Worst student teacher you have seen on placement

[icecreamandapple]

About to start a PGCE very soon, just wondering are there any teachers who's had a teacher student who's been shockingly bad? Not that I am planning to be by the way, I'm just curious. Hopefully I will be ok but I keep telling myself that I'm sure some teachers would have seen some bad student teachers. Also what happens if a teacher is so bad can they get removed from the placement if it's affecting the children education and progress?

Many many years ago when I was early 20s there was an NQT in a newish bunch of friends I had made. We went out clubbing most Fridays in town and she'd regularly snog one of several of her 6th form students on the dancefloor (she was a French teacher although not French or especially unusual or attractive). She was early 20s and the boys 18 so a few years difference... but she was a teacher at their school. No one thought this was bad and she never got in trouble for this. Early 90s so not talking 70s here! Same era also knew an NQT who got a caution for carrying Ectasy tablets. They're now a headteacher. Not sure if that would happen now either.

I got my staggered breaks messed up and left my year nines in the corridor for five minutes until one of them was brave enough to stick their head in and ask if they could come in, I could have easily been in the staff room!

I was a piss-poor trainee, I wasn't confident enough, had a 1 year old who didn't sleep, and sometimes forgot my own name, never mind their names, I only got through because I had 'nice' placements, my first term as an NQT in a rougher school nearly broke me. I had shit behaviour management skills, and the advice of the (large, male) SLT behaviour guru was 'just TELL them', yeah, that might work for you mate!

I managed to pull myself together after Xmas, and actually, now I can 'just TELL them'. I did three years there and I'm moving on tomorrow, I'm bricking it about being 'new' again!

They've replaced me with a teach first trainee, who's only ever done 3 10 minute starters, and is even more nervous and ineffectual than I was when I started, so I'll be keeping her in my thoughts this term.

Oh there was also a guy, IDK what the rules are now but in 2001 we had to have Maths and English GCSE to be able to do the PGCE. The evidence had to be presented on arrival.

He came and didn't have the proof that he had the Maths. It was really obvious that he was trying to get in without having it. The tutor sent him away. Some people felt sorry for him but it was pretty clear that he was trying to bamboozle his way in.

No one thought this was bad and she never got in trouble for this. Early 90s so not talking 70s here!

@Backonceagainwiththe Yep, things in society have changed quite a lot in a fairly short space of time. Under 18 would be illegal now for someone teaching them, but it wasn't then.

@FangsForTheMemory

I lived in a flatshare with two student teachers who were so badly educated themselves that I couldn't imagine how they were going to cope with teachig even primary school children.

Surely they must have had degrees to get on the PGCE?

I can't actually imagine a more terrifying thread to have read before I begin my SCITT next week!
Although the feedback seems to be sensible. Plan, don't be a dick, take on board feedback and act on it consistently.

I think I can handle that

When I was training, one of the other people in my training class had gone into his first ever lesson to observe the teacher, made notes and told her how it could be better!!! (He'd come from a career in banking)

Another on my course was just actually bonkers, she couldn't get that the course leader was an expert in teaching and when she told her what was wrong with her teaching (e.g. not actually teaching what the lesson was about) was insistent that she was right! She also chased a sheep on our field trip (geography trainees) to try and cuddle it.

Had one student teacher who was too lazy to plan lessons and felt that their previous job as a TA meant they already knew it all. There were so many failed lessons where videos, music clips didn't play as they hadn't checked it would on the school computers. Worksheets that wouldn't load on the school computers due to incompatibility.
A huge rant that reprographics didn't do their photocopying on time when it was handed in 10 min before the lesson started. Lessons that lasted 15 minutes and there was nothing to do for the next 45. A few Q&A sessions where they had questions but didn't actually know the right answers themselves. Several lessons that were clearly made up on the spot with no correlation to the curriculum or even the topic they were supposed to be teaching. A total refusal to take any advice, and a complaint to their tutor that I was 'too harsh' on them for asking for lesson plans 2 days in advance.
They failed that placement, and the tutor who did the visiting observation did not mince her words when giving feedback as the observed lesson had been a car crash.

They actually returned for a further placement and it was like a different person - lesson plans a week in advance, willing to take advice, some truly excellent lessons and a pass for the re-sit placement.

I did my teacher training a few years ago and my cohort and Iwere all shocked at the bad teachers we encountered. I was taught how to do reports by matching children to someone who was of similar ability in the previous year's report and changing the name! Not teaching the full curriculum. It was really sad to see!

The student in my Y5 class who was too lazy to do planning. He was supposed to show me his plans each week.

First week, gave me a plan, bit sketchy but I gave him feedback and the benefit of the doubt.

Second week, gave me exactly the same plan just with the date changed at the top. Clearly thought I was stupid and wouldn't notice. I pointed it out and he said, "oh no, I must have printed off last week's by accident." Asked him to print off the right one, he said he'd left his laptop at home which actually meant "I haven't done it, now you've rumbled me I'll have to do it tonight."
Week 3, he tried to give me Week 2's plan again with the date changed at the top...
Yes, I did tell his tutor all about it! This student was on his final practice and had already been offered a job for September so he clearly thought he didn't need to put any effort into passing final practice! He had no control either so if I wasn't in the room all hell broke loose.
Had a Year 2 student once who really couldn't spell. She was lovely but would write words on the board for the children to use in their writing and most of them would be spelt wrong. I had to step in as I really couldn't have the children copying down the wrong spellings to learn/use. I gave her lots of help and strategies but although she completed that placement successfully she later dropped out of her course.
The worst one was a student in a colleague's class who was given a group to look after on a class visit to a museum and totally ignored her group of five children to the point where two of them disappeared and a massive search was launched. They turned up eventually but the ensuing fall-out included the end of that student's placement!

@justasmalltownmum I've definitely forgotten to go to lessons before even recently after 18 years of teaching!!

Covid timetables have not helped!!

We were lucky enough to have good ones most of the time.

The ones that weren't, were flakey,lazy and not committed. It was obvious that they didn't think of the class as "their" class, planning was poor, awful time management , being late or taking random breaks because they had a headache/felt funny and always expecting someone else to step in (to sort groups out, get equipment ready, make sure everything is done including things on their plan,finish a lesson etc) .

LuluJakey1: *One who could not plan interesting lessons or communicate with children so they just ran riot. Incredibly boring and no sense of humour. It got to the point that unless we were planning and almost delivering lessons for him the room was chaos. He was not lazy, just absolutely not suited to teaching. He was from TeachFirst. He told me ' I had no idea it would be like this. I only want to teach for a couple of years and then I thought I'd get an Assistant Head job and then a Headship.'

His course leader actually came in and taught and planned with him for a whole week and at the end said 'He's just not up to it'.

He left the programme after 8 weeks and went back to work for the Conservative Party in London, which was where he had come from.*

It wasn't Gavin Williamson, was it?!

Ah gods Covid Timetables. Different start times, break times and lunchtimes for senior vs junior classes. Trying to remember whether a particular class got to go 10 mins before the bell (as they started 10 mins early in the morning) or not. More than once I had just started to eat a sandwich for lunch when a class would appear and I'd remember they were on late lunches so I had another hour before it was actually lunchtime!
I pitied the student we had last year, staggered starts, 3 different break times, 2 different lunchtimes and a staggered end to the day.
Not forgetting the hand-sanitising, one way systems and desk cleaning routines to add in to everything else.

The trainee that was spotted in a local town with one of the Year 11s ....

Respect the TA’s they are their to help you, they aren’t your personal servant and you need them onboard.

Main things for me are:
Listen to advice! There’s a reason you aren’t just thrown in a classroom and left to get on with it.

Use the behaviour policy, I hate trainees that try bargain with students rather than being consistent so they know where they stand.

Respect your mentors time. If they ask for lesson plans 3 days in advance that’s so they can check them and give you time to make improvements. My last trainee had a habit of giving them to me at the end of the day, the day before the lesson. This means I am forced to give up my time on an evening with my family to check it and there is no time to communicate suggested changes. Also give them some space, I work hard during my frees and breaks so I have less to do at home, I have had trainees that would just sit and chat about nonsense, fine now and again but not when I can’t get any work done ever.

Always have an emergency end of lesson task/game incase you run short and give yourself plenty of time to pack up at the end so you can check the room and dismiss them in a calm manner. If your class leave the room a mess it’s your job to fix it.

I once had a student teacher who was changing career to teaching after working for years in industry.
She absolutely could not pitch lessons to teenagers. Her lessons wouldn't have been out of place in a PhD lecture but certainly were not suitable for a class of 13 yr olds approaching the topic for the first time.
Despite a lot of advice about use of language, relevant terminology in the curriculum she wouldn't or couldn't pitch her lessons in any way that was accessible to the classes. She quit after 3 weeks, saying that she hadn't got her doctorate just to 'lower' herself to a bunch of kids. Which, to be honest, is fair enough. She knew it wasn't for her and decided to return to her previous industry. I far prefer a student like that to one who blindly refuses to see that they just aren't suited to teaching for whatever reason.

Had a student teacher who was extremely bright- she had a double first in maths from Cambridge, and was doing a primary PGCE. She just couldn’t understand how to get the kids to understand what she knew about maths and would get very frustrated when they didn’t “get” it. I think that although of course teachers need to be academically bright themselves, some experience of having struggled with some aspect of learning themselves at school goes a long way in helping with empathy and understanding.

I was lucky enough to have some wonderful students, including one who went on to have a horrific second placement elsewhere. I've no idea what went wrong, but when I bumped into him a few years later, he told me that every time his mentor told him that he wasn't good enough and he felt like giving up, he would remember his first placement, grit his teeth and carry on. He went on to qualify and was an excellent teacher. Mind you, I did have one who didn't bother to plan properly and felt that when marking books, just putting a tick at the bottom of the work was sufficient. To cap it all, our school had an LA inspection and one of my lessons was observed. In my feedback, I was praised for my lesson, but then the inspector said 'by the way, did you know your student was asleep for part of the time?'

I did a PGCE 20 years ago. Passed it with alot of hard work but realised I didn't want to be a teacher.

I realise now that I'm older and wiser that I had very, very little mentoring.

In my first school, the teacher due to mentor me had emergency surgery about a week in and I was left with a temp teacher from an agency.

At my second school the teacher was harassed- she had a baby and toddler at home and was selling one house and buying another. She was a nice woman but if not teaching she was on the phone to childminder or solicitor.

I didn't really realise how much I was being short changed and I was too young and unassertive to complain.

So, if you feel unsupported please talk to your tutor.

Many moons ago I was in charge of student placements at a large inner city primary. We always had a fair amount of students and things usually ran smoothly and we had some excellent trainees.
Except the term we didn't and it was chaos.
4th year B.Ed: appeared to have no ability to plan, prepare, teach or discipline. But thought she was wonderful. Fortunately had an external supervisor who agreed with us and couldn't believe she'd got so far through the course. We were going to send her back but she'd have been given another placement. So we kept her and she failed.
PGCE final placement: didn't like our 'rough ' children and couldn't be bothered with them. Failed.
2 first years on a joint placement. 1 was off ill for quite a few days and when she returned the class teacher suggested she have the morning to go through the planning and catch up on plans. Went home to get a folder and came back with her parents. Who then complained to the head that their child was being 'punished ' while she cried in the car.
2 students on a joint placement who were very particular about what they should and shouldn't do. The class teacher was finding it difficult to liaise with them because they always arrived at 10 to 9. Apparently this was down to childcare. Only one had a child. Unfortunately for them my TA had seen them having breakfast in a local cafe every morning at 8am.

and the advice of the (large, male) SLT behaviour guru was 'just TELL them', yeah, that might work for you mate

large male means nothing, I have seen 6 foot men going to get 5 foot women to settle their class.

Use the behaviour policy, I hate trainees that try bargain with students rather than being consistent so they know where they stand

except that in many secondary schools these days using the behaviour policy is frowned upon as it's a paper tiger and the whole bargaining with students is what slt want. I totally agree with you though but that's the way it is.

S*uetully
*
True, but his specific presence was that he was large and male. I learned an awful lot more from the 5'2 female head of geography who told me:

'This is your classroom, the are being disrespectful, you should be offended, show them they are being offensive' basically a much classier 'how very dare you' attitude.

I also suffered from following the behaviour policy but being the only one doing it, so the kids thought I was the biggest bitch in the whole wide world for actually giving them detentions.

I don’t agree with plans having to be in a week in advance, surely plans need to be adjusted/changed as a previous lesson happens? Yes a rough idea of what will be going on but unless the lessons are stand-alone (and as a final year/PGCE they likely aren’t) a detailed lesson plan a week in advance seems a bit pointless…