Who saw the Dispatches programme on awful maths teaching in primary schools?

[WilfSell]

I was shocked by how few teachers, supposed to be teaching maths, could do the tests. link here

Fewer than half I think, could pass half of the questions. Only one got them all right.

It seems a bit, um, fundamental really.

This isn't a teacher bashing thread. I love teachers. So what can be done? Specialist teachers across age groups? Abandon SATS in favour of proper skills development?

Ooh you've just reminded me to go and do that. That programme was horrifying.

If we lived in England I would be withdrawing DS from school for the duration of the SATs and SATS preparation. It is totally unforgiveable to put kids under such pressure (and such boredom) for something that is nothing to do with their individual achievements at all. IMO SATs tests should just be delivered one day to be administered with no preparation at all. That would give a real assessment of the teaching and the children's understanding. Any child with an IQ more than a 2 year old's must be so bored - no wonder they get turned off education!

As for primary school teachers who can't do basic arithmetic - words fail me. It is unforgiveable. What chance have our kids got?

The interesting bit was when they tried some different conceptual ideas about understanding number, fractions etc. The kids then got it.

I just did the test - I got three wrong but then I'm not teaching primary maths and two were because I didn't read the question properly (d'oh) and I couldn't be arsed with the last one.

Lol WilfSell - I got 3 wrong too . Same reasons. I rushed through it, finished with 9 mins to spare. Two stupid basic arithmetic errors (4 times 2.1 anyone?) and one not reading the question (worked out grey squares not white squares - duh). But as you say, we were only doing it for a bit of fun.

It was blatantly obvious that the kids had never ever been taught basic concepts before that specialist teacher was brought in. They had absolutely no clue how fractions worked at all, but I'm afraid I wasn't convinced that they understood it at the end either. No mention of lowest common multiples, or inverting the second fraction in a division - none of that at all. Am I just horribly old fashioned?

I agree it is bad. But where will we get all these maths graduates to teach primary and secondary maths?

Doesn't have to be maths graduates do it? I dunno. Maybe just better teacher training? I don't have a maths degree (although I do have a very poor A level) and I think I could convey some concepts.

The point is that the focus needs to be on helping good teaching strategies to spread, not learning stuff for tests?

An A at GCSE should be the absolute minimum. If you can't get an A at GCSE you've no business teaching maths to anyone, least of all children.

I wish there was a facility to merge two threads!

It was shocking and the people in charge of education have known for years about the poor standard of maths teaching. I think the SATS or similar tests are vital because they are an objective test that holds the schools accountable to the teaching that they are delivering. Without the results from the tests we wouldn't know that pupils are not able to meet the required standards. The schools could quite happily continue as they are, and many of them could continue to deliver a shocking standard of maths education. This harms the entire country because many of our competitors have a better quality of maths education.

As I said earlier, IMO the SATS should be delivered with no preparation and no revision. The kids should not be put under pressure to help make the school look good.

gaelicsheep, yes good idea then we would see real reflection of what is going on

Why not a maths or science graduate? Reason is it would cost too much as britain produces so few such graduates. A at A leve l would be good. A* at GCSE ok but not amount of' teaching strategies' can compensate for lack of dubject knowledge.

A C at GCSE is little higher that SAT level 5a

SATs really aren't the answer as they're delivered - gaelicsheep's suggestion is the only way you could even begin to make them work.

I think the key thing with this is that understanding maths is one thing - those silly numeracy tests I did as part of my own PGCE 10 years ago will have established my rudimentary maths skills, & presumably the standard was higher than that which is expected of an 11 year old - but teaching it in a purposeful & hopefully engaging way is quite another.

None of which answers the real issue: we can't get enough Maths graduates to teach in secondary schools. I teach in a successful secondary: when we advertise a deputy head post, we get 80+ applications. Yet we can't recruit & retain a full Maths team of acceptable calibre.

So where are the Maths specialists to come from to sort out primaries?

I'd love to see a good maths A level being a requirement. But so many people are scared off maths well before A levels I just can't see enough potential primary teachers meeting the criteria. However, it is only A level maths that really gives you the understanding that you need (or possibly not in my case, even if I did get an A - a long time ago).

I think training could be provided to get them up to the standard needed to teach primary maths. It is not rocket science. The teacher training colleges should do much more in terms of teaching and testing the maths required. It doesn't look like the QTS Numeracy exam is good enough, because many of the teachers admitted that they struggle with fractions. I don't know if they get maths training while they are in the job, but it looks like they need top-up training. Maybe they could cut down on some of the peripheral INSET training and concentrate on core skills.

I don't think you need people with maths degrees for primary schools, as gaelicsheep said a good maths A level should be sufficient, with extra training and testing.

I think the problem is that you really need the most skilled people to teach those basic skills, which are so crucial for all future mathematical and scientific understanding. Drilling people who are not mathematically minded is just not going to work, as if they have to go off script they will be totally scuppered. Maybe we do need visiting specialist teachers after all.

I have always said that I don't want any more pay as a teacher. As long as I have a roof over my head and food on the table I really don't care what I earn. But maybe maths and science graduates need to be paid significantly more than the rest of us to attract the brightest graduates.

I know in many schools I have worked in "positions of responsibility" have been created just in order to keep good staff in these subjects.

I think the word 'meaningful' is so important. I am reasonably numerate but got to O level without really having any understanding of the reason why I was studying any of it, beyond basic arithmetic. No idea of the practical applications of, for example algebra/geometry/logarhythms (sp?) etc. I still don't really know what log tables are for.

And that, I'm afraid, is probably the fault of bad teaching.

I only got 5 out of fourteen right. Don't ask me to express that as a fraction

I just did that test, and I couldn't answer more than half of the questions. My maths teaching was appalling, and I am of the slightly younger scale of MNers.

I think part of the problem is that maths is difficult for some people. And it's boring to people who find it difficult. There is only so much you can jazz up maths. At some point, you have to settle down and start fucking around with quadratic equations.

So, maths classes can be difficult to engage once you're out of the higher sets. but because the curriculum is so target driven, it doesn't allow for the fact that 70% of school leavers will never ever need to use any of the maths they have learned by age 11.

We need two maths classes. It should be mandatory, no argument with that, but we need basic and higher sets, and none of this bullshit about putting all the dim kids in basic and most in higher. You should only be going in the higher set if you need it for further education, such as Physics, Maths, IT or Engineering etc.

EVERYONE else (wannabee social workers, nurses, shop workers, office workers, managers, police officers etc) should be doing basic maths, where their fucking precious life is not wasted on quadratic equations they have no interest in, will never understand, and will forget about the second their maths teacher is not staring directly at them. When was the last time you NEEDED to do a quadratic equation?

They need to be concentrating on making sure the basic maths NEEDS have settled into their brain, such as percentages, multiplying and dividing high numbers, understanding pie charts and generally backing up everything about maths that they should have learned by the time they are 14, and not trying to cram in useless (to the majority of the population) information that they won't understand, have zero interest in, and will never ever want or need.

the problem was the teacher that they brought in was teaching the kids stuff that they should have mastered 3 years ago. The SATS tests were much harder than the stuff he was covering, and the standard of the SATS was the level that they should be mastering at their age. The kids weren't stupid, they had been allowed to move on with huge gaps in their knowledge.

I mean AFTER age 11.

The QTS Numeracy test is (or was - I was one of the pilot entrants) a waste of time. I have A Level Maths & had run my own business - my numeracy's fine.

OTOH, my friend sweated over it - she'd re-taken GCSE Maths & scraped a C, in order to start a PGCE in secondary English. She is never going to teach Maths.

So - total waste of time & resources in my case, unnecessary stress to my friend, who is a fabulous teacher in an area where numeracy is never going to be an issue, & could've been deprived of the opportunity to teach her subject specialism.

I agree you shouldn't need a Maths degree to teach KS2 Maths; I can't recall ever using anything from my A Level when covering KS3 lessons either, come to that.

I'm currently involved in a peer coaching project with a Maths colleague which requires me to understand the subject matter, & it really isn't challenging - but my colleague is an inexperienced but excellent teacher, & it's his ability to deliver the subject in a way that makes potentially difficult concepts intelligible to students of varying abilities which makes his lessons successful.

I can't imagine that it would be at all easy to do at primary level if you were a non-specialist, lacking in confidence re: your own understanding.

It's not just about 'getting teachers up to standard', it's about training them to deliver numeracy.

coldtits I had no need for maths and would probably have dropped it if i could as I found it hard. BUT I was in the top set and not only did the quadratic equations but did higher maths ( I think that is what it was called between GCSE and A Level) and got a lot from that.

I do think that maths is the hardest subject to teach because of the other reasons you have stated and that therefore perhaps they should get more money.