Ooops, Sorry guys!

I knew I should have kept my mouth shut! See what I mean about being a jinx?

Date posted: 16 Nov 2008

Come on you Spurs!

Oh wow! I'm a Tottenham Hotspur supporter, I have always been one, when you grow up in Tottenham as I did it kind of goes with the territory. It has been, as they say, a season of two halves. In mid-September (before things got really bad) I was discussing Spurs' awful start to the season with my mother, who is also a Spurs supporter. I said "You watch, they won't win anything until about the end of October and then they won't lose for the rest of the season." Don't you just love being right?

Of course it took a new manager to get it sorted out and it's now too late for them to finish top of the Premiership there are just too many points to make up, but things are heading in the right direction.

I just hope I haven't jinxed them by saying that. I'm a jinx in cup matches, which is why I never watch them. I haven't seen Spurs win a cup match since about 1971. Not because I don't want to watch, but because I know that if I do they will lose, so I deliberately avoid watching them. I have been known to switch channels on TV for 30 seconds to check progress only to see them concede a goal. Some risks aren't worth taking. Spurs can lose (as we have seen) without me, but they never seem to win with me unless I'm actually there. Given ticket prices that's not likely to happen very much.

Date posted: 13 Nov 2008

It's a Parent thing

No. 1 son is late home. He has been on a trip to the Schools Prom at the Royal Albert Hall. He told me he was going to be back at school by 11pm. Then this afternoon he phoned and said that he would be dropped off in the town here and not have to go the extra miles to school. That's good. I checked the times, the concert isn't scheduled to end until 10pm. It is now almost midnight and not a word, though they'd be doing well to leave there at 10pm and get back here by now. He's not answering his phone. So of course, being a parent, I'm getting stressed.

Worst case scenario is that some disaster has befallen the Royal Albert Hall and everbody is dead, but we haven't seen the news so we don't know. Next worse case, some disaster has befallen the coach and everybody is dead and the police haven't got to us yet, so we don't know. Next worse case the coach is broken down and they are stranded miles away, or maybe he's fallen asleep and is now at school on his own wondering where we are and can't phone us because his phone battery had run flat or he's lost his phone.

Of course what's really happened, most likely, is that they are actually almost here and he's asleep and somebody will wake him up just in time for him to phone and say "come and collect me". It's what parents are for isn't it, worrying about what might happen to our kids.

Date posted: 10 Nov 2008

On the subject of elites

In Kent the LEA still operates Grammar Schools. I strongly believe that all children have the right to learn and develop in an atmosphere and at a speed that best suits them and their individual needs. I was banging the gong about individual and flexible learning years ago. If all schools could provide the kind of education that met the academic and development needs of all their pupils then the grammar school argument would have died a death years ago. However, most comprehensive schools don't/can't/won't do that. Academically able children get left out of the equation almost every time.

There's an assumption that bright kids can somehow fend for themselves, that they don't need to be specially catered for in the way that children with learning difficulties need to be specially catered for. That's wrong. All children have special needs, but only some children have them met in a comprehensive education system.

Secondary schools round here are just now having open days for they year 7 intake in the next academic year. The same old arguments about grammar schools and whether they are a bad thing or not are being rehashed. The usual tired old thing about "children shouldn't be classed as failures at 11" gets trotted out. Well sorry, but if I, as a parent, gave my child the impression that they were a failure because they didn't pass the 11+ then it's me who is the failure, not my child. The same is true for those teachers and (even worse) Head Teachers who say that - they should be sacked immediately. The thing about the 11+ is that it is supposed to indicate the children who will do well with a fast-paced academic learning style. Just because a child doesn't do well on the test doesn't make that child a failure, it just means that their learning style is different from that. That's all it means, it doesn't mean that they are stupid, it doesn't mean that they aren't a decent person and it certainly doesn't mean that they are a failure.

Part of the issue of course is envy and the assumption (which is demonstrably not true) that Grammar Schools get more money per child than other schools, the majority of them (for various reasons) seem to get less, though their running expenses (like exam entry fees) are often higher. Another part of the issue is that Grammar Schools are perceived as being the preserve of the middle classes. Maybe there are more middle class kids in Grammar schools than working class kids, but I'm darn sure that more working class kids went to University when everybody had Grammar schools than do so now. That's because with a Grammar School the expectation is that every student, regardless of family background, is there on merit and is capable of going to University if they want to.

Mixed-ability teaching is the in thing at the moment. It used to be all about streaming, now it's about mixed ability. Well, as a teacher, how much easier is it to cater to everybody's needs in a class where you have maybe 25% of the academic ability range compared to a class which covers the whole ability range? The weakest students will often have an aide of some sort or special provision to help them cope. The rest of the group will get attention based on how hard they are finding the work. The strugglers will get more attention than the high flyers. Each level of ability will get their own set of tasks and aims but when the pressure is on for grades the aim isn't to get everybody who can up to an A or an A*, but to make sure nobody falls below a C. That's how they measure schools these days, so of course the midrange learners will take precedence so that the school hits its targets.

One thing that nobody seems to take into account is the social effect of having wide ability ranges in a school. If you look at the social arrangement of a school, things like a House system or the appointment of Form and House and School officials from the student body, who is it gets appointed? In a comprehensive system it's the more academically able kids, that's who. The ones who have a bit of spare capacity, who don't have to spend every hour working just to keep up, the ones who can cope with additional demands. How does that make the rest of their class/house/school feel about themselves? Every day they have to face people who are deemed to be "better" than they are, because they hold positions of trust and responsibility. Take the academically able kids out of the school, remove them from daily view and the other students will take on those roles and responsibilities, and they will do them well and it will do wonders for their confidence and self-belief. The important thing is that they get to have the chance.

People are suspicious of Grammar Schools for all sorts of reasons, they hide their reasons under the "Grammar Schools are Elitist" banner because they don't want too many people asking too many awkward questions and actually comparing Grammar and Comprehensive systems. I went to a pretty good comprehensive school, the needs of the most academically able (and I'm not including myself in that group) were not met in that environment, despite the best efforts of the school. We need to encourage academically able learners from all backgrounds because the country, the economy, needs them. We need doctors and lawyers and teachers and researchers and all sorts of academic skills just as much as we need plumbers and carpenters and builders and checkout operators and road sweepers and people with practical skills.

I say this so many times, here and elsewhere, but it bears repeating "there's nothing wrong with elites".

Date posted: 10 Nov 2008

Ick

The weather here's disgusting. Wet, windy and not very warm. The forcasters have been saying that the wind's gusting up to 70mph, so I'm glad I don't have to go out in it today. Even more glad that I'm not teaching today because this kind of weather makes even the most docile child a little bit wild. It's amazing how much children are affected by the weather, even older children who you might expect to be able to deal with it an carry on as normal.

My main gripe now, (apart from the leaky roof) is that my Japanese Maple tree has lost all of its leaves, about 3 days after they finally turned red! Isn't that just the way? Oh well, it could be worse - at least they aren't lying around on our lawn waiting for me to clear them up - I've got somebody else's leaves!

Date posted: 10 Nov 2008

Well, I'm not very popular

No. 1 son wants to have a friend over this weekend for a sleepover. Initially we said he could but today we remembered that next week he has module exams for Maths, Physics, Chemistry and Biology, so we changed our minds. No. 1 son is already tired and needs to get some rest and do some revision. He isn't happy. It's all a plot to make him unhappy and we are treating him like he's an idiot. Shame. Which is more important - a night spent watching old "Dr Who" episodes or sleeping and revising? He didn't seem very impressed when we told him that if he didn't do well in the exams he would be paying for the re-sit himself. The week after next he's got Spanish and French oral exams as well, so it'll be a long time before he has any friends to sleep over. What wicked parents we are!

Date posted: 06 Nov 2008

A second election thought

What would Martin Luther King make of Barack Obama's success? Would he feel he was judged on the colour of his skin, or on the content of his character?

Date posted: 05 Nov 2008