the principal's office. And our class sizes were huge, 40+ and one teacher. No TAs, not even in primary school. At primary school too, we were taught by specialist teachers. So one teacher for math, one for science, one for English etc.

There was a hunger - some might call it 'competition or pressure cooking' but we just had to do well. Of course, I now know that that's not a good thing to do, but if one is able, then why not.

Acting up is really not acceptable. I remember some of my friends being like this - they had a v close relationship with the principal.

"then in order to appease the parent, the school will prevent the teacher from making any decisions about that child´s assessment or discipline in future and instead refer it upwards to a Head of Department, Head of Year or overall Headteacher. Or the child will be moved to the group of a teacher who is happy to capitulate to the parent rather than treat the child the same as the other children at the school."

Gosh. I have never heard of this happening- and I have been involved with several schools and know a lot of teachers. Sounds more like the sort of thing that might happen in a rubbish private school where they are desparate for the money............

I have heard of it in one particularly poor private school where they didn't want to lose pupils (and fees)

You can see the lack of respect for teachers on MN where they want it in general but not if their own 'little darling' is in trouble!
Thread titles say it all - very strong language. They are all for rushing in and giving it to the Head both barrels! My advice is always go in and have a friendly chat with the class teacher, find out all the facts before taking it further.

" I gathered that they had not been taught or expected to prove it, and I wondered why. Perhaps a previous teacher gave up in the face of groans and uproar? "

BR
"No. Two kids did the "but miss why do we have to learn this- when are we ever going to use it in life" line that I am sure we have all heard from our own kids. Did you miss the much larger group who went to talk to their maths teacher at lunchtime because they didn't understand something and were worried about being left behind? Or did that not fit with your prejudices?"

A group went to talk to the teacher at lunchtime, and this proves exactly what?
It doesn't reveal anything about why students felt they didn't need to prove the theorem, or why they felt their opinion about what they should be doing in maths should have any bearing on what was taught or what they were asked to do by the teacher. There is a lack of understanding of where teachers and students stand relative to each other, and a lack of understanding of where the students really are relative to the wider world here.

As to 'prejudices'. What I am going on here is experience and direct observation from the pov of a student. I went to a state school (in Ireland) where there were many issues wrt disruption in lower level classes. I was in class with many disruptive kids in the first year of secondary. My sisters had the same experience. The behaviour of the disruptive kids was mirrored in their behaviour out of school, in the evenings and at weekends.

BR
' I have it on good authority that only children in comprehensives ever say anything like that. While throwing chairs, dragging their knuckles and ruthlessly bullying any child with an IQ of over 100 who ended up there by mistake.'
It doesn't take a whole class of disruptive students to affect the learning environment. Two students who cannot be checked can screw it up for everyone. You seem determined to ignore the fact that in many schools, small minorities of students effectively dictate the terms on which classrooms are run, and this can extend to influencing the culture of the school as a whole. There are schools where going to the teacher to try to catch up would earn you ridicule.

My dad went to a highly regarded boarding school in Ireland in the 1930s where bullying was rife, there was fagging, some classrooms were uncontainable, unteachable, etc. The regime included cold baths every morning, and the punishments were pretty savage, and included caning. He drew from this experience that the leadership of the school dictated the general culture, and was a staunch opponent of corporal punishment and advocate of more sane approaches to education. However, he was shocked that a school that tried to be a lot more civilised would still have students who were determined to make school all about them and made it very difficult for teachers to fulfill their duties towards the rest of the class.

Twisting the Chinese teacher's comment about mucking about on the part of the class into 'The teacher says I'm dumb' isn't smart arseyness. It is an example of a student taking personally (and resenting as a blow to the ego) the teacher's comments about how the class functions. There is a lack of resilience there that people should be worried about. There is also a tendency to see school as being all about you and your feelings, which is fine for children of three but not for teenagers.