Thank you for watching. Comments are welcomed and encouraged - what do you think? I heart comments I have seen, and reply to those TH-cam notifies me off. FEEDBACK: 30:56 Blue line out of place KEY COMMENTS: - So teachers cannot handle the stress of being graded for training children to be graded????? @N.i.c.k.H - If schools could be trusted to self evaluate that could work but they can't. (please read their full comment) @charliecharliewhiskey9403
Interesting video. While I see where teachers are coming from, I've seen this rhetoric from university professors who were running absolutely awful quality courses. Like literally courses that had no practicals, no lectures, nothing, just "write a paper on topic x" and that's it. Sometimes standardization is good. Creativity in teaching should be welcome when effective. Although now that I think about it, Finland abolished them in the 90s. Maybe there's something to this abolition view.
Finland has parents; British parents seem to have largely abandoned their children, and the quality of education is about what you would expect in that context. Somebody somewhere has to care about the quality, or it will just continue to decline. If you ‘support’ schools when they fail, and they keep failing, do you keep ‘supporting’ them? Support has a role, but so does judgement.
@@Iaotle I mean, when the schools are converted to academies they typically have an improvement in performance. None of the other interventions were addressed in the video, but I suspect that they're better than nothing. The point of the video seems to be that there are problems with how inspections are conducted, particularly from the perspective of the people being inspected. The complaint that makes the most sense to me is that the inspections are too infrequent to get a good sample; secondly the complaint that there are completely different levels and experiences of inspections depending on whether it is committed by a full time staff inspector or a third party service provider... A lot of the complaints seem really silly to me though. The ofsted inspectors always look at the same things, so they have every opportunity to do self evaluation and address those issues on an ongoing basis, so that they are addressed when they are inspected... if they are failing to meet ofsted's criteria they should reach out for help or look for somebody more competent to take their place, and if they can't do that they should resign.
@@microcolonel yeah, but "performance" is exactly the issue. Whatever kids' scores on some tests are doesn't actually indicate if a school is good at teaching the kids useful skills, only that they're good at teaching how to take tests. "When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure." I'm not anti intervention, I don't have enough data to make a good case for either argument, having oversight is good in principle, I wish the schools I went to had more oversight, but I don't know if that would necessarily make the teaching better. The reason I use Finland as an example is because they have the best school system in the world (or used to at some recent point), and the way they achieve this is by grading students less, not giving homework, having long breaks between each class, having interactive lessons, etc. So it could definitely be the case that these inspections are ineffectual, and the solution lies in changing the education methods at a more fundamental level.
@@Iaotle if their self assessments are showing they would fail under the ofsted criteria, they should address that before there is an inspection. If you tell the public that your school needs help that is a way easier pill to swallow than them suddenly finding out that you aren't able to make it work from ofsted. Finland has national inspections and oversight over schools just like England... The schools are also treating the fact that kids are not wealthy as a determinant in their educational outcomes, but that's not convincing either. Some of the poorest people in the U.S. thrive at well-run schools (particularly charter and voucher-funded private schools); likely in large part because their families actually care about them enough to be involved in their education.
I happen to be reading "Seven Myths About Education" by Ms. Daisy Christodoulou. The book makes many references to Ofsted inspections and shows, in the specific matter of curriculum, how the "best practice" that it seeks to promote is anything but that. So, there is a real need to look at the big picture here. This should NOT be about whether we should hold teachers to account or not. We got to fundamentally trust our teachers and give them a ton of support. Because, if you read the book, you will know that nor the teacher, nor the school is the real problem when it comes to our children's education.
So teachers cannot handle the stress of being graded for training children to be graded????? Maybe the schools need to be run by the pupils since they are apparently more psychology robust.
Yeah totally makes sense that every single teacher around the country is as feckless as you imagine. Or maybe you lack empathy... I think it's pretty obvious which it is .
If schools could be trusted to self evaluate, then there wouldn't have been such a significant drop in quality in those schools that were totally left alone by ofsted for 10 years, right? Like, they had the least stress on their shoulders in the entire system yet failed miserably. Whether ofsted is good or not is a valid question to ask, as is the specifics of their judgement criteria, but I truly don't think that removing independent review is a good idea, not on the basis that some people feel like it's "toxic" to apply standards to them. This is like the obesity epidemic. The question is like asking "should we remove all social stigma around obesity?" We tried that, body positivity been pushed really heavily in the past decade, and the result is a greater number of obese people (including myself) and people struggling with heart conditions. I'm sure that independent review is tough on some schools and people. But that's the point. Human beings don't self regulate very well. Especially when you add things like office politics to the mix. I'm sure the police also feel it's very toxic and unfair that they have to put up with independent review, but hey, having seen how many coppers act when they think nobody is watching, I have to say that I simply don't care. Or heck, another institution that engages in "self regulation" and abhors independent inquiries into how they run their facilities with kids around; the Catholic Church. Let schools self regulate, and some will continue to succeed, but many will go back to being just as bad as they were in the 70s. I'd be more willing to let them self regulate if we also abolished the catchment system, so that people had actually free choice over where they send their kids. That would make schools more like businesses with a vested interest in maintaining a certain minimum standard lest they lose students because of angry parents. As it is, with no pressure from below, they need pressure from above or they quite simply fail. And yeah, it sucks, and sometimes teachers will get depressed about it, or maybe even take their own life. Yes, that's terrible. But we shouldn't abolish enforcement of minimum standards for the education of children just because some teachers can't hack it.
I agreed with you until you said schools should run more like businesses. Running them like that negatively impacts the learning experience, since they would effectively be forced to cut costs etc. while schools that are already prestigious would get a huge advantage. Schools should be run for the students, not for-profit.
Most kids will tell you the truth ask any parent come their parent teacher meet sadly most are very poor and an almost impossible environment to learn effectively. One teacher told us conditions had greatly improved only to be shot down by 5 pupils who reported it’s actually degraded further especially when the teacher did not even know half his pupils. Standards are there criticising those who try to maintain so half status quo’s is just ludicrous and blowing one persons failure to deal with reality out of all proportion just shows what a flakey and weak society we are building it screams of apathy and builds a poor example to any future generations.
Although I am a teacher (4th grade. 9 & 10 year-olds) I live in America so I hesitate to offer some nuanced opinion when clearly I haven’t experienced this nonsense first hand. However, this was as interesting a video as it was disheartening. Here in America we focus far too much on test scores as well.
I'm an 17 year veteran ex teacher. In my town we have 3 good schools... I wouldn't send my daughter to any of them, we drive her to a different out of town school. Good is about as useful as saying "the teachers aren't noticeable drunk"
Thank you for watching. Comments are welcomed and encouraged - what do you think?
I heart comments I have seen, and reply to those TH-cam notifies me off.
FEEDBACK:
30:56 Blue line out of place
KEY COMMENTS:
- So teachers cannot handle the stress of being graded for training children to be graded????? @N.i.c.k.H
- If schools could be trusted to self evaluate that could work but they can't. (please read their full comment) @charliecharliewhiskey9403
Interesting video. While I see where teachers are coming from, I've seen this rhetoric from university professors who were running absolutely awful quality courses. Like literally courses that had no practicals, no lectures, nothing, just "write a paper on topic x" and that's it. Sometimes standardization is good. Creativity in teaching should be welcome when effective.
Although now that I think about it, Finland abolished them in the 90s. Maybe there's something to this abolition view.
Finland has parents; British parents seem to have largely abandoned their children, and the quality of education is about what you would expect in that context.
Somebody somewhere has to care about the quality, or it will just continue to decline.
If you ‘support’ schools when they fail, and they keep failing, do you keep ‘supporting’ them?
Support has a role, but so does judgement.
@@microcolonel yeah but this "judgement" clearly hasn't been working for them so far, right? Isn't that the point of the video
@@Iaotle I mean, when the schools are converted to academies they typically have an improvement in performance. None of the other interventions were addressed in the video, but I suspect that they're better than nothing.
The point of the video seems to be that there are problems with how inspections are conducted, particularly from the perspective of the people being inspected.
The complaint that makes the most sense to me is that the inspections are too infrequent to get a good sample; secondly the complaint that there are completely different levels and experiences of inspections depending on whether it is committed by a full time staff inspector or a third party service provider...
A lot of the complaints seem really silly to me though. The ofsted inspectors always look at the same things, so they have every opportunity to do self evaluation and address those issues on an ongoing basis, so that they are addressed when they are inspected... if they are failing to meet ofsted's criteria they should reach out for help or look for somebody more competent to take their place, and if they can't do that they should resign.
@@microcolonel yeah, but "performance" is exactly the issue. Whatever kids' scores on some tests are doesn't actually indicate if a school is good at teaching the kids useful skills, only that they're good at teaching how to take tests. "When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure."
I'm not anti intervention, I don't have enough data to make a good case for either argument, having oversight is good in principle, I wish the schools I went to had more oversight, but I don't know if that would necessarily make the teaching better.
The reason I use Finland as an example is because they have the best school system in the world (or used to at some recent point), and the way they achieve this is by grading students less, not giving homework, having long breaks between each class, having interactive lessons, etc. So it could definitely be the case that these inspections are ineffectual, and the solution lies in changing the education methods at a more fundamental level.
@@Iaotle if their self assessments are showing they would fail under the ofsted criteria, they should address that before there is an inspection. If you tell the public that your school needs help that is a way easier pill to swallow than them suddenly finding out that you aren't able to make it work from ofsted.
Finland has national inspections and oversight over schools just like England...
The schools are also treating the fact that kids are not wealthy as a determinant in their educational outcomes, but that's not convincing either. Some of the poorest people in the U.S. thrive at well-run schools (particularly charter and voucher-funded private schools); likely in large part because their families actually care about them enough to be involved in their education.
I happen to be reading "Seven Myths About Education" by Ms. Daisy Christodoulou. The book makes many references to Ofsted inspections and shows, in the specific matter of curriculum, how the "best practice" that it seeks to promote is anything but that. So, there is a real need to look at the big picture here.
This should NOT be about whether we should hold teachers to account or not. We got to fundamentally trust our teachers and give them a ton of support. Because, if you read the book, you will know that nor the teacher, nor the school is the real problem when it comes to our children's education.
So teachers cannot handle the stress of being graded for training children to be graded?????
Maybe the schools need to be run by the pupils since they are apparently more psychology robust.
Yeah totally makes sense that every single teacher around the country is as feckless as you imagine. Or maybe you lack empathy... I think it's pretty obvious which it is .
@@RG-sv4qbI don't think he said that.
If schools could be trusted to self evaluate, then there wouldn't have been such a significant drop in quality in those schools that were totally left alone by ofsted for 10 years, right? Like, they had the least stress on their shoulders in the entire system yet failed miserably. Whether ofsted is good or not is a valid question to ask, as is the specifics of their judgement criteria, but I truly don't think that removing independent review is a good idea, not on the basis that some people feel like it's "toxic" to apply standards to them.
This is like the obesity epidemic. The question is like asking "should we remove all social stigma around obesity?" We tried that, body positivity been pushed really heavily in the past decade, and the result is a greater number of obese people (including myself) and people struggling with heart conditions.
I'm sure that independent review is tough on some schools and people. But that's the point. Human beings don't self regulate very well. Especially when you add things like office politics to the mix.
I'm sure the police also feel it's very toxic and unfair that they have to put up with independent review, but hey, having seen how many coppers act when they think nobody is watching, I have to say that I simply don't care.
Or heck, another institution that engages in "self regulation" and abhors independent inquiries into how they run their facilities with kids around; the Catholic Church.
Let schools self regulate, and some will continue to succeed, but many will go back to being just as bad as they were in the 70s.
I'd be more willing to let them self regulate if we also abolished the catchment system, so that people had actually free choice over where they send their kids. That would make schools more like businesses with a vested interest in maintaining a certain minimum standard lest they lose students because of angry parents. As it is, with no pressure from below, they need pressure from above or they quite simply fail.
And yeah, it sucks, and sometimes teachers will get depressed about it, or maybe even take their own life. Yes, that's terrible. But we shouldn't abolish enforcement of minimum standards for the education of children just because some teachers can't hack it.
Great comment! I have added this to the key comments 😁
I agreed with you until you said schools should run more like businesses. Running them like that negatively impacts the learning experience, since they would effectively be forced to cut costs etc. while schools that are already prestigious would get a huge advantage. Schools should be run for the students, not for-profit.
Most kids will tell you the truth ask any parent come their parent teacher meet sadly most are very poor and an almost impossible environment to learn effectively. One teacher told us conditions had greatly improved only to be shot down by 5 pupils who reported it’s actually degraded further especially when the teacher did not even know half his pupils. Standards are there criticising those who try to maintain so half status quo’s is just ludicrous and blowing one persons failure to deal with reality out of all proportion just shows what a flakey and weak society we are building it screams of apathy and builds a poor example to any future generations.
Although I am a teacher (4th grade. 9 & 10 year-olds) I live in America so I hesitate to offer some nuanced opinion when clearly I haven’t experienced this nonsense first hand.
However, this was as interesting a video as it was disheartening.
Here in America we focus far too much on test scores as well.
I am unfamiliar with school regulation in America but it is on my list of things to explore.
I'm an 17 year veteran ex teacher. In my town we have 3 good schools... I wouldn't send my daughter to any of them, we drive her to a different out of town school. Good is about as useful as saying "the teachers aren't noticeable drunk"