No Shit Sherlock : Supportive parents do more than good schools to boost children's exam results

[TalkinPeace2]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-19923891

You don't say ....

Hully - you said I wanted to "produce well-drilled Sainos fodder"

What did you mean then?

TalkinPeace: from the DfE: "Academies and Free Schools will retain their existing freedom to depart from the National Curriculum where they consider it appropriate, but they are required by law, like all schools, to teach a broad and balanced curriculum. And all state schools will be held accountable for their performance in tests and exams which reflect the National Curriculum.
As is the case now, although academies are not required to follow the National Curriculum, we envisage that many will choose to offer it".

I suppose they are "envisaging" that - because it's easier to take something that is already there, you have the materials for it, you have teachers trained in it, rather than developing a whole new curriculum. You can just tinker round the edges. I suppose academies could go on teaching the old curriculum but that would just be letting children down, it would be stupid.

Stargirl, Personally I don't think so - I love the fact that probability is on the primary curriculum. It's pointless if they're teaching it when children don't even know their tts though. Maybe that's what's going wrong.

Oh thanks achillea I'm sorry for your daughter and sorry to be proved right that this is STILL going on. It's shameful.

Achillea I was quite amazed about this because it is the one thing that helps with all Maths at a later stage. Therefore for me times tables were a basic and I would have done a lot more at an earlier age had I known they were not taught in schools. I am not a big fan of drilling anything but this seems to be a basic that I remember at school enjoying the singing.

We had a letter from the school telling us that we should do TT with DCs (DD in Year 4) and they told us what TT they should know and it was set for homework. I have been doing it because I can see the importance and we have been doing it every day. How would a child fare without a motivated parent. How many children never understand Maths because this basic need is not being taught? How long would it take? Ten mins a day? Surely geometry should come after?

I think it's because drilling went out of fashion because it was oppressive and boring, allegedly. Mad idea. People would say, well they've got the tools to work it out, they know how to multiply, so they don't need their tts, and the tools are so much more important than instant recall. It's so terrible that it's still going on.

Losing trust you are absolutely right, they should be doing tts in y1 before they even know what they're learning.

achillea - you have my sympathies. Lack of transparency on the part of schools as to the skills they will impart and the skills they expect parents to impart. I spend a lot of time trying to work out what school is doing and plugging gaps, and with the best will in the world my attempts at anticipation are not always right. If you don't do things school never told you to do (but were tacitly expected) your child suffers and school tells you off; if you do things that you anticipate school not doing too soon, you get told off. Grrrrrr.

It's my own fault she didn't do her TTs, we were given the tasks to do at home, but I'm a principled mare and when I found it hard I threw my hands up and thought 'well she's at school for 6.5 hours a day, I only get 2 hours with her in the evening they can do it'.

I learned myself them by rote, didn't even notice it happening, but it was at school. We didn't get homework until age 11.

Ooh they are going to debate "taking the home out of homework" right now on radio 4- d'you think they read this? :)

Yes I bet they do euphemism

Possibly a spinoff from the previous BBC article refered in OP and more analysis of the US report. Still haven't found the source for that.

It was also on Newsround - DD watching CBBC because of Francois Hollande. Problem in France according to them and we know in the US too.

Have I missed it? I'm listening to pm.

"Homework should be fun"
"if it's ineffective it's the wrong kind of homework"

how tedious

"homework's not about parents, it's about children doing their own work"

does he have ANY idea how some people live? talk about ivory towers

"homework creates new connections between children and parents and opens up new worlds to parents that they didn't learn about themselves"

utter utter idealistic guff, no idea what the real world is like

Anthony Seldon, Master of Wellington, you should NOT be wheeled out on radio 4 to generalise about state education for children who are world's different from your privileged lot

He spoke about creative homework and everybody having access to computers. Tell that to the young girl I work with who had to go to the library on her own every night because her parents were too poor for a computer and used to get told off by her mother for not being able to be there to look after younger siblings. Homework is really helping her! Plus how much creative homework are you getting for your children or is to learn their TT, far less creative.

BTW I couldn't do times tables (well actually worked out my own method for working them out medium fast) BUT I was pretty good at Maths eg. Maths A'level Pure and Further Pure with a good grade in the dark ages.

If you don't have a Maths brain then being able to do times tables may be a good indication of ability to get a good GCSE grade (as a friend who tutored told me). However if you are good at Maths, you will be able to come up with alternative ways of solving multiplication, and other arithmetic problems. Of course we may all be able to do the later, but some of us are discouraged when told that isn't how you do it or that the teacher's way is the best. I would have been discouraged in my first year of secondary if I hadn't already done high level Maths at Primary, when I was pretty much bottom of the class for reciting tables.

That was a really poor effort by PM, seriously they need to get him off the list of people to phone bash on state school issues. He sounded like a dick.

Mummytime that's great but that's also unusual. For most people, command of tts means they'll approach maths with more confidence. That means they make take it further and have a much better approach to all their learning, better self confidence, more enthusiasm. I would have thought it's extremely unusual to have someone who can't do tts to be able to go on to do further pure maths. I hope you wouldn't suggest not bothering with times tables because they didn't suit you.

If you don't have a Maths brain then being able to do times tables may be a good indication of ability to get a good GCSE grade

I think that really says it all by the Tutor as most people will just want to get their GCSE to get many jobs and not go on to A'Levels etc in it.

My school's results have improved considerably with the introduction of routine after school and holiday sessions. Of course they have. Some of the students who benefit are those who come from homes where there is no motivation to succeed academically. Some have very chaotic home lives. Many have parents who are simply nervous of engaging with school because of their own experiences.

It is a money issue though, because I am genuinely at full stretch. I do it because I see the difference it makes, and I have a partner who shares my domestic load. I have colleagues who cannot give the hours to the job that I give. Targeted schools should be funded to staff these extended hours without increasing directed time. It would be money well spent.

I think times tables should be taught, but what I really really hate is any teacher who says "Show me how you solve....."
Then tells some pupils they did it the right way, and others did it the wrong way, even if they all got the correct answer. (Admittedly occasionally someones method might work for one problem but not for another, in that case they should be shown that, by trying to solve the second problem.)

I think knowing the fact that multiplication is multiple addition, is far more important than being able to parrot tables. If you can do the second only, you can be overcome by nerves, forget one fact, and be lost.

But then I hate homework at primary, as I found when DCs school still did it; it stopped me doing other things with them. We literally sometimes had to choose between learning spellings or working on other literacy or comprehension skills.