Incompetant Teachers

angelbabyx · 30/12/10 - 23:56

Not sure that's how to even describe him but i was thinking of him last night and it got me all started up.

Well i was bad at maths in school, i was in the lowest set in standard grade. In my class it was mostly rebel kids who used to sit with their phones out every lesson.
There was about 4 kids who wanted to learn. Me and 3 others. They were better at maths than me tho. I was just so useless at it.

Our teacher just didn't bother with us.

Homework was optional, and usually he'd just go round our table and leave out asking the others as he knew they wouldn't do it.
Lessons usually ended up being - him searching a radio site that played songs and the class just chatting away after he finished the mental maths and tried to teach us a bit of a maths book chapter but the other kids just wouldn't let the work happen moaning that they wanted to finish now etc.

He had all these questions at the start for mental maths and tried to relate them to things we'd laugh at like being drunk and football etc but i don't think he ever managed to teach us anything.

Anyone else have the same thing?
I think it was shocking that we were just kinda thought of as 'they're so useless, i wont even bother teaching them'

I did manage to pass maths, but got a 5, the grading was from 1-7 with 7 being the lowest and a fail, scottish people may know this.
I can't imagine many of the others having passed, seeing as they didn't even do the work. The other people that wanted to learn did probably pass and probably passed with better grade than me. It just makes me angry, a whole class near enough failing a subject just because he couldn't really teach us because he couldn't discipline (them). :mad:

silentNate · 30/12/10 - 23:58

I notice the English teacher you had wasn't too great either

Psychosis · 31/12/10 - 00:03

In defence of that teacher, try to see it from their perspective.

I imagine you went to a rough school or one in a deprived area. In a school like that, even the top set are going to be bitchy and difficult for the teacher to deal with. They spend all day every day, wasting every last b reath and every ounce of their energy fighting to get the kids in their charge to stop throwing things, stop talking, put their phone away, focus, do homework, answer a question, BRING A PEN TO LESSONS!!!

In low ability groups where 90% of the class just want to fight, play on their phones and cause trouble, he's emotionally exhausted. He sees a class where he cannot do anything but watch them fail, because even with effort they are never going to eb C grade students. He knows that if he turns his back on the rest of the class to help the three students who want to learn, someone is going to get punched, or books are going to fly out of the window.

So he sits at the front of the class so that he can observe everyone else, and tries his best to crowd control to avoid disaster.

It's not always about "oh, he couldn't discipline" them. You cannot discipline children who won't be disciplined. As a teacher your power is not infinite. You cannot force children to listen.

As for mental maths - you've just pointed out a case where he is actively trying to engage the class, he is trying to do ANYTHING to engage you.

If he throws worksheets at you and lectures from the board, all he'll hear is "arghh suuuuur, this is booooring, can't we do somethin' fun? This is gay, like. I ain't doin' this crap."

So, he tries to make it interesting for you. He tries to do the impossible and relate maths to things he thinks you like. And now students complain that it's stupid and "arghh suuuur, can't you just tell us the answers and give us some worksheets? I hate maths."

I'm not having a go at you with this. I just want you to understand how utterly impossible his situation might be. Teaching is an exhausting job. Sometimes I'm so tired from the effort that I just want to drop onto the floor in the middle of a lesson and have a kip. I don't, obviously.

fleet · 31/12/10 - 00:09

silentNate wrote: »

I notice the English teacher you had wasn't too great either

You beat me to it!

Psychosis · 31/12/10 - 00:10

No need to mock her!

[Deleted User] · 31/12/10 - 00:15

Some teachers are incompetent and shouldn't be teachers in the first place but are due to lack of numbers in the profession, others aren't but appear to be incompetent because their hands are tied with the red tape the government insists on bundling our schools with - then you get the rare few who are competent, despite all of this.

Psychosis · 31/12/10 - 00:16

Pr1s0n 13reak wrote: »

Some teachers are incompetent and shouldn't be teachers in the first place but are due to lack of numbers in the profession

Tell that to the massive numbers of unemployed teachers who can't get into the profession, and to the 200 teachers who apply for the same job.

[Deleted User] · 31/12/10 - 00:19

Psychosis wrote: »

Tell that to the massive numbers of unemployed teachers who can't get into the profession, and to the 200 teachers who apply for the same job.

That's partly because (I know certainly in my area) that several schools are getting knocked down and built into one large 'super school' of sorts, which means less posts.

Classes are getting bigger and bigger, ergo more pupils + less classes = less teachers. etc.

Instead there are a hell of a lot of "support teachers" floating around, sometimes 4 to one class.

It is ridiculous.

netcurtains · 31/12/10 - 00:20

My geography teacher was a complete incompetent. All anyone had to say was "Sir, tell us about Cornwall" which was where he came from and he would spent the entire lesson blathering on about Cornwall. I got a U in my geography CSE.
This is the sort of thing that happens when you are struggling with a subject, you end up in the bottom set and there is zero hope in the bottom set, you get the most incompetent "I lost all enthusiasm for teaching back in 1975" type teachers, you're surrounded by timewasters, no hopers and thickies.
Contrast this with my English Lit teacher who was an absolute dream to spend an hour with. I was in the top set for English Lit and with that came a better teacher and easier students to work with.

It's a shame that this is the way school works (or at least it was in the Eighties). I wanted to do well in all subjects but I was terrible at geography and once I was dumped in the bottom set to fester, I had no hope of my knowledge in that subject improving. The man was pleasant enough but he had long since given up on teaching.

QwertyGirl1771 · 31/12/10 - 00:37

This is quite sad. When I was a secondary school, I was a complete dullard when it came to maths. I just scraped by in primary school. But my maths teacher was an absolute star and made everything sound so simple (which is a talent) and he never got a fail rate amongst his students passing their O'Levels. I was as pleased as punch with my O'Level (parents weren't). Now, my daughter comes home from school and I ask her about homework and how her day was and she says she's learnt nothing. I was quite concerned about her lack of homework that when there was a parents evening at the school a few weeks back, I bought the subject up and the teacher said daughter does it at lunch time, which I didn't know because daughter never told me. In my days, we couldn't sit in a room during lunch-time and do the homework. I get annoyed that teachers don't correct my daughters messy writing (though me and Hubby have very neat writing and know our spellings). I can try my utter best for her to have better writing and understand the reasons why it should be clear and readable if she wants to work with the police. Again, in my days, we had teachers who wouldn't tollerate bad writing or spelling

[Deleted User] · 31/12/10 - 01:17

I had similar experiences at school, whether I liked them or lot I had some very good teachers, but some that were utter shit at their jobs. My science teacher in my GCSE's was like this, she tried doing starters, but as usual no one listened to her so she just handed books out and asked us to answer questions, which naturally few actually did. I learned nothing from her and had to revise like mad.

A trend I noticed was that is classes full of horrible kids, the bad teachers would let the scum get away with absolutely anything, locking them in cupboards and everything. Yet if I forgot a pen or didn't finish some work they went totally mental at me, detentions, the full wack, probably as a way of asserting themselves but being far too cowardly to say it to who they should have been. I felt sorry for the teachers who were decent but couldn't control the classes, but the ones who reacted as above because they couldn't were complete tw*ts.

[Deleted User] · 31/12/10 - 01:33

Psychosis wrote: »

In defence of that teacher, try to see it from their perspective.

I imagine you went to a rough school or one in a deprived area. In a school like that, even the top set are going to be bitchy and difficult for the teacher to deal with. They spend all day every day, wasting every last b reath and every ounce of their energy fighting to get the kids in their charge to stop throwing things, stop talking, put their phone away, focus, do homework, answer a question, BRING A PEN TO LESSONS!!!

In low ability groups where 90% of the class just want to fight, play on their phones and cause trouble, he's emotionally exhausted. He sees a class where he cannot do anything but watch them fail, because even with effort they are never going to eb C grade students. He knows that if he turns his back on the rest of the class to help the three students who want to learn, someone is going to get punched, or books are going to fly out of the window.

So he sits at the front of the class so that he can observe everyone else, and tries his best to crowd control to avoid disaster.

It's not always about "oh, he couldn't discipline" them. You cannot discipline children who won't be disciplined. As a teacher your power is not infinite. You cannot force children to listen.

As for mental maths - you've just pointed out a case where he is actively trying to engage the class, he is trying to do ANYTHING to engage you.

If he throws worksheets at you and lectures from the board, all he'll hear is "arghh suuuuur, this is booooring, can't we do somethin' fun? This is gay, like. I ain't doin' this crap."

So, he tries to make it interesting for you. He tries to do the impossible and relate maths to things he thinks you like. And now students complain that it's stupid and "arghh suuuur, can't you just tell us the answers and give us some worksheets? I hate maths."

I'm not having a go at you with this. I just want you to understand how utterly impossible his situation might be. Teaching is an exhausting job. Sometimes I'm so tired from the effort that I just want to drop onto the floor in the middle of a lesson and have a kip. I don't, obviously.

Extremely insightful to see the classrooms woes from a teachers standpoint.

Caxton · 31/12/10 - 01:48

Looking back on my school life at Secondary Modern school in the late 1950s I had some excellent teachers but also some incompetent ones who should have never entered the teaching profession, they just could not control a class and could not teach and were completely out of their depth.

Looking later at some of the teachers my son had at school in the mid 1980s little had changed, speaking to them also at open days I considered some of them utterly useless, speaking to my son recently he agreed with my findings on his teachers.

I believe little has changed over the years, would be teachers need to be screened much more before they are allowed to enter the profession. It is our children's education at stake the useless ones need throwing out.

If a doctor, surgeon, nurse, dentist, air traffic controller, policeman, bus driver, train driver, to name just a few examples were just as incompetent they would get thrown out. If they can be screened for their ability to carry out their so can teachers they should be no exception. It is not as if we are short of them, at the salary they get we should have the very best.

The main item prospective teachers need to be screened for apart from their ability to actually teach is how they would control a class of unruly pupils and how they would cope.

Looking back at my school life the useless teachers were the ones who had little or no control over a class. The ones who were good were the ones who made it perfectly clear from the very start and laid down their rules of the classroom and the consequences to pupils who did not follow them. It should also be remembered unlike today the teachers had 28-32 pupils in our classes at secondary modern school, this was the norm then, the only time their were less was when we split up for woodwork and metalwork lessons

ads84 · 31/12/10 - 02:02

Psychosis wrote: »

In defence of that teacher, try to see it from their perspective.

I imagine you went to a rough school or one in a deprived area. In a school like that, even the top set are going to be bitchy and difficult for the teacher to deal with. They spend all day every day, wasting every last b reath and every ounce of their energy fighting to get the kids in their charge to stop throwing things, stop talking, put their phone away, focus, do homework, answer a question, BRING A PEN TO LESSONS!!!

In low ability groups where 90% of the class just want to fight, play on their phones and cause trouble, he's emotionally exhausted. He sees a class where he cannot do anything but watch them fail, because even with effort they are never going to eb C grade students. He knows that if he turns his back on the rest of the class to help the three students who want to learn, someone is going to get punched, or books are going to fly out of the window.

So he sits at the front of the class so that he can observe everyone else, and tries his best to crowd control to avoid disaster.

It's not always about "oh, he couldn't discipline" them. You cannot discipline children who won't be disciplined. As a teacher your power is not infinite. You cannot force children to listen.

As for mental maths - you've just pointed out a case where he is actively trying to engage the class, he is trying to do ANYTHING to engage you.

If he throws worksheets at you and lectures from the board, all he'll hear is "arghh suuuuur, this is booooring, can't we do somethin' fun? This is gay, like. I ain't doin' this crap."

So, he tries to make it interesting for you. He tries to do the impossible and relate maths to things he thinks you like. And now students complain that it's stupid and "arghh suuuur, can't you just tell us the answers and give us some worksheets? I hate maths."

I'm not having a go at you with this. I just want you to understand how utterly impossible his situation might be. Teaching is an exhausting job. Sometimes I'm so tired from the effort that I just want to drop onto the floor in the middle of a lesson and have a kip. I don't, obviously.

I really admire the way you always stand up for the profession Psychosis. I've given up trying, and instead, I just agree sarcastically when people slag teachers off...it's easier

I really try my best for my class. I can confidently say that I am aware of all of my children's needs and capabilities, and I try to provide them with great lessons that enthral them. Despite this, I'm human - occasionally I have an off day and I give a crap lesson. My kids stare blankly at me and I feel guilty...but I try hard to put this right next lesson.
When I was at school, I had some teachers that I suppose you might describe as a tad incompetent, but the kids in the class didn't exactly make life easy for them either. On the other hand, I had some excellent teachers and this is what inspired me to want to do what I do each day.

[Deleted User] · 31/12/10 - 07:12

Psychosis wrote: »

In defence of that teacher, try to see it from their perspective.

I imagine you went to a rough school or one in a deprived area. In a school like that, even the top set are going to be bitchy and difficult for the teacher to deal with. They spend all day every day, wasting every last b reath and every ounce of their energy fighting to get the kids in their charge to stop throwing things, stop talking, put their phone away, focus, do homework, answer a question, BRING A PEN TO LESSONS!!!

In low ability groups where 90% of the class just want to fight, play on their phones and cause trouble, he's emotionally exhausted. He sees a class where he cannot do anything but watch them fail, because even with effort they are never going to eb C grade students. He knows that if he turns his back on the rest of the class to help the three students who want to learn, someone is going to get punched, or books are going to fly out of the window.

So he sits at the front of the class so that he can observe everyone else, and tries his best to crowd control to avoid disaster.

It's not always about "oh, he couldn't discipline" them. You cannot discipline children who won't be disciplined. As a teacher your power is not infinite. You cannot force children to listen.

As for mental maths - you've just pointed out a case where he is actively trying to engage the class, he is trying to do ANYTHING to engage you.

If he throws worksheets at you and lectures from the board, all he'll hear is "arghh suuuuur, this is booooring, can't we do somethin' fun? This is gay, like. I ain't doin' this crap."

So, he tries to make it interesting for you. He tries to do the impossible and relate maths to things he thinks you like. And now students complain that it's stupid and "arghh suuuur, can't you just tell us the answers and give us some worksheets? I hate maths."

I'm not having a go at you with this. I just want you to understand how utterly impossible his situation might be. Teaching is an exhausting job. Sometimes I'm so tired from the effort that I just want to drop onto the floor in the middle of a lesson and have a kip. I don't, obviously.

As a future teacher, I am glad to see someone reply to this from a teacher's perspective. Some teachers are incompetent, but some of us are just human beings who cannot work miracles all of the time.

Caxton - teachers do have to do quite a bit to teach. We have to pass the CBASE test, which tests general knowledge. We also need five years of study. Sure, some people go through that without actually having a passion for teaching, but it would be difficult. Although even those of us who have a passion for teaching are not always 100%, nor are people in most professions. We all get worn down at times.

We do have to do student teaching in order to get our degree. We have to teach while our professors watch and evaluate us. So teachers are screened in that way. That said, sometimes no amount of training can prepare you. Especially in the inner city schools. Experience teachers a lot.

Teachers are not above criticism. There are some bad teachers (I've had a few). However, I do think sometimes that many of the people who complain about teachers do not fully understand all that teachers deal with. Sure, we love what we do. That doesn't make it easier, though. We all make mistakes. We're people.

janism · 31/12/10 - 07:34

As a teacher you are still subject to lesson observations each term, our head does a walk round each day to see the kids and what is happening so you have to be teaching. There are times when you have a bad lesson, the kids don't get it so it is best to move on. My class work really hard and know the class rules and boundaries.
I should also say I teach primary children with social, emotional and behavioural difficulties who have all failed in mainstream school so the rules and boundaries are very important. Lessons need to be interesting and we are working towards making them independent learners. They all worked out how to light a bulb without any advice from me, they were given the equipment and had to work in pairs to find this out. They were so proud when they did it as opposed to me telling them what to do, they were given help if they asked but they really tried and they talked through the activity. This is why I became a teacher.

Fibromite59 · 31/12/10 - 09:39

I have never forgotten the teacher I had when I first started school at the age of four and a half.

She was all right if you were bright and well-behaved but if you were not she was a tyrant.

There was a little boy in the class, who just couldn't seem to even learn his letters, let alone how to read. As I was good at reading, the teacher used to make me sit with him to try to teach him his letters. I remember how I would show him a letter and tell him what it was, but he could never seem to remember it. At the age of four, I realised that there was something wrong with him and that he needed help, (I realise now that he was most likely dyslexic). The teacher however, didn't seem to realise this and did nothing but shout at him and ridicule him until he cried, and this was everyday. I know that dyslexia wasn't known about in the 1950's, but surely she should have understood that this poor little boy needed help.

She also had a terrible temper and I remember her once banging a boy's head against a wall for disobaying her. I can still see her doing it now, and the bruises on the boy's head afterwards.

She certainly wouldn't get away with that today, but then, theachers seems to be able to do anything and nobody challenged them.

alsmama · 31/12/10 - 09:45

YingYang wrote: »

Extremely insightful to see the classrooms woes from a teachers standpoint.

This.

ads84 wrote: »

I really admire the way you always stand up for the profession Psychosis.

This.

Leanna1989 wrote: »

As a future teacher, I am glad to see someone reply to this from a teacher's perspective. Some teachers are incompetent, but some of us are just human beings who cannot work miracles all of the time.

And this.

It's so easy to slag off teachers on an anonymous forum, and remember the teachers who stand out who didn't do what we think they should have done. But what about the teachers who just got on and did a good job? Faded away into obscurity in our memories in a lot of cases.

It is really frustrating - teaching is a great profession, there are a lot of great teachers around and yet the government and the general public feel free to throw insults and criticise just because it's a very public job. I think someone should start a positive teachers' thread ... in fact I think I'm going to go and do that right now!

[Deleted User] · 31/12/10 - 09:58

I went to quite a good school in an affluent area but some of our teachers were ruthless and quite draconian in their approach to controlling pupils.

I wasn't an unruly pupil either I always loved school but some of the teachers definitely made it more difficult for me to like certain subjects due to their general attitude. My French teacher as an example was particularly vicious if you managed to get something wrong and would often humiliate pupils in front of the whole class which made me go from top class to bottom class as I just completely gave up on learning in that environment. I had the same problem with maths as the op in that I wanted to learn but felt it more difficult than other subjects but the class I was put in were not in the slightest bit interested in learning and made it hard for the teacher to control them. I do think though had she been more forceful in controlling them I would have got more from the experience than I did. The fact that she was a walk over only seemed to feed the unruly pupils bad behaviour and she lost the power. That in my eyes makes her a bad teacher.

Not all teachers are like this though and it is a difficult profession. We have to see both sides of the coin as not everyone's experience of teachers is a good one. I had it easy though compared to some of the tales my mum tells me of life in school in Birkenhead when she was a kid. Pupils were basically just labelled "thick" and given up on and told they would be lucky to get a job as a cleaner. So in that respect kids these days do have it a lot easier.

Achtung! · 31/12/10 - 10:02

Teachers these days, even at primary schools seem to be restricted to performance charts, achievement matrices, scoring the child's activities and capabilities, logging every single thing that every child says or does, taking photographs of the child doing activities to go in the child's progress diary. It's all geared towards "evidence" and arse-covering for when OFSTED come round and assess the school in my opinion. I do actually feel sorry for the teachers, it's no wonder that they need classroom assistants, because the amount of stuff they have to gather for just one child is over the top, never mind doing it for thirty or so in the class. It's a shame the emphasis doesn't seem to be on teaching.

Artymags · 31/12/10 - 10:46

Teaching is such a very arduous and difficult profession with such long hours.
When I was teaching I used to be at school before 8 a.m and rarely left before 5.30 p.m (it makes me smile to see these T.V dramas where teachers leave school at the end of the day at the same time as their pupils.) Then I spent all evening marking, filling in record sheets and preparing the next day's lessons. I had no time at all for any social life.
It always made me cross that people generally didn't know how hard teachers work. They seem to think they work the same hours as the pupils.
It's not nice to be so unappreciated when you give every bit of your life and energy to the profession.

Teachers can't get away with being incompetant now. The monitoring and screening that goes on is intense.
Some do occasionally let things slip when ill health or family worries take precedence, but they are only human..
I had a terrible couple of years myself when I was trying to look after an ailing mother, a father with Alzheimer's and a wayward step-daughter on heroin and in trouble with the police. I found it very hard to keep up my usual high standard in the classroom during that time, but teachers aren't supposed to think of anything other than their job.

Hey there!

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