AIBU for thinking the DfE have got this one wrong?

[herculepoirot2]

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7242631/Maths-spelling-tests-trainee-teachers-scrapped-attempt-boost-staff-numbers.html

Trainee teachers hated these tests, because they meant they could invest in a PGCE or on-the-job teacher training route, but be asked to leave because of limitations in their ability to spell or do basic calculations.

Then the Government cancelled the cap on the number of times you could take the test before being disqualified from teaching, because it was affecting recruitment numbers. Now the Government are abolishing the test altogether, because of the several thousands of potential teachers who have failed to qualify every year as a result of failing them.

Aren’t they mopping the decks on the Titanic? If teaching has become so undesirable as a profession that they can only plug the gap by recruiting people who struggle to spell twenty middle-order words, or to calculate a simple percentage value given pen and paper, shouldn’t they be dealing with the very obvious workload and behaviour issues affecting the numbers of people applying to teacher training, rather than lowering the standard of education required to do it?

I have a small child. Although I sympathise with those colleagues who have signed up to teacher training and had to leave because they couldn’t pass these tests, some of whom have been absolutely lovely, I do not want my child taught by someone whose ability to spell and do simple maths has never been tested in any robust way.

AIBU?

A^nd where in teaching would anyone use the skills needed for the maths one? Yes you would need the ability to work out the answers but why is such a horribly short period of time?

You would need to demonstrate these skills every day when teaching maths to primary level children!^

No you wouldn't; you would have to take the time to explain things in a way the pupils will understand. Watching you do a maths problem in18 seconds, they would learn nothing. Like when I ask DS to teach me anything IT related, because he is so competant, he does it so quickly, I am none the wiser.

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I just think it’s a shame that a person in the uk can be finished with the English language and maths by the age of 15-16 to be honest. Maybe I’m wrong, but it just doesn’t sit with me.

I have a First class hons in English, A in both A Level and GCSE and wanted to teach English. But I can't do the maths test. I have always struggled with it and I panic when I am given a test and with mental arthritic in general. I can do things at home with a calculator, but put me in a test environment and I fall apart. That is why I never went into teaching.

I think these tests should depend on what you want to teach and what skills you may need to employ while doing so e.g working out a percentage, or using a calculator for certain sums. If you are teaching art or PE maybe the tests could be different.

But overall they need to look at why teachers are leaving rather than trying to force through new ones

I think scrapping them is ridiculous, I've done the practice tests and none of it is hard. I get that the mental arithmetic section is initially daunting but actually the maths is easy and I was left with time to spare waiting for the question to move on.

Every teacher should be able to do that level of maths and English. I think especially so for primary teachers who need to be able to deliver every subject.

If you are teaching art or PE maybe the tests could be different.
ALL teachers have a responsibility to demonstrate basic literacy and numeracy in the classroom.

Primary school teachers are much better at literacy and numeracy across the curriculum because they see it as their job, whereas some secondary staff seem to think it doesn't matter that they can't spell or do basic sums because they don't teach maths and English.

They are not complex percentages in the test. The maths isn't complex. It requires brushing up on skills (I had a high grade in GCSE maths and had forgotten most of it) but it's not an unreasonable expectation of staff.

Just this week I have:
Graded assessments and worked out a percentage. It's much quicker without a calculator when the assessments are round numbers.
Done a data analysis of a key stage
Worked out costs for September's order
Done class groupings for next year

All of them require basic maths skills. All of them would have taken 4 times as long if I didn't have a basic level of functional numeracy.

Also who doesn’t have spell check?

Children who are learning to spell.

Colleagues who rely on spell check are a pain in the arse as it means I have to proof read everything. It is a handy tool for picking up typos but not a replacement tool for someone who doesn’t know how to spell.

I don't think scrapping the skills tests are the way forwards- although I do know a few people who live in rural areas who had to travel a long way to sit them- which is a PITA. Perhaps having more test centers and making it possible to sit the tests outside of Monday-Friday 9-5 would be a good idea?

I do sort of think the tests are neither here nor there (I passed them first time) but I'm also not sure someone who can't pass them would make a good teacher. They're just a hoop to jump through- and you can practice for them and there are some great YouTube videos available online. FWIW, I think the timed element of the maths test is worthwhile, because as a teacher you do have to be able to respond to children's questions quickly and under pressure!

I'm not sure making the PGCE easier to get onto is any sort of answer to the teaching recruitment/retention crisis. As someone who's just finished their PGCE, it's a bloody hard year- making it easier to get onto won't mean more people will finish it, necessarily. The drop out rate in my subject at my uni was about 25%, and I know from an NQT who'd been through the same PGCE, around 20% of her cohort had dropped out of their NQT years by Christmas.

I think there are really deep problems with teacher training that are linked to more general problems in teaching:

-Less schools (in shortage subjects at least) have full departments, so schools are less able to take trainees. This leads to trainees having insane commutes to placements/less suitable placements, which can be a contributory factor in them dropping out.

-Less experienced teachers are staying in schools, so in school mentors sometimes have less experienced and are less well equipped to support trainees. A lot of people I know had in school mentors who were say NQT + 2 and mentoring for the first time- this isn't a problem as such, but I do think having a good/bad mentor can make or break a placement for some people.

-If teachers you are working with are busy/stressed out, they obviously have less time to support you as a student- which means less good quality training.

-If you're in a busy/stressed out department, that's not a nice environment to train in, and it may put you off teaching.

-If you're seeing the problems in the profession first hand, this can obviously put people off wanting to be in the profession long term.

I'm not saying that the PGCE year should be made easier as such, but making it easier to get onto the PGCE won't necessarily help more people finish the PGCE, and long term won't produce more teachers. The fundamental problems in schools need to be addressed, and this will make teaching more attractive, and then there will be more new people coming into the profession.

I think the big crisis coming up for schools is also not getting a warm body in front of a class, but about who will be the future middle leaders and SLT in schools. If very few new recruits are staying in the profession for 5 years or more, it's hard to know where these will come from.

Yabbers are you another that would tell a dyslexic child to use a dictionary?

ALL TEACHERS ARE TEACHERS OF LITERACY.

Excuse caps but it is actually insulting to a PE teacher to suggest all they do is stand on a field with a whistle and tanned legs.

Excuse caps but it is actually insulting to a PE teacher to suggest all they do is stand on a field with a whistle and tanned legs.

I just started typing a dissenting reply, saying that I would worry more about losing really great PE teachers, but then I stopped, because actually that literacy test isn’t too much to expect of any intelligent adult. PE teachers teach exam PE, so they need to be able to spell/mark/correct errors.

From what I've seen- which isn't loads- GCSE level PE does actually involve a fair bit of maths, e.g. working out things like resting heart rate vs heart rate during exercise, working out oxygen debts, working out effects of different (performance enhancing) drugs on the body, sections about diet for different athletes and so on.

Also, it's just really important for young people to see adults modelling high standards of literacy and numeracy around them. These things are important for most jobs (and for getting a job too) so it's important that adults in the classroom can model these.

Teaching is hard (I’m not saying that it is the hardest job in the world, just to make that clear to anyone reading who tries to misinterpret what I say) and people are simply not staying in the job. This is despite some people believing we only have to work part time and get 13 weeks paid holiday.

None of these government plans are addressing this and trying to work out why people are leaving.

Making it easier to get onto a PGCE, or saying you don’t even need QTS or making teaching a non-graduate profession will not help. The job is what it is making people leave.

I'm actually appalled they're talking of scrapping them - I was cross enough when they set them to repeated tries.

They are not that hard - when I did them the hardest part about them was finding the centre that administered them in a portakabin in the arse end of the county, and having someone next to me who verbally worked out every single response as a distraction - I was one of the first couple of years who sat them when it was strictly limited tries and then you'd wasted your year of hell doing your PGCE. Actually revising for the Maths test was one of the best things I did in terms of practical mathematics I use daily now - the tricks to calculate quickly that were in the revision book I used have stuck with me and I use to this day.

Even if you're teaching the earliest of early years you still need to be numerically competent in order to interpret the data that comes along with education these days (yes I know the internal data demands are allegedly being reduced - believe it when I see it). As for the number of mistakes I see in worksheets, newsletters and on classroom walls - it's appalling - not talking about typos as everyone's fingers get ahead of their brain sometimes, but apostrophes carpet-bombed into plurals, its/it's and their/there/they're muddled up and the like... basic, basic literacy (and proofreading).

YANBU. I work as a learning support assistant in a secondary school. We have an unqualified teacher working there, she has failed the skills tests twice.

Recently I had to cover a lesson of hers. The email she sent me explaining the cover work, and the cover work itself (the worksheets to hand to students) were full of spelling mistakes and grammatical errors. It was so poor, the students noticed as well, and commented that it’s usually like that. It sets such a bad example for the students, and would reflect badly on the school during an inspection.

I think the English tests are an absolute necessity, anyone teaching children should have a good standard of spelling and grammar.

I think doing 5/6 subjects at 1/2 or 2/3 of an A level sounds more sensible tbh.

And that's exactly what happens in Scotland too. After compulsory school leaving age at 16, most students go on to study 5 subjects. Most do English and Maths, plus three others. Then Higher exams after a year. Last year at school there's room for further specialisation in Advanced Highers (harder than an A-level) or doing more Highers in different subjects.

The English/Welsh/Northern Irish system of three subjects over two years culminating in A-levels is exceptionally narrow when you look at nearly all of their close geographic neighbours.

This thread has made me thankful that I am in Ireland tbh

This thread has made me feel horribly depressed about the state of our schools.

Those that can't pass the tests shouldn't be able to teach. I thought it was silly when the 3 test cap was lifted.

I passed both tests on my first attempt and didn't find them difficult even though I've never felt particularly confident with maths.

I don't think that letting anyone onto training courses will solve the retention and recruitment problems.

Yanbu. The tests are not difficult. Even with the current tests there are plenty of teachers out there who lack subject knowledge. I taught primary and you could not effectively teach upper KS2 without being able to pass those tests.

To be honest hercule, the PE teachers at our school are pretty literate and many have maths or English as a second subject, nationally. There is also no shortage in recruitment to PE or art (or history) so if a few wannabes fail the test, it matters not.
What is more alarming are levels of what seems to be pretty basic literacy (as mentioned above) in primary teachers and in many secondary teachers of quite shortage subjects.

I have friend who was a wonderful TA and is a lovely, good person, who got into teaching via an access route. But she never got GCSE maths , eventually getting an equivalent and cannot spell very basic words. She is now a teacher of year 3. It does make me shudder. But she must have passed the tests!

I think all teachers of any subject should be able to pass the skills tests.

I also think talking about grade boundaries in terms of percentages with no reference at all to what is in the exam shows a real lack of understanding of assessment, and I hope it's not teachers doing it.

But she never got GCSE maths , eventually getting an equivalent and cannot spell very basic words. She is now a teacher of year 3

That is frightening

Piggywaspushed

True.

I did primary pgce- I passed the maths qts first time when I took it for real but I'd failed every practice test before hand by a mark or two. They're very time restricted and that's what does it. It's hard to get back in the swing.

They are also no indicators of intelligence, for those fretting. Several people on my course had good degree classifications and passed those tests (and uni assessments) but had some terrifying gaps in their basic knowledge and poor English. I found that far more worrying and would be far more concerned about that should they teach my child in future!

People have given examples of teachers who are not very good at basic numeracy and/or literacy. Therefore, is there any evidence that the skills tests are making sure that 'only the brightest' enter the profession (which I believe was the phrase used when Michael Gove introduced the tests)?

If the tests are not really 'raising standards' in teaching, then surely it is time they went.