Odd words used by teachers.

[Seeker33]

CONSEQUENCES for PUNISHMENT.

I can understand why they do it. But NOT why ALL schools use that terminology/

Will try to think of it like that (rather than picturing myself holding the stake).

In France, up until about 20 years ago, parents were not in fact stakeholders at school at all. You left your DC at the school gate and what happened inside was not your business. Your duty was to support the school whatever it did and to shut up.

Although the law has evolved, and continues to do so, wider publicity and knowledge of the stakeholder concept would be a Good Thing.

True, very true. Just sounds a bit too corporate to me.

I don't particularly like the word either, Littleham. But I don't have another one to describe the concept, which I do like!

What I hate most is the fact there are a thousand different terms of jargon to express the same simple concepts.

As an NQT I had ofsted in and, to my relief, the inspector went over to talk to my brightest lad. He asked him, "so, do you use the success criteria to help you?" Lad looked puzzled and said the fatal words, "what's a success criteria?"

Luckily, equally-bright neighbour said, "he means the WILF!!" and the boy was able to give some sort of ofsted-acceptable response.

How ridiculous it all is.

So success criteria is checking the answer?

No success criteria is checking to see if you have done what the teacher asked for that piece of work. WILF = what I'm looking for

In 6 Ofsted's I've never had any child asked about success criteria or learning objectives or WALT or WILF which is just as well as we don't use them.

I did once have an inspector ask a boy (who was often up to mischief ) what he was doing. His answer ....nowt! That took some explaining ??

We use 'steps to success' instead of success criteria, slightly better!

I hate it though, hate how formulaic it has all become and how rigid it seems. Was told recently that we should be doing more wow teaching (how we used to teach!) but where does sharing the objective come in when you're all in role setting up an Egyptian museum?

We say "remember you need ..." Much simpler!

If the kids don't know what they mean then something's going wrong (although I do at adults who claim they don't). But "plenary" for example is a perfectly usual English word that anyone who has ever been to a conference will know. "Success criteria"? Who doesn't want their child to know clearly want they have to do to do well? "Learning objective"? Isn't it good if both thea her and kids have a clear idea of what the lesson is for?

"Consequences" and "punishment" are two different things.

What's wrong with collaboration? Another perfectly normal English word, surely?

And I am pretty sure that "uplevel" is an urban myth. I have been dealing with educational jargon for 14 years and I have only ever heard it used a couple of times anecdotally on social media as an example of how ghastly educational jargon is!

Now that success criteria has been explained fully (I think I prefer WILF) I can see why it's important. I lose track of the number of times I've had to tell my adult students to answer the question set and checking that you have done what is asked for is an important skill. But why give it such an obscure name?

I' m honestly not being a git, but what's obscure about the words "success" and "criteria"?

For example, my year 9 ds has Spanish homework this weekend. He has to do a piece of writing- and he's been given a sheet with C grade "criteria" so that he knows what he has to include to get that grade. Surely that's a good thing?

I don't think either are necessary but if pushed I prefer success criteria (which seems plain English) to WALT, WILF, TIB & WAGOLL ??

I work in education (not schools) and my literacy is very good, yet I needed it explaining twice before I fully understood it. While i don't mind jargon in a profession, I believe jargon in education hinders openness and inclusion.

Dont know about up level, but have seen upskill many times in business when people talk about the need to upskill the workforce!

I dislike WALT/Learning Objectives/success criteria intensely. It spoils the surprise! Being told what you are going to learn before you learn it is like being told what's in your presents on Christmas morning

The behavioural stuff used in many schools (language of choice etc.) really gets to me. Most children are not making rational, logical, considered choices when they tell you to go and suck your mum

Knowing what you need to do to succeed means that you are more likely to do so. So says the research.

I'm not convinced about "success criteria" because I have seen too many clever answers receive poor marks merely because the "success criteria" were too restrictive and/or poorly formulated.

We use uplevel in our school (#sorrynotsorry ). The children understand exactly what to do.

We also have WILFs in everything except maths - they don't really spoil the surprise of what they are learning because I won't necessarily hand them out till we've done the first part of the lesson. They are really a signpost towards what they need in their work, without explicitly giving step by step instructions. It helps them focus on what is important, enables them to self check and to peer assess.

We also have consequences, which we link directly to choices. Parents HATE the word punishment (and we have parents who hate their children having consequences to their actions too, if I'm honest ).

You would all probably hate our school . But it works for us.

Amummyatlast- I am honestly not trying to be a git(!) but i don't understand how you found success criteria difficult to understand. What else could it mean?

I'm a lawyer and 'success criteria' was far from plain English to me. I understand it from the explanation given on this thread but to call it plain English and not jargon is disingenuous. Just because it seems obvious to you doesn't mean it is even to the intelligent and interested layman.

So what else could it mean?

I'm not keen on Assessment Focus either.

Success criteria is a jargonish way of saying goals, or objectives.

In both business and education, it's the people who study and discuss, rather than do, who create these overly complex jargon systems. They change every few years.

What would you call success criteria if not that? I agree its a poncey term but what would you replace it with?

A teacher that cannot think of synonyms appropriate for children of different ages? That's quite worrisome. At any rate, there is this thing called a thesaurus which is quite helpful.