Are the majority of classes in state schools as disruptive as the class on Jamie Oliver's Dream School?

[mummynoo]

After watching Jamie Oliver's dream school, I am wondering if all state school classes are as rude and disruptive as the class featured in this programme. Since my daughter is due to start infants school this September?

Can any teachers who might be reading this give me their opinion. Is it impossible to teach because the pupils are constantly talking over you?

Xenia, you seem to have fallen into the clasic error of confusing association with causation. Yes, more members of the (current) cabinet or top business leaders went to private school but there is no evidence this is down to better education - it is as likely or in my opinion more likely to derive from the fact that those rich enough to send their kids private also have bbetter connections to ensure the kids get the best jobs - not whst you know but who you know. Plus they have the money to give them a leg up financially and in business terms.

eg I went to the same uni as George Osborne, did the same degree in the same year. The reason he's chancellor and I'm not has at least as much to do with the fact he's never needd to work a normal job and has the right connections - he clearly knows no more about running the economy than I do.

You have to be v naive to imagine it's all just down to private schools educating better.

Also getting better grades isn't exactly the same as 'educating better'. It should be part, but only part, of education.

Also remember Margaret Thatcher, Gordon Brown, John Major and the Millibands all went to state school. There are others in the cabinet. Ian Duncan Smith went to military school but before that attended my old comp when it was a secondary modern. The Minister for Pensions went to a rough and ready comp in Birmingham. The BBC documentary 'Who gets the best jobs' conveniently mentioned that the Millibands went to the same college in Oxford but forgot conveniently to mention that they went to a comp first. There are more in the cabinet now but my opinion is that for many being a politician is a job that comes easier when you do not have to work for a living. Lets not forget that Clegg and Cameron had wives that earned a fortune. Far easier to concentrate on politics. Also look how sucessful Cameron is compared to Boris Johnson and reputatably this is because Cameron had a useful relation.

Yes, it's a fascinating issue but even if going to a fee paying school helps advance you not just because of better exam results but because you say aitch not haitch and secondly because you make connections and perhaps also you get some self confidence and may be even hobbies which give you things in common with those you'll work with, then surely it's worth paying fees for those advantages.

Indeed that programme on getting jobs even illustrated how just the clothing of the very poor can look wrong for some job applications never mind the accent, although nothing to stop any of us changing our accents and doing an Eliza Dolittle if we want to play that game I suppose.

Also if everyone in the family goes to good schools and makes money then presumably you can benefit future generations too so you're benefiting not only your chidlren if as a woman you pick work which pays you enough to pay school fees but probably your grandchildren and beyond. Thus it can be a pretty selfish decision to go into art or something badly paid as a woman if it means you cannot get your chidlren educated well IF and only if you think some of these things are desirable of course. Most of us value most or I do our good physical and mental health and relationships with those we love but on top of that some material success is not unpleasant and can ease life.

Xenia my bottom set are a mixture;of the 16 kids the one who I hope will actually get a C has to have a reader and a scribe in exams, being so severely dyslexic(apparently a menace at primary at some point got the help needed, started to suceed and is now a pleasure). The two that could get a C if they tried one is mild aspergers- and a pain in the lessons although has a very supportive mum and may come round, one is bright enough but has a vile temper, a nice mum who has no control and some difficult family issues. Those last two are the sort that could be brought round and may still be - they have over a year of school left and lots and lots of people working to help them.

The rest are just not academic, and no I dont think they should be dragged through a GCSE, it's a depressing experience for all of us. One very nice boy at the end of a lesson where I had pulled out all the stops, loads of whizz bang etc said 'miss I knwo you really try and everything but god science is soooo boring.' Made me laugh.

I personally am passionate about my subject so I wouldnt want them to be excluded from it completely but I would like there to be a sensible alternative system- a qualification which takes in areas like healthy eating, sexual health, safety with electricity, maybe aspects of the natural world, etc; areas of science that may be of use to them rather than for instance, the various reactions of limestone. It might help the motivation of the pupils, although I suppose as it wouldn't count for anything in the real world, it might actually be worse. The problem with systems that have tried to go some way down this path -like the applied science now staggering to a halt- is that
alternative qualifications seem so wordy- its all case studies and coursework and in fact not at all suitable for kids struggling to write.

For what its worth- I went to a public school where the standard of teaching was castrophically bad in most subjects and the pastoral care non existant- I would have done far better at the state school I now teach at.

Well I could JUST about tolerate David Starkey giving lectures on Modern History at the LSE in the early 90's - I went to a few of his lectures and thought he was a pompous a*, very clever, but also incredibly pompous. I was doing my first degree at LSE so of course at that level and maturity level you are already used to lecturers like him, but throwing him into an inner city class of "failures" with Saxon "bling" is just TV rubbish. Of course, inner school children who have been "failed by the system" are more difficult to teach, so finding the right people to motivate them is incredibly difficult.

David Starkey is a terrifically poor choice and clearly they are doing it deliberately. Jamie O is not the first education expert that comes to mind ! Mr Motivator would have been better than Mr Starkey !

I am an educator at 6th Form and above, the students with the most difficulties are the ones who have had problems with motivation all the way from primary school. Why is this Govt not doing more to address what goes wrong initially, i.e. in primary schools? These children have been failed long before they reach my college.

In colleges around the country we are just picking up the pieces. I love my job, I am committed to education and I let my students know that. A lot of them think of me as strict and ever so slightly scary (I am a bit!) but I always treat them with respect and therefore thankfully don?t have classroom management issues. You can be strict and set good standards by being a good role model. I can?t motivate every single student to go to a top university, but none of my students fail their exams. At the end of the year or two years they leave with decent qualifications.

In Finland the children start school at 7, not 4. They have the shortest day at school anywhere in the industrialised world, yet still manage to get the best results in Maths and Literacy. There is also a culture based on RESPECT for learning and teaching, something seriously lacking in the UK. We are way behind and will stay behind.

The children who do well in this country are the very lucky ones whose parents are able to watch out for them. Not only the private school kids, but the kids whose parents are so aware that they don't allow their children to fall by the way side already at the tender age of 4. Middle class schools in middle class areas do well, because they are full of middle class PARENTS not because the schools are any better. This is a disaster for poorer children.

It was so inspiring to listen to a Finnish Maths teacher (on Teacher TV) talking about the respect he has for his students. When asked why he had so much respect for his students he said ?because my students are the future of my country?. This sounds like patriotic claptrap. But if all teachers/students in this country had an iota of that wonderful, positive attitude to learning, we wouldn?t be where we are now, bottom of the pile.

Beautifully put, TheBFactor.

xenia, I know you find it impossible to imagine that anyone could desire more for themselvs or their children than material comfort, but actually - and you'll just have to take my word for it - some people want to achieve more in their lives than making money. I would be very very sad if my child was head of Tesco's (unless she started paying her staff and suppliers properly, etc) but would be immensely proud of her if she earned little but left the world a better place. I don't think that's being selfish - far from it.

By the way, Xenia, if you think that everyone at state schools says haitch instead of aitch you need to get out more and stop watching 1960's sitcoms.

DD2 took her Maths GCSE 3 times and just could not get higher than a D, She does not have a low I Q just finds maths Difficult. She got 2 A's and a C at A level and is now in her 2nd year at uni

Xenia, my DD (in reception) recently pointed out to another child that it is aitch rather than haitch. She told them it did make the sound h but the letter name was aitch.

I was listening to children reading (yes I do care about education :)) and also PMSL. And hoping that her teacher doesn't think I go round proclaiming that saying haitch is bad.

State school here all the way :)

I speak with a private school posh-like accent (and still say haitch and "awwwright love" and all that (what am I like......???)

I was once told off by my lower middle class Oxford grad ex-boyfriend not to ask for a fish knife - this was 2 mins after we had sat down in a very posh restaurant. I walked straight out and let him eat on his own ! He was the sort of person Karl Marx called the "Petit-bourgeois" - the Maggie Thatch sort of cornershop owners who clawed their way into top universities and then take elocution lessons because they have a chip about their backgrounds.

I love meritocricy, but not when it has to come at the expense of others.

The snobbery of people and their classes, battling their way into a class further up is what annoys me most about being British. We have the most class based snobs system in the world and it is our downfall.

Speaking from a personal perspective my classmates were like those featured on this programme, actually they were worse unless you were in a top set. This was at a comp with a fantastic reputation, the sort where people falsify applications to get children in.

I was good at French and very keen but simply couldn't learn due to the missiles that flew past my head most of the lesson aimed straight at the teacher's head. She would go outside and cry for some of the lesson. Eventually I moved up and did well. I saw at first hand how the children who started ahead usually stayed ahead - I still believe this is largely the case. I was viewed with suspicion by teachers who didn't believe I had the ability to do well in a higher set. This meant I didn't believe in myself either. They 'motivated' me by telling me I was likely to fail.

I will never let this happen to my children in the future.

Great posts, TheBFactor and B&B. I started to compile a response to Xenia in regard to her notion that women who go into jobs that don't pay enough to pay school fees ie teachers, nurses, midwives, librarians, law centre workers etc are selfish, then lost the will to live.

I sort of now think that anyone who has to publicise and justify their life choices and status so doggedly and repeatedly must have some ishoooos.

Or a low IQ .

Look I know what Xenia says is unpalatable but I do wish folk wouldn't knee jerk react against what she says.

Cos if you think about it

a. the privately schooled are absurdly over represented in most areas of power and money. Anyone who uses anecdotes about themselves, their neioghbours or their DC are utterly missing the point.

b. Women are absurdly under represented in all these areas too. And while everyone can bang on about teachers and midwives and whatnot...we need women in politics, the judiciary, the finance sector, the top FTSE 100 boards.

Making out that women who choose these arenas are somehow lesser women, or only interested in money or have low IQs is traiterous to all our daughters.

Christ with views like these who needs the patriarchy!!!!

My views are well thought out, not knee jerk, thanks wordfactory. The other posts responding to her also read as much more thoughtful than hers, tbh.

I don't think you've summarised oppositions to Xenia and her like at all accurately.

a) no, people aren't missing the point. They're pointing out that these tables etc point to trends and not some fatalistic predictions for indivdiuals.

b) No-one has said that we don't need women in a variety of sectors. Just objected to views that women that go into lower paid jobs are 'selfish'.

It's Xenia who uses phrases like 'low IQ' which, I agree, benefits no-one.

But Rosebud, sadly Xenia is right about probability, though probability is not certainty. Many in the state sector have given up on themselves, because their teachers/schools have given up on them. This can happen in any school - it happens in private schools too - but it's most common in the state sector because if you are paying 30k a year, you probably do think education is important. My bet is that this is also why home ed is linked with success; you are showing that it matters.

I don't think it's enough to just not say we don't need more women in positions of influence and power, while actively promoting low paid employment as selfless.

I think we have to shriek it from the rooftops.

And however well thought out you think your views are, they give the distinct impression that you think women are somehow above the grubby worlds of power and money.

Now that may not be yout intention but it is how it reads.
Ditto the postsers you were commending.

My concern is that such things give the impression that women ought not enter these arenas...

Everytime you say to a girl
Midwife = good
MD of company = bad

(which is exactly what one of the posters you were commending was saying)

well it is bloody convenient for men isn't it?

I agree with you Wordfactory.

Xenia is only saying that if you want your child to have a better chance of achieving power and money, top academic schools are a good investment.

I know what she says irks and we can all always find exceptions to the rule. There is always the poor kid from the sink estate who's "come good"...but I don't believe this to be the norm.

Also, I think this is less likely to happen these days, I think there is less social mobility now.

Um, I think it's quite obvious that b&b was talking in more complex terms than good/bad. About ethics, politics, social responsibility, how you deploy power and capital and all those grubby words.

Xenia is not 'only' saying top academic schools are a good investment, she's spouting all sorts of narrow minded views and telling clearly intelligent women who've made their own choices that they should be out earning to pay private school fees. Very offensive and strongly suggests that Xenia is a lot less bright than she thinks she is.

I positively do not want my kids to go to any private school (I might make an exception for St. Paul's Girls'). It's not just a matter of not being able to afford to, though I couldn't, it's for quite other reasons.

Anyhow what the obsession about money and power? I'm not advising mine to choose what they do on the basis of money or power, what grisly criteria for life.

I think I would pay for my child not to go to school with Xenia's.

Obviousy I agree with wordfactory. We need many m ore women in positions of power and we need to ensure all children have a good chance of making good.

Now I accept making good can mean just living a happy life in poverty of course and I have repeatedly said on mumsnet that what I am most grateful for is mym good physical and mental health and relationships with those I love but trying to ensure your children have a good school whether in state or private sector is a laudable aim which most parents share. It's not a radical suggestion of mine.

I don't think it's the thread for whether it's better if women opt out of capitalism and till the land in subsistence terms because power and money are nasty maile things but I do find that a very sexist position. You can be female and love earning a lot of money and gaining power. It's not wicked or male. You can be a capitalist and a feminist - it's the most fun position to hold, actualyl. I recommend it. Impoverished female socialists tend to cut their noses off to spite their faces.

I never witnessed behaviour like this in my state comprehensive. But, then, these aren't typical children - they've probably been truanting for years.

However, at Cambridge University, our lectures were sometimes like this! I did a very male dominated degree and the behaviour of the students (especially the public school educated ones) was very much like this!

OP, most state school will have a huge range of behaviour and ability. Schools will also have a code of conduct or discipline system with sanctions.

Please remember Jamie's social experiment (which I am enjoying watching and think is reasonable good TV) is not a school.