To think if you cannot add one half to one quarter you really should not be in teaching

[mrgrouper]

I am starting teacher training in September and so have joined some teacher training Facebook groups. We all have to pass professional skills tests in literacy and numeracy. The tests are pretty easy but there is a mental arithmetic test that a lot of trainees are panicking on. A woman has posted that she is doing the mock test and it claims one half plus one quarter is three quarters and she has no idea how the examiners had worked this out. She is not training to be a maths teacher but surely all teachers should know basic maths. I knew this stuff aged 7.

In my top year of primary school, my teacher used to send us to the school secretary if we got some of the harder questions wrong, because she didn't understand some of them herself. We all just accepted it, and it worked well, but that was simple algebra - very different from not understanding simple fractions!

I also recall that there was just one poor little girl in our class at 8, who couldn't grasp dividing a circle into quarters - I remember because we all tried to help her get it (and eventually she did).

So struggling with that level ofmaths as an adult doesn't seem to suggest that she'd be very capable dealing with all sorts of questions that bright children come up with in a school :-/

I decided to ask DS2 who is 8 and professes to be bad at fractions. It took him about 2 seconds to come up with the correct answer.

YANBU. Anyone who does not know this should still be sitting in Y3 primary school. Repeating the year until they are ready to move on.

If they are primary, they will need to be able to teach multiplying and dividing fractions in Y6.

Such a shame that the government have made so many good teachers leave teaching because of the pressure and bureaucracy. Now there is pressure on the trainers to get more people to qualify, but they are people who ten years ago wouldn't have been allowed to start training in the first place.

I despair for the education system TBH.

I should add that expected levels for maths have increased a lot recently. We are now teaching in Y6 what would a few years ago have been Y9 level. It's a lot more complex than when I trained, but I have refreshed my knowledge accordingly!

I'd have thought some bright Reception kids and lots of Year 1's / most Year 2's) would know this?

Yes! Repeat the year until you have mastered the skills! (Unless there is a learning disability/insert pc term here ) Don't sweep it under that carpet and leave the student to fall further and further behind...

Surely this is a wind up? My 7 year old would know that. My 12 year old bought a maths question home....How many eye balls would fit in an Olympic size swimming pool? Now that did stump me. But fractions are just basic.

I misread the OP = spent half an hour on Google and asking various people, thinking I'd lost my fucking mind.

I can't reat but yay I can add!!!

• read (or evidently spell)

The reason that teachers who have a poor grasp of subject matter won't last is that they are scrutinised within an inch of their lives.

Ha! Are you kidding? They're scrutinised by people who don't have any better grasp of the subject than they do!

Crunchy, sadly, I doubt this is a wind up. I was a TA all of two years. In that time I'd worked with a teacher who told the class that Africa was a country. Slip of the tongue, surely? Well, according to the same teacher, Australia wasn't a continent (she actually told me off in front of the class for saying it was).
Another teacher didn't know what a mammoth was (the class were discussing animals and a 5-y.o. mentioned mammoth), so a helpful TA explained to her that mammoths were from Ice Age, the film I also worked alongside a nursery nurse who wouldn't let me make bubble mixture with soap and water. Apparently that wasn't "proper bubble" because it didn't come from a bottle with "made in China" on it. I could go on... :(

It has to be primary.
In the new GCSEs, a minimum of 15% of the marks are awarded on the maths content of the paper - in every single subject ...

Sorry that was to Notmuchtosay1 not "Crunchy*
haven't slept for a week

Such a shame that the government have made so many good teachers leave teaching because of the pressure and bureaucracy
I left in the last couple of years because it was sending me doolally. I used to love teaching fractions- so many good resources and fun practical activities. I'm now a sheep farmer and divide sheep into groups instead.

See no reason why someone who can't add a half and a quarter can't teach history, English, art, pe or some other non scientific/ numerate subject.

It's shocking though that such a person ever passed GCSE maths.

I once had a teacher in primary school who couldn't do algebra. There were a few of us in the class who had already learnt how to do algebra, so we were a bit

It was part of the curriculum, but after she tried (and failed) to teach us, she had to get a teacher in from another class to help. The other teacher couldn't be there for everything lesson, of course, so she eventually gave up teaching us algebra. We just did old work instead. When my parents found out they were a bit displeased.

I can understand why some people choose to home educate when I hear of things like this

I'm glad the teachers in our school are all great with maths. The year 5 and 6 teacher is head of maths and they really push the students in year 6. They have extra maths after school one day a week from Christmas through to the sats. Their aim is all children getting a level 5 and some a 6. (Though I know the sats have changed now this last year) I know the grades are mostly to make the school look good. But I am thankful we have great teachers. I tested the OP's question about a quarter and a half on my son who has just turned 7. He had a crumpet cut into 4 this morning he ate one piece and I asked how much he'd eaten. He said a quarter. Then I showed the half and said "this is a half and this is a quarter, what does that add up to?" He'd got no idea what a half plus a quarter was...but when I put the question differently and said "how much crumpet is left" He knew it was three quarters. So putting the question a different way worked.

Probably. Some people have difficulty visualizing fractions whereas your brain can probably picture a circle or cake! It is a little alarming as I would expect a 7 year old to be able to do it.

On the eyeballs question... work out rough dimensions of eye ball or use large marbles. How many fit in a box 10x10x10cm. Use this knowledge to work out how many would therefore fit in a pool...

On the eyeballs question... work out rough dimensions of eye ball

Interesting - I think that a sphere of diameter 'r' occupies about 1/2 the space of a cube radius 'r'. (I heard that recently on a discussion about over estimating).

So take it from there.. I just can't imagine a pool of eyeballs.

But how many otters can fit in a plane?

97, unless you allow for an extra 3 on the flight deck...

But that would be in contravention of CAA regulations Mrs Wembley!

Ah, hang on...

How about two in the toilet and one in the fridge? (Assuming, of course, that you take out the shelves and turn it off.)