taking children out of school for holidays in term time

milliebear00001

Fly_Baby wrote: »

I'm pretty sure any parent is qualified enough to implement at the very least the primary school curriculum.

And it IS a shame that there are no text books. My son is in Year 2 only but I cannot help wondering how on earth he is going to cope when his school programme gets more and more challenging. Don't kids do any revision then if there are no text books? They DO have set books for each course at Universities so why not in schools?

The first sentence shows a breathtaking lack of understanding of the National Curriculum requirements - some of which - particularly in maths and science would defeat many an adult in a test situation. Questions I received from my Year 5 class while studying Earth and Space this year included the role of black holes and Dark Matter and the likelihood of the Big Bang being the true explanation for the beginnings of the Universe as we know it - not exactly 2 + 2 is it? Not to mention the fact that being a good teacher of young children rests on a whole lot more than subject knowledge.

Most children do not do well by learning from a textbook. Our training means we know this, and that is why we teach, and you don't. Funny how everyone's an expert in teaching kids, despite the need for four years of university education before you can actually do the job.

NEH

milliebear00001 wrote: »

The first sentence shows a breathtaking lack of understanding of the National Curriculum requirements - some of which - particularly in maths and science would defeat many an adult in a test situation. Questions I received from my Year 5 class while studying Earth and Space this year included the role of black holes and Dark Matter and the likelihood of the Big Bang being the true explanation for the beginnings of the Universe as we know it - not exactly 2 + 2 is it? Not to mention the fact that being a good teacher of young children rests on a whole lot more than subject knowledge.

Most children do not do well by learning from a textbook. Our training means we know this, and that is why we teach, and you don't. Funny how everyone's an expert in teaching kids, despite the need for four years of university education before you can actually do the job.

can i just point out that people like my mum for instance though now retired is part of the old school where you didn't do 4 years of university training so 4 years of university training isn't the only route to being a good teacher...;)

clairehi

loftus wrote: »

those copier machines that used ink stencils and whose name I can't remember.
.

In the late 70s I was at primary school and we had letters home that were printed by the "Banda" machine in smudgy purple ink - you couldnt read a word of them! Was that what you meant?

loftus

clairehi wrote: »

In the late 70s I was at primary school and we had letters home that were printed by the "Banda" machine in smudgy purple ink - you couldnt read a word of them! Was that what you meant?

Thats the thing - I think the word I was looking for was mimiograph, but you're right they were purple and they smudged so easily.

milliebear00001

NEH wrote: »

can i just point out that people like my mum for instance though now retired is part of the old school where you didn't do 4 years of university training so 4 years of university training isn't the only route to being a good teacher...;)

Those days are long gone I'm afraid. I don't know if your mum was a good teacher. I had plenty of my own who wouldn't cut the mustard in today's classrooms.

NEH

milliebear00001 wrote: »

Those days are long gone I'm afraid. I don't know if your mum was a good teacher. I had plenty of my own who wouldn't cut the mustard in today's classrooms.

I know they are long gone but still it was an effective way of learning to teach. It certainly wasn't easy and i think knowing my mum and a lot of her teacher friends could still cut mustard in classrooms today. My mum didn't have it any easier and still had long hours and paperwork to trawl through....

Becles

Fluffi wrote: »

Personally I liked working my way though the maths textbooks at school - I was normally ahead of most of the class and saw it as a competition!

That can be a bad thing though. My eldest has that attitude and will rush work just so he can be finished first or because he wants to move onto the next bit. It's taken a long time to get him to slow down and pace himself so he does a good job in the time allocated and to realise it's not a competition to finish first.

He's 13 now, and I was at a parents night last week and although he has improved, a few teachers did say he should slow down and spend a bit more time on things. We've been chatting again over the weekend about planning his work and making a better use of time rather than rushing.

Fly_Baby

milliebear00001 wrote: »

The first sentence shows a breathtaking lack of understanding of the National Curriculum requirements - some of which - particularly in maths and science would defeat many an adult in a test situation. Questions I received from my Year 5 class while studying Earth and Space this year included the role of black holes and Dark Matter and the likelihood of the Big Bang being the true explanation for the beginnings of the Universe as we know it - not exactly 2 + 2 is it? Not to mention the fact that being a good teacher of young children rests on a whole lot more than subject knowledge.

Most children do not do well by learning from a textbook. Our training means we know this, and that is why we teach, and you don't. Funny how everyone's an expert in teaching kids, despite the need for four years of university education before you can actually do the job.

Hang on a minute. I never tried to imply that you can take any random parent, place them in a class of 30 kids and they would do just good a hob as a qualified teacher. Nor did I try to undermine the importance of having a subject taught by a professional.

I did say though that if parents had access to the school curriculum (in the way of textbooks or whatever), that would allow them to know exactly what the child had to miss for whatever reason, and THAT they would be able to help with, with the aid of the textbook. That was the issue of the thread in the first place - how badly can a child be affected by his absence from school and what can/should be done to rectify that.

Honestly, if the effect of that holiday or illness is as detrimental as some posters in this thread are claiming, then any reasonable parent would be only too happy to put in some personal effort to try and help the child to catch up, without loading this extra job onto the teacher (which would be unfair).

But the problem is - the parent cannot help! Because a) the parent has no idea what exactly the child has missed and b) the parent has no access to the classroom material which could be used to help the child catch up.

mountainofdebt

Fly_Baby wrote: »

And it IS a shame that there are no text books. My son is in Year 2 only but I cannot help wondering how on earth he is going to cope when his school programme gets more and more challenging. Don't kids do any revision then if there are no text books? They DO have set books for each course at Universities so why not in schools?

Have news for you - my son is in the lower 6th and for the first time in his school career he has had text books for his subjects that he has been able to bring home.

I did buy him the textbook that he was using in his maths classes as well as a copy of the books he was studying in English whislt he was studying his GCSEs

Fly_Baby

mountainofdebt wrote: »

Have news for you - my son is in the lower 6th and for the first time in his school career he has had text books for his subjects that he has been able to bring home.

I did buy him the textbook that he was using in his maths classes as well as a copy of the books he was studying in English whislt he was studying his GCSEs

Well, I guess better late than never.