Jamie's Dream School

[londonone]

20 in a class
No curriculum
TV Cameras

And they still piss around! Maybe people will start to get a real idea about how perhaps some of the students are in fact not vitims but the architects of their own downfall!

'I see students all the time who cannot make any distinction between failing at a task and being a failure. They really have no resilience at all; it's a massive, massive problem and completely under-recognised.'

Malezka, this is the key. Excellent posts.
What a shame these children haven't been able to develop resilience -- organised sports for children, classrooms where they are prepared and challenged, and parents who don't have a chip on their shoulder against school and authority in general would go a long way to helping. In a perfect world...

In a perfect world there would be no teens too terrified to try.

Agree with Hullygully too.

Bless Jamie fortrying if only the people up top had as much enthusiasm.

bronze I agree with your earlier post - I really would give my eye teeth to spend an hour with Rolf Harris/Ellen McArthur/Robert Winston. Shame that these teenagers had little pre-knowledge of these people. They did not seem to hold them in awe at all somehow. It was as if they were totally raw, uneducated, and had never watched anything on TV apart from soaps.
Starkey - what can I say - he got the reception he deserved. Still, I would have loved the chance to look closely at the artefacts he brought. What a waste of opportunity!

Unfortunately Pickle, in my school any of the lower set groups are largely like this and most classes will behave like this if they can get away with it (supply teachers/ new teachers etc). It is seen as a bit of a game. 'Good' behaviour depends on a good relationship with the teacher (takes a lot of time and effort), strong leadership within the school prepared to sanction poor behaviour (difficult in ours because there is a reluctance to increase exclusion levels). IME a new teacher may have the best and most inspirational lesson planned but they won't get the chance to teach it if they haven't made their expectations clear and (for want of a better phrase) 'won the kids over'.

Oi Aitch - stop it with the spoilers!

I don't think it's about "teaching," just because it's called Dream School. It's about how we reengage these disaffected youth who are ultimately the responsibilty of us all.

Ellen McArthur = inspiring.

Apparently kids these days

1. must never be bored
2. must always always be 'respected' despite not respecting anyone
3. know their rights but not their responsibility

Life IS boring kids!. The only way we know something is interesting is because of the boring bits that punctuates the exciting bit. Hey kids! Get used to it! Work, washing up, doing what you're told are ALL boring but necessary.

Where should kids start on the ladder?

I couldn't watch the whole program cos I got too cross. If people out there think these children are few and far between in the real world then get real. There's a large proportion in each and every school; driving teachers to nervous breakdowns and damaging other kids' education. That's YOUR kids' education, people.

Is more accountability for parents necessary? Or is that nannying? These children didn't get the way they are in a vacuum.

Actually, they did.

I was really interested in this programme because i'm doing a teaching degree (but primary not secondary). I've got to give JO respect for having a go, he does say that even though it worked out for him not having GCSE's it doesn't mean everyone else will. If anything it's bringing attention to the problems in schools like the school dinners programme he did. IMO it can only be a good thing.

I liked Rolf Harris's approach of trying to make art relevant to that boy...Henry was it? Agree with whoever said his outburst at thinking his work was shit was very telling.

Starkey...well I think this goes to show why he isn't a teacher! What he said so inappropriate and the head was right to say he should be disciplined but the kids weren't doing much to earn his respect either. I can't believe he gave up so quickly though!

Looking forward to next weeks episode!

The programme is a brilliant reflection of our society.

Don't care; I'll talk if I want to; not lisetning; Want money; Want fame; Hear Me Hear Me; What da slebs doin; how's my profile; get me on telly; yes I will suffer humiliation for some PR; it's my life and I'll swear if I want to; you feel shit, I don't care; boo hoo, things iz tough for me; no one listens to me, boo hoo; feel my pain, every single one of my teachers treated me like shit; Hear Me Hear Me; who's gonna help me now; I'm making a noise, hear me

Couldn't put it better myself POinty...

Pointydog - that sounds like toddler tantrums to me.

You have it bang on, btw.

Yep. It's all their fault. Not ours/society's.

Oh, isn't that what they say too?

It is a dream school because some idiot just dreamed it up. Yet another low rent way of filling the tv screens with absolute pap.

Instead of spending money on these low rent slebs, why not pay for a good playwright and some fine actors and give us some great drama.

I am soooooo fed up with with this dross along with all the move house, look what is in my loft, let's paint the bedroom crapola.

It is society, gully. Intcha listening?

It's good telly though, jode.

As a relatively new FE teacher it was at least reassuring (if disturbing) to see that the kids in the Dream School behave absolutely no differently than they do where I work. I was trying to do a 1:1 tutorial today and the student was still texting away. Alas, we have very few sanctions as we're constantly measured on achievement and their destinations post college. That said .... it's a rewarding 2nd profession but not for the faint hearted :)

apols, hully, but give me some credit for knowing the difference between a teaser and a spoiler...

Only read the first few pages. I found it car crash TV BUT it did show that to be an inspirational teacher is not the same thing as being the best in your field or an academic. I would have liked these teachers to be teaching children/young adults from under-privilaged homes who are desperate to learn and to get out of a cycle of deprivation, but it wouldn't make such good TV I suppose [sceptical]. Apologies if both of these comments have already been made.

I remember there was a programme where a boy who had been expelled (I think) and lived in a deprived area was put in a private school and excelled. Whatever happened to him? Did anyone else watch it?

also....
would you really have a class of 20 where every pupil had become so disaffected with school? What's the average class size in a PRU?

There have been a few. One was ultimately expelled and some have done fine.

It certainly reminds some of us why we pay school feels to segregate our children from the great unwashed. It's the constant low level indiscipline and noise that must make learning awful for others in the class that must be so difficult. It seems the state school system has no ability to ensure children behave. They can't make them do things. Why would they have to "win them round" as someone suggested above? It could be a lot simpler than that if you just had some decent rules and the ones who don't play ball get sent to different places - actualyl that's what had happened to a few on the programme originally - sent to exclusion units.