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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

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

297 replies

mrgrouper · 13/07/2016 13:43

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.

OP posts:
eyebrowsonfleek · 13/07/2016 17:39

I'm a parent of 3 and have sat in more than a handful of Parents Evenings where the teacher has admitted that they don't know their tables and work the out.
Not knowing half plus a quarter is gobsmacking if you are aiming to be a teacher.

Original poster
mrgrouper · 13/07/2016 17:39

pauldacre
I swear it is true. I must have got to the phase where I had doubts about my teacher, so asked her one half times one half and she said one. I went home and said my teacher is a wally I am not going back. Mum said she probably misheard and thought I asked one half plus one half, so she said go back and ask one quarter MULTIPLIED by one quarter, which I did and she said one half.
At this point I went totally beserk and refused to go back, so mum had to shift me to another school.

OP posts:
corythatwas · 13/07/2016 17:42

Never mind becoming a teacher: how do people manage to get through life if they can't work out how to divide 3 pizzas/biscuits/lengths of garlic bread between 4 people?

Or is this mathematical inability a direct result of today's wasteful society where you always buy more than is needed and the rest goes in the bin?

dotdotdotmustdash · 13/07/2016 17:43

I knew someone training to be an English teacher who admitted she'd never understood apostrophe rules. I did find that strange.

I came across this recently with a primary stage teacher (I'm a supply TA). I had gently pointed out that she had missed an apostrophe and she admitted that she thought that they only came after an 's'.

derxa · 13/07/2016 17:43

Yet another bloody teacher bashing thread.

sorenofthejnaii · 13/07/2016 17:45

Oooh.

Fraction division and multiplication. A whole new ball game !

I have 4 pizzas. Each person needs 1/3 of a pizza. How many slices will there be?

Singapore Maths and all that - and why do we always do pizzas?

Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g · 13/07/2016 17:45

It's not a teacher bashing thread, derxa. It's a thread about the required knowledge and skills to train and work as a primary teacher.

RhodaBull · 13/07/2016 17:45

This is a potential teacher bashing thread. Why, as presumably a teacher, would you want substandard people to join the profession? Confused

user1467101855 · 13/07/2016 17:46

Am I to understand that the min standard of Maths for UK primary school teachers (who will be teaching your children maths?) is GCSE level? 16 year old level.

Oh good fuck. Although that explains a lot.

Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g · 13/07/2016 17:47

Pizzas are great and slice up very nicely. Personally I'm happy to use anything edible, but it does get messy if the item in question doesn't slice easily. Lots of crumbs if you try to break biscuits into quarters, for example. Grin

callherwillow · 13/07/2016 17:49

What do you think should happen user?

ellie264 · 13/07/2016 17:49

I must admit that when I started a high level accounting course, I had to revise my basic fractions on the GCSE Bitesize website! Blush

But, as someone has said before, surely 1/2 add 1/4 is basic common sense, not requiring any true maths skills? I would be very worried if a teacher could not grasp that.

CalmItKermitt · 13/07/2016 17:49

My English teacher once dropped me a mark for using "grisly" to describe a gruesome murder. She red penned it and changed it to "grizzly" 🙄😡

Derxa - it's not teacher bashing! It's IMPORTANT that they're competent fgs!

UnikittyInHerBusinessSuit · 13/07/2016 17:51

The woman in question is not a teacher derxa, she's struggling to pass the first hurdle required to start training - which is very reassuring.

user1467101855 · 13/07/2016 17:51

I think your teachers should at least have maths at an 18 year old level as an absolute minimum, for a start!

KyloRenNeedsTherapy · 13/07/2016 17:52

What level of maths should they have user? I'm confused. I have a GCSE maths and teach to Y6 - I don't need anymore than that!

callherwillow · 13/07/2016 17:52

Start a thread saying teachers should have a degree, everyone agrees because teachers are professionals / proffessionels.

Start a thread saying the degree should be a certain standard and everyone goes mad because teachers are actually better when they are less bright and 'I know someone with a PHD in physics from Oxford who was the WORST teacher ...'

sorenofthejnaii · 13/07/2016 17:52

I asked a class if they would like 3/4 of a pizza or 9/12 of a pizza.

1 child wanted 9/12 as he would get more slices. Which is true.

CalmItKermitt · 13/07/2016 17:53

When we looked round secondaries for DS, some of the students' work was on show. In one of the workbooks, a student had used "who's" in context and the teacher had corrected it - wrongly - to "whose".

Impressive 🙄

derxa · 13/07/2016 17:55

It's not a teacher bashing thread, derxa. It's a thread about the required knowledge and skills to train and work as a primary teacher. I know all about 'the required knowledge and skills to train and work as a primary teacher'. If you can't add 1/2 + 1/4 then you won't last 5 minutes in teacher training. The most able pupils in Y6 often have maths ability above the old Level 6.

callherwillow · 13/07/2016 17:56

I don't think that's always true Derxa

sorenofthejnaii · 13/07/2016 17:57

I think your teachers should at least have maths at an 18 year old level as an absolute minimum, for a start

I think that's a high expectation and would eliminate a lot of good teachers.

There are children - especially in yr6 - who I think are probably better at maths than their teacher. Mind you, there are some who probably know more about other things than their teacher.

It's important for a teacher to recognise this.

sorenofthejnaii · 13/07/2016 17:58

If you can't add 1/2 + 1/4 then you won't last 5 minutes in teacher training

If you can't do that, then you shouldn't even have got a GCSE C to get onto teacher training in the first place.

corythatwas · 13/07/2016 18:00

derxa, how is this teacher-bashing, unless one assumes (which no one on this thread does) that nothing better can be expected from a teacher?

Surely the fact that posters are unanimously saying "this woman should not be a teacher" suggests that they do not believe that teachers are generally ignorant?

Complaining of an incompetent doctor who is not doing his work properly (as I have done on occasion) is not doctor-bashing: it is expecting doctors to uphold certain standards; it is saying "doctors should not be incompetent and lazy".

I have also mentioned the dentist who twice tried to apply the anaesthetic to the wrong side of the patient's mouth: again not dentist bashing but reasonable expectations about competence.

The difference was that when patients complained (as they did) there was an investigation into this dentist's practice and the dentist in question is no longer around. It is incredibly difficult to do this to a teacher even for far more serious things than incompetence.

albertatrilogy · 13/07/2016 18:05

I think your teachers should at least have maths at an 18 year old level as an absolute minimum, for a start

I passed an O-Level Maths at the highest grade, but found I was struggling with my daughter's Year 7 Maths.

The syllabus had changed and that part of my brain has gone rusty. I'm sure with the right training I could get to A-Level.

My stepdaughter passed her GCSE Maths but was never confident due to a poor teacher at primary school. She is now a brilliant primary school teacher precisely because she knows what it's like to feel scared of sums and numbers - and what strategies can help to overcome the scared feelings.