Current issues in Education............

[Lucyellensmumma]

Sorry, i know i shouldnt put this here, and i know i shoudn't be a lazy arse and do my own research but MN is always such a good place to start.

I have an interview for GTP on thursday and one of the questions i have been told to expect is to talk about current issues in Education.

I am SHIT at current affairs - i have looked on the TES and TDA websites and can't pick out anything i would feel in my depth talking about

So, any teachers? parents of secondary school children what are the burning issues?

Theres the thing about school being compulsary til 18 and if not A levels then vocational qualifications - who said that? David cameron? See how rubbish i am at politics

What about exams getting easier?

Is there anything stark staringly obvious that i should know?

If i am totally honest, i saw the ad in the local paper, its a brilliant school for GTP and it sort of galvanised me to think, sod it, im going to do it - so i haven't done that much background research, was totally gob smacked to get an interview

Can only assume its because my subject is science, principally biology but people have said i should definately say i can teach chemistry and physics, im not THAT confident with those subjects, but so long as its not A level i should be OK.

I dont think i have to do a presentation, it didnt say so in my letter, it said there would be a tour and a talk (by them) and an interview.

Should i post this in education? or going back to work - AIBU seems to get the most traffic

Not normally. But you could state that you are happy to do top up work or modules in your own time. Be honest though, because on the whole you will receive a semi-timetable from day one, meaning that you'll be expected to teach from then. Yes, you will get training but that tends to not be subject specific but more about how to teach. You will have staff to help you plan etc too, but the knowledge is fairly important. I had to take a subject knowledge audit too before being accepted, as well as literacy and numeracy tests.

I would say you can teach all 3 as you can't specify below A-Level on the whole, but I would still be honest and say that your clear strength lies with your preferred subject but that you feel you have the background knowledge to be able to build on in the other two.

Wow, came back to post and it's all been said

If you have to pick one, make it ECM- it's the basis of everything at the moment.

Good luck

Thank you so much everyone - Mdme, you sound like a wonderful teacher you all do

I'll give it my best shot - those core reasons, thanks for those - i might have arrived at them in a round about sort of way and of course having it laid out its a bit of a d'oh, of course its that, makes total and utter sense - i love what you said about the evaluating data with regards to important life decisions.

Really hope i can do you all proud - will spend tonight reading up on ECM i think and the changes in the 14-19 curriculum, i wont know much but at least i will be able to demonstrate an interest.

If you said to me, right go and teach a lesson on DNA or the circulatory system, i couldn't, but with lesson prep i'm confident. There is, i assume within the curriculum the learning objectives listed? So a lesson plan would build on that?

How much time to you spend standing talking in front of hte class? i have this image of not doing that, but rather having "conversations" where the subject is discussed and the students get to put forward their ideas - however, i remember lots of copying stuff down from the blackboard - dullsville

Those are the million dollar questions, LEM. It depends on your class, and even on the time of day of the lesson.

The wisdom is that you have lots of short activities, but this doesn't work with every class.

You should know the learning objectives for each lesson, and you start off with these when planning a lesson.

I think you have to be fairly confident to stand up and talk for a lenght of time. I am just feeling confident now, but only when I am passionate and confident about the topic. I think that some copying from the board is useful (as a fill-in-the-blank activity). With Science, you obviously have practical work, which takes up the bulk of the lesson. If it's non-practical, you can still have group and pair work. Anytime you do this, you introduce an element of risk, so have to be ready to intervene if it doesn't go to plan.

With any lesson, you have to over prepare and have more things to do than they can possibly get through in one lesson. There is nothing worse than trying to root around in a lesson for something to do when your great plans have gone pear-shaped. It can be soul-destroying when parts of your plan don't get used, but you can always use them with another class, even if it's a year later.

Your course will take you through all this practical stuff. You don't need to know this before you start. However, if they ask on your course about a good lesson, you can say pace and variety (but that it depends on the individual classes).

A Big Thing now is Assessment for Learning (AfL). It is all linked in with what MmeB says about learning objectives. There are also success criteria, so the pupils know what they have to do in order to achieve in your lesson, and at what level. It's all about helping the pupils to know where they are and what they need to do to move on.

We are supposed to do very little talking, which I am a bit about, mostly because I love to talk, but our SLT would frown on mroe than 10 minutes of teacher-led stuff in an hour's lesson. Lessons must be three part: starter, main (with at least two activities) and a plenary. The plenary is used to assess progress (see AfL). According to Ofsted, pupils must demonstrate progress by the end of the lesson.

My school is massively strict on this, but we are a former National Challenge school, now rapidly improving,a nd with much to prove...

By SlackSally Tue 23-Feb-10 16:07:06
frankkinaround - I thought it was an awesome topic, but got royally served.

How so?

Look at the website of any broadsheet and at its "education" topic.

It is hard to say to be honest, it depends on the class and the subject.

The Learning Obs are rarely listed in the curriculum, but the specifications for each exam will be available to you. You then break it down and decide what that means you have to teach, if you see what I mean? From that you can create lessons and objectives/outcomes for each lesson.

All of this also depends on the school set-up. I'm in a school at the moment that does provide schemes of work (telling you what needs to be taught and roughly when) and then the individual teachers write their lesson plans and objectives. My previous school did a lot of collaborative planning, so for some modules whole lesson plans would be provided. But these would obviously have to be differentiated per group. And then a colleague was in a school with nothing! She had to get the specs from SLT and do everything for herself as did the other teachers.

I know this doesn't answer your queries, but it really does vary by school. If the school you are looking at is good with GTPs you will have a good support system behind you, so you won't have to do any of the above without assistance and back-up during your training year!

There is something really satisfying about working with children, even the smelly ones who swear at you! When is the interview again?

How did it go LEM?