Honestly if everyone could just chill the f out it would help kids, parents and teachers.
The couple of years I had with ds doing not a lot frankly but child led learning if you want a buzzword for it was instinct affirming and life changing. Kids learn - try and stop them! Primary really overall what you want is kids to be able to read, to comprehend, to compare and contrast and explain their own ideas and to be numerate and confident at tackling basic maths. OF COURSE I don't claim I could teach classes of 30 random kids to pass SATS exams but I can damn sure facilitate my son's basic development of areas of the brain that are programmed to be hungry to learn at that age.
Ds had nearly three years out of UK school, a brief stint at pseudo schools when we were traveling which were really just about socialising with other kids and doing art and sports projects with a token nod at maths and literacy in classes with kids of all different languages and ages being taught by tefl at most qualified teachers.
When we came back to school and slotted back in he was fine and seemed to have missed nothing other than the terms they gave to processes in maths (re ask him to do x and he looks baffled till he realises oh by x they mean what we called y). NOT that teachers don't do fantastic jobs at primary but that quality one on one interest in you and your learning, albeit it haphazard and not every day or particularly disciplined or adhering to a prescribed curriculum, is at least equal to being one of 30 in an overcrowded room for six hours a day and a teacher forced to follow the latest guidelines.
I appreciate teachers seem to have become far less unionised and political than when I started but ffs if they're pissed off about education standards and resources etc then tell the bloody government and the people who vote for them - don't blame the teachers who are trying to connect with and add some value to the life of your children despite being in a shitty underfunded overcrowded overloaded system.
How did we get to be the enemy when we're also parents - I'm not overly happy that my son has been taught by people whose English I find hard to understand one on one in a quiet room. I'm not overly impressed that a few kids in his class with massive challenges that require far more intensive support that can be provided set the tone and pace of learning for everyone else. I'm not hugely enamoured with the fact that his PP provision equates to a less than high achieving year 10 taking him out of key subject lessons for a chat each week. I can't blame the teachers though as they didn't make any of the decisions that created this situation. It's not his maths teachers fault that she doesn't speak english at a comprehensible level yet was employed to work in a UK school - I can't even blame the school (which also employs me) that they can't recruit an english, qualified maths teacher.
I know this is a huge rant and i promise to shut up but grrrrr! It's not us you need to rant at - we're suffering under it the same as you.