Is it just me that feels this way?

[Melaniefhappy]

Hi Everyone,

Am I the only one to feel utterly disappointed, if not despairing, about the standard of education at my state primary school (in Hampshire)?

We recently changed schools (moved home) and whilst I totally accept that all schools are different, this new one offers little to inspire the children to do well; for example ..they do no spelling tests, do not ever correct spellings on written work, send home work that is appalling to be 'celebrated' by parents. Dare I go on as I don't wish to bore you ..however... they only read once a week with the children at any age (our old school read everyday - I know, as I went in twice a week with another army of mums to help this happen). Our new school refuses to consider this option despite friendly discussions with the teacher, offers of help, letters and meetings with the head.

Hence I feel I am home schooling first and foremost (in a fun way at home) with school doing the rest- harsh but true. In fact, if my children suceed in their primary education it will be despite the school's involvement, not as a result of it. They are very ready to book fun things - school trips, teachers dressing up for fun reward days, in classroom picnics, and lots of watching videos..but the academics seem to be second place at all times unless you are in the gifted and talented group - you lucky people you!!!

Just before you ask ...other parents in our class range from not really bothered about their children's reading and spelling standards through to worried but have been (like me) totally ground down by the 'no no no' attitude of the school. Despite gentle friendly approaches of concern, nothing happens- and I am the class rep!!! Trouble is, I do not wish to have to quite literally argue/fight with the school and force the issues through Governor levels and on to the Department of Education (or whatever it is called now). Am I a coward?

Yes I am on the PTA, and yes I go in to read, and help as much as I can in the school, and funnily enough there was lots of competition to be a Governor so I didn't take this route - rather wish I had now- might have had a real voice!!!.

Hence I am currently playing the lottery to afford to send my two children to private school - both my husband and I went, and without this, neither one of us would have done so well. Not well enough however to afford the fees today!

Sorry ...rant over!!! I just wondered if I was alone in this or if I am mad, unreasonable and expecting too much.
All the best, really sorry again to moan- it is either this or cry!
Melanie
x

Bunny can you tell me something, is the chanting that you do required: as in, part of the curriculum? Is that why you do it?

Children have to know the 2x, 5x and 10x tables by the end of Y2, so yes, it is part of the curriculum. I daresay not all schools do the chanting, but personally I find it easier, as they don't have to think of tunes and body movement at the same time. I know some teachers would prefer to learn them using singing and dance!

We've also got a massive x table push in KS2 at the moment, instigated by the local girls' grammar. All children in KS2 are taking part in it, and I will put the more able Y2 children on it from Srping half term.

I think there was a major problem when the numeracy strategy first came out when the emphasis in KS1 was 'pattern' rather than actual x tables. At the end of Y2 a lot of the children could recite 2,4,6,8,etc, but couldn't immediately tell you that (e.g.) there were 8 2ps in 16p without counting up on their fingers. As multiplication is probably the most used operation, I always found this short-sighted and, after the first year of the strategy, have always recited tables.

2kids, what a bizarre school to expect that. Was it a good school? Am honestly amazed. Have genuinely never heard of anything so daft as expecting the parents to teach the basics like that.

Cortina, I see ability as a mixture between nature and nurture. Ds's sister showed signs of being very bright very early. Ds otoh has never yet shown the same reasoning abilities as some of his brighter peers. Of course, it may simply be that he is a late developer. Or it may be that he isn't particularly gifted. In either case, I am sure lots can be done for him, and lots he can do for himself.

btw He is not at all conscientious or self-motivated, but he is fairly amiable, so in an environment like his school where everybody is expected to get on with their work, he will do so.

Peacocks, I hope I am able to combine a respectful attitude towards dcs' teachers with the open admission that they have got their facts wrong. I would far rather say calmly 'no, I think mrs X has misunderstood this, let's check up on it, shall we?' than seethe inwardly and have my dcs wonder what is wrong. I want them to grow up into the kind of adults who take nothing on trust but are still able to communicate with other people.

Bunny, thanks for your reply. It confirms my view.

Smee, we had to do it too. It's not a bizarre or unusal practice ime, and thank God you are shocked. You haven't realised quite how things have been working.

Cory, you are trying to turn my restraint into a criticism of me. I doubt any of my children's teachers would have welcomed me telling the children that they were wrong: particularly when they were so arsey when it was just me telling them they were wrong (in more tactful terms, obviously). So I take that extremely badly.

I think you are doing the "fridge is full" thing with ref to homework. You take absolutely no account of the experiences of other people.

Stupid, ridiculous, pointless, boring homework that requires either parental supervision or parental input is not uncommon to say the least and further discriminates between advantaged and the disadvantaged with very little benefit. Six and a half hours of school for a seven year old is not enough? Then the teachers are doing something wrong.

I am not at all criticising you, peacocks. I was just trying to explain my take on it: I don't see why you should take that badly.

I certainly don't deny that I too would have got angry with arsey teachers. Of course I would!

Though I have not been in the habit of pointing out the teachers' mistakes to them, unless it's something absolutely necessary: I find it hard to upset people. If I just gently point it out to dcs, I think that is quite enough for most occasions. Dcs can still be polite and respectful and work hard at school even if they know mrs C sometimes gets things wrong: I have brought them up to believe that nobody is infallible, but we still have to work with each other.

And again, where did I say that I am in favour of stupid ridiculous pointless homework? Of course I'm not- I'm not in favour of stupid ridiculous pointless anything! But other people have experiences of stupid pointless ridiculous lessons- does that mean we all have to say we disapprove of lessons full stop?

I only approve of homework if it is good and to the point. But that could equally go for any other aspect of my child's day.

I haven't read the whole thread but completely disagree with easter bunny's comments that children don't learn by osmosis. If you take a young child to a foreign country they will often pick up the language. If you encourage a child to read they will improve their spelling as they recognises spelling patterns. Essentially, children who are exposed to knowledge will soak it up. Scary that somebody should think otherwise.

But they will soak it up to different degrees, cissy. Some children are more efficient soakers than others. My dd is a voracious reader: at 13, she has read far more Victorian literature than you would find on the standard undergraduate reading list. But she still has to think extremely carefully about spelling, because it's something she doesn't seem to soak up by osmosis. It needs to be taught to her. Don't know why this is: I soaked it up.

Cortina, I see ability as a mixture between nature and nurture. Ds's sister showed signs of being very bright very early. Ds otoh has never yet shown the same reasoning abilities as some of his brighter peers. Of course, it may simply be that he is a late developer. Or it may be that he isn't particularly gifted. In either case, I am sure lots can be done for him, and lots he can do for himself.

Thanks for replying Cory. As you might be able to guess from some of my posts I am interested in the whole 'ability' question. I personally believe that ability is 'learnable' to a large extent and that there is no upper limit to potential (unless there are learning impairments).

As I see it experience, encouragement and self belief can take you a long way (they did me in the end). I can't help wincing when I see you say 'brighter peers'.

I used to believe my peers were brighter and it meant I didn't try as hard as I should have done. I didn't understand that I could expand my mind. Now I feel I don't have to prove myself as much as improve myself.

Labelling children (which teachers sometimes do due to the enormous complexities of their jobs) concerns me more. I've been reading with interest in Claxton's What's The Point of School:

Of particular importance are children's achievements in high status subjects, especially English and maths, maybe assessed over quite short periods. These are often coupled with impressions of the children being quick or slow on the uptake or generally obliging or bolshy. Such judgments once made are hardly ever rescinded.

It is as rare for a 'bright' child to be recategorised on the basis of a run of poor results, as it is for a 'weak' child to be upgraded if she goes on to do well. The bright child will be described as 'not fulfilling their potential' and some ancillary reason perhaps found - having got in with a bad crowd, home circumstances. The 'over achieving' weak student will probably be credited with a surge of effort, rather than an 'increase' in ability.

Yet spurts and dips in school performance are the rule rather than the exception.

Claxton argues that being smart is as much a matter of determination and self-discipline as it is of intellect.

It's all very interesting and sorry to go off topic a bit. I am doing a lot of reading on the subject at the moment.

Also v impressed that your DD is such an avid reader! It's interesting you say the spelling doesn't sink in so to speak. Have you asked her to look at the words she reads and their construction in a conscious way? That might help. I'd say something about how impressed I was DD could tackle Victorian lit etc and how impressed and pleased I was with her enthusiasm and then ask about whether she'd noticed the vocab of the times etc?

How poor is her spelling? I think mine only improved significantly at about the age of 15 or 16.

I am fairly new to MN and I have to say I am impressed at the quality of the posts and debate on the education site etc. It's great to be able to thrash things out with such interesting people.

Cortina, it's interetsting stuff, isn't it? I never seem to think quite the same about it from day to day.

As a university tutor I think self belief can be a bit of a two edged sword tbh. OF course, it's a good thing to have, but it won't necessarily put you up top. I see students who are very strong in self belief and willing to work hard but who still cannot cope with their degrees. Because there is still a significant gap between having SN and having what it takes to write an acceptable MA thesis- even with a lot of work. Some people just don't "get" it. It can be heart-rending when it has never occurred to them before that there might be limits to their capacity.

If it was only opportunities and attitude, you would have to wonder why other musicians with access to the very best tutors and a conviction of their own genius still did not achieved what Mozart did. There is a range between being tone deaf (the musical equivalent of learning difficulties) and being Mozart.

I think it's not so much about doing as well as others in absolute terms: it's about whether you are doing as well as you could be doing. And there I absolutely agree with you: nurture is enormously important. Ds (even if he does turn out not to be very talented) will still have an edge of other little boys, with a similar set of talents, because he is in family where learning is cherished and he will get help to do so. (That's the kind of inequality that schools need to address, and that Peacocks is quite rightly concerned about). He may also have an edge on some of the boys who are more talented than him. But unless his talents naturally equip him for it I don't think it would be possible to push him into the kind of expectations that you would have of somebody with a great gift; and I don't think it would even be right to try. My brother, who is less academically gifted (for want of a better word) than his siblings, found it a great relief when his (highly academic and eager-to-support-him) parents finally accepted that he would be happier in a practical job. He's worked his way up in his chosen path and is happy; his two younger siblings have PhDs. Not about parental expectation (they naturally were most excited about the eldest), but about him and what was right for him.

What I want for ds is for him to learn as much as he can and then find something to do with himself that is suited to his own talents and personality.

Yes, I can see where you are coming from.

Thing is most of us fall in the middle of the ability spectrum, as do I, and it's then I believe that your potential and ability are vast. Ok, you may not be a genius but you can go one hell of a long way further than you might imagine. Carol Dweck explores this brilliantly IMO in 'Mindset'. I think everyone should read it.

Take me, I'm pretty average, but I believe I could have got a First if I had worked incredibly hard at university. If you believe getting a First is a signifier of ability that is. I think I could cope with an MA thesis with a great deal of hard work, keen interest and support.

Claxton talks about kitchen cookers to illustrate this point (!) :

Imagine that the genetic component of 'intelligence' is like the size of a kitchen cooker. Someone may have three cooking rings and a single oven, and someone else has four rings and two ovens. These will set different hypothetical limits on the meals they can produce. But in practice, the quality and variety of their food generally reflects quite different things: how interested they are in cooking; the recipe books they have; how adventurous they are; who they can call for advice when a sauce curdles; and so on. In practice, neither of the cooks with the different size cookers is anywhere near the limit of their cooking 'potential'. Any differences in their meals are much more likely to reflect differences in interest, experience and support than they do the addition of another burner or fan assisted over.

I quite like this analogy and I think you touch on it when you talk about your DS.

I believe that believing in yourself as a learner is the important issue. The human mind is enormously elastic, we can always get smarter.

Being labelled as 'clever' brings just as many problems. Students who have been told they are 'bright' often begin to associate their brightness with easy success. There's a danger when they find themselves unable to do something easily, and having to try harder, they see this as evidence that they are not as bright as they are supposed to be. They are not living up to their billing. They may then stop trying. Bright girls are apparently more prone to this. It can apparently lead to 'imposter syndrome' etc.

It's all very interesting I think

Just to say that the academic route isn't for everyone as you say and more practical routes just as valid.

I have a brother who works as a tree surgeon, I do believe he would have been capable of getting a good degree if he wanted to (it's interesting that he doesn't believe he has the ability though). He's brilliant with his hands, he loves nature and being outdoors too, so tree surgery was for him.

It's great that he found what he wanted to do in life and that's what schools should equip us to do.

peacocks, what did you do then about teaching of times tables in your school? It's on the curriculum, so should be taught (obviously!). Did they really not teach them at all? Did you complain? Am genuinely interested.

We were told the children had to know their times tables by this day, or that day. We did it at home. No I didn't complain about that: there was no point. Really, really no point. That was a mountain of complacency I was never going to be able to conquer.

I can see why you're not happy with that approach, peacocks.

Have enjoyed the conversation between you and Cortina. I think Cortina you have lots of interesting ideas.

Peacocks, there's book you might be interested in:

All Must Have Prizes by Melanie Phillips.

She says:

At some point in the last few decades, the educational world came to agree that its overriding priority was to make children feel good about themselves. None of them should feel inferior to anyone else or a failure..Nothing was to be difficult, everything in the education garden was to be fun. The uncomfortable truth that little of value is achieved without effort, in education as in elsewhere, was decried as a form of child abuse.

You know, it's ok for my children, and to be honest for the children of most of my friends. But they went to regular schools, with varying degrees of parental involvement, and I thought it appalling that children with parents who couldn't or wouldn't help would fall behind on the essentials. Because parental help was a requirement, not an extra, to basic education.

Oh I like Melanie Phillips. And of course I agree with your rather desolate quote.

I do actually agree with you about the Melanie Phillips quote to some extent.

Though I think schools can get equally bad results by making children feel bad about themselves. Remember that bit in Kes where Billy tells the teacher that he's the only one that's ever tried to teach them anything: the other teachers assumed that because they're in the lower stream, it's a waste of effort anyway. There is good evidence that that attitude was prevalent in the lower classses of comprehensives at that time. The upper sets and the grammars of course got a totally different approach (and totally different teachers).

So I don't think it's the concept of fun in itself that gets in the way of good teaching, but low expectations. Whether low expectations make teachers humiliate and over-punish the children (as in Kes) or on the contrary make them try to smooth their path into blandness doesn't matter so much: either way the children will know that you have given up on them.

"All must have prizes" is crap as an educational principle. But so was "we already know who is going to get prizes". And "there is only one way to get prizes".

Cortina Mon 18-Jan-10 15:40:23
Peacocks, there's book you might be interested in:
All Must Have Prizes by Melanie Phillips.
She says:
At some point in the last few decades, the educational world came to agree that its overriding priority was to make children feel good about themselves. None of them should feel inferior to anyone else or a failure..Nothing was to be difficult, everything in the education garden was to be fun. The uncomfortable truth that little of value is achieved without effort, in education as in elsewhere, was decried as a form of child abuse.

I have to say that sounds nothing like my classroom or the school I teach in.

Oooh...I wasn't going to say anything tonight....

but.......

That's why I like 'close the gap' marking so much. You highlight parts of the work where the child has achieved the objective, at the same time as giving them a 'close the gap' activity. This is telling the children that their work isn't perfect, and it is up to them to improve it. It means that they never get a comment 'very good' or 'excellent', and gradually learn that everything can be improved. They therefore become much better at editing and checking at a younger age.

I agree totally that children should only be praised when they have made an effort. This is why, as teachers, it is of paramount importance that we know what each child is capable of, so that due praise (and constructive criticism) can be given.

I don't agree that it is the educational world solely to blame. I have received half coloured in, scribbled Christmas cards that I would have sent the children back to do again. (In fact I got one child to redo a design for a card that his mother was buying because I knew he was capable of better things - how mean is that?!)

I often find that my expectations are much higher than the parents, who seem to want to praise their children (a la supernanny)for breathing!

And sticker charts.... don't get me on that one. Oh, and the 'magic' naughty step.....

is it really so important to make learning fun?

I don't see how or why you would deliberately try not to make learning fun.

deliberately not making it fun has nothing to do with my question re the importance of making learning fun.

Learning something new is often not fun. Does making lessons fun help children to learn? Does ti help them to achieve more? I think the link between fun and learning is probably tenuous.