Exams

They need parents who actually do want them to learn and to encourage their learning by preparing them for school with the basic abilities already in place, not waiting for the school to fulfil their duties for them.

People have to want to learn – what ever the subject.

And those that want to learn certainly don’t want a teacher that berates them for asking a question that they don’t know the answer to. Or to be told that everything that isn’t directly related to the syllabus is “not relevant”, in a tone of voice that means “shut up”.

Or my favourite, being marked down for knowing how to do things.

Example – “rename all the images in this directory to be BMP files”. Cue a lot of selecting a file, pressing… what was it, F2? Deleting the old extension, typing bmp, pressing Enter. Rinse and repeat for every file.
This was the days of Windows for Workgroups.

Cue me, drop to DOS, rename *.img *.bmp and job done, for all of the files, at once.

I was told to “do it properly” or leave the class. Brilliant, huh?

There’s another example (reminder to self – Mavis Beacon) but I need to go clock in soon so no time to write it. Later…

They need parents who actually do want them to learn

And they need parents and peers who value education and don’t celebrate failure.

I never understood why the clever kid was hated, and the one that probably failed at flipping burgers was the most popular, along with some parents of clever kids telling them that they have airs and graces, beyond their station, blah blah.

They need parents who actually do want them to learn

And peers who are unresentful of their attempts to learn. This is an aspect of education that I have never seen adequately addressed in the press. An important and difficult aspect of a headmaster’s job is to shepherd the ethos of the school: does it encourage the clever child or the philistine bully? As Rick points out, sometimes the staff acquiesce in demoralization (perhaps they lack confidence themselves or are simply fagged out, have no control, … ). A loving parent can be excused for being anxious that their child’s future may be jeopardized by the uncouth society in which their child has been placed. This is what class divisions and caste systems are really about. Not fantasies of superiority but fear of pollution; the anxiety that your child will miss out on his intellectual birthright because his jealous peers may persuade him to shun it – and the darkness comprehended it not.

does it encourage the clever child or the philistine bully?

Now, which little darling has the parent with the most clout, or the ability to make the most noise?
That’s who they’ll appease, and if the parent is an insufferable bully, chances are the child won’t be so different.

Not fantasies of superiority but fear of pollution;

I’m not sure I entirely agree. It’s more a fear of pollution of the superiority. Consider all the bull regarding “royal blood”. It’s a complete fabrication because the truth is, for many (if not all) royal families, back in history it was quite simply that one of them was a bigger meaner more murderous duplicitous bastard than the other guy. Heads got hung on pikes, people loyal to the other were tortured to death, and the King ruled with an iron fist. Loyal subjects were barely more than slaves and their loyalty wasn’t out of respect, it was out of fear.
Fast forward many generations and we end up with the likes of Prince Andrew.
But all this big deal about marrying commoners or (god help us all, an American ;) ) is not because there’s anything special or sacred about royal blood, it’s simply because the only thing keeping the myth going is the myth itself.

that your child will miss out on his intellectual birthright

That birthright begins at home.

I went to a school for people with learning disabilities. Many of them were dyslexic. As such, I was not taught much more than the basics of my own native tongue. Indeed, we had “doing words” and “naming words” and “describing words” because it was too much to expect the many to cope with phrases like “verb” and “adjective”.
I should have left school barely literate.

Why I am somewhat better than that is due to a mother that read to me until I was able to start reading myself. I’ve already mentioned in the past my junior school teacher’s reaction to me being fed up with big print and pictures every facing page…because by then I was reading John Wyndham. She simply said “no you aren’t”. Didn’t ask questions, didn’t test me, didn’t pull down a book and tell me to read out of it, “no you aren’t”, end of discussion.

My favourite two books – Charlotte’s Web (that I began reading on a flight back from BiWi ¹ when I was something like six), and Empty World that I’d read before finishing junior school. No idea what that is in modern key stage equivalents, I’d have been about 11.

I like reading. If the story is interesting, I can do a normal sized paperback in two evenings. I enjoyed The Crimson Labyrinth (Yusuke Kishi) so I did that in a single day, back in summer 2016 (I think?).

It’s not about school, it’s not genetics, it starts with parents who care…

¹ Properly called BWI, said as “bee-wee” by locals, it’s the Baltimore/Washington International airport. The one where I stopped all the escalators because I saw a big red button and was like “mommy, what does this do?” (PROD!).

reminder to self – Mavis Beacon

When Windows 3.11 was fresh and cutting edge and Word was the upcoming text editor, I wanted to sign up with an employment agency to see if that would help me find a job.

They wanted to test my typing. The woman there, Emily, seemed quite impressed by my speed. That should have been a clue as I don’t think I’m particularly fast (around 40-55wpm depending on mood and concentration). To put that into context, mom can jam a manual typewriter with a speed nearly double that, so much so that one of her prized possessions back then was a daisy wheel typewriter that could keep up.

Then came the test of doing it using styles and effects. Words in bold, italics, etc etc. That I failed horribly, for the “Word” that I was being tested on wasn’t actually Word, but something that looked like Word and kept track of speed accuracy. The problem was, it wasn’t enough like Word to be useful. Specifically it did not support keyboard shortcuts. So when something in bold was wanted, I’d be faulted for ^B (or whatever it was, been a long time since I’ve touched Word), then I’d have to find the mouse, find a stupid icon, click it, then go back to typing. Over and over.
So if you actually know what you’re doing, go find an alternative career as you’ll suffer the stupidity of being assessed by those who don’t.

I think we’ve covered tautologies before.

I’m sure we could discover several new tautological expressions whilst considering the potential implications of scrapping Public Health England in the middle of a pandemic and replacing it with something headed by Dido-bloody-Harding.

What could possibly go wrong?

[uh, isn’t her husband that nutter that wants to do away with the NHS and have an insurance based service? because that’s working out so well in the US (well, it is for people who have a title and get paid a lot to fail upwards; the lesser people, not so much) neither of them should be allowed within a hundred miles of any decision that affects the NHS]

When I was in kindergarten the headmistress complained to my mother that I was uncontrollable, pulled hideous faces, and that I threatened to burn the school down. My mother laughed and suggested that she try a different career. It sounds to me, Rick, that your junior school teacher needed the same advice. It is politically correct, of course, to assume that all kids are tender innocents, and that all teachers are caring fountains of wisdom. WW II created a shortage of teachers; teaching was not high on the agenda in those days. I can remember a hastily recruited teacher, a salesman, who stubbed his cigarettes out on the back of children’s hands, and a clueless graduate student who was harried by chanting children chasing him down the corridors. Some things have improved since then.

husband that nutter that wants to

Foster his health related business interests?

a clueless graduate student who was harried

My parents were among those. My father became a head teacher after just three years; my mother’s teaching career was on hold for years when my siblings and I were small, and then part-time for years. By the end of their careers I think they were pretty good at their jobs!

In her old age, long after my father died, my mother wrote a lot of short stories – in particular what is basically a recount about herself as a young school pupil, and a matching story about the post WWI young teacher who had to cope with her. Both published in Kaleidoscope (which also has some of mine & others of hers as well as others by other people): https://www.amazon.co.uk/Kaleidoscope-M-H-He/dp/3942357305/

So let the backslapping begin with a 9% rise in pass rates and 25% of GCSE students getting a A/A*/8/9.

If you did an appraisal review in business with that sort of skew you would be looking for gameful employment elsewhere.

It does no one any favours and it now condemns those who got lesser grades to even more bias against them as to not do well in such a good year will just highlight their lack of performance even more.

On another shameful note, Btec results are again relegated to second rate/third rate threatment as they delay their results and where is the outcry from middleclass moms/dads and orchestrated events of self pity on that front…

Nothing was going to be perfect about this and teachers have been put in a difficult position but it doesn’t help if you can’t be honest and really differentiate between pupils.

I am sure that they will look at schools with higher than normal grades spread for special focus after this.

Still at least it is over now but I suppose next year is still difficult with some saying next years students should have special treatment as well.

Edit: Should that be Gameful or Gainful Employment I leave it up to you.

At least they didn’t tell teachers beforehand that their grades would be the ones awarded. Imagine the grade inflation that would have caused…

Another locus of hypocrisy and blackmail for teachers is writing references. Many employers use a standard form that the teacher is supposed to fill in, which are often impossible to answer. I adopted a policy of asking students to write their own references, with the proviso that I retained a right of veto and of interpolation on any part of it. I would warn new students that if they missed appointments or did not keep in regular contact with me, I would have insufficient information with which to write a reference, and that I would make the fact public.

No wonder it was a catastrophe. Mates of Gove and Cummings (surprise!) wiggled their way into things…
https://www.theguardian.com/education/2020/aug/20/firm-linked-to-gove-and-cummings-hired-to-work-with-ofqual-on-a-levels

And peers who are unresentful of their attempts to learn.

For me that was the big advantage of getting into Grammar School. There the environment encouraged learning, while the secondary modern opposed it. That’s not the staff’s attitudes, but the other pupils.

I took some of the last GCE O levels before GCSE. At the transition it was generally agreed that a an O level 6 (just passed) and a GCSE A (hhighest grade) were equivalent. Pupils going on to A level with GCSE had a shock.

Sorry what elitist nonense.

Why do you see it right to reinforce stereotypes and that somehow those who went to a certain type of school because of circumstances are opposed to learning and that the teachers in those schools did not care.

Yes there may be pupils who disrupt learning but do not condemn the vast majority who wish to do so.

Today we have the same elitism nonsense about Btec and GCSE/A Levels and it is reinforced by the government moving heaven and earth to placate one section whilst doing nothing for the other.

There are just as many mickey mouse courses at A level and university as other types of education establishments and that is the real issue as the real debate is about honesty in eduction and not some artificial inflated set of results.

Every child deserves an equal stab at making the most of there lives and some second chances to deny that is not the sign of a modern society.

Of course those who attended certain schools don’t even have to lower themeselves to worrying about how they will make a living.

Unfortunately education is inherently tangled with snobbery, status and social advantage.

Every child deserves an equal stab at making the most of there lives

Yes indeed. Everybody should get above average marks, we should all be born in households full of books, we should all have loving parents. But as Sportin’ Life will tell you It Ain’t Necessarily So .

Well that seems a distortion, though i understand the point made, in that I meant every child should get the opportunity and support to maximise their potential not every child should get above average after all I have argued for honesty in education as I think it does no favours.

Equality of opportunity is key not based on a social construct that keeps some at a certain level so others can gain.

We have this odd attitude that academia is the be end to all and intelectual intellegence is the yardstick and if you don’t conform then you are somewhat less. Funny a certain country in the 1930’s followed that train of thought and didn’t some say the same about those from a certain continent…

The artist or art critic , one being good at the creation of art and the other evaluating and analyzing it. Both have skills and worth but from opposites.

Yes I may take a eutopian view, though I concede I may have other less egalitarian views as we are all human and less than perfect, but that doesn’t mean we should not strive to make our society more equal and fair and sometimes even if some squander the chance we should look to support them again unless some don’t think some are deserving of help.

Yes there may be pupils who disrupt learning but do not condemn the vast majority who wish to do so

I learned, while still at primary level¹, to pretend to be less than I was and also developed my leg muscles².

Mostly this had me off the bully radar.³ If my parents had spent a little (I was only offered a part-fees scholarship – better than the two others in my year who had to pay the full whack despite being coached for months)

Of course those who attended certain schools don’t even have to lower themeselves to worrying about how they will make a living.

I think you find they attended those schools because their parents didn’t have to worry about how to make a living.

Unfortunately education is inherently tangled with snobbery, status and social advantage.

The current Cabinet being a classic example of a waste of good education. I’m sure society in general would have benefited more if they had all been swapped with more deserving students.

Everybody should get above average marks, we should all be born in households full of books, we should all have loving parents.

The smartest kid I ever met in my schooldays was actually beaten by his father when he ever demonstrated any sign of intelligence. His father was thicker than the proverbial plank and proud of it.

¹ In Sheffield, I was the star pupil, after our move to Coventry I was the smart-arse that talked funny⁴

Well that seems a distortion, though i understand the point made, in that I meant every child should get the opportunity and support to maximise their potential not every child should get above average after all I have argued for honesty in education as I think it does no favours.

Hang on, weren’t you the one arguing against Grammar schools? Oh, yes…

The thing with Grammers is it gave the illussion that the lower classes could aspire to something but only a few as not to upset the middle and upper classes and then dumped the rest in schools that gave a education that was good enough for doing low end jobs for low end pay.

The point with the Grammar system (at least in the various bits of the country where my relatives attended them back in the 50s) was that they provided two “streams”. The academically-minded went to the Grammar; those more suited to a vocational education went to the alternative (the name of which I forget). Both groups were therefore enabled to reach their respective potentials, with the use of appropriate environments.

None of those that I know who attended Grammar schools came from wealthy backgrounds: it was just one of the local schools.

These days, we appear to attempt to squeeze everyone through the same route of academic attainment, whether it’s appropriate to the individuals or not. Is that progress?

Hang on, weren’t you the one arguing against Grammar schools? Oh, yes…

Seems I am not doing a good job of getting my point over..message to self keep up at the back :-)

The issue about Grammers is that it gave something for a few and then didn’t do well with who was put in the “other stream” at what is an early age.

It consigned some to a poorer, from a point of expectations, level of education and that included some very able acedamic kids who didn’t make the Grammer.

Only about 20% of children at Grammers in the 1950’s were classed as being from family’s with parents from Unskilled or Semi Skilled jobs so not so wealthy backgrounds then only made up a small proportion and you still think it didn’t matter?

Grammers were a sop to enable a few to raise to the heights of what the middle classes had, as I have previously stated, whilst keeping the rest at a level to take the jobs others didn’t want.

I agree we may not have progress as all are squeezed through one route, so we can say we have high levels going top Uni,but have we raised standards and done the best I am not so sure.

Now we also have schooling based on if you can afford to be in the catchment area of the better schools so is that progress most likely not.

Perhaps we need to look at Germany for the answer?

Unfortunately education is inherently tangled with snobbery, status and social advantage.

Indeed. In my experience, people from working class families tend to be conditioned to believe that they aren’t intelligent, and the results of this belief may be visited upon the children who happen to be smart. Either a beating, as Steve mentions or a more subtle “so you think you’re smarter than us?”, where the “us” is the rest of the family who basically ignore the child until she falls back into line.

The ones currently screaming about how badly traumatised their children are over the non-exam debacle? I bet they’re mostly the (faux) middle class MumsNet crowd.

to pretend to be less than I was

Oh yes. Nobody likes a “clod”, “bum licker”, and various unprintable insults implying sexual acts with the faculty. It was bad enough coming from kids, but it hear it coming from their parents…
There’s a certain group of people who really celebrate stupidity. They, and their offspring, do a lot of damage within the education system.

Mostly this had me off the bully radar.

Boarding school is fun. Nobody likes a “grass”, the teachers pretty much state that outright, and if the bully happens to be a prefect (and most were), then they’re pretty much untouchable as they didn’t get their position due to any form of aptitude or good behaviour, they got it because their parents were school trustees and the like.
[there’s a reason why the prefects in my SIBA stories are mostly portrayed as utter bastards; and the staff as largely indifferent]

Oh, and unspoken advice is “you’re a boy, learn to man up and take care of your own problems” while understanding that a sixteen year old fifth former can punch an eleven year old first former unconscious and nothing will happen, but should first former attempt to fight back, it’ll be endless detention from the staff and worse from the prefects (how do you fancy being the reason your entire dormitory has to get up at 5am and run five laps of the track in the rain in pyjamas?).
Did I mention prefects are bastards?

we appear to attempt to squeeze everyone through the same route of academic attainment

Somewhere along the way, the dots were joined. Qualifications → better job → more pay.

It’s the same here in France. It seems like everybody wants to be “encadrement” (à beaurocrat) so universities churn out endless teenagers qualified in various fields…only to find out that there’s like one job and a hundred identikit graduates.

Part of the reason in France is because encadrement falls into a different social category. Much better employment rights and sickness rights and so on. For me, for example, if I’m signed off sick, my first three days are unpaid ¹. Technically it is the same for everybody in the private sector, but when you are in a better social class than the worker bees, your employer may well have special conventions that apply, like you get paid from day 1…

¹ Yup, that has the obvious consequence that people who really shouldn’t be at work go in anyway, because for some (especially with kids), missing three days pay is a big thing ² and it’s just too bad if they pass on the winter flu to everybody else. People started to understand the seriousness of CoViD when Macron announced that everybody would be paid from the first day. That stopped when France ended the state of health emergency and lockdown ended, so with the infections on the rise, I wonder how many people who might start to have symptoms will go to work anyway rather than risk losing pay?

² God forbid they give up their regular nicotine fix…

Did I mention prefects are bastards?

Oh s… better ditch the badge I kept as a momento :-)

I was sent away to a boarding school, Winchester House, in Brackley when I was seven. It probably explains a lot.