Should your child's reception teacher have GCSE maths and English?

[mrz]

https://www.tes.com/news/school-news/breaking-news/dfe-drops-gcse-maths-and-english-requirement-early-years-educators

oh and for the early years educator, you need to be able to make observations, plan activities and make assessments, talk to and help parents and talk to and work with outside professionals - I think expecting GCSEs in English and Maths, should be a basic requirement, and may go some way to early years education being valued more than it is now.

Does this mean i can be a TA without having to re do Maths? I have a degree, but no Maths!

"I think expecting GCSEs in English and Maths, should be a basic requirement, and may go some way to early years education being valued more than it is now." I agree but it is rather 'chicken and egg' - until it is valued as a career it won't attract the candidates that meet that requirement.

I think GCSE English and maths are a bare minimum.

To clarify - level 2 English and Maths are equivalent qualifications to a Grade C GCSE (and I would ague a more useful one).

I wouldn't say I am, or ever was, very good at maths. However I passed GCSE easily enough, the level of difficulty to scrape a pass at Grade C isn't great.
I do know of a primary school teacher without maths GCSE, I think she did some sort or access course before or alongside her degree

So yes, basic requirement.

Why does it have be only English and maths?
I can see why reception teacher needs it, since they are actually in school.
But why can't they have variety of people who are good other things like art, music, sports etc in nursery/ pre-school setting who aren't good at maths or English?
Or foreigner who hasn't got GCSE like me, who was educated in other country? (I don't want to do it though!)

English and Maths is generally accepted as being fundamental to a basic education in the UK.

....also, a preschool worker is going to be working with either a group of key children, or more likely, all the children in the room, and literacy and numeracy are going to be threaded through many different activities.

I think standards should be higher across the board. When I was younger I thought my teachers were geniuses, of course they weren't, but they should be above average at least surely!? I know several people with very average GCSEs who are now teachers and it does concern me.

noble Around here you can get five mornings / afternoons (you get assigned one) in term time of nursery education at a local primary school. At ours, it's free flow with Reception, apart from 20 minutes when Reception children do phonics and Nursery children have story time. You apply in the same way as for Reception, but have a better chance of a place as there are twice as many (because of the morning / afternoon sessions). It's free, and (depending on when your child is born) it's between three and five terms before the Autumn they start school.

Unfortunately, it's utterly impossible to access unless you have a stay-at-home parent, a full-time nanny or (and these are like gold-dust) a childminder prepared to do the nursery lunchtime run as well as the school run.

We go to a one-form entry school where the only reception teacher (and therefore Head of Early Years!) is only 'qualified' to teach reception. She can not teach other years. Is that possible? Legal?

It is possible and legal but she wouldn't usually be teaching older year groups but QTS confers teacher status and if she had the subject knowledge she could.I trained to teach ages 5 to 11. It now teach 16 to 60.

The Reception teacher probably has Early Years Teacher Status - she is qualified and has a degree and postgraduate qualification (and GCSEs).

Wellies- A nursury nurse who has poor spoken language skills should not be working with little children. The only way they can learn to speak nicely is by having good examples.

Ericaequites - I agree (although a PP thought this made me a mean person 😄). The person I described is also the nursery manager. Am I wrong to feel the standards should be even higher in that role? They represent the setting publicly (on social media, website, in person) and are expected to lead the delivery of the EY framework outcomes to a high standard.

No, Wellies, having those expectation doesn't make you a mean person. But slagging off somebody who looks after your child, but still sending her/him there for your convenience sound like not a nice person to me.

I was anonymously copying verbatim how she writes and talks to illustrate the low literacy levels - how is that slagging off?
It isn't for my convenience - where did you get that from?

"it is the only early years setting to which I have access (rural, can't afford a car) and it gives my youngest child an opportunity to play with other children of the same age and experience independence before school."

It's not the manager's fault where you live or don't have car. And I am sure there must be other setting where children can play with children of the same age. (Though it may not be nursery or preschool.)

And I am anonymously saying that what you said make you sound like not a nice person, I didn't say you are mean.

I was particularly shocked that you said she makes you cringe. Why do you let somebody who makes you cringe look after your child?

Erica, thanks for your replies but I still don't see how they make your point. This thread is about the need for certain levels of literacy and numeracy in the teachers/leaders of EY settings, and that is why I shared my experience of a preschool Manager who does not spell well, does not use punctuation, etc to illustrate the way in which lower standards do worry parents. If anyone else on the thread believes that my concerns are unfounded, then I would be interested in hearing another point of view.

Deliberately avoiding answering my question by addressing other poster?

Ha ha 😄 no, just wondering if someone who hasn't got sidetracked by the personal stuff could look at the same matter objectively 👍

Personal stuff?