To think teachers should be able to spell

[Brieandcamembert]

I have increasingly noticed recently teachers (often of primary age) who make very basic spelling and grammar errors. Surely having excellent basic skills in this area is an essential criteria for teaching it?

I'm really concerned that we are raising a generation who will have appalling literacy skills.

I have seen the classic "of / have" confusion
I have seen "been" used instead of "being"
I have also seen phonetically similar words interchanged with one another.

I am a teacher. And I have to say I agree with you.

I have seen so many awful internal emails with basic grammar and spelling errors. Teachers tend to teach these things correctly as they will have planned and prepped for the lesson and brushed up on that bit of knowledge. But it does show depth of knowledge is missing.

In teacher training there are English tests and certain levels are required but often teachers will brush up for those. However , this shows they do not really know it fully.

However, there is a shortage, recruitment crisis and the pay means it is hard to attract people with these skills.

This is not all teachers by any means, just the occasional one. Sadly more so in 'hard to recruit' areas or less desirable schools, where the is knowledge is really needed.

Teach First tries to solve it but it's hard to get their graduates to stay with a badly respected and poorly paid job when they are capable of earning far more elsewhere.

Btw, what are people criticising in the grammar of the OP's first sentence? Somebody mentioned splitting an infinitive (a highly disputed 'rule' anyway, which many grammarians consider to be old-fashioned and redundant). There is no infinitive in the OP's first sentence!

Teach First tries to solve it but it's hard to get their graduates to stay with a badly respected and poorly paid job when they are capable of earning far more elsewhere.
Teach First is not about retaining teachers. It's about getting them to teach for a bit before moving on to more lucrative sectors.

I also don’t think they are that badly paid when you take into account the pension and holidays, even in London. In many parts of the country, teacher training is massively oversubscribed- perhaps we need to train more so we have the pick of better people

The average wage is about £32,000. I’m currently on £4,000 less than that. It’s a crap salary for degree educated professionals.

The hours are long (obviously not unique to teaching by any stretch of the imagination).
The work is high pressure and you regularly get verbally abused by pupils and parents.

The bigger crisis is retention. People training because it looks like a good job and the holidays are amazing. Then they find they can’t cope with the working conditions and they leave.
You can think teachers get a good salary all you like. But actual teachers are voting with their feet and leaving.

@CallmeHendricks

Your OP might have carried more weight with me had you not split an infinitive in the first sentence.

Is Op a teacher?

"But just look at how easy it is to train as a teacher now. A friend's dd has been accepted onto a PGCE with two Es at A level and a degree in something obscure that she did over many years at OU."

It's nothing to do with lack of a relevant degree.

I was at school when a lot of the teachers at primary level (and at some secondary schools) would have had "at most" a Certificate in education which did not require A levels or a degree. (Minimum entry level was 5 O levels).

But their spelling and grammar was spot on.

@WhenSheWasBad - that’s actually higher than most “degree educated professionals”. Perhaps even all (excluding city lawyers and bankers in London- but then starting salaries for newly graduated lawyers and accountants outside London are lower than teachers). As I said when you take into account the huge pension, it’s better paid than most graduate jobs.

Hours are much shorter than many other professions and holidays are better than most if not all. It’s not for everyone but it’s not a bad deal. My ex was a teacher and his job was a lot shorter hours and less stressful than mine.

Oops, unlike my grammar!!!

Home school then if you’re bothered

@WhenSheWasBad - there are recruitment crisis in every area at the moment. My profession are finding it impossible to recruit and there is no cap on training numbers as there are for teachers.

@Regularsizedrudy - is the answer to poor teaching just to home school? Wouldn’t it be better to have an adequate standard of teachers (not that I have experienced an issue in dds school but op has).

@annabell22

Some teachers have dyslexia- it doesn't mean that they shouldn't become a teacher.

Is the solution to send children to a school where they will not be taught incorrect SPAG?

The errors OP pointed out are not because of dyslexia

Yes there’s some awful spelling and grammar from staff in schools. However, there’s a recruitment and retention problem in teaching due to the horrific hours and stress staff are enduring. I can’t see how you can be picky really.

but who the hell uses an apostrophy for a plural?"

Oops

@annabell22

Some teachers have dyslexia- it doesn't mean that they shouldn't become a teacher.

Um should they? How can they teach the correct way to apply grammar? How would they correct spelling mark student's work?

The dumbing down of education is to blame. I could read write and spell perfectly age 7. Leant times tables parrot fashion and 50 years later I can still remember them all.
Standards been dropping for years, since Labour government decided to axe state Grammar schools

A relation qualified as a primary school teacher. Her spelling and grammar were so poor that my husband bought her 'Eats, Shoots, and Leaves '.

People make mistakes though its acceptable , why get so het up over it
Most won't use correct grammar in life anyway , so much is abbreviated and condensed into quick emails etc

Teachers no longer have to pass literacy and numeracy tests before or during their course. The requirement is a grade 4 at GCSE. Many do not have an understanding of the mistakes they are making. People don’t like to point it out so it continues. The threshold to get on to a course is shockingly low. It is very difficult to fail anyone because of the processes involved. Standards have dropped to astonishingly low levels over the past few years. Of course, there are still very good candidates but these are starting to be the minority rather than the majority.

This thread is a good reason why there is a teacher retention crisis. People like to put teachers on a pedestal just so they can knock them back off again.

I think some of you need to get a life to be honest .
People can make mistakes , can you say you never have.
Typos are easy to make and happen a lot in the work place
As adults we ignore , read the word for what it is and move on
We don't go screaming about it

Part of the reason for the dire standards of maths in school leavers is that they were taught in primary school by teachers who are mostly not that good at maths, so the basic understanding of number and mathematical concepts is not there. If you think the standard of English is bad for many primary teachers, then you would be horrified by their maths. They do not actually understand what they are doing, they just follow what they see as 'the rules'. Examples including thinking the remainder in division is the 'tenth' digit: so 166 divided by 7 is 23 remainder 5 but teacher will write that it is therefore 23.5. I have loads more examples from my time as a teacher, sadly.

I hate it. I'm a teacher (primary) and am appalled at the general standard of spelling and grammar in schools.

@WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll that isn't discrimination is it though
I you don't know what the definition discrimination is , you really shouldn't be commenting on someones spelling mistake

Im not a teacher but this just seems like a general teacher bashing post yet again on here
People make mistakes in all jobs except some of you clearly who are all Mary Poppins