Asked to teach BTEC

[happilyconfused]

Blowing my own trumpet just a little - but I have an excellent pass rate at GCSE and A level - like other Mnetters teachers. However I have now been asked to deliver BTEC level 2 course to Year 10/11 and again to Year 12/13. I will still be delivering my 'bread and butter' courses.

My impression is that the Head sees BTEC as the Holy Grail. He wants all kids to leave with something - don't we all! My concern is the amount of marking and the amount of 'help' I will have to give them in order to pass.

Comments please

What's your subject?

I don't teach BTEC but the teachers at our school who do so are really enjoying it. There is a lot of support/training available. I think the scariest thing about it is the initial work monitoring visit, when they check you're assessing things correctly. They have been incredibly supportive and have sorted out any "blips" in planning and assessment really quickly.

It IS time consuming though and most of the teachers do an extra session after school each week to try and fit it all in.

My subjects are Business, Economics and Politics. I don't see any KS3 kids - hurrah. My A levels are 'carefully selected' so they are exam only options because I found that boys and coursework are not a good mix. From what I have seen so far within the school is that there are a lot of BTEC 'catch-up' days - and it has been targeted at the 'weaker' student. Maybe my fear is that I will have the 'thick' group dumped on me.

Our brighter kids do the BTECs, cos with a BTEC plus English and Maths their 5 A-Cs are sorted.

I don't think my school sees it that way Janeite. It is more like the last chance saloon so that at least they can leave with something and then go to the local sixth form college. No-one has bothered to explaing to the kids that in exchange for no exams that they have to work every lesson to build up the portfolio of criteria evidence.

From a school pov it's great as it will count towards GCSE scores. However, imo your instincts are right - you will get the 'thick group' dumped on you and you will spend inordinate amounts of time helping them through because they will all have to pass. Of course we all want students to leave with something however it should be something they've actually worked for. Sorry to sound cynical but I've spent a good few hours chasing students for coursework recently...

We have shied away from introducing BTEC in my subject (science) as we already have an applied course that is 50% coursework. That is bad enough with coursework. You will end up doing a lot of work and spending a lot of time catching up so students make the grade. Your school probably see it as a good way of propping up A-C grades as with a lot of bribery and nagging the C/D borders tend to all get Cs. IMO though it sounds as if you don't want to lose your privileged position teaching 'clever' kids. In this respect you sound a bit selfish. We'd all love to just teach top sets to well motivated students but teaching isn't like that most of the time. I would love to just teach chemistry to top sets but in an 11-18 high school then I also have to take my share of the less able ones. They may be giving you BTEC as you have a good KS4 record already, hoping that you can spread some of this down to the lower ability.

The school wanted me to offer A level Economics two years ago so as to attract kids to stay on at our Sixth Form and I complied. They are not all A grade kids and some find Economics very hard. Likewise with Politics.

The Business groups, both at A level and GCSE can be a very mixed bag in terms of ability and behaviour. There is no setting in Business. The GCSE has coursework.

My current feeling is that it is yet another syllabus that I will have to deliver and stay on top of along with the four that I already do. And then there will be timetabling issues - don't the BTECs require a lot of ICT time?

Yes BTEC does need a lot of ICT time - we're lucky that we have department laptops and more importantly this year BTEC has been timetabled against ks3 so we've been able to use them most lessons. Who knows what the situation will be like in september - if we're timetabled against applied science it'll be horrendous.

ftr I think you're being a bit harsh kritur