Teacher can't spell

[snowybrrr]

Every letter she sends home is littered with spelling and grammatical errors.
Last week one of the spelling words she sent home for the children to learn was spelled incorrectly.I don't think she she is fit to be a primary teacher.

I cannot abide poor spelling, to me it shows a lack of basic education.

What year is she teaching? I would make the head aware of the errors in the letters going out, it reflects badly on the teacher and the school.

I would question the schools recruitment strategy if they can allow such shoddiness.

snowybrr

Not unusual but your situation sounds extreme. Maybe gently suggest she/ heturns her spelling and grammar checker back on.

However, like many of us, she/ he may be preparing handouts/ letters in very little time and simply don't have the time to properly proofread the document.

Finally, and this has happened, the teacher may have dyslexia himself/ herself. This will be obvious is they are using the wrong word (their when they meant they're for example - often problems with homophones).

Now the question to ask yourself is whether teaching is just about teaching spelling methods and correctly spelling every word (which certainly isn't the case at our school) or whether teaching is about opening doors, exciting curiousity and imagination, and giving children the tools to move on and do well.

Certainly there is no particular year in primary school where one learns how to spell - it is a gradual accretion of knowledge and experience in most cases. So to be fair to the teacher are they adding value in other ways - inspring the children to get into nature or science, really helping them progress in maths, etc... Because these are also valuable contributions.

HTH

speaking of not proofreading. Sorry

this will be obvious IF....

Most teachers under 40 will have been victims of the 'no phonics' and 'creativity not correct spellings' teaching of the past few decades. Is it any wonder that they find spelling challenging. If you were to raise this point on TES (though I don't recommend it) you'll find an awful lot of teachers think that bad spelling really doesn't matter; just echoing what they were taught themselves.

she is in her mid 50s I'd say, so at primary school in the 60s.

No excuse then!

She may still be dyslexic though, I would have a quiet word if it bothered me, so she has a chance to up her game.

Wow! Eight posts and no one has pointed a finger at the TA

I'm not perfect but I am not employed to teach children to spell.

There is a job share arrangement so perhaps the other teacher would be better doing spellings and letters to parents

Does this teacher actually type the letters home? In most schools this is done by the office staff. If that is the case, your only complaint is one word mis-spelt in a list.

I don't know who types it up but it is the ones that list what subject areas will be covered that term.Never have problems with letters coming from the other classes.

Wow labtest, hostile much? I'm not familiar with the OP's other threads, but just looking at this one, it's very reasonable to expect a teacher to spell and use grammar correctly. This is a case of consistent, chronic mistakes, not a one-off blooper. It's not good enough for someone who's supposed to teach literacy to children.

OP I wonder if the best and kindest thing to do is have a quiet word with the HT. You don't want to come across as confrontational, but you should bring it to her attention.

If you don't know who types it, why are you complaining, or why have you attributed it to one particular teacher when it could, in fact, be from her job-share partner?

Very actually. Being advised to keep my leukaemia stricken child home in a bubble for two years so that parents are not inconvenienced by having to to stay home when their kid has chicken pox tends to do that to you.

I have a friend who is a primary teacher and I wince at her spelling.

Grammar I can forgive, I am late-30s and know my own grammar is awful, I had a lack of education in that area, although I have tried to teach myself since.

However, my friend is a superb teacher. I see her with my DCs out of school hours and she is wonderful with them, and I have no doubt she is the same at school. Surely that's what counts?

Spelling comes later.

I think misspelling on the list spelling words is a pretty dire mistake, and even a dyslexic teacher really shouldn't have done that (yes, it may be harder for them to spell, but their coping strategies should cover checking in tasks where correct spelling is critical).

How often are mistakes in notes really happening? And are you sure it's all the same person produing every note themselves?

I would send a few of these letters to the Head and suggest they ask the teacher to get her letters proofread before issuing them to parents.

My school encourages all the teachers to get someone to read through any e-mails or letters going to parents in order to avoid typos/errors and to check grammar (we also have to use proper footers and a particular font and size on non-internal e-mails).

It's pretty stupid to send children home with misspelled words in their spelling lists. I don't think it's forgiveable really.

If spelling is important, the list needs to be right.

If spelling isn't important, there shouldn't be a spellings homework.

If my child came home with spellings that were wrong I'd be in a real quandary.

I am a teacher and usually, my spelling is excellent. However, I still check and double check everything before I send it out to parents. If a teacher knows that they have issues with their spelling, then they should ask someone else to check their letters etc before they go out.

I'm a teacher and I'd feel like correcting the incorrect spellings in red pen and sending them back. But that's just me being a bit mean.

I think you should have a word with the teacher, or if you don't seel you can, have a word with the head or deputy.