Male teachers in primary school

[anawee23]

Hi Ladies,
Just wondering if you would like to give me your opinions on male teachers in primary schools and whether you think there are enough of them, feel free to be honest and straightforward.

I am currently training to be a teacher and have the task of researching and discovering what parents and adults in general think about Male primary school teachers and whether there is a connection to the bad publicity and the fact that there are less than female teachers?

I have done all my research regarding statistics and facts and figures, but would love to know how the general public and parents feel about this matter/topic.

Thank you for participating, I look forward to reading your replies.

yes mrz I was surprised he'd had so much trouble from people but that was from relatives etc outside the profession. He has found employment without too much of a problem. I wouldn't be surprised if some men were being dissuaded from considering teaching as a profession because of negative cultural attitudes to guys who like working with young children.

I know this is an old thread but something has happened recently and I don't really know what to do.

My DS has the most amazing male infant school teacher, all the children adore him, he is a fantastic teacher who engages them etc etc.

DS came home and told me that his teacher is gay. I asked him where he heard that and he said that another child has told him. Knowing the DC I would imagine it has come from his family!

How do I get him to not repeat this to anyone else without making it a big deal, I would be mortified if he repeated it at school and they thought it had come from my or DH (I know that may sound a bit childish but we would never say that true or not).

Should I mention it to another teacher or just ignore it?

Does he know what word means? If not i would give him a basic explanation of what it means, but tell him you have no idea if his teacher is gay (even if you do know!). I would tell him that he needs to not say anything as people don't always like others talking about their home life/families. If you don't explain what it means you do run the risk of your son thinking there is something wrong with being gay when he does find out.

I wouldn't say anything to another member of staff, but if you are worried you could let the teacher in question know what has happened. You can stress that you don't care if he is or not, but just wanted to give him a heads up if a comment is made in class (plus it shows that it hasn't come from you!).

h4j speaks good sense.

None at my DS's school and I think it needs some to be honest!

Oops just noticed this is a resurrected thread! Still would like some male teachers though...

Also totally agree with hockeyforjockeys.

Thank you for your replies, I wasn't really sure where to post a thread about it. DS is only just 6 so he has no idea what it means.

Its so sad that some parents have actually discussed it in front of their DC, it is irrelevant whether he is or isn't and really isn't something 6 years olds should be discussing as its obvious it hasn't come from their own opinions!

I chose my DC's primary school as it had an equal balance of male/female teachers. I had been told by other mums that their sons had no chance to do football/boy stuff at the other schools locally.

Ds (and I) would LOVE for there to be a male teacher at his Primary school, there are non currently, well they do have two male PE teachers who aren't based at the school but they just come in on a Tuesday and hold the lessons but it would be totally refreshing for there to be a male role model for the boys to look up to. When ds attended a private nursery it was the same there, no male keyworkers but they did occasionally have male school leavers on work experience placements and the boys LOVED it, shame really, haven't had chance to read any of this thread yet but I'm wondering why there aren't more, I think it would be so beneficial for boys.

We have one and only male teacher in our whole school .I hope we have 3 in each 2 years group.Boys need some male influence.
I hope teachers are paid a bit more to attact more intelligent people.This is particular important for a man.They wouldn't choose this career if the little salary is not enough for a normal family.

I don't think there are enough, and infants is particularly bad (as are pre-school environments).

I spent some time at an infant school with no male staff and I think that the dynamic within the staff suffered as a result as I think that all female environments (and all male ones probably) turn out a bit weird.

The ones there are also seem to accelerate through to senior management and I don't know if that is right or not (they might be more career focused and be ambitious for management roles, or it might be for spurious reasons).

I think that there has been a tendency toward feminisation of teaching at all levels. I trained as a secondary teacher in 2001 and the majority of the trainees were female. I don't know which came first, the feminisation of teaching or the fall in prestige of teaching. I think historically it was held in better regard and the comparisons made with nursing and the police with regards to pay does not reflect the careers that many people are choosing between.

This makes interesting reading, in terms of the economic benefits to women in teaching and economic costs to men.

Ds1 currently has the token male teacher and TBH he is bloody brilliant.

I m not happy about the sexism that views male teachers as better.
Reading these replies, the impression given is that all male teachers are fantastic, much better than female ones. There are good and not so good male teachers, just like female ones. I would imagine one reason why individual male teachers are popular is because they are unusual.

Incidentally, I think research shows that having male teachers doesn';t make much difference to boys, which is what people always think.

I have 8 year old twin boys and was a primary teacher myself.

I'm seriously hacked off with the lack of male teachers(as are a lot of my friends).

My boys have never had a male teacher bar this week when one had a supply teacher for the afternoon and came out buzzingly enthusiastic the like of which I've never seen before.His twin was jealous.

Boys need role models,they need to see men in school enjoying school.Men understand boys as they were once boys themselves this can only have an impact on teaching.As a female teacher it was only having boys myself that taught me how little I understood boys,really understood them.

I have a dd too and I'd hate for her to never have a female teacher.There should be more a balance,the gov really need to do something-but how?

I'd rather a fab female teacher than a mediocre male teacher.Only the best should get teaching jobs but more needs to be done to get men into teaching in the first place.

One thing that annoys me is how so much of senior management is made up of men when you consider how few are actually teachers. Why is this? It means that what few male teachers there are are sucked out of the classroom into management.My own suspicion is men are more attracted to the management side so maybe more incentives should be given to teachers male and female to actually stay in the classroom and limitations should be put in place as to how quickly you move into management.

Different perspective - DD currently has the 'token male' teacher in her primary school.

He's truly terrible. He was bad for my DS, 2 years ago (took the whole of the next year to repair the damage) and is now even lazier, more boring, talks for even more of each lesson, has recycled every lesson 2x more so he is even less engaged by it than last time. (Have raised this with the head, governors next step)

However, this teacher knows he is safe, as he is the only male teacher and he knows that parents like him 'because it's so good for the children to have a male teacher'.

The perception that 'male teachers are good because they are male' protects some shockingly poor male teachers from the consequences that would normally be dished out to a female teacher.

We had a male student in our school last year. Again, he was lazy, thought he was god's gift, didn't bother with planning or paperwork because 'I'll get a job anyway because I'm male'. Sure enough, he found employment long before our other, truly excellent, female student did.

The Government are doing the exact opposite! The Upper pay scale was used to encourage good, experienced teachers to stay in the classroom, rather than take on management roles to gain additional pay. However latest reports are that the UPS levels are somehow going to be removed. Which means that as soon as you reach the top of the payscale ( in around 6 years) the only way to increase your salary will be to move out of classroom teaching and into administration/management on the Leadership scale.

Agree rosy71. My DS has had five different male teachers this year (they stream for certain subjects). Three were great, one is OK, and one was "encouraged toward pastures new" shall we say.

Similar ratio to with women, I guess.

I do agree that having some males around as role models is very, very positive.

Interestingly, though the school has a lot of male teachers, they are all at the junior level. There are none in the infants. I think that is a shame, but I do know the head has tried very, very hard and it is hard to find males who want to teach infants, I guess partly because of fear.

People do say stupid things. Our infant site has a wonderful, wonderful caretaker who has been there over thirty years. One mum said to me, and many others, that "she thought there must be something funny about him wanting to be with small children all the time". Just so cruel. I can see why new male teachers would not want to set themselves up to endure that.

...so if UPS is going to be removed would they take it away from teachers already on it?

No-one seems to know what is going to happen! Even the experts on TES are unsure. ( and clearly the Government has no idea!)

I think there should be MORE male teachers. In a Primary school with 415 pupils, just 1/4 of the teachers are male - and apparently this is a very high ratio!

The school tries to make sure that every pupil is taught by a male teacher at least once through the school, at some point from YR to Y6. I think male teachers bring a different perspective to the table to female teachers, and it can be very good for children to experience this.

I don't understand why there aren't more male teachers in Primary. There should be!

Our school has a male PE/sports teacher who teaches the pupils from Infant School through to the rest of primary school. He's very good and the children like him a lot. We had one male TA in infant school until he left to do further studies. He was good and the children liked him too. I think it is more important whether the teacher is good or not, and not whether they are male or female per se. But it would be good to have both male and female teachers, not just all female teachers (or vice versa).

My 2 girls had both male and females teachers at their school from 7 to 11 (but at another school before there were no male teachers before year 3 but a couple after that). Agree that gender doesn't matter when it comes to teaching: there is nothing inherrently better about a male teacher or a female teacher: they had some crap male teachers as well as some brilliant ones & same goes for the female teachers. However, I think that it is important for boys to be exposed to male influences at school right from primary upwards (this school is really sporty so it attracts young male teachers) as so often it seems that primary teachers are rather "mumsy". I do think it is odd when the only male teacher is the Head: kind of like the cockerel amongst all the hens! The females still outnumber males at thsi school, but that's because there are so many more female part timers. Also important for girls to get female maths & science teachers at secondary level and to see female heads of department, etc.

Not in favour of male primary school teachers. One joined all female staff at our school of 260 pupils and instantly my heckles raised.

Yes I agree there is gender imbalance. But that's how I like it. I have read and listened to enough news stories to ascertain that men are the main perpetrators of sexual abuse.

Yes,DBS blah blah blah. DBS only goes so far. Not a predictor of human behaviour which we all know is unpredictable.

Low personal risk = female staff. I know. I came from a school where male music teacher sexually abused female pupils in the 1980s.

Sorry if my comments sound sexist. Men might be good teachers. Not for me and my daughter thanks.

@Rightgirlwrongplanet1 you clearly feel strongly about it if you resurrected a 6 year old thread just to say that!

A truly dreadful thing to say.
Would you make such a u generalisation about black people?