"Below Average" Kids

I found this article on the BBC News website the other day: Click here!

What a bizarre story! It essentially says that those children who turn up at secondary school with below average grades, finish secondary school with below average grades. Thank you Sherlock, I'd never have guessed.

This is fairly typical of politicians who will never admit that some children aren't cut out for academia and may have talents in other areas, but due to the nature of education in the UK and it's academic focus, these children "under-achieve". What do you expect from teachers? They can't work miracles for all those "below average" students. Some do close the gap with enormous amounts of extra help from staff, but with average class sizes still at around 30 and funding being cut, the time that politicians suggest teachers devote to these children just isn't available.

If the time required to raise these children's attainment was afforded to them, those who had worked hard before entering secondary school would have to be ignored which would therefore have a detrimental effect on their grades. Once again teachers can't win and are chastised by those in suits as a result.

What is also ignored is that these children may not actually want to learn, whatever efforts are made. A lot depends on parental support, which in many cases isn't forthcoming as statistically these children tend to be from backgrounds where schooling wasn't seen as important. You'd be surprised at how many parents support their child's lack of application at school, making excuses for their child's lack of enthusiasm for learning.

I teach an intelligent lad who entered secondary school with above average grades but has since decided to enter the tattooing and piercing profession (which is fine) and, with the support of his parents, is convinced that he doesn't really need qualifications. Due to his natural aptitude towards learning and his knowledge gained up to this point he will probably leave school with the statutory 5 A* to C grades, but well below what he has been targeted by the algorithm schools use to generate targets. Whose fault will it be? Mine, and his other teachers despite the fact that this is a choice made by the child with the full support of his parents. This doesn't really seem fair to me, as all his teachers have tried to enthuse him with little or no success.

My other issue with this report is the fact that the statistics were released by the Department for Education, who would have ploughed thousands, if not millions of pounds into the frankly obvious findings of this research, and that money surely could have been used far more effectively elsewhere.

It got the government another headline though, I suppose, at the expense of teacher morale once more.