To wonder if there are supporters of grammar schools who didn't go to grammar schools themselves

[WildebeestH]

Just that really. The only friends I have who support grammar schools went to grammar schools themselves. I'm intrigued to know if there are many people who support them having not been to a grammar (or other selective) school and if so why?

Please don't tell me we've had a 544 post discussion and some people don't actually know what a comprehensive school is..........

But we have had some people assuring us that they don't work, even though there appears to be doubt as to what they are.

Twoheaped, of course a school that deliberately selects the brightest kids aged 10 gets better results than a school which takes kids of all abilities. That's just obvious, and nothing to do with grammar schools being better than comps.

Yes, the results of some comps in the county are damned good. Others are dire.

"No, the closest in results are nowhere near the grammar school"

As I said, can you think of a reason why that might be?

I think people would be happier with the offering of different courses within the same building, such as the vocational courses, mentioned up thread. But that seems to have been now dropped?

The Tories didn't like it, Head

Things that teachers have said they have been taught in their teacher training courses:

• VAK learning styles – taught there and still being taught
• Investigative learning better than explicit instruction
• Whole Language methods for teaching reading
• Making lessons engaging as a means of behaviour management – cited by many teachers as first heard in their ITT training
• AfL, leading to burdensome data collection
• Reading Recovery (still being supported by the IoE, despite the lack of evidence for it)

Of course, there is undoubtedly a lot of other nonsense that comes from consultants, the DfE etc. But many of the worst and most damaging ideas in education undoubtedly have originally come from education academics.

Bert you misunderstand.
The school closest to the grammar got 77% maths and English, 80% for the 5 subjects.
School my dc go to (15 miles from grammar) got 87% for the 5, one 2 miles from that got 83%.
Conversely, where we have moved to, top results were 58% and again 12 miles (as crow) from grammar, so well outside catchment.

I think people would be happier with the offering of different courses within the same building, such as the vocational courses, mentioned up thread. But that seems to have been now dropped?

There are people on both sides of the political spectrum who feel that it's important not to push children onto vocational courses too early. Also, there is the question of whether the vocational courses are good quality. I know some left-leaning people believe that some of the previous courses the Tories got rid of were pretty useless.

Personally, I can see the arguments both ways, so I'm torn. One of the problems is about what 'vocational' courses should consist of these days is that a lot of the things that were taught as vocational at my comprehensive school (a long time ago) are no longer relevant. Shorthand and typing, for example. (I learned to touch-type there!). Others, like auto mechanics have, I believe, become too specialised and high-tech.

Touch typing is still very much relevant - most of us use computers these days, and being able to touch type, as I can, (self-taught) is much quicker than pecking away with two fingers.

Things that teachers have said they have been taught in their teacher training courses:

Yes, but crucially, since I left my teacher training course over a decade ago, I've not seen them. Except AfL, which is actually a decent idea and shouldn't be on your list. Instead I've been presented with a whole range of new bollocks coming from different sources. Triple marking, for example, came from Ofsted. Growth mindset - that book by Carol Dweck. That shitty video on creativity from Ken Robinson and the awful Shift Happens one. A whole bunch of stuff about iPads in classrooms coming mainly from people who sell iPads.

Touch typing is still very much relevant - most of us use computers these days, and being able to touch type, as I can, (self-taught) is much quicker than pecking away with two fingers.

Shorthand is still very much in demand. OK, not needed by every secretary as it used to be, but those with shorthand skills today can command better salaries and jobs. Rather than it being a dead skill, it's more of a niche skill these days.

Shorthand?

You are seriously suggesting teaching shorthand?

Give me strength.

The standard of vocational courses I do think did go down I agree. In needlework /Dt I made a blouse, whereas my children made a felt square hat.
I think it's almost as if the students wanting to go into vocational training are sat waiting until they are 16 to start.

Yes, but crucially, since I left my teacher training course over a decade ago, I've not seen them.

But the starting point of this discussion was my PP about 'education experts' - the ones who are likely to be appointed to a panel supervising education. Whether or not those things are currently being taught (and VAK most certainly still is), the fact that they were taught, and taught for so long, is at the origin of a great many false beliefs about education held by people with influence - the education 'experts' my original post referred to. Who don't tend to be relatively new entrants to the profession.

Touch typing is still very much relevant

I agree that it's relevant, but it's not 'vocational' the way it used to be before personal computers, when huge numbers of people were employed as typists.

We made skirts in primary school. This was a long time ago, but I still sew for pleasure.

But the starting point of this discussion was my PP about 'education experts'
But then we had a panel of non-primary experts introducing SPAG to primary schools. They were then hoping to get on to the bit that they knew about, secondary education, but that got scrapped. So you have the current mess of obscure bits of grammar for primary school pupils, whereas some of it would make sense for secondary both for English and MFL.

For anyone who is interested in accurate representation of what named, individual schools are doing, I asked the deputy headteacher of Michaela whether it would be true to say that teachers there are expected to 'teach from a script'.

He replied:

No, that would be a completely inaccurate description! We create cohesive resources but our teaching is not scripted.

the ones who are likely to be appointed to a panel supervising education

What makes you say that? The government appointed Tom Bennett (a popular choice among teachers) to head up the behaviour review. Gove got Carol Vorderman to head up his report into maths education and she did an excellent job, which Gove then ignored entirely. Professor Sir Adrian Smith was appointed to head up the review into post-16 maths education and probably did an excellent job but his review was kicked into the long grass and we'll probably now never see it.
I don't think the problem is the experts that are chosen, I think the problem is politicians ignoring the experts. If an expert came on and banged on about learning styles or whatever, they'd be laughed off the stage. What the Lib Dems appear to be advocating is for some of the major decisions about schools and the curriculum to be taken out of the hands of politicians, and to stop treating it like a political football. This is hugely important.

kesstrel it's odd then, that their book contains scripts for lessons. It's certainly very prescriptive.

But then we had a panel of non-primary experts introducing SPAG to primary schools.

That's an interesting point, but I would argue that the reason for this is that some 'experts' in the 1970s and 80s decided (without any supporting evidence) that children didn't need any grammar instruction, because we learn to speak 'naturally'. (Things being 'natural' was really big back in the 70s.) Of course, they were ignoring the fact that written language is different from spoken language, in that it lacks pauses and inflection, and so requires conventions like capital letters and punctuation, otherwise it's a mess. And in order to properly understand where to put the punctuation, you need at least some understanding of grammar, intuitive or taught.

So we lost all our expertise in how to teach grammar to primary school children, and the teachers now expected to teach it don't understand it either. And no one in education departments did any research on it, either, because it had been deemed unnecessary and counter-productive (inhibiting creativity). IMO, the government would have been better off consulting real experts in countries that don't speak English, where they still teach grammar, in order to get ideas from them.

You are seriously suggesting teaching shorthand?

No, where the hell did I say that????????????? Stop reading things into other peoples' posts - it makes you look stupid.

Noble, ffs, you were looking at a tweet of a section of one page of their book - you said yourself you hadn't read it! I now have the book, and can assure you that the "script" you claim you saw was an example of a didactic lesson, to illustrate the principles behind their teaching methods. But obviously, they must be lying about it, ....

I think the biggest driver of teaching fads in schools over the past decade has been Ofsted. The amount of training sessions I've sat in that have started 'what Ofsted will be looking for is...'. That's what drove the learning objective obsession, the three part lesson, the mini plenaries, the endless poring over data to demonstrate progress, the insane marking policies. All because schools are terrified of Ofsted, and anything that anyone has heard has met with Ofsted approval is instantly leaped on and made mandatory.

kesstrel it's interesting that you appear to have the dep head on hotdial and explains a lot. But teachers all teaching the same lessons in the same style from the same resources using the same methods is teaching from a script.