Ineffective teacher

[Advicerequest]

One of my son's teachers is hugely ineffective. Extremely slow, confused and Unconfident. I have discovered (on the grapevine). that she was nervous about teaching the course and had share this with other teachers. Today my son discovered that she is using the notes of a former student (a levels last year) to teach the class. My son is having to compensate by teaching himself his a level from the internet which is extremely time consumjng. I talked to a former student who told me that this teacher had a reputation for being one to avoid.
I have approached the school tactfully but they are reluctant to acknowledge just how rubbish the teacher is and are monitoring my son (but not actually much practical to help other than giving advice on reading). It's a private school! My son is having zero issues in all other classes and loves all his other teachers. I'm not sure how to deal with this situation. Should I escalate? He has 18 months to go.

Escalate how? You've raised it with the school.

What subject is it?

I'd be interested to know how you got this information "on the grapevine" and who gossiped about her concerns about teaching the course.

Indeed. There's a lot of nastiness at play here.

I guess it’s common practice to utilise under-hours teachers to teach other subjects. The teacher would have had little choice in this despite their lack of confidence/competence so they’re probably as unhappy about the situation as you are. This wouldn’t happen in an ideal world but the world of education is far from ideal. The underlings usually do their best to make the best out of the situation. Ideally this teacher, having had this subject plonked on them, will have had additional training and studying to best meet the class’s needs but in reality full-time teaching leaves very little time/energy for this, whatever their personal levels of motivation.
This lets the teacher down and of course it lets the students down. Self study to augment classroom learning will do your son very little harm however. If approached with a little diligence and self-motivation and autonomy it could be the making of him, both for this subject and , actually, for life!

What subject is this? I find it quite shocking that her concerns about teaching have been leaked to parents. Someone has been exceptionally unprofessional.
Is the school under financial pressure, that you know of?

The thing about the grapevine OP is that it's a nasty place to be without any hard evidence. It's just a bunch of unfounded accusations from people who have nothing better to do

Even if all of this is true, if that's the best they can do for an A level teacher, then that's the best they can do. What the heck do you think will happen? They will find someone else? Re-schedule the whole timetable?

Not gonna happen. There is a crisis in teaching, in state AND in private schools. (Some of it fuelled by PITA parents, actually)

OP, I sympathise. I teach maths (including A-level) and would hate to do it if I didn’t feel confident with the content.

Most Alevels are taught with two teachers per subject: does your son have another teacher for the same subject who is stronger?

In terms of escalation though, I don’t think that there is anything you can do about this, other than get a private tutor.

Hello,

In this case, it is best to raise it with the headteacher or the school board.

A teacher in a private school could need re-training or given some work or classes to build up their teaching ways or to rebuild confidence, If they are using notes from an old student that should be brought up.

Another way to report it is to go to Ofsted or report it to the DfE.

Sincerely

Hannah

Online Law Advisor

I don’t think using notes from a former student is that bad necessarily. Teachers get resources from all kinds of places. It would depend upon the subject being taught and how good the notes were!

@LegalAdvice4Education please retrain or get a different job as your advice is just wrong.

Unfortunately schools are so understaffed that they often do skills audits to identify where gaps in the timetable can be filled by other teachers. This means people end up teaching subjects they themselves might only have a low A-level in themselves.

I was put in a situation where I was forced to teach a subject that was not my own and that I had a D at A-level in. It was such a stressful, awful time where I was trying my best to teach myself before I taught the students. My situation wasn’t unusual, either, and there were a few members of staff in similar situations.

This is one of the issues schools are facing with the lack of teachers.

But judging my the amount of daily teacher bashing threads on here, I can totally see why people are leaving in their droves.

Haha ha

What kind of online law adviser thinks that either Ofsted or the DfE have any involvement about the A level teaching in a independent school

Where did your online law expertise come from?

Where did your online law expertise come from?

Tiktok

I think TikTok is more knowledgeable than Hannah

Fair point.

ChatGTP.

It reads like the shite my students think I can't see through.

Hi OP, it's not Economics is it?! If it is (or any of the other mostly 6th form only subjects) you might suggest to the school they send the teacher on one of the Tutor2u subject crash courses and buy their PPTs.

I teach Economics (which I have a degree in) and have lost count of the colleagues over the years I've had to help out who have had the subject dumped on them without so much as an A-level in it. And some schools are too tight to even give these individuals a budget for off the shelf resources.

Don't push too hard though or you'll simply drive the teacher out, end up with cover for the rest of the course and/or the school will drop it.

I left an independent school because of how they treated their staff.

At school, I taught myself microeconomics and statistics at A-level (due to those teachers being MIA - the macro and pure maths teachers were good though). I got the top grade in both. There are great resources available nowadays too. You don't really "need" a teacher if you're motivated.

Stop gossiping with other parents!

Dear Hanna - Online Law Advisor, stick to your day job, which clearly isnt giving accurate legal advice about education!

’Go to Ofsted’? The first thing to do if you have a complaint is, as you first said, raise it with the Head. Then the next stage is to follow the school’s complaint procedure.
Ofsted does NOT deal with complaints from moaning parents - they would just redirect said complainant back to the schools complaints procedure.

The inspection body for independents is ISI anyway...

There are 4 errors in Hannah 5 line post.

For some subjects this is surprisingly common.

Subjects like economics or psychology are often hard to get teachers for as there isn't enough teaching for full time, so a teacher who teaches something else gets it dumped on them.

It's really bad for both teacher and students as the school usually don't bother providing any resources or support and the teacher is on their own trying to figure out the spec and find resources.

Realistically if you complain either you may find the subject gets pulled completely - so the class is told to transfer to different A levels - or it might be given to a deputy head with more experience and figuring out as they go along.

This sort of situation rarely ends well though - if it is given to a more experienced teacher the lessons will improve but if they are not familiar with the subject and exams the results can still be pretty bad.

Hannah's not getting an A* 😂

Ha ha ha. Are you serious?!!!!!
Your son says.....
And parents wonder why people wouldn't go into teaching even if they were paid a salary that matches skill & responsibilities. Maybe your son would like to critique his GP and the NHS or perhaps your local Police officers???