Let's save the country some money.

Davesnave

shirlgirl2004 wrote: »

Of course if the state want to give me the money they would have spent on books, teacher time, building maintenace, exams etc then I'll happily pay an inspection fee.

But what would happen if you failed the inspection? Special measures? An outsider brought in to 'manage' the situation?

If your principles come at a price, so does accountability.

SingleSue

Davesnave wrote: »

I'd agree here. It's not always the case that the teaching is 'bad',' either, but that the needs of the child cannot be fully met within the time/money/social constraints placed upon the staff & institutions.

In an attempt to put this thread back on track, I'd argue that £billions of educational improvements could be made, all for free, if parents shouldered more responsibility than they do. It's the lack of confidence Sue mentions that needs to change, because, regardless of one's opinions here, the kids are at home far more than they are in school. In many cases, however, it's a lack of interest too. (No, not you, Sue!;))

As a practical example, I'd cite my second child who was severely dyslexic. We could have demanded our 'rights' to more than the pathetic hour a week of individual tuition allocated, but inside knowledge/pragmatism suggested there was a better way. Working with the school, my DW put in the hundreds of hours required, besides holding down a job. It wasn't rocket science, just graft, and it paid off.

The above is a fairly extreme example, but around a third of children have some kind of special need which, if not met, comes back later to haunt society in the form of behaviour problems or just plain underachievement. The solution isn't necessarily to ditch the system and go independent, but to work with it, though I recognise that in some places, where social problems are particularly bad, that might seem much less attractive.

I agree entirely....all 3 of mine have a differing need of some sort or another and I have worked closely with the school in an attempt to improve their needs.

During the last 13 years, I have met some poor teachers but I have also met some very dedicated and excellent teachers too. In youngest son's case, his first school was hopeless, no matter how hard I tried to work with them, as far as they were concerned, an autistic child did not require any difference in teaching or handling...even if through their actions, youngest became a screaming, non verbal monster again.

He didn't stay there too long as I took the bull by the horns and found another infant school which was sensitive to his needs and the improvement was amazing. This followed through at junior level where the head master was determined he was not going to give up on him, so I worked very closely with him and the rest of the staff.....I was on first name terms with all the teachers by the time he left and the legacy he left for other autistic children at the school has made that the best mainstream junior school in the area for non standard autistic children.

But the work with him did not start when he started school, because of the abscence of speach therapy (they kept going on maternity leave!), it was down to me to do the research, learn a version of makaton and gradually, very gradually, get the shutters open and him talking.....you wouldn't realise he was non verbal until the age of 5 now and was still only on 2 words sentences at age 7, he doesn't shut up!

Middle son was initially at the same primary school as youngest, they ignored his diagnosis too and too often removed his behaviour controls...again they could not be advised by anyone (not even the specialists), he ended up being permanently excluded and with the label of being unteachable.

He is nearly 15 now, he is in the top set for everything and is considered to be a gentleman, a gentle giant and a sponge when it comes to learning, all because of the work that has gone in not only by myself but also the PRU he went to (after a couple of eek terms when they were treating him as badly behaved instead of having aspergers due to his previous primary school not keeping any of the information from the specialists...they thought I was making it up about the Aspergers as there was nothing in his file about it).

He is at the same high school as youngest, and like youngest, the school have done everything in their power to work with me, to listen to me and to do what is best for middle son...and he has repaid that in bucket loads.

I was also on first name terms with the head master there too...at times we used to joke that I could be one of the staff as I am there about as often as they are! I've yet to meet the new executive head.....

Eldest has problems with dyslexia, strangely the primary school he was attending was pretty good with him....and it was the same primary that expelled middle son and made youngest regress. It went a little wrong in high school (a different one to the other two boys) and he didn't make much progress until he had an amazing english teacher for his GCSE. She gave him the confidence that I had been trying to give him, his English improved and that had a knock on effect on everything else, in the end, he went from a student predicted mainly F and G in pretty much all subjects, to a student who obtained 10 A-C GCSE's including English and maths.

For me, there is no home teachers only good, school teachers only bad.....there are good and bad in both sectors, it is just sometimes you have to find them.

shirlgirl2004

Davesnave wrote: »

But what would happen if you failed the inspection? Special measures? An outsider brought in to 'manage' the situation?

If your principles come at a price, so does accountability.

Believe me I wouldn't fail an inspection my 4 1/2 year old is 2 years ahead of her peers and the 7 year old is 2 years ahead in Maths and her reading age at almost 4 was that of an 8 year old (haven't bothered checking since as it is all a bit irrelevant now). She can build an electrical circuit unaided and knows approx 25% of the world flags etc etc.

To address other points made:
I have had experience of many poor teachers (in allegedly outstanding schools) surely I haven't been that unlucky? The numbers of children with poor literacy and numeracy skills speaks volumes for the quality of teaching and the environement the Government would like us to send our children to.

I think there is something to be said for giving people who don't use state education a "refund" but of course that wouldn't save the country money and that is what we are supposed to be discussing here.

I think there's a difference between meeting people that are for your own good such as a Dr to treat and ailment and a snooper that comes to judge what the parent has done and what the child can manage to do. The child may feel as if they don't know enough their right to be at home with the parent is taken away. That would make me feel nervous but obviously LIR is made of stronger stuff.

I don't think a 5 year old should be able to write SingleSue but that doesn't mean it should be prevented. My eldest DD loved writing at that age but I certainly didn't force it, there's a difference.

Graham_Devon

shirlgirl2004 wrote: »

Believe me I wouldn't fail an inspection my 4 1/2 year old is 2 years ahead of her peers and the 7 year old is 2 years ahead in Maths and her reading age at almost 4 was that of an 8 year old (haven't bothered checking since as it is all a bit irrelevant now). She can build an electrical circuit unaided and knows approx 25% of the world flags etc etc.

So why are you so against a visit to assess this?

Is it just your control you are against being somewhat broken?

I think there's a difference between meeting people that are for your own good such as a Dr to treat and ailment and a snooper that comes to judge what the parent has done and what the child can manage to do.

Seems it is solely your control that you fear being broken.

You are actively persuing a situation which enables child abuse to happen easier than it might. This is what I cannot understand. You have nothign to hide. Your children are, as you say, at exceptional standards.

This is all about you. That's what I abhore.

shirlgirl2004

Graham_Devon wrote: »

So why are you so against a visit to assess this?

Is it just your control you are against being somewhat broken?



Seems it is solely your control that you fear being broken.

You are actively persuing a situation which enables child abuse to happen easier than it might. This is what I cannot understand. You have nothing to hide. Your children are, as you say, at exceptional standards.

This is all about you. That's what I abhore.

It is about my family. The Government tells families that they are responsible for the education of their children and then decides to check only on what the HE children are learning. They could in theory force me to send my children to school when there are so many children struggling in schools. Either I am responsible for the education of my children or I'm not the Government can't have it both ways.

I want my children to be free from testing and feeling judged. I don't want them to grow up with the feelings of inadequacy that so many children and adults have (even if those feelings aren't justified.) How many of us walk into a room full of people and feel self conscious? This is because we are constantly judged and made to feel inadequate. Is it so wrong that I wish to keep my children away from that so they grow in confident individuals where they don't constantly seek approval from their peers?

Graham_Devon

shirlgirl2004 wrote: »

It is about my family. The Government tells families that they are responsible for the education of their children and then decides to check only on what the HE children are learning. They could in theory force me to send my children to school when there are so many children struggling in schools. Either I am responsible for the education of my children or I'm not the Government can't have it both ways.

I'm responsible for working out and paying income tax. I'm responsible for making sure my car is insured, taxed, MOT'd. Etc etc etc.

It doesn't mean I therefore reserve the right to not have anyone check on these things.

I want my children to be free from testing and feeling judged. I don't want them to grow up with the feelings of inadequacy that so many children and adults have (even if those feelings aren't justified.) How many of us walk into a room full of people and feel self conscious? This is because we are constantly judged and made to feel inadequate. Is it so wrong that I wish to keep my children away from that so they grow in confident individuals where they don't constantly seek approval from their peers?

On a personal level, I don't see how sheltering them away from these situations, is going to help them in those situations in the future.

I just cannot get it. Sorry. Most reasons seem to clash with each other. I guess though that this argument has gone as far as it can.

I remain convinced that fighting to stop visits is for the adults benefit, and nothing to do with the childs benefit. You remain convinced it's for the childrens benefit. That's life. Just wish visits were going ahead, as it would have give then chance at least, for lives to be saved. I personally feel thats more important than a parents wish to have no interaction.

As I said at the start of all this, I'm yet to see a genuine reason, or genuine concern over these vists taking place. After this conversation, nothing has changed.

lostinrates

shirlgirl2004 wrote: »

I want my children to be free from testing and feeling judged. I don't want them to grow up with the feelings of inadequacy that so many children and adults have (even if those feelings aren't justified.) How many of us walk into a room full of people and feel self conscious? This is because we are constantly judged and made to feel inadequate. Is it so wrong that I wish to keep my children away from that so they grow in confident individuals where they don't constantly seek approval from their peers?

As I have said before, I'm not opposed t home or alternative ed. But yes I thnk some exposure to ''judgement'' is a valable life experience. It can't b avoided forever...in friendships, in relationships where you can feel you ''failed'' to attract and in work/mployment situations. while I don't think it has to take the form of standard education tests at a young age, I do think it has the potential(though no the inevitabilty) to hold children back in later life.


In fact, I've seen evidence of this from peers in my alternative education sphere. Very many have found the ''real'' world very hard to get to grips with as adults for various reasons, though their abiltiies too, are far greater than average, so would I say, have been their difficulties in friendships, ''normal'' work situations, relationships and with substance abuse and mental health problems and socia difficulties (the endearingly precosious 14 yer old becomes an obnoxious and frustrated 34 year old when they are adults amoung equals they expected to be ''different'' from). I don't think that would have been inevitable, but I think a lot of it could have been minimised....unfortunately when teahers are close to the situation and passionate, whether as parents or as very close mentors, I hink some things are harder to see very clearly, and a beneficial but not dictating outside view with a wider breadth f experience of numbers of children could have been useful.

To be absolutely clear, I am 100% in favour of parents making choices, including home or alernative schools. If we were parents DH and I would probably be more than averagely involved in education at home (particularly as regards music and languages) an DH has always said he' not want a daughter of his going to senior school in this country: so I share concerns about mainstream education. Particularly unassisted. However, my direct personal exerience also tells me the time I spent alongside my alternative place of education in a mainstream school (albeit a private single sex school so also a slightly ''minoriy'' experience) was extremely bemeficial to me emotionally as well as educationally, although I would have strongly disagreed with that position at the time and some way into adult hood when I felt that two contradictory experiences were damaging. That is not to say I would repeat the experience for my children if I had them. I might: it wuld depend on who the child was.


As regards this:

I think there is something to be said for giving people who don't use state education a "refund" but of course that wouldn't save the country money and that is what we are supposed to be discussing here.

My comment on the matter was directly in related to this:

I think you'll find we're already saving the state a small fortune by not taking up school spaces. I don't see why we should have to pay for the privilege of a visit we don't want or need. Of course if the state want to give me the money they would have spent on books, teacher time, building maintenace, exams etc then I'll happily pay an inspection fee.

And as for being made of sterner stuff...to me it would be the thing I would hold as a prerequisite for whoever taught any children of mine, and to be able to support the development of their strength of character and commitment to endeavour, whilst maintaining the ability to be open to reasoned argument. Without that I would fear the risk of extreme emotional fragility when faced with disagreement or contradition, or the development of knowlege that conflicts with previous education.


edit: fwi I'm bowing out now, as I really don'twant to touch any (more) nerves here.