Should secondary teachers have to pass a subject knowledge exam before being allowed to teach that subject?

[noblegiraffe]

Something I've been wondering lately. The threads about unqualified teachers, teachers teaching outside their specialism, whether requiring teachers to have a degree is meaningful when many teach a subject not relevant to their degree.

I know subject knowledge isn't all, and people can be very knowledgable and still be crap teachers, but can you have a good teacher who doesn't meet a minimum standard of subject knowledge?

Boney, is that possibe? I'm familiar with the English datasets, but not with the Scottish ones?

I'm just curious, because on the face of it the rule that a Scottish teacher can only teach their specific subject would be a challenge to very small schools, as to maintain a full spectrum of subjects (English, Maths, 3xScience, History, Geography, Art, at least 1 MFL, at least one DT subject, let alone RE / Music / Drama / any vocational subjects) would require 10 teachers - 8 if a teacher allowed to teach Science can teach any science subject. That would be a challenge for a school with only 90 pupil;s, as essentially (even with a fully teaching head / deputy) the budget for 9 students would have to pay for the salary and overheads of 1 teacher.

In England, at primary level, you need 25-30 pupils to pay for 1 teacher, at least in the 'low budget' counties I have worked in.

So unless there are specific 'small school' budget arrangements to pay for that number of teachers in Scotland OR pretty much all are employed part time OR they are allowed to teach across several subjects, I'm curious as to how it works - because without any of those things, any similar plan to allow teachers to only teach 1 subject in English schools could have unintended consequences, either in terms of schools running out of money OR only being able to afford to offer a very restricted range of subjects.

cant

A quick look gives me this

www.gov.scot/Topics/Statistics/Browse/School-Education

but I don't know if its broken down further

There’s a huge workload issue around teachers being expected to teach other subjects and we know that workload is the main reason for so many teachers quitting. Just over the weekend I’ve seen a post about the huge job of learning the science curriculum for the other sciences to your specialty and a teacher who has said that teaching their subject is fine but teaching other subjects is very stressful.

Apart from the workload put on the teacher to get up to scratch and to plan outside of their comfort zone (like I said, I stuck to the textbook closely when I did it, what about subjects with no textbook? Where are teachers supposed to be acquiring this subject knowledge from?), there’s also the workload put on the specialist subject teachers to help the colleague/pick up the pieces the next year.

I think there is a whole host of variables to consider here. My degree is in one subject, my pgce another closely related subject. My first job was for a different subject and I now also teach another subject. All 4 subjects would fall loosely under the humanities umbrella and I have achieved results in line or above other teachers in the department. Probably because I enjoy all the subjects, wanted to take them on and received excellent support and cpd. Also the skills are similar.
I know humanities teachers that have had totally unrelated subjects put onto their timetable that they had no desire to teach and no support doing so. Not a successful outcome for staff or students.

Sadly, this isn't a new thing. A good friend trained a a history teacher in the late 1970's /early 1980's. He was also expected to teach maths, a subject he never studied beyond 'o' level. A family member who taught for many years, was also expected one year, to teach cookery. Now, she happens to be an excellent cook, but her teaching qualifications were in a subject with no relevance to that subject at all.
Whilst I agree that in an ideal world all secondary school subjects would be taught by specialist teachers, the plain fact is that there are not enough applicants for ITT to fill the current vacancies, especially in STEM and MFL subjects. So what do we do? Stop offering them altogether? Because the government is not going to address the issue anytime soon as that would involve both spending money and admitting they have effectively driven good teachers out of the profession with the ever more ridiculous demands they place on teachers.

Interesting thread. I'm an English teacher, second in a large department and I mentor trainees. When I stared teaching, my assumption was that intellectual, very well-read types would be the best English teachers, especially when I came to literature. However, as it turns out, some of the most effective teachers I have seen (both in terms of student engagement and GCSE results) have been people who to me at least don't seem typically bookish or even even very widely read. They are however diligent and know the texts they are teaching very well.

I think to cut it at Eng Lit A-Level, you must be very well read and there's no two ways about it. At A level, there is an expectation that students have a concept of the literary canon more broadly. I.e. If studying Othello, to do well you would need to have an idea of the conventions of Shakespearean tragedy more generally, and how your play conforms to or challenges expectations. Whereas at GCSE, texts tend to be looked at much more individually. If you study Romeo and Juliet, as long as you know that play inside-out, you can achieve very highly.

I don't know if subject knowledge exams would be an effective way to select the right people. I suppose it would depend very much on how the paper was designed. As someone who has mentored trainees, I think that if you have a highly motivated person, with a good attitude, who has the humility to recognise and address weaknesses in their own SK, along with a genuine love of the subject, you can make a great teacher even out of someone with less than ideal SK. However, our school is a specialist training school and I know that not all centres offering school direct put as much energy and time into their trainees.

So what do we do? Stop offering them altogether? Because the government is not going to address the issue anytime soon

But the government isn’t going to address the issue at all while teachers continue to take on extra workload in order to make up for DfE inadequacies.

How much of an extra workload is it? It is making up your timetable.

Fffion

it is not the "making up your timetable", that increases the workload, its the research in to the subject, putting together the lesson plan etc.

I teach a subject (secondary, to A level) that I don't even have an A level in, let alone a degree. Ad yes there is a lot of work to do reading up on it and learning it myself, but having learned it I can teach it, and in many ways will understand better how to explain it than someone who learned it years ago.

Yeah, I'm not going to believe that subject knowledge is not only irrelevant but an actual disadvantage when it comes to teaching.

People who have subject knowledge also read up on the stuff they are teaching and don't simply rely on decades-old knowledge.

Interesting debate. I've been a qualified secondary teacher for >20 years. My PGCE was in my degree subject but also included a second subject in which I have a (not great) A level. Between uni and PGCE, I worked in industry in a completely unrelated area to my degree.

Over my career, I have taught a number of other subjects as well as my main one. My time in industry has been really useful as I delivered GNVQs in Business Studies, some IT and key skills. I have taught A level General Studies successfully and because of family there, I am the go-to person to deliver cover lessons in German (crap O level grade only but I understand a lot of spoken language).

I actually quite enjoy teaching different subjects to the normal one, BUT it has mostly been in short bursts, rather than having to plan and prepare a year's lessons.

Noble, I agree that the government aren't going to address the issue. Unfortunately, I'm not sure what anyone can do. My understanding (please correct me if I'm wrong) is that once qts is awarded, there is no restriction on what a teacher can be asked to teach? Certainly, in my friend's case, this is what he was told by his ht , though I appreciate that was a long time ago and things may have changed. Given that outside of an initial training bursary, there is not much to attract or retain STEM teachers, is it any wonder that graduates are choosing to go into careers where they can at least earn enough to buy a property?

I was taught A level English by two teachers. One had a degree in Geography, the other had a degree in English. I can say, without doubt, it was the teacher with the degree in English who facilitated my getting into Cambridge (to study English).

Geography teacher was diligent, and was good at breaking down the mechanics of writing a very nuts and bolts essay. However, he simply didn't have the background knowledge that added real depth to teaching the subject beyond the basic remit of an A level. The teacher with a degree in English did - and that's what helped me.

I think there's no other way of looking at this than as a really shameful state of affairs. It's not fair on the children in the state sector. It's not really fair on teachers either. I am genuinely sad that we treat education with this little respect.

I taught IT but had a computing degree so that was useless content-wise until very recently. However, having a background knowledge at a higher level than I was teaching meant I understood what was going on behind the desktop publishing and wysiwyg web design of various terrible curricula. Whether I’d pass an exam is very doubtful though as unfortunately a lot of what is examined in my subject is not what you would do if you understood what you were doing.

I know many teachers who’ve taught out of their specialism and they have done a good job but it’s a waste isn’t it? Mrs Smith teaching to the geography textbook when she’s a PhD in nuclear physics or whatever. Seeing teachers as interchangeable adults who give out worksheets and read off a departmental presentation is doing the profession no favours.

How much of an extra workload is it? It is making up your timetable.

How would it work, in the utopian ideal of someone only teaching their own subject, if that meant a continuously varying amount of employment, depending on e.g. numbers of people choosing that option at GCSE or A-level?

Would it be OK for a teacher of a non-core subject to be employed full time one year, 0.6 the next, 0.7 the next, 0.3 the next, rather than be required to teach an additional subject? Or is the additional workload for the teacher, plus disadvantage to the pupils, so great that it is better to accept continually varying pay / hours of employment to just teach their own subject?

Handbag, I feel that it is absolutely a waste if there is, elsewhere in the same building, a gropup being taught Physics by a Geography teacher. But if the choice for the nuclear physicist is to teach some Geography OR go down to a part time timetable in some years, it seems to me that it is a somewhat different balance?

Equally, it depends whether the school could genuinely employ e.g. a Geography specialist if the nuclear physicist wasn't teaching the class. Is it better to have a constantly open vacancy (there are some schools that simply cannot recruit Maths teachers, for example) or a good teacher who is a non-specialist?

When schools cannot employ qualified maths teachers there should a national scandal, not just putting someone in there who happened to do an A level 20 years ago.

It would be better if Mrs PhD could be shared round a few local schools (not at her expense) if it was impossible to fill up her timetable. In my many years in schools it is never the case that when the going is good that you need to timetable teachers out of their specialisms into teaching something they don’t want to teach or can’t teach. When things are going to shit and you’re squeezing every hour of contact time out of your workforce then your PE teachers are also having a stab at Y7 geography and ICT. It isn’t good for the children that in previous years would have had a specialist, it isn’t good for the teacher as it’s just filler on their timetable that causes a lot of work but isn’t at a level that contributes to their professional development.

cant there is a turnover of teachers in schools which means that secondary schools can make hiring decisions based on their staffing needs for the next year which wouldn't mean that every teacher was constantly teaching a different percentage timetable. Not many teachers are in a stable department of 1! People go part time, go off on maternity leave, quit teaching, move schools, all sorts.

Sorry, I was simplifying to a single teacher for illustrative purposes.

I can picture a (less mainstream) humanities department of 3. A DT specialism which has 1 teacher. A music department with a couple of teachers. A Drama department of 1 or 2 - ie not a Science or Maths or English department of many. I would suggest that it is quite possible that within such smaller departments, the 'would happen anyway' moves of maternity, leaving teaching, actual desire to go part time etc would not ALWAYS exactly match demand?

We have someone in my dept. who is a bit of a blue eyed boy. degree from Cambridge in Philosophy , I believe. Started off as an RS teacher, left. Was lured back but we didn't need RS teachers! So, now he teaches English. various people are so in awe of his Cambridge degree that he now teaches Lit and Lang Lit A level! You can imagine this disgruntles a few of us. I have no real idea whether he is any good. My colleague says she has to mentor him rather a lot in terms of how to teach English, rather than the actual subject content. It's actually amazing how many English teachers don't actually have Eng Lit degrees btw. And conversely, how an Eng Lit degree gives you no real foundation in all the grammar stuff mentioned upthread. many Eng teachers are terrified of grammar!

That said, I teach A level film and don't have a degree in that. You can learn as you go along if you have the right skills and attitude.

I also used to teach German but only up to year 9. It was bloody hard work : so much prep.

And to the PP who said English teachers could teach drama. No. I have once. never ever again. I played wink murder for a year.

I suppose I meant to say the important thing is the teaching qualification in the teaching/ pedagogy of the subject - so long as the appropriate intellect and skills are there...

People teaching out of specialism can be very good but teaching and marking English is specialised in itself and that's where the support needs to go.

I suspect it happens most at A level to be honest. Do all politics teachers have degrees in it, for example? I very much doubt it as they would be no use in years 7 - 11.

We have a part time teacher who only teachers their subject at A-level to small classes. Living the workload dream!

I would have thought there’s quite a crossover between lit and film? I think our English teachers also do media studies. I mean lit is teaching Shakespeare by watching Baz Luhrmann so it must be easy to transfer teaching skills

I won't bite on that one noble

You would think there would be a crossover , yes, but I can tell you not all Eng teachers could teach film. The new spec is highly specialised. I also used to teach comms . I could never ever teach media: not just because I would hate it but because I have no practical skills at all and very limited knowledge in that area. Very few of my dept feel like they could teach A level Eng Lang. Teaching is partly about lifelong learning.

On courses now more and more film teachers have degrees in film and teach in sixth form colleges.

Your part timer may be living the workload dream but she is making a pay sacrifice no doubt which many could not or would not make..