Any advice on the most effective way to deal with a bad teacher

[threesenough]

I need advice. My dd's teacher is failing her whole class. I think she has been a good teacher in the past but I - and other parents I have spoken to - feel that she has been in her job too long and has become jaded and can't be bothered.
In every other year at school my dds has enthused about her teachers and in turn teachers have told me how much she loves learning. This year she has become disengaged, bored, despondent. It can only be down to a poor teacher. Next year we are faced with another notoriously poor teacher. In that case I know of mums who petitioned to have her removed or at least shifted to teach a different year that was less crucial to children's educational development (! Not sure which year that could be!!!). Nothing was done.
I feel really powerless to counteract the adverse effects that the combination of two lazy teachers can have on so many children in Y4 and Y5. Other parents who have already been through this stage at our school refer to this as 'the lost years' or 'the wilderness years'.
What is the most effective way to address this issue?Can anyone advise?

I am not a teacher.

I am a parent who has had 2 children go all the way through the school system to 6th form level and come out the other side and go to university.

And I have 2 other children still in the school system.

Who carries out the performance management?

I have actually been slightly on the other side.A teacher, and Head was not percieved to being doing a good job by some parents and they wrote letters.My DH and I spoke to the other silent parents and they all agreed with us that we could not see much wrong with her actual teaching, so my DH and I backed her,and spoke up for her at public meetings.She however, decided not to put up a fight and left to go overseas.Afterwards, I spoke to a good friend who worked in the school office, who told me that, behind the scenes, said teacher and Head was also completely in a mess with paperwork.

Line manager does PM.

I am a teacher. Underperfoming teachers are ususally subject to capability proceedures.

It is quite rare to find a totally underperfoming teacher ime. Most are hardworking and dedicated.

Some are perhaps not inspiring, but this is not the same as incompetetent

Line manager does performance management - in a primary school this is often the Head. The Performance Management Committee are governors - they have to oversee the peformance management procedures in the school and deal with the performance management of the headteacher.

T'is Law n35 in the Precious List, no?

"my child does well at school because she is a genius, my child does badly at school because she has a bad teacher"

Oh, and she's getting a different bad one next year? Did I read that right. That's really unlucky isn't it.

My dd lost her year 5 as did many of her classmates. The teacher was awful. I worked in school, so I knew things weren't right there, but couldn't do much about it initially as it was mostly hearsay. However, things escalated.

DD had work torn up and was frequently criticised in a negative way. She went from being upbeat and cheerful to being neurotic and anxious. In maths they were constantly having to correct the teacher, who really struggled with basic mental maths and they were often left with their jotters whilst she sorted out 'problems'. Most of them the teacher had actually caused. The only books that got overused in Y5 were the jotters.

DH went into parents evening and when he asked where dd was with regard to progress/levels he was fobbed off and told that she was fine. He was told she had social problems (dd has always been praised in the past for her social skills, so that was a new one!) and she couldn't tell him about her maths progress/why she was struggling at all. In the end she stood up half way through a conversation, headed for the door and ushered him out with 'I think that's enough now Mr Flapperg. I don't really have anything else I can say'.

We complained, but unfortunately the Head was on his way out of the school with health problems and we ended up not tackling this as we should have. In retrospect, I wish I'd made more fuss, written a complaint, done more to protect future classes.

I've since found out from a colleague that she walked out of dd's class and cried, announcing that they were all monsters and a complete waste of everyones time and she'd never known such an awful class in her whole life. Strange that their Y6 teacher found them to be delightful, with enquiring, challenging minds and fantastic imaginations. She said they were very chatty, but once that was sorted, they were one of the best classes she'd ever worked with!

If your child is struggling, tackle it. If it's hearsay, tell the naysayers they need to address their individual concerns. Teachers are like everyone else. They are good and bad in equal measure and not tackling the bad teachers does the profession no favours imo.

Teachers are like everyone else. They are good and bad in equal measure

Seriously?

Even Ofsted would say there are more good teachers than bad ones. Even Ofsted*!

Over the years I've worked with a couple of teachers I considered bad ineffectual oddly in both cases parents thought they were the best thing since sliced bread

one went on to become a head the other an advisor

Does that make me a good teacher?

No, clam. You should be having an appropriate work/life balance, while also marking all the children's work and planning for the next month.
If you don't have any time off at the weekend, your teaching will be adversely affected. You need to find the time to work and not work.

Obviously.

Damn. Got it wrong. Again.

atm it is impossible to judge whether the OP is right or wrong because she hasn't given us anything specific to go by

as the child of two teachers, grandchild of two teachers, having worked as a teacher myself, I am well aware that not all teachers are equally good teachers-any more than all doctors are equally good doctors or all plumbers equally good plumbers

but it doesn't mean that every time a patient deteriorates that constitutes proof of the doctor being a bad doctor

in the present case, I would want to know how the poor teaching manifests itself, what the teacher actually does wrong

Have you considered that your child's teacher might be feeling really got at and bullied by a classful of parents who have clearly taken against her?

Without wishing to be unprofessional or give too much away about my own situation, I am a teacher who has had, for the first time ever, to deal with a whole load of sht this year, served up to me by one particular set of parents who have stirred and stirred amongst the others for the whole year. I am not* a jaded and lazy teacher, and I actually have a lovely relationship with their kids, but the parents have made me scared and completely lacking in confidence in my own ability. I know I have not done the best job I could with their children because I'm scared of their parents.

Maybe you could help the teacher to help your child, by selling school in a more positive light to your child? Even if you don't really believe it, telling her how lucky she is that Mrs Whatever did such and such, or that whatever subject must have been a really good lesson, can have a really positive effect on the child. (I have used this technique with kids who were terrified of the games teachers.) It won't help your child to feel positive when she is stuck in a negative environment about school both when she is there and when she is at home.

"My dd's teacher is failing her whole class"
"feel that she has been in her job too long and has become jaded and can't be bothered."
"It can only be down to a poor teacher"
"Next year we are faced with another notoriously poor teacher"
"mums who petitioned to have her removed"
"two lazy teachers"
" 'the lost years' or 'the wilderness years'."

Sounds to me like a witch-hunt - cetainly some emotive statements there. You'd need to have some serious facts and evidence if you wish to be taken seriously as a parent with their child's interests at heart, as opposed to someone who indulges in playground gossip.

Great sympathy to gwenniebee. I know that my DD's Reception teacher (her 'magic teacher', the one who has been her best ever), who was utterly brilliant, was hounded in a similar way by the following year's parents - to such an extent that she spent two thirds of the year off due to mental illness. Horrible.

On the other hand, I have spoken to the head this year about DD's current teacher. I presented evidence in as factual a way as I possibly could - indicents, dates, quotes from my daughter, evidence from her books, evidence of DS's failure to catch up after his year in the same class. Absolutely no hearsay or opinion from other parents, nor did I discuss my approach with any other parents. Said teacher is 'retiring' (extremely early and rather abruptly) at the end of this year.

My view is that if there is a genuine, serious problem which is affecting your daughter's learning and happiness and which is demonstrably due to the teaching, then you should take objective, factual evidence to the head. Do not take gossip or rumour, and make certain that what you report is reported as objectively as you can.

gwenniebee. How horrid for you. Hope things pick up soon.

I've often seen parents "go for" newly qualified teachers, in that they're constantly in fussing about reading logs, lost jumpers and comments in homework books and other stuff they wouldn't dare bother more established teachers with. And many of them nowadays don't even have the courtesy to bring up minor issues directly with the teacher but go straight to the Head to complain discuss.

Perhaps it is a clash of learning/teaching styles. My ds loved his former science teacher and yet one of his best friends went from being out-going and enthusiastic about learning to being bored and fed up when taught by the same teacher.

If you are planning to raise any of your concerns with the head teacher you will need something more concrete. I made a complaint about one of ds's teachers this year. Some of the points I raised were:

• books not marked for 6 weeks
• referring to students as muppet/numpty/idiot
• student with the lowest mark in the weekly spelling test was in the 'seat of shame' This teacher did cause a change in behaviour with my ds who became reluctant to answer any questions in class through fear of being humiliated if he was incorrect. Head teacher dealt with the situation and there has been an improvement, although ds is still a little wary of this teacher. However, I did not feel the need to canvass the views of other parents and start a petition.

teacherwith2kids puts it perfectly: "My view is that if there is a genuine, serious problem which is affecting your daughter's learning and happiness and which is demonstrably due to the teaching, then you should take objective, factual evidence to the head"

you need factual evidence, incidents, dates, something that can be proved to result from the teaching not from stages in your dd's development, peer pressure etc

At this point, it would be helpful for the op to post again.
It doesnt sound to me that the teacher is merely uninspiring.
If the op wants to take it further with the school, she needs to back it up with some facts, along the lines of what some posters have posted.
I would hope that most parents understand that teachers have an increasingly difficult job,in difficult circumstances and most are very hardworking.
I would also hope that even teachers can see that if a teacher is indeed not really coping with their job, and adversely affecting many pupils learning,that morally they should step down from that particular job.