What does Nicky Morgan not seem to understand?

[theluckiest]

Nicky Morgan urges teachers' unions to 'do their bit' www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-35899478

No Nicky, teaching is not wonderful at the moment. No, teachers are not just moaning yet again (because that's what we usually do, isn't it?). No, your constant interfering, moving of goalposts and unnecessary 'reforms' are not helping anyone. In fact, you are damaging education irreparably.

Here's an example: the 'more rigorous' testing that you insist all 11 year olds should be put through are actually damaging. They are demoralising teachers but much more importantly, they are seriously damaging children's mental health. Yes, really. The stress these children are being put under is unforgivable this year. As a school we are held to ransom because of these tests (let's be honest, tests that we teachers, parents and schools know are bullshit).

They feel like they have failed already because your 'rigour' is inappropriate, unnecessary and completely pointless. They despise learning this nonsense and I can't blame them. At a time of their lives when learning should be exciting, they are force-fed inaccurate, archaic grammar and given the message that their writing cannot be good enough if it doesn't have a semi-colon.

Sounds crazy doesn't it? Because it is. So forgive me if I don't "Use the tools available to them to build up teachers, promote the profession and tell the story of what a rewarding job teaching really is" at the moment. (how I laughed when I read that one!!)

And don't get me started on academisation....Nicky, take your fingers out of your ears and listen. Before it's too late.

Every single time education has been changed, teachers have been up in arms.

Seems fair enough to me to be up in arms about the goalposts constantly changing. That would piss off anyone, in any job. In teaching, it means that each cohort of children who only get one education each - have to put up with something that hasn't yet become well established.

Don't you think that it should be one or the other? No one resitting or everyone, not some depending on year of birth?
The only reason I can think of for this 2 year discrepancy is nothing to do with the good of the children, and everything to do with the system being unable to cope with the numbers who would have to resit (it can barely cope as it is) and they are hoping to fiddle the figures in 2 years time to have more students passing

Should teachers not speak out when they think that children are being disadvantaged?

Your defeatist attitude is pretty poor, actually. Teachers have complained about stuff and change has occurred so saying that things will plough on regardless is incorrect. Current Y11 will now have a legacy resit opportunity in June of Y12 thanks to teachers speaking up and I believe some KS2 teacher assessment dates have been put back in response to concerns. Remember when Gove-levels were first leaked? They were only intended to be sat by 75% of children with the rest merely getting a leaving certificate. That changed too.

Ignore random dashes in that post.

I imagine it's another piece of evidence that convinces you that teachers are consistently doom-mongering. You seem to have come through your (state?) education fairly unscathed though?

Yes, that was my point. The change from OLevels/CSEs to GCSEs was greeted by the teaching profession with shrieks of derision.

There was no solid evidence to support that change either, as far as I remember - at least, that is what my teachers told me. But, the education system didn't collapse. Life continued. Young people were not leaving school illiterate or uneducated.

'Schools and teachers operate in a no-blame culture'.

Maybe this Shanghai stuff does have something to offer.

You've selectively quoted that out of context. My point was that whether or not your teachers were correct is lost in the mists of time. We don't know if they were right or not.

I'm interested in your evidence that young people were not leaving school illiterate or uneducated in that era - what do you base that statement on?

& yet you've not been shunned here, have you pretty? People have genuinely tried to engage with you & your POV.

I'd love there to be a more persuasive argument than 'well this bucket of crap IS going to be poured over you, like it or not, so smile & pretend it's chocolate'.

That's just no fun to debate.

We have done ourselves no favours with that because the general attitude by now is that teachers won't like anything the government does, so people shrug and smile and roll their eyes a bit.

...And then you get threads on here where people are saying 'why is my DD being taught maths by a PE teacher' or 'Why is my DS now being sent home with a shed load of SATs revision' or 'How can I stop my primary becoming an academy?' or 'my DS is being forced to take French GCSE even though he's rubbish at it and would be better taking music' or (projecting into the future) 'my DD has failed maths but her sixth form won't let her resit because she got a 4 even though a 4 is a fail' or 'my local school's exam results have plummeted recently, should I be concerned?' or 'my DS has just started secondary and is being forced into lunchtime and after school SATs revision and can't see his friends, he's anxious and starting to refuse school' And then all teachers can do is say 'we tried to tell you'

I think parents are finally starting to realise what the moaning was all about.

Seems fair enough to me to be up in arms about the goalposts constantly changing. That would piss off anyone, in any job. In teaching, it means that each cohort of children who only get one education each - have to put up with something that hasn't yet become well established.

But, as I asked upthread, don't people know that is what the job is going to be like before they join the profession?
State Education has forever been a political football. It's always been dynamic and changed to match the ideology of the party in power. You can't become a postie and then object to the early starts or amount of walking involved.

Ironically, Academisation might just take the sector a step further away from the whims of politicians - local Councils won't be able to win elections based on whether or not they plan to restructure the local education framework (yes, it can and does happen, despite NM assertions otherwise), and even national initiatives such as the national curriculum can be disregarded by Academies if they wish.

No jelly you misunderstand me. What I mean is that if I looked at my social media (bearing in mind we tend to gravitate towards people with similar views to us anyway) the general impression would be that the country is up in arms; positively raging about this.

However I believe that's a skewed take on things and I suspect NM knows that too; hence why she's cheerfully carrying on. My second paragraph in the post above outlines the whys - essentially people have a perception of young people having an easier academic ride than even thirty years ago and of teachers who, to paraphrase Roosevelt (I think!) have nothing to fear but change itself.

Sometimes it's not about having a defeatist attitude but about recognising where time and energy is best placed. The new curriculum I like: no problem with that at all (I'm talking about secondary school here.) Academies - I think there are positives and certainly the negatives that are loudly spoken of happened in LA maintained schools anyway.

I just googled the O-level to GCSE change and got this BBC news story
news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/june/20/newsid_2516000/2516847.stm

And I quote "Teachers' unions welcomed the announcement. Fred Jarvis, of the National Union of Teachers, said: "This is one decision of Sir Keith's which will be applauded throughout the teaching profession"."

Ok, give us some positives then raining!

What do you teach, raining?

Ah, so you're suggesting that people don't become teachers, given how the current situation is? And that those that were silly enough to become teachers already should just put up and shut up because it was ever thus. No hope of changing it, despite fearing the impact on students education. Just give it up, express no opinion at all on what you're being asked to do, and keep your head down. Do you worry about ongoing morale? How would you suggest teachers best reconcile themselves to the situation?

Positives are no more controlled assessment (yippee) reducing workload and putting more onus on students. A more varied and challenging curriculum. Schools judged on progress not spurious observations. The push for grade C and thus the deflated balloon effect gone. Academic qualifications more academic.

I'm interested in your evidence that young people were not leaving school illiterate or uneducated in that era - what do you base that statement on?

The fact that some of my cohort are now teachers!

?

don't people know that is what the job is going to be like before they join the profession?

I've been teaching nearly 11 years and it is very different now to how it was then. That's why so many people are leaving!

I've also been teaching eleven years and it was filled with how awful it was, never been this bad, chronic shortage, teachers leaving in droves

I certainly remember my headmistress back in the 1960s looking forward to the time when GCEs/CSEs became one exam. It took another 20 years though.

'Knowing what the job is like before joining' only really applies if the job stays the same, though! If the job keeps changing, then all you can know is that you won't know what you're getting yourself into.

I'm not a teacher, just a slightly bewildered parent of three children who might as well have been going through three different education systems, given how many changes have happened between exam years for each.

DH, meanwhile, is still saying in puzzled tones, 'So... are you saying AS levels are a lower level than A levels now? When did that happen?' Luckily for him, the answer will be irrelevant before long.

(He did S-levels in the days when that was a higher grade than A-level, and seems determined to confuse the two.)

There's not much of an issue with the primary curriculum either. As it is written in the curriculum document.

The assessment of it has been a complete and utter fuck up. I'm not convinced that what is being tested at ks1 & 2 actually is relevant or necessary. I certainly don't think it's a good marker of whether a child is on track to reach a good GCSE grade in English.

English, then, raining. Are you not worried about the effect that losing controlled assessment will have on the achievement of girls, who are usually the ones to carry the English department in terms of results? (Just as a matter of interest, really, I've not seen it discussed anywhere - girls results for maths dropped when we lost coursework under Labour).

Schools judged on progress hopefully you are aware of the research that shows that the progress 8 measure cannot be used as a measure of school efficacy, and yet it will be seen in this way anyway?

Push for a grade C will now be a push for a grade 5 because parents will still be interested in headline measures.

Ok, in true 'what did the Romans ever do for us?' mode, I'll give you the unmourned CA.

(We're doing IGCSE to retain old style coursework mind you. & also to avoid the 'pale male & stale' dead white guy bias of new Eng Lit).

But what has that to do with academies?

raining 11 years ago I had to compete for my job against a field of candidates who had been shortlisted for interview. This year we've advertised 3 times and had to scrape the barrel.