Teaching - what needs to change?

[Whinberry]

I am not a teacher but I keep hearing how stressful it is and how many teachers want to leave. What is it that is wrong and what needs to change? More money is always needed but apart from just 'more money' what do you think needs to happen?

Get rid of the Tory government.

Didn’t they run schools down and piss off the teacher last time? Or am I making that up.

I’ve been teaching since the early 80s, and for most of the 80s, I taught whole class, 30 children, no TA. Mind you, my planning for the week was an A4 sheet of notes, and there were far fewer identified SN issues. Plus marking was a doddle. That changed over time Whinberry, I wouldn’t be allowed or able to teach like that now.

Maybe a more pertinent question is ‘will it/when will it change?’ I am trying to decide if I should stay or go.

IMHO it's broken.

It's like someone says - "This is your task [teaching a class]. It is very difficult and challenging and exhausting, but you want to do it so that's OK [it is]. Oh, we also need you to do this marking, in a specific way which will take you several hours per class, every two-three weeks; also you need to do reports every month or so, also plan interesting and well-differentiated lessons where students make rapid progress; also go to meetings and parents' evenings. All of that will take at least 20 hours a week. We will give you 3 hours a week to do it all. What do you mean that's not enough time?"

What needs to change is contact time, three hours teaching a day max instead of five hours. I had a week this term when I taught three full days in a row and was on duty on the Tuesday as well; by Wednesday I was on my knees. The extra hours would be used to plan and mark, the balance would then be right.

Obviously this would require a massive cash injection.

The other big issue is behaviour, and policies/rules not being followed through by SLT. This has become a massive problem in the school I have just left, but I gather it is happening elsewhere as well. You can't say to Jessica "Your skirt is too short" if she can retort "well, so is everyone else's" and no one does anything about it. Ditto chewing gum, not having a pen, talking in class, swearing at teachers etc.

By the way when I said the class marking was every two-three weeks, I am talking about secondary, where you see the class twice a week for my subject. This term I taught 11 classes so I was marking most nights.

When I said historical I was thinking 70/80s. I certainly appreciate that only teaching two days a week and having three days to plan would be easier. But I was trying to be realistic here about changes that could be feasible in the short/medium term.

This is not just a Tory issue - just mention 'curriculum for excellence' to anyone in Scotland who isn't SNP and see what response you get!

If kids with challenging behaviour are to be in mainstream schools, give us the support we need to deal with them.

Stop parents telling us how to do our job.

Stop parents phoning and email the school about trivial things.

Scrap the Curriculum for Excellence.

Find more supply teachers.

I'm in Scotland and I don't think things are nearly as bad as in the rest of the UK,

We say 'look at the results in china'!! Well, their teachers teach 2-3 hours a day! Japanese teachers are given time to plan lessons together.

I'm planning on leaving teaching at the end of the year. I teach 26/27 hour per week. Plus a form. I have 11 different classes to mark and plan (all new) course for. I can only recycle resources for my year 10. The kids are nasty and enough of their parents are bullies. I work my ass off and the kids don't care about their learning or their exams...

I think offering proper exit interviews to staff leaving would be a good idea.

This might be a stupid question, or maybe it isnt but why do fee paying and/or Jewish schools do better than most state high schools? Is the whole academy thing a failure?

Simple TDH. Small class sizes, involved parents who aren’t from areas of social deprivation with all the disadvantage that comes with that, the ability to exclude children that aren’t behaving.

Pink I totally agree, but in my school 'return to work' discussions are woefully inadequate. Ok, 'I was off with a sore throat' is dealt equally with ' I have an on going thyroid problem which will need monitoring'. To be absent due to illness, I have to e-mail before 7.30, I then have to telephone and speak to a member of SLT before 8.00. I then need to text or e-mail my HoD with the work for the day. Well if I can manage all that obviously I am not really ill then.

Contact time needs reducing.

All the top PISA countries that everyone raves about have a lot less contact time and a lot more planning and prep time compared to the Uk.

Why did we depart from these methodologies ? Because that prepares you to be a civil servant in the 1950s.

First thing that needs to change is schools should have to employ teachers to teach.

Government should step back and let teachers get on with it.

Dump league tables, dump SATs.

Junior school children are drilled and drilled for SATs then they have a few 'fun' weeks before leaving for secondary, then 6 weeks holiday, is it a wonder they have slipped by the time they get to secondary.

Exam boards and teachers should be able to agree common parts of the curriculum. Eg maths can overlap with various subjects, most obviously physics and some computer science but also geography and cooking but the curriculum doesn't do that.

This would mean children can apply things learned in one subject to another. Eg if you have done Venn diagrams in maths then Karnaugh maps make more sense. If you have learned ratios then that means you can work out the distance on a map or increase a recipe.

I know some of these things are taught in maths but I also know there are different curricula.

Forget PISA, yes Singapore and Korea have fantastic maths results but children in Korea study 9am to 12 midnight. We have a different culture. Look at the things we are good at as a country / culture.

Some better practical subjects, possibly with links to local businesses.

This might be a stupid question, or maybe it isnt but why do fee paying and/or Jewish schools do better than most state high schools?

Selection. If you look at the numbers of disadvantaged children, ESOL, chaotic background they are under represented in schools with election.

My RC Girls' school was also 100% white in a town with a large Pakistani population.

Recognise that society has changed and children are different than they were when I started teaching 20 years ago.

We need a proper Kindergarten stage for 3-7 year olds where the focus is on executive function and emotional self regulation. Research would indicate that this develops best in an environment where free play dominates.

Assessment at 6 and half to identify children with additional support needs across all 4 domains of learning and very high level of investment in staffing to support these children.

Either a reduction in contact hours per teacher or a massive reduction in class sizes which I predict would improve both teacher and pupil mental health.

A lot of work from ITE onwards on establishing a sustainable work/life balance. Teachers tend to live their lives in the school holidays which just leads to burn out.

The constant meddling with curriculum and exam specs. The current situation is that we provide a rigourous academic curriculum. This is not appropriate for all children, whether it be too hard or just boring. This leads to disengagement and poor behaviour. So much time and effort pastorally is then put in to many students supporting (forcing) them to access said curriculum. I loved English at school but the way I see it taught now I don't recognise. They are taught to pass exams. 're writing paragraphs and using checklist to ensure correct spelling and grammar. Peer marking it then writing it again and again until it is a regurgitated version of the teachers... all to answer something like 'What's the importance of Scrooges nephew in this scene? '.
We don't want 2 tier/divisive system bit a broad curriculum with vocational, practical and creative outlets is sadly missed.

This might be a stupid question, or maybe it isnt but why do fee paying and/or Jewish schools do better than most state high schools?

Are you serious? Fee paying schools can choose which kids they take, kick out any that prove troublesome and don't have to jump through government-imposed hoops. I worked in an independent school for years. It was like a totally different job, even compared with the best state school I've taught in.

Remove the obsessive accountability agenda. Everyone is seeking to apportion blame to everyone else because children are not meeting insane targets. This takes up hours of time with meetings and trawling through data. Kids are human beings who don’t make uniform progress; one term they might go backwards a bit, particularly after the long summer holiday. Another term it might suddenly all “click” and they’ll come on leaps and bounds. If only leadership teams would trust teachers, instead of wasting time hounding them about data/targets/flightpaths/whatever to cover their own arses.

Teachers need fewer contact hours and more time to plan, mark and differentiate. This will make them better teachers because children will get better quality feedback, better prepared lessons but also a teacher who isn’t completely frazzled and on their knees with exhaustion.

SENCO here. Barriers to providing decent SEN support ie: ehc money not being ring fenced, being charged for EP services, crappy tokenistic nod to Sen during initial teacher training, not enough decent teaching assistants.

Not enough experienced staff in school.

Lack of decent alternative provision

Lack of knowledge and support for the mental health epidemic in our schools.

CAMHS waiting lists

ineffective behaviour policies

A key stage 4 curriculum that is inaccessible to a lot of the kids I teach which doesn't prepare them for life.

I could go on....

We say 'look at the results in china'!!

And quietly nobody mentions that they just don't educate large sections of society. I recently taught a pupil who had been born in China to British parents working out there in professional roles. They put him in a Chinese school, but brought him back within 2 years because they could see he wouldn't be kept in his school (ADHD). He met ARE in his Y6 SATs. If even pupils like him are not counted in their results no wonder they do well.

We need a proper Kindergarten stage for 3-7 year olds where the focus is on executive function and emotional self regulation

I agree whole heartedly with this and think you should be made Education Secretary stargirl. However, I think we need to find a way of improving the development of these things throughout school, not just EYFS/ KS1.

Ditch target grades.

Honestly.

So much negativity would be removed if we just got rid of them - less stressed teachers, fewer stressed kids, greater autonomy of what is taught (&how), less time spent on spreadsheets...

Also, get the government to stop meddling. Choose a curriculum and STICK WITH IT. Let teachers teach and kids learn without worrying about what the end result will be. Allow us to inspire kids and ‘put the fun back in’.

Far greater use of team teaching, so having 3 teachers between 2 classes, for example. Not only would it reduce the overall workload for teachers and improve outcomes for children because they'd get so much more contact with qualified teachers, but it would be catalyst for improving teacher performance because they'd have the opportunity to learn from their teaching partners.

When I was observing lessons in Shanghai last year, it was usual to have other teachers from the school watching every lesson. Weekly departmental meetings were then held to discuss the lessons watched and suggest tweaks/changes/improvements. No teacher was worried about being observed because it was completely normal to them. In this country, once you're set lose in your own classroom not only are you rarely watched by anyone else, it is very unusual to have the chance to watch any other teachers. The potential for this to improve teaching and outcomes, and therefore job satisfaction is incredible. Imagine teaching in a school where every teacher, regardless of stage of their career or experience level, regularly takes part in discussions about how to do their job most effectively to get the best outcome for the pupils.

Oh - and an acceptance of the blindingly obvious that data is absolute bollocks. The basis on which it's produced is so spurious, and the stakes for the teachers who produce it are so high, I've yet to see internal data that's worth the paper it's written on. Many hours of teacher time goes into producing it, then analysing it, then justifying it at a pupil progress meeting but what actual difference to pupil outcomes does it make? Teachers should have the time to prepare damn good lessons which are adapted to meet the needs of their class, and properly resourced to do so rather than constantly chasing their tail and having to sling together something at the last minute because they were so busy doing data or marking they didn't have time to prepare properly. If teachers had the time for proper lesson preparation then the quality of education received by pupils would be so much better and so outcomes would improve and teachers would be less stressed because they would know they were spending their time doing things that make an actual difference to children.

I got out this summer due to the ever increasing workload and demands of the job after 25 years in the classroom.
Earlier on in the thread someone mentioned parents, and I now watch in horror at the amount of time my DCs teachers have to spend on some of the parents. My youngest is in Y2 and there are a small band of parents who are so demanding on the teachers time. Everyday before and after school at least one of them is there. Nits, are they drinking enough water during the day, how much lunch they ate, why A hit B yesterday (it wasn't As fault, he's an angel at home despite being a nightmare at every class party), why B hit A yesterday (it wasn't Bs fault, he's an angel at home despite being a nightmare at every class party), complaining about where there child is sat, etc.
It is endless and much of it is unnecessary, and that is before the endless email streams between parents that I'm sure end up in emails to the teacher. The teacher is great and the school is fantastic. Parents are so much more demanding on teachers time now.