Anyone else have a DC who's teacher seems to be doing their own thing/gone AWOL?

[yesandyesagain]

My DC (7) has a teacher who seems to be doing her own thing entirely. I do think DC is on track, but every day they seem to come back with crazy stuff they've done that day-- walks, stories, ballet lessons by the teacher, little plays, learning poems by heart. She even taught them skipping rhymes I haven't heard since I was 10!

I know the rest of the school works from very samey powerpoints from what I hear from my other DC, and was considering moving my children but there aren't many better options around. This teacher quite reminds me of my own primary school days though, and I'm pleased. Doesn't seem like something OFSTED would like, however.

How is this possible? Is this the sort of thing she might get disciplined for if someone were to complain? I thought teachers didn't really have autonomy these days? Any way I can covertly support her?

What exactly are you worried about - that your child might enjoy learning?

She sounds brilliant! You could email the head and vaguely say thank you to Mrs ClassTeacher- LittleYes is so content and positive about learning since being in her class and comes home happily telling you all the brilliant things they have learned.

You'll be hearing about the fun end of day bits, not the PowerPoints.

She sounds fantastic

Walks, stories and plays / poems? Sounds like normal primary school stuff to me.
Thank goodness I work in a school where I can do all of this in my subject areas without criticism!

Crazy stuff that day… been for a walk?!

AWOL? Where is she?

Sounds fine to me. If your child is on track then they must be teaching the curriculum. Some of the things you mentioned would be part of the curriculum anyway e.g. reciting poems, learning plays

She is truly amazing! @FourEyesGood I'm just gushing that she's so wonderful and different to the rest of the school, not unhappy, just surprised.

@Barbie222 See, this is what I thought, but they seem to do such an amount of it that I get the impression a good chunk of the day really is good fun. In this year older DC were even filling in workbooks for art lessons and bored to death

We have had the occasional teacher like that, who manages to bring some joy to the DC - those who add some fun to every lesson, and give the DCs freedom to learn in a way that suits them. I think that a really specific thank you helps - my son had an awesome, wild teacher, after years of some very boring, by the book teachers. I wrote her a card at Christmas and just said how pleased we were that DS was skipping in to school each day, and that he really loved the guess the flag quiz / 15 mins on a vintage game boy as a prize / maths outside with sticks - and telling her what a change it was… don’t know if that helped but awesome teachers are wonderful and should be treasured and paid a million pounds….

Maybe the school is worse than I thought if this is standard, the others didn't have this sort of a nice time...

My daughter is 7 and does “crazy” things like this every day. I’m in Scotland. Here, there are guidelines about what should be taught; but not how it should be taught.

As a teacher I need to plan my own lessons to match the national curriculum. There is no guidance about exactly HOW I do that though. It is up to the teacher. Many teachers reuse/share resources, many other teachers try to think outside the box and use more engaging methods to teach. It all depends on the teacher, and the class dynamic.

My children have loads of fun at primary school. They do all sorts of interesting and exciting things. I don’t think their teachers are going off piste, they’re just making the curriculum fun and accessible.

Power points? That does sound boring.

My DD has had many lovely teachers like that over the years. The individual teacher makes such a difference. One year DD's teacher's birthday was on the same day as hers. They had an all day birthday party...learning fractions by cutting the cake up etc. Another particular highlight was when they got a class pet...an African land snail. My DD loves going into the woodland area to dig up dirt to go in his tank.

Wow sounds like your child has a lovely teacher who's using creativity to teach the children. My daughter is the same age and her class have just written, starred in and made all of the sets and props for a small play including costumes and they have all absolutely loved every minute. I'm sure doing this has taught them invaluable skills that PowerPoints haven't.

Surely all children this age benefit from creator learning? My daughter's teacher had them learning something by making raps last week.

Creative*

Learning poems by heart is part of the KS2 English curriculum.

Just to defend the other teachers - PowerPoints don’t necessarily need to be non engaging either. PowerPoints are basically my lesson plans nowadays! There are so many elements of a lesson that we need to do (without getting too bogged down with specifics, I mean a starter, success criteria, learning intentions, plenary, differentiation etc) it’s just easier to have the structure already set up and then slot activities in.

obviously not everyone used powerpoint in this way thought.

She sounds lovely and creative! I had one teacher that has always stuck in my head- was secondary school but he taught a foreign language in such a different and inspirational way that out of a class of 30 we all passed our O level (showing my age was 1987!) - 16 grade A and 14 grade B.
I couldn't be a teacher - don't have the patience but hats off to those who can and do a good job.

I’m in Wales and obviously education is devolved, but I’m very sad to hear that you think all that is unusual! Sounds completely normal.

Lots of teachers are like this (including me 🙂). I love to take mine out on the field and read under a tree, go on treasure hunts, sit on a magic carpet and go on an adventure.... Children will still be learning but in a fun way. I'm glad you're child's teacher is keeping her passion.

A walk could just be a wander around the school grounds during a lesson about, for example, spotting the signs of spring or looking for microhabitats. It's often more exciting because they get to go to areas of the grounds that are usually off-limits. I did that with some Y2s the other week. This week, I took some different Y2s to see the school duck eggs that had just hatched the day before.

What I'm getting at is that this sounds like some of the normal school subjects are being taught in a more memorable way, which is great.

My own DC aren't at school yet but you've reminded me of my own tiny, rural primary school where we spent a lot of time maypole dancing, catching stray sheep and being taken for walks to make daisy chains. Appalling ofsted and was swiftly "improved" afterwards but it was lovely

Is the teacher Miss Jean Brodie or Jon Keating. Sounds delightful

Or Mrs May?