Should we have more teachers and fewer teaching assistants

[Guest sibon]

A good teaching assistant always bears these things in mind and supports and helps maintain the relationship between the children and the teacher and is careful to reinforce the teacher's authority, not subvert it.

 

This is the real point.

 

Classroom Assistants are an excellent way to get more adults into a classroom. The key to making it work properly is to make sure that the teacher and the Assistant know their roles exactly. That takes planning.

 

Our CA team are excellent. Many of them just come for a year, before going to do a PGCE. They make a huge difference to the education of students who struggle.

[Guest sibon]

From an adult - this adult needs to be a teacher not a teaching assistant.

 

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Why do you think that?

[Lockjaw]

From an adult - this adult needs to be a teacher not a teaching assistant.

 

Bearing in mind that the teaching assistants work with many different teachers on a daily basis and are, as a consequence, exposed to many different teaching styles and able to observe the effectiveness thereof, don't you think they are perfectly capable of developing an effective questioning technique?

[Darth Vader]

Teaching Assistants should be just that, assistants in a class taught by a teacher.

 

Cover Supervisors should not exist, in my opinion.. Cover Supervisors, who do not have qualified teacher status, are allowed to take classes. Some Primary Schools employ Cover Supervisors and not qualified teachers, to take classes during the Class teacher's PPA time. In my opinion, this is very wrong, it is scheduled time when the school knows that the teacher will not be there, so why should a class have a non-teacher 'teaching' them week in week out, for half a day a week? When my kids are at school, I expect them to be taught by a teacher, not someone less qualified, on the cheap.

[Rupert_Baehr]

Is that here in the Uk or in Germany?

 

Sorry. - I didn't make that clear. I was talking about the UK during the late 1990s/early 2000's.

 

The government ran a big recruiting drive, increased the number of PGCE places and 'encouraged' graduates to become teachers. - By paying their tuition fees for them, amongst other things. The number of NQTs increased significantly, but the percentage who left after 2 or 3 years increased, too.

[Rupert_Baehr]

There has been a steady increase in the standard of graduates entering the profession in the last five years. That is probably partially because of limited opportunities elsewhere. It is also because salaries are more competitive and conditions of service were radically improved during the "workforce reforms". There is still a lot to do to make teaching in state schools a really attractive proposition, but the advancement is undeniable.

 

Glad to hear that. I taught in a Secondary school during 95 and 96. There were no CAs. Salaries were not particularly good, but nobody seemed to be too bothered about that. There was more than enough 'red tape', government interference and unnecessary bureaucracy. We also had teachers 'misused' as administrators - doing jobs they were neither trained nor wanted to do.

 

 

Teaching Assistants should be just that, assistants in a class taught by a teacher.

 

Cover Supervisors should not exist, in my opinion.. Cover Supervisors, who do not have qualified teacher status, are allowed to take classes. Some Primary Schools employ Cover Supervisors and not qualified teachers, to take classes during the Class teacher's PPA time. In my opinion, this is very wrong, it is scheduled time when the school knows that the teacher will not be there, so why should a class have a non-teacher 'teaching' them week in week out, for half a day a week? When my kids are at school, I expect them to be taught by a teacher, not someone less qualified, on the cheap.

 

Does money come into it? Have you asked the head at your child's school why the school does not provide a teacher?

[Darth Vader]

Glad to hear that. I taught in a Secondary school during 95 and 96. There were no CAs. Salaries were not particularly good, but nobody seemed to be too bothered about that. There was more than enough 'red tape', government interference and unnecessary bureaucracy. We also had teachers 'misused' as administrators - doing jobs they were neither trained nor wanted to do.

 

 

 

 

Does money come into it? Have you asked the head at your child's school why the school does not provide a teacher?

 

Mmmmmm. Let's see. Cover Supervisor on 13k or teacher on 32k? Heads trying to balance the books....Of course it's about money. The government should not allow this. The unions should not allow it, and parents should speak out against it.

[redrobbo]

The last that I heard was that there are more children starting school soon than we have the number of places for so just shows you how stats get confused.

I know that tHe City council is looking at how they are going to manage the increase in the birth rate for children who will start school in the near future. The problem will be the actual space that they take up rather than the number of teachers as recruiting teachers should be a relatively easy task when compared to the logistics of getting children in a space that just doesn't accomodate the numbers...

 

A somewhat ironic post when the coalition government has just announced that Labour's policy of Building Schools for the Future has been scrapped....

 

"Originally all of England's 3,500 schools were to be revamped by 2023. The plan was to replace out-dated buildings with facilities that suit modern education."

 

Link: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/10514113.stm

[Rupert_Baehr]

Mmmmmm. Let's see. Cover Supervisor on 13k or teacher on 32k? Heads trying to balance the books....Of course it's about money. The government should not allow this. The unions should not allow it, and parents should speak out against it.

 

The government haven't got enough money to pay for everything they want - so they don't have much choice.

 

Teachers aren't going to work for 13k a year. (Though I suspect there are more than a few who would be pleased to receive the 32k you think they get.)

 

Which union would could do something about it? - What would the union do and why?

 

You're speaking out about it here. Unfortunately, I doubt much would happen were you to speak about it elsewhere, either.

[Anna B]

I am unsure about the difference between 'supervising' and 'teaching.'

Particularly in the primary sector.

 

A teacher can set work but it must surely be of a very low calibre to allow a class of thirty mixed ability children to be able to get on with it for any length of time without imput from an adult. If an adult intervenes then surely that is teaching, a role for which a teaching assistant is neither qualified nor paid.

 

The nature of this intervention can be crucial in the learning process and is a very important part of teaching. Knowing when and how to offer support takes skill and judgement.

 

Teachers / assistants do not sit at a desk at the front of a class marking books, whilst their pupils 'get on with their work'.

 

This is cost cutting pure and simple.