To be concerned about primary teachers not having basic maths skills?

[ThreeTimesThree]

My year 3’s DS teachers are repeatedly making mistakes, and I’m wondering if I need to raise this officially with the school.

His usual class teacher (who is now on leave) was unable to read a scale over 100cm. (This was during home schooling and I happened to be with him at the time) So when the scale went to 100cm and 3cm, she said “130cm and 3cm”. And for the next example made a similar mistake. My son said this was not right and what the answer should be. To which she apologised, and just skipped the rest of these similar questions.

Another teacher he’s had since April was unable to do fractions; so saying 3/4 of 120 is 30, 5/6 of 180 is 30, 2/3 of 90 is 30. My DS pointed out these were incorrect and told her what the answers should be. So at first she insisted her working were right But DS insisted it was not right and explained his working out,she double checked and said yes and made the class rub their work out and rewrite it down. She’s now off isolating so DS currently has a supply teacher.

Supply teacher “teaching” fractions last week. And saying 1/2 x2 = 2/4, 1/5 x 5 = 5/25, 2/4 x 2 = 4/8. She was trying to teach equivalent fractions. DS told the teacher those were incorrect, and she was just rewriting the same fraction but using different numbers.

But the teacher insisted she was right. My son said 1/2 x 2 is the same as 1/2 + 1/2 which equals 1. But she replied, “we are not doing addition, we are doing multiplication.” And told DS he was confused. DS has amazing maths skills and came home that day very upset as the teacher was teaching them incorrect maths.

I had a word with the teacher the following morning to say DS was upset and if she could tell me what she had taught. And sure enough she said she was teaching the children 1/2 x 2 = 2/4, 1/5 x 5 = 5/25. I politely pointed out these didn’t look right, and if she could review what she was teaching them. But the next day she did the same mistakes again, as my DS informed me.

Just wondering if I should raise this with the head? Surely teachers need to have better maths skills than this?

I think sadly there are a lot of primary school teachers whose maths is not sufficient to teach years 5 and 6. To struggle with year 3 work is very worrying. I am appalled by the fact that they do not seem to acknowledge there weaknesses which means they do little to improve . How can we improve children's maths which such inadequacy - no wonder people seek outside tuition

@sunshinesontv

I must admit that I came on ready to defend the teacher.

I teach and those live lessons delivered during lockdown will not be indicative of her everyday teaching. I was excruciatingly aware that 30 entire families were watching my lessons and ready to critique them. I knew mistakes would be discussed on the class whatsapp, and every lesson felt like a high-stakes observation. I was ready to say that a mistake under those conditions would induce panic in most people.

However, you have detailed too many mistakes, that still persist now, and she is worryingly unable to accept these even when they are pointed out.

I would email the Head. She won't appreciate it of course, but it will lead to more Maths observations and the support and training she needs.

I agree. It will have been hard for teachers knowing their teaching was being potentially watched by parents and there’s bound to be mistakes. I’m not fussed about those, provided the teacher realises and rectifies them. During the live lessons, there were times when DS’s class teacher would make mistakes, and DS would tell me. I would just laugh if off and say yes, she probably just made a silly mistake, and meant to say x, and leave it at that. But as you say, when huge mistakes in maths are being pointed out and the teacher can not recognise this and proceeds to teach a whole lesson incorrectly, and again the following day, that’s what worries me.

@Flipflops85

We still get year 7s coming in with huge misconceptions at a class level and you can guess which primary they have come from.

Yes, all primary teachers are very stupid. I mean I don’t know why the hell we get paid. It’s refreshing to know that secondaries have it in hand, otherwise the pupils would be doomed. Poor bloody kids.

Did I say it was every school? Every teacher? No, I said I can usually tell which school they went to because their science educations is very poor.

I know some exceptional primary teachers. They teach subjects and skills I couldn't. But I also come across some woeful ones, just like you do with people in all professions.

Yikes that's "interesting" absolutely raise the issue.

Depends which ‘average’ you are using, it might not be a mean average
Even when it is not the mean. The only case when it is guaranteed to match is when the mentioned "average" is a median calculated exactly on the same data sample (ie average of the aggregated hospital level), but this is a very artificial measure in this case.

Eg. it is possible for more than 50% of hospitals to be above the median (country wide) waiting time for cancer treatment, as seen from the overall patient population - as hospitals are themselves of very different size. This is actually quite commonly observed.

[quote Plantlover23]@Theydidntwin is right, if the supply teacher was teaching equivalent fractions she wasn’t actually wrong as the fractions should be the same and you do work out equivalent fractions by multiplying the numerator and denominator by the same number. E.g 1/2 = 2/4 - multiply both the numerator and denominator by 2.

Her only real mistake was putting the multiplication sign between the fractions as it makes it appear like they are multiplying rather than finding equivalence. The only way I would change this would be to illustrate using arcs across the top of the fraction and bottom of the fraction that I am multiplying the numerator and denominator by the same number 🤷🏻‍♀️ So I assume the reason she came back the next day and ignored your DS was because she was actually correct

The other two are pretty terrible however! Especially for a normal class teacher he has all the time I would definitely mention it to someone. Maths is often very heavily resourced now and there’s huge amounts of support for teachers for subject knowledge, so there isn’t really any excuse for them not to know.[/quote]
Saying 1/2 x 2 = 2/4 is incorrect and she should have rectified it there and then when it was pointed out my a pupil.
There are no excuses. It’s like teaching a class additions, but instead of putting an addition sign there, there’s a multiplication sign, i.e. 5 x 5 = 10. And then saying “the only real mistake is putting a multiplication sign as it makes it appear they are multiplying rather than adding.” That is not ok.
And she was not “actually correct.”

I have no issues with teachers making mistakes which they rectify or accepting they may need support in a particular area. But to not realise these mistakes and continue to teach incorrect math, I find unacceptable.

And then lots of other people chip in with terrible ideas which would confuse children even more!

If that was aimed at me, I have been teaching equivalent fractions to Y3 this week. The example I gave was exactly the type that the extremely well-regarded, extremely widely-used scheme we use suggests we give to the children. All of mine grasped that quite happily, and in the plenary we addressed 1/5 x 5 = 5/25 to show the difference between just multiplying by 5 and finding the equivalent fraction.

Depends which ‘average’ you are using, it might not be a mean average

This was GMTV, they wouldn't understand anything other than a mean.

Is there any monitoring and evaluation for supply teachers to ensure quality?

That depends on the school or college, I had a long term supply where I was observed 3 times on my first day.

Some schools / colleges treat you as a regular member of staff, particularly if it is along term post so you are observed as pat of the school monitoring and OFSTED inspections.

When it is daily cover it's more difficult. Personally I hated being given music as supply, I can't play an instrument or sing, you have a group of teenagers who all want to play the instruments and as their teacher knows you are not a specialist the work left is usually something like, "make a poster for a school concert".

(As in, it doesn't!)

@supermoonrising

As a former primary teacher, I think it’s ludicrous that all primary teachers are expected to teach Maths. Having a B or C at GCSE and passing their numeracy test doesn’t mean you’re any good at Maths, let alone able to teach it. You can’t effectively teach a subject you’re not confident about yourself. It really is that simple IMO.

Having said that, I guess the problem is they can’t recruit enough Maths teachers for secondary school let alone needing even more for primary schools.

Really? I went to a bog standard state primary school in Scotland in the 1960s and then an even more bog standard state primary school in England in the early 1970s. Not a single teacher I ever had struggled with the basics of maths, which in those days meant pretty much exclusively arithmetic. They were also red hot on spelling, grammar and punctuation and managed to teach us to read to a good standard and to do extended writing. I didn't have their CVs, of course, but I'd be amazed if any of my teachers were graduates. Back then the usual thing was to do exams at school (state school, usually) and then go to Teacher Training College for 3 years.

That's what my Mum did (also a primary school teacher) and in her late 80s she is still exceptionally good at arithmetic, spelling etc.

The curriculum nowadays is a lot wider but as time has not expanded this surely has to mean some things are not studied in as much detail.

Have I missed if this is a long term supply or daily cover?

I think this thread is a good example of the confusion in primary schools.

I am secondary English trained but have been working in primary on supply. I have left several schools at the end of a working day in tears of frustration. I taught a lesson on words that end in y and how we pluralise them and was told categorically by the TA that I was wrong and to add an apostrophe and ‘s’.

Regarding maths, there seems to be real confusion between those taught the traditional way and those coming through with the new methods. There is also a problem with those who have plateaued at primary level and don’t have an in-depth understanding of the subject as it progresses beyond the basics.

I would also say that the primary curriculum is designed a certain way and within it, there are elements that can be seen as incorrect when viewed by subject specialists. A good example is the question: how many sides does a circle have?. The answer would not satisfy mathematicians.

I don’t know what is behind this. I could weep for the way we teach English at primary. However, much of the logic behind the work is designed to teach children who don’t have strong literacy and numeracy levels. I was reading books and newspapers far advanced for my age when young but there is a real gap with the comprehension levels in some classes. I worked with a teacher who had never heard of Pompeii and Herculaneum - at primary that surprised me, but not others.

I don’t know the answer anymore as maths in particular has to adhere to mathematical logic yet I do see a loosening of that precision in the language of explanation, which, unless you have a very clear understanding of maths, can lead to more confusion.

I taught a lesson on words that end in y and how we pluralise them and was told categorically by the TA that I was wrong and to add an apostrophe and ‘s’.

A TA, not a teacher. They don’t have minimum progressional standards for English and mathematics.

@Ariannah

Raise? Report? Why do we need to jump immediately to this sort of anger. What an odd post? Nothing about the words “raise” or “report” implies anger. You would normally report something by politely emailing the head about the issue and requesting a meeting to discuss further.

Yes that was quite a bizarre reaction wasn’t it. No I’m not angry, I’m concerned. And wondering if the school i.e. HT should know so they can be aware and provide the right support to the teachers should they need it. And by raise, indeed I did mean a calm, polite email to the HT outlining my concerns.

Wasn't it the sainted Michael Gove himself who said that he wanted all schools to be above average?

Supply teacher was for just over a week.

OP, I share your concern. I've been a primary teacher for over 30 years and, whilst I can tell you that there are stresses and strains in the sector that most people have no idea about, I think you are well within your rights to take this one higher.

@NDSandG

I think you only need a C in maths (in old money). But this is primary school maths and with the support of answer books and the internet, no excuse to get these wrong. This teacher shouldn’t be in a classroom if she can’t handle basic fractions or even be bothered to check that she might be wrong. Absolutely speak to the headteacher.

Anyone teaching now, who qualified in more recent years, have also done the maths skills test as it was compulsory for access to the course.

We ended up home-schooling as I was so disgusted at the quality of maths teaching .

He didn't last the term

No wonder kids leave school practically illiterate.

Ah well, there you go. You can all feel happy and smug.The 8 year old can feel all excited about his fractions and being so super intelligent.

It's shocking that anyone teaching our children can have such a poor understanding of the material they're 'qualified' to teach. And so many people on this thread trying to interpret the examples as possibly right is actually quite frightening. Whatever the teacher thought she was teaching, it was wrong. Just wrong. There can be traditional and modern approaches to teaching maths, but the maths itself does not change. In this case, it was just plain wrong.

This year was the first year entrants who didn't need to do it.
Certainly at the universities Dd applied to including the one she has started at.
They all talked about it in their open days but by the time she actually needed to look at booking it (had to be done prior to starting the course) it had been stopped.

Anyone recently qualified will have done them, probably 3 years ago.

To be fair the skills tests weren't fit for purpose. It wasn't just that they were a barrier. They didn't test the right kind of skills and were too focused on speed than accuracy.

A recent maths GCSE should be sufficient. I'd support it being moved to a 5 (or 6 even) for those teaching maths, including primary. It was changed to a 4 instead of 5 because the government kept changing the goal posts when it came to what constituted a grade c following the change in grading.

@PurpleDaisies

I would consider that something a TA (especially one who had been in that year group for several years) would know but my bigger concern was that she argued with me, in front of the class, that I was wrong.

@threetimesthree. With respect, I think you are wrong. 1/2x2 by common sense means '2 halves' which equals 1 whole. BUt mathematically, a whole number when written as a fraction has the denominator (bottom number) as 1. So the calculations id 1/2 x 2/1 and the answer is 2/2 = 1. To explain it another way the faction we call 'a half' is one whole amount divided by 2. The number we call '2' is 2 units, not divided by anything -or if you want to express it as a fraction, you write it as 2/1fraction, you write 2/1. I am a retired teacher (Science) and I am worried that these teachers don't understand fractions.

Children need the key maths and English in order to be successful at primary. It irritates me that too much time is spent on pointless tasks - of course maths and English can be reinforced in other subject which helps. The poor teaching hold the able back in particular - by the time some children reach year 5 their maths is superior to the teachers that teach them - this is totally unacceptable. The training up of TAs is great but the maths of the year 5 and 6 groups needs to be good not as is currently the case in a significant number of primaries.

She's right that the answers she's come up with are equivalent fractions. She is wholly incorrect that "1/2 * 2" is going to result in an equivalent fraction. Show her half a cake and then ask her what she'd have if she multiplied it by 2!

I completely understand teachers making one off mistakes now and then and being corrected by their students. That's fine, and has the benefit of teaching children to think critically about what they're told even by people in authority, and how to raise errors politely(!)

This isn't that. She's been corrected on several occasions by a student and now another adult and she's digging her heels in. It shows a fundamental lack of understanding of what she is teaching which she is perpetuating to all her students. Definitely raise it.