Strontium Dog wrote:I didn't assert anything, rather you asked if I had data to show that hiring teachers without formal teaching qualifications would work in state schools. I'm not sure how you expect me to be able to have data of that ilk, as it's the kind of thing which will only be proven successful or otherwise by attempting it. If it doesn't work, then so be it, and we've lost nothing by trying. I would, however, note that even with full educational freedom, the likes of Eton and Harrow still overwhelmingly employ qualified teachers, and I see no reason why this wouldn't be the case in state schools too.

Schools like Eton & Harrow don't appoint teachers who aren't highly qualified in their subject & they have the finances to attract & retain those people. The quality of teaching is also very important to those schools & their reputations so they have huge resources to support new staff. They have similar induction, appraisal & development systems to state schools but with a much bigger budget. Therefore, any staff who haven't already proven themselves at another school are "trained" as part of their induction.

State schools don't have that kind of budget so it's important that they employ teachers who already have QTS because they are going to be responsible for classes of children/students from day 1. They are supported & monitored of course but if they can't do the job it becomes very difficult for the school because they don't have huge resources to train teachers.

If you give state schools the "freedom" to appoint non-qualified staff then they'll also need an increased budget to train & support them.

Strontium Dog wrote:I didn't assert anything,...

You did. You asserted that the model used by Eton and Harrow should be 'good enough' in another context:

Strontium Dog wrote:
If it's good enough for Eton and Harrow...

Strontium Dog wrote:
...rather you asked if I had data to show that hiring teachers without formal teaching qualifications would work in state schools. I'm not sure how you expect me to be able to have data of that ilk, as it's the kind of thing which will only be proven successful or otherwise by attempting it. If it doesn't work, then so be it, and we've lost nothing by trying. I would, however, note that even with full educational freedom, the likes of Eton and Harrow still overwhelmingly employ qualified teachers, and I see no reason why this wouldn't be the case in state schools too.

So you do recognise that teaching qualifications are important?

I think you are just posting stuff to be contentious SD.

Strontium Dog wrote:If it doesn't work, then so be it, and we've lost nothing by trying.

This attitude is another reason why torydems can't be trusted around schools.

Since they shrug off any amount of scientific evidence, court judgements and even UN reports in the unthinking pursuit of their morally bankrupt ideology I shudder to think what would need to happen to make them accept that one of their catastrophic education deforms "doesn't work", certainly thousands upon thousands of children robbed of their education would have to be just the tip of the iceberg.

But even if the torydems could ever be dragged, whipped and snivelling, to the acceptance of reality then their continuing belief that 'nothing would have been lost' would be as reprehensible as it would be deluded.

Being called morally bankrupt by someone who believes coalition politicians are vermin: the very definition of irony right there, folks.

I'm ignoring the rest of your fact-free tirade. Troll someone else with your vicious lies and smears.

Strontium Dog wrote:If it doesn't work, then so be it, and we've lost nothing by trying.

Yeah, what does it matter if it ends up ruining the education of children? No loss, right?

Vacuous.

Yes, I'm sure giving headteachers a little flexibility over who they employ will totally ruin the lives of children across the land. Racing certainty.

Emmeline wrote:There will also be the the exceptional person who already has the knowledge & skills to teach without any training but they are rare & I suspect that many of them didn't begin their teaching careers as good teachers but rather learnt along the way from others & their own mistakes.

But it's always been the case that people like this can be fast-tracked through the PGCE process. The point is that they still have to go though it and get qualified. If someone can't dedicate a year of their life to getting qualified, then I can't imagine they're particularly serious about the profession.

Strontium Dog wrote:Yes, I'm sure giving headteachers a little flexibility over who they employ will totally ruin the lives of children across the land. Racing certainty.

The gamble of giving some unqualified teachers the responsibility of educating children comes with the risk of ruining their education in some cases, yes. It's a gamble.

If it doesn't work, then so be it, and we've lost nothing by trying.

was the vacuous bit. I wouldn't call any kid's education "nothing".

pensioner wrote:I used to think teaching was a cushy number until I got a job as a Technology Technician in a local school. That opened my eyes to the stress of the job and the dedication that the majority of teachers give to there students. I used to think that teachers started work at nine and finished at three thirty. No they do not in my experience, I have never seen a Teacher at the three schools I worked at leave on most days anyway without taking work home.

Well you've got to account for planning time too. I'd say it takes about an hour to plan a 2 hour lesson (on average), more for a new teacher. Homework marking obviously depends on the age group. But for older students, and especially essay based work, rather than work with a right and wrong answer, it can take a long time.

Strontium Dog wrote:Yes, I'm sure giving headteachers a little flexibility over who they employ will totally ruin the lives of children across the land. Racing certainty.

Well, by ensuring that schools are restricted to taking on qualified teachers only, we may not see more instances of this:

http://www.theguardian.com/education/20 ... functional

From which:

"The report, which has been leaked to the Guardian, says teachers at the faith school are inexperienced and have not been provided with proper training.

Pupils are given the same work "regardless of their different abilities" and the governing body is "ineffective", according to the report which was commissioned amid reports of irregularities at the school."

""Staff have been appointed to key roles for which they do not have qualifications and experience. For example, most of the primary school teachers have not taught before and the head of the primary school is experienced in teaching secondary-aged pupils only," the inspection report says.

It says that teachers' assessments of work against the national curriculum are "over-generous" and pupils are making poor progress at Key Stage 3.

Primary school teaching is characterised by "poor lesson planning" with all pupils given the same work regardless of ability. In a maths lesson pupils were "insufficiently challenged" and spent most of the 55 minutes cutting out and pasting shapes and "learned little that was mathematical"."

No doubt there are pupils at this school who are now a year behind their peers in other schools.

Also, no doubt it will be very costly to fix this free school, money that would have be better spent on employing properly trained qualified staff in the first place.

Strontium Dog wrote:I didn't assert anything, rather you asked if I had data to show that hiring teachers without formal teaching qualifications would work in state schools. I'm not sure how you expect me to be able to have data of that ilk, as it's the kind of thing which will only be proven successful or otherwise by attempting it.

You don't need data of this ilk, you just need to know that the PGCE wasn't just pulled out of someone's arse. It's based on decades of research into the best teaching methodologies. It stands to reason that someone with the benefit on that training will be a better teacher than someone without it. Perhaps more importantly, someone who would be a good teacher despite being unqualified will only be a better teacher if properly trained. So where's the argument for them not being trained?

I'm With Stupid wrote:So where's the argument for them not being trained?

It's in the idea that fetishizing freedom is the answer to EVERYTHING, and you must not under any circumstances engage your brain before doing so or consider that the usefulness of said fetish might have exceptions or limitations.

And Eton and Harrow are such stunning failures, as we know.

campermon wrote:

Strontium Dog wrote:Yes, I'm sure giving headteachers a little flexibility over who they employ will totally ruin the lives of children across the land. Racing certainty.

Well, by ensuring that schools are restricted to taking on qualified teachers only, we may not see more instances of this:

http://www.theguardian.com/education/20 ... functional

From which:

"The report, which has been leaked to the Guardian, says teachers at the faith school are inexperienced and have not been provided with proper training.

Pupils are given the same work "regardless of their different abilities" and the governing body is "ineffective", according to the report which was commissioned amid reports of irregularities at the school."

""Staff have been appointed to key roles for which they do not have qualifications and experience. For example, most of the primary school teachers have not taught before and the head of the primary school is experienced in teaching secondary-aged pupils only," the inspection report says.

It says that teachers' assessments of work against the national curriculum are "over-generous" and pupils are making poor progress at Key Stage 3.

Primary school teaching is characterised by "poor lesson planning" with all pupils given the same work regardless of ability. In a maths lesson pupils were "insufficiently challenged" and spent most of the 55 minutes cutting out and pasting shapes and "learned little that was mathematical"."

No doubt there are pupils at this school who are now a year behind their peers in other schools.

Also, no doubt it will be very costly to fix this free school, money that would have be better spent on employing properly trained qualified staff in the first place.

The only good thing is that pupils from faith schools just wont make it in society. Thus being the be all and end all of this stupid system.

Strontium Dog wrote:And Eton and Harrow are such stunning failures, as we know.

So your government is providing the extra funding to get the class sizes that Eton enjoys, are they? Great news! I can't wait for modern language classes with no more than 12 students in.

Starting to sound a little out of your depth here SD. All you can do is go back to your soundbite of "it's good enough for Eton" when in reality, you know that any comparison between the proposed system and a £35k a year private school is laughable.

Strontium Dog wrote:And Eton and Harrow are such stunning failures, as we know.

You may be on to something here SD.

Further to I'm with Stupid's post, I did a little digging around.

Eton, for example, has a pupil:teacher ratio of about 8:1 (source: here). That's about halve the pupil:teacher ratio of regular secondary schools (source: here)

You will also see that Eton is not particularly special with its pupil:teacher ratio; from the source you will also note that independent schools on average have a similar ratio.

You've changed my mind SD. I wholeheartedly agree with you that we should transfer the independent school model, exemplified by Eton and Harrow, to the publicly funded school system. For this to happen at secondary level we'd possibly need to build a new school for each current one i.e. my school has approx a 1000 kids, but if we were to decrease our pupil:teacher ratio we'd need another building to accommodate the extra classes. We'd also need to employ more qualified teachers; as you said, Eton and Harrow employ mostly qualified staff.

Just think of the stimulation to the economy of all this building and training. It would be an publicly funded educational renaissance!

Your idea is simply brilliant SD. Underneath all your bluster, you're a socialist at heart.




Edit - to get the ratio's the right way round; pupil:teacher not teacher:pupil

Rumour has it that Eton goes the extra mile to ensure that some very special students pass their A-levels. I think that's great! Only it's difficult to do that in state schools....so many more students to look after!

Thomas Eshuis wrote:

Strontium Dog wrote:

Thomas Eshuis wrote:

Strontium Dog wrote:

Ah, it's unsupported assertion time again. How it fills me with joy.

Ah, it's pot > kettle time again.

Ah, it's Thomas's Fairy Tale Hour again.

Strontium Dog wrote:I always support my assertions. If you ever find an assertion that I make which you believe to be unsupported, alert me to it and I will explain why you are wrong.

Sure you do. After all, you were only ever wrong once innit?

Twice, actually.

Strontium Dog wrote:And Eton and Harrow are such stunning failures, as we know.

And whatever works with as shit-ton of money behind it, works just as well with a small fraction of that much money behind it, as we know.

And whatever works for a class of 12 rich, supported, motivated children from the most privileged minority of society boarding at the best school in the country, works just as well with a class of 30 hungry disillusioned delinquents at an inner city sink school, as we all know.

Honestly, you should try going into a school one day and getting a clue.

Beatsong wrote:

Strontium Dog wrote:And Eton and Harrow are such stunning failures, as we know.

And whatever works with as shit-ton of money behind it, works just as well with a small fraction of that much money behind it, as we know.

And whatever works for a class of 12 rich, supported, motivated children from the most privileged minority of society boarding at the best school in the country, works just as well with a class of 30 hungry disillusioned delinquents at an inner city sink school, as we all know.

Honestly, you should try going into a school one day and getting a clue.

Ah, but Beatsong..... I expect SD's argument regarding those 'hungry disillusioned delinquents' will be the same as the one the other SD has just made about pupils from faith schools, thus benefiting all the 'worthy pupils' to no end. Just think how little effort the Eton and Harrow lot will need to expend when all the competition is literally in the gutter.