Absolutely. I’d support the idea but it’s something that you’d have to wonder how it could be implemented.

Who would it be left up to? Would favouritism be a factor?

There’s a lot to think about and I’ve never seen a suggestion made that can truly reflect teaching performance. There’s just so many variables.

A system is only worth implementing if it can be beyond reproach. That means where a teacher is subject to an opinion that is subjective (how can a principal’s view of your teaching be regarded as objective?) So it should protect the teacher from that – but it should also be tight enough to prevent an accomplished bullsh!tter sidestepping their responsibilities.

I just don’t know how it could be done in a way that represents value. Realistically, what any parent of guardian should be doing if they feel that their kid’s teacher isn’t good enough is to ask the teaching council to investigate.
They have come out with a code of conduct and you now must be registered with the teaching council in order to teach. So if a teacher has breached their professional conduct you can take it away from the school and have the teaching council do their work.

I’m sure anyone who has done teaching practice during college will attest to the 4 visits you get over any TP period being very inconsistent in terms of the advice, support and marking of your efforts.

It is a fact that teachers as professionals and adults are much more responsible for the learning environment (80% is the usual figure given by academics) and that their ability to forge positive and mutually respectful relationships with learners, and the quality of their teaching in terms of engagement are paramount to the success of learners in their classroom. This is all proven and has been much written and talked about by academics and reports and studies.
School inspections that give glowing reports often seem to be in stark contrast to the experience of learners in a school where a whole school approach is not implemented as regards discipline and approach to students in the classroom – it is what we used to call ‘mean’ teachers, it has a drastic effect on the happiness and ability to learn of students, and it is still well and truly with us.
Until we believe and act on the very real evidence that pedagogy and relationships in schools are the most critical to learning, and stop blaming learners, we will get nowhere and continue to have our young people becoming disengaged from their learning (disproportionately boys), stressed and feeling themselves to be a failure. This is not about ideology or opinion – hard facts and statistics are there to back up that this actually works.

When the Finns adopted this approach, with the following values, to underpin their education system, their results went up to the point where their system is considered the gold standard in the world. They could have blamed students for not learning, but instead they gave more responsibility to students for their own learning and prioritised a happy learning environment with mutually respectful relationships and, no brainer, it worked!

“The learning environment must support the pupil’s growth and learning. it must be physically, psychologically, and socially safe, and must support the pupil’s health. the objective is to increase pupils’ curiosity and motivation to learn, and to promote their activeness, self-direction, and creativity by offering interesting challenges and
problems. the learning environment must guide pupils in setting their own objectives and evaluating their own actions. the pupils must be given the chance to participate in the creation and development of their own learning environment. (Preamble, national core curriculum for Basic education, Finland 2004)

She’s at a loose end and says mad crap once in a while. I think that’s the reason.

You have to take Mary with a large grain of salt,she not only kissed the blarney stone,she must have swallowed it.

Are, to be sure, it’s the Blarney Stone. High on the walls (see previous article about medieval toilets).

Oops. Aah.

Well yes, but teachers have to be much much better qualified (Masters) before they can be teachers. They have a strong tradition of compulsory ongoing in-service training for teachers too. They also place the highest possible importance on the mutually respectful relationships between teachers and students, and creating a happy and relaxed learning environment. Students are much more involved in decisions on how and what they learn, and do a lot more student initiated group work and self-assessment. There is NO mandatory testing of students until after they are 16.

Here are some interesting quotes from an OECD report on the Finnish education system:

“Finnish industry leaders not only promoted the importance of mathematics, science and technology in the formal curriculum, but they also advocated for more attention to creativity, problem-solving, teamwork and cross-curricular projects in schools. in spite of some criticism in the 1990s, one example of the kind of message that corporate leaders were delivering to the schools is this statement from a senior nokia manager whom Sahlberg interviewed during this period in his role as chair of a task force on the national science curriculum:
if i hire a youngster who doesn’t know all the mathematics or physics that is needed to work here, i have colleagues here who can easily teach those things. But if i get somebody who doesn’t know how to work with other people, how to think differently or how to create original ideas and somebody who is afraid of making a mistake, there is nothing we can do here. do what you have to do to keep our education system up-to-date but don’t take away [the] creativity and open-mindedness that we now have in our fine peruskoulu. (Sahlberg, forthcoming).”

On being learner-centred:
“Finnish classrooms are typically described by observers as learner-centred. as the emphasis on student self-assessment would suggest, students are expected to take an active role in designing their own learning activities. Students are expected to work collaboratively in teams on projects, and there is a substantial focus on projects that
cut across traditional subject or disciplinary lines. By the time students enrol in upper secondary school (grades 10-12), they are expected to be able to take sufficient charge of their own learning to be able to design their own individual programme. upper secondary schools are now mostly based on individual study plans. there is no longer a grade structure; each student proceeds at his or her own pace within the modular structure. every student constructs his or her own study plan, which consists of different courses in various subjects according to each student’s individual choices. The focus on helping students take increasing responsibility for their own learning is not accidental; it reflects a key value underpinning the national core curriculum for the comprehensive school, as described below:
the learning environment must support the pupil’s growth and learning. it must be physically, psychologically, and socially safe, and must support the pupil’s health. the objective is to increase pupils’ curiosity and motivation to learn, and to promote their activeness, self-direction, and creativity by offering interesting challenges and
problems. the learning environment must guide pupils in setting their own objectives and evaluating their own actions. the pupils must be given the chance to participate in the creation and development of their own learning environment. (Preamble, national core curriculum for Basic education, 2004).”

You expect the school to act on a petition?

I’ve no problem with review and infection and would welcome it. But by the Inspectorate, not the bloated Quango we are all allegedly represented by and forced to be members of. Any teacher doing their job right has nothing to fear from proper monitoring.

We would have hoped that the school would have acted in the best interest of its pupils, sure what did we know at 17? Its not like we were asking them to sack him, we simply asked to have a different teacher for the subject and there were different teachers available.

You’d think the school might realise something needs to change when even the people that get detention for messing don’t want to continue to mess in a class anymore, would you not see that as unusual?…cause I do :)

I agree, a teacher doing their job has nothing to fear.

Review and infection? I’m afraid I’d have a major problem with that. And how does one sign a ‘partition’? Would that not be grafitti?

Was it your English teacher? Didn’t teach you the difference between a ‘partition’ and a ‘petition’?

Are a group of 5th year students really the best judge of a teacher? He/she must have set them too much homework or asked them to stop texting during class!

Unbelievable responses that you could only see in an authoritarian country like Ireland! I am stunned! Are you really saying that learners should have no input on their learning environment and what works for them? No wonder people cannot take part in our democracy in this country and put up with any kind of sh1t when they are schooled from young to be passive recipients of an outmoded education system.

It is common good practice in many countries to involve actual learners in evaluating their learning environment and their learning experience. Who else but the actual people who spend every day there learning can say what works for them?

I am really sad that the students went to this length to try to have a voice and nothing was done about it. You always hear the exact same comments from most students about particular teachers about how they cannot learn from them, but sure what would the students know!!!

Unbelievable attitudes…

Remarkable that some think students have no role in understanding what good learning is. If the group of students in Barry’s school had more say over directing their own learning (as in the Finnish system – they have the best results in the world) we would not have situations like the one described. See this quote from and OECD report on the Finnish system (all their teachers also have to have Masters, and they have high quality ongoing compulsory in-service training):
“Finnish classrooms are typically described by observers as learner-centred. as the emphasis on student self-assessment would suggest, students are expected to take an active role in designing their own learning activities. Students are expected to work collaboratively in teams on projects, and there is a substantial focus on projects that
cut across traditional subject or disciplinary lines. By the time students enrol in upper secondary school (grades 10-12), they are expected to be able to take sufficient charge of their own learning to be able to design their own individual programme. upper secondary schools are now mostly based on individual study plans. there is no longer a grade structure; each student proceeds at his or her own pace within the modular structure. every student constructs his or her own study plan, which consists of different courses in various subjects according to each student’s individual choices.
The focus on helping students take increasing responsibility for their own learning is not accidental; it reflects a key value underpinning the national core curriculum for the comprehensive school, as described below:
The learning environment must support the pupil’s growth and learning. it must be physically, psychologically, and socially safe, and must support the pupil’s health. the objective is to increase pupils’ curiosity and motivation to learn, and to promote their activeness, self-direction, and creativity by offering interesting challenges and
problems. the learning environment must guide pupils in setting their own objectives and evaluating their own actions. the pupils must be given the chance to participate in the creation and development of their own learning environment. (Preamble, national core curriculum for Basic education, 2004)

Indeed, but who defines ‘good’? How do you measure it?

Richard – something people don’t seem to realise (and every parent/gaurdian should be informed of) is that the Teaching council have a code of conduct:
http://www.teachingcouncil.ie/latest-news/new-code-of-professional-conduct-for-teachers.1423.html

This is filled with stuff that may seem obvious – when I first saw it I thought “What a sad situation that these things need to be outlined”.
However, the great thing about it being there in black and white is that nobody can ever say “but I didn’t know”.

Now – the reason it’s a good thing it’s there is that the teaching council registration is a precondition to be permitted to teach in Ireland. If you don’t have registration, you can’t get the job.

And the teaching council have the power to cancel your registration.

So if you have any complaints about a teacher that breaches the TC’s code of conduct, discuss it with the principal and elevate it to the TC if the issue persists (or if it’s serious enough then act immediately)

Anyone with common sense is qualified to comment.

You have to be a teacher for a long time to say that teachers should be reassessed?
Honestly thats your response?

I just find that very difficult to believe. Nothing on the walls at all? Nothing?

I’ve seen thius happen myself over the years when I was in school,

Inspection happening, right time to get:
- stuff on walls
- floors cleaned
- those bags and coats normally stored in that location, they need to be moved for the day
- great activity’s for the day for students to make them look interested

Yep it happens, perhaps not in EVERY school but it certainly happens

I always thought the WE were getting inspected when the inspector came, not the teacher. That’s the impression the teachers always gave me anyway!!

The usual hessian wall covering, coat hangers and whiteboard. No children’s work, no interesting posters. Serious.

Very true but be careful of creating a witch hunt. The teaching profession isn’t comparable to many others and there is no fail safe way to make teachers accountable; what works in certain sectors have been tried and failed within the classroom environment. After 10 years of the US trying private sector type teacher assessments and damaging their education system even further they are beginning to wake up to the fact that less demand for accountability from external forces leads to better education standards! To make our schools better the motivation has to come from within the school. We have to find ways to make it easier for teachers to constantly improve; to develop a culture within schools of research and self evaluation. Our schools are still modelled on the egg crate system unfortunately; as a teacher myself I have found it difficult to learn and share teaching methods even with teachers in my school. Before the Internet I’d say it was impossible.

@Trea Lynch lack of external accountability is exactly the reason that the country is in the mess we are in. the education system is not going to be fixed by another mutual appreciation society. what is need is a period of impartial empirical based fact finding with consequences and remedy’s outlined as a result of said fact finding adhered to at the end of said period. 1000 different school have 1000 different agendas is not going to accomplish anything. the primary role of the education system is to provide an education for tomorrows future, not to provide permanent jobs for people who are unable to provide that role. at the moment there is a situation whereby good teachers are being utilized by more intelligent students whilst less intelligent students are stuck with incompetent teachers. what situation does this lead to. brigades of people unable to make a living in the real world and thereby becoming a burden on the state. it is a cycle that needs to stop

I would be in complete agreement with you if the empirically backed fact finding hasn’t already shown that that kind of knee jerk “we’ll find the bad ones and fire them” demands have a negative effect on a systems education. It sounds like plain common sense and easy to do but in fact it is contrary to what has been proven to work in systems like Finland’s. Now I understand that there are teachers who should not be teaching but they are very much in the minority and a lot are phantoms; my neighbour’s uncle’s milkman told me type stuff. To invest money in chasing phantoms is a waste; spend money on a teacher training program that is more demanding and exclusive, pay ALL teachers a respectable wage and you will root out lazy teachers from the beginning. However if you demonise the teaching profession and start witch hints among their ranks then research has shown that you discourage the quality candidates you want to be teachers and attract the type that see the profession as a doss and really are in it for the wrong reasons.

@Trea Lynch would you pay me a surgeons wage today and allow me to operate on someone tomorrow. by the same token how is paying incompetent teachers more money going to improve the performance. whilst yes training is useful in the initial stages. once they have commenced employment they are having a direct impact on future generations and on society as a whole, therefore it would be neglectful to allow them to continue employment if they are not doing their job. logically if a class of students is failing year on years and they have the same teacher then it is obvious that the teacher is at fault, how is removing said teacher going to have an a negative effect on the education system.

to address your comment “demands have a negative effect on a systems education” how or what do you think the education system is. from my limited uneducated point of view i would have thought that the education system is supposed to educate people. if the brakes on your car is not working do you continue to drive until you have an accident or do you fix them in order to prevent an accident. by the same token the purpose of the education system is to educate students. whilst yes teachers are a vital cog in that wheel if some students are not coming out at the other side with an education then logically that system is malfunctioning. therefore all elements of the education system need to be looked including teachers if it is found that some teachers are faltering in their duty then they need to be replaced, the longer the damaged part to continue the analogy is left in the greater the damage.

with regards to your comment “. Now I understand that there are teachers who should not be teaching but they are very much in the minority and a lot are phantoms; my neighbour’s uncle’s milkman told me type stuff”. i would never suggest that someone should lose their position based on rumor hearsay and gossip. however the present situation seems to be a job for life irrespective of abilthy, this has to change because the rality is that if there are no incentive to work there will be no work done.

the facts are that even if there is one bad teacher he/she in the space of five years she has produced 30 failures that are going to be a burden on the state in years to come, these individuals will be unable to support themselves financially will rely completely on the state and guess what they will produce kids that will do the same thing all over again.

If a teacher is teaching a class and that class is failing consistently then who exactly is to blame.

Seamus, I really have to respond to some of your points.

Firstly, teaching isn’t a “job for life” anymore. Not at all. I know many teachers that have bounced around different schools and contracts because the way in which contracts are awarded means that it is very difficult to get a contract for a period of more than 1 year at a time regardless of how good you are. This is detrimental to the lives of teachers and also to students. The last school I taught at, I had 3rd year class that had – no joke – 9 different teachers between 1st year and when I came into the school. This inconsistency makes things incredibly hard on both students and teacher.

you also said: “at the moment there is a situation whereby good teachers are being utilized by more intelligent students whilst less intelligent students are stuck with incompetent teachers.”. How do you know this unless you’re either a) sitting in the classroom or b) an inspector yourself?

your comment “would you pay me a surgeons wage today and allow me to operate on someone tomorrow” was highly cynical. Of course you wouldn’t, but that’s not really the point. Good wages attract good candidates. The numbers applying for teaching are falling at the moment, and who can blame people given the constant cuts to both wages and resources. If you want to reform a system, you have to work from the ground up. Successive governments have implemented cuts and changes to the education system without proper consultation with teachers, or proper consideration for the future of the education system. This short-sightedness is starting to bite, and will get worse if something isn’t done about it.

@Jim Hanley first off i would agree in principle that “bouncing teachers around” is not good for students” if you will take the time to read back through the entire thing you will see that i said a “what is need is a period of impartial empirical based fact finding with consequences and remedy’s outlined as a result of said fact finding adhered to at the end of said period” if it is found that a situation as you outlined vis a ve teachers being chopped and changed and is found to be detrimental to academic abilthy then it would need to be looked at.

second as to second question How do you know this unless you’re either a) sitting in the classroom or b) an inspector yourself? there is a c in there i went though the academic system myself that is exactly what i experienced, there were limited resources and limited good teachers, as no one could be fired by not doing there job the good teachers were utilized by those that would make the best use of them ie the smarter kids. the less intelligent amongst us were lumped with the trash which to be honest under any other system they would be unemployed. what was the end result legions of people who never even past the junior cert never mind the leaving cert. i did however have the opportunity to get (good) another teacher for a few months for one subject as thankfully my previous teacher retired or got sick or something. this had the effect of dragging me from a d in the mock junior cert to up to b in the actual junior cert . this really only goes to prove my point tbh

thirdly as to your reference to my comment “would you pay me a surgeons wage today and allow me to operate on someone tomorrow”. this was made within the context of rebutting the previous argument made by tray lynch that to “pay ALL teachers a respectable wage and you will root out lazy teachers from the beginning”. no amount of money is going to make someone a better person at their job. ie if someone is crap at making tea on Monday if you give them a pay increase on a Tuesday does that equate into a better cup of tea on a Wednesday

Just to clarify my meaning with regards to the payment of a respectable wage to all teacher; an increase in wages does not, and will never, have a reciprocal effect on teacher performance. No teacher will ever say “I’ll teach better if you pay me more,” BUT a respectable wage is essential to attract the right sort if candidates into the profession. My point in all of this is that it’s practically impossible to find and remove an ineffective teacher once in the system; just look to America for proof of this. Much more effective is raising the bar to get into teaching in the first place. Demand more of candidates and pay them accordingly.

@Trea Lynch as regards America it is very simple they have no interest in mass education. their only interest in educating people to the point that they can become consumers. they do not want the plebs have the abilthy to think for themselves. in the states its all about how much money your have

as regards your comment “it’s practically impossible to find and remove an ineffective teacher once in the system;it being impossible to weed out bad teachers” you are correct in that the present system does not allow for that. a crap teacher can sit there all day long collect the pay cheque rattle on not give a dam and is basically accountable to no one. as i argued before what is needed is a study of the entire system, tenure is something that really needs to be looked because whilst yes their are a lot of good teachers if you get stuck with a crap one ya might as well not even attend,

Are you serious????? Begrudging teachers having kids??? I’ve heard it all now!!

The reason for grinds is that the leaving cert is about rote learning and not enough places for the most popular courses. Grinds teach kids to store info, no need to understand it. How to ‘predict’ the questions and pre memorize the boilerplate answers. No wonder so many fail 1st year in 3rd level where understanding is expected, grinds or no grinds.
Rabbitte wants to move from rote learning LC and look at the opposition from teachers..

Rabitte is not the education minister so he should butt out. The issue teachers have is the huge sudden change when any change should be gradual from first year on.

Stephan, please get your facts right, teachers are not opposed to the new form examinations, in fact the unions and their members are broadly in favour (reservations exist due to the extra resources needed to run the new system and the dire state of the finances).

What teachers are opposed to is the railroading of teachers correcting and grading their own pupils junior cert work. This will set a very dangerous precedent and is open to parental and school management interference never mind the potential problem of lazy teacher grade inflation.

Another part I personally don’t agree with is the new grading system. Failure will be a thing of the past, fails will no
longer be awarded, if students ‘fail’ they will now be classed as ‘not successful’ or something like that.

Yes Eric, education is not for the self-realisation of the person – let’s make sure we have a huge big red stamp that we can stamp FAILURE onto the final report for that person… perhaps a tattoo on their forehead would be better – that way prospective employers would know if they were a failure or not a failure. We have a really screwed up system that privileges rote learning to make our children cogs in the wheel of an industry that has in any event moved on by the time they are seeking environment. Most believe now that supporting creativity, independent thinking, co-operative working together, self-assessment, etc delivers the kind of person who can take their place in the world and succeed and be happy.
Sir Ken Robinson puts it better than me: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDZFcDGpL4U

My French teacher had 4 babies in 6 years, 1 set of twins. Needless to say I can’t string a french sentence together.

It may be difficult getting a new teacher midway through a year preparing for an exam, but that’s life! It’s also difficult when my GP takes maternity leave, or my hairdresser, but I would never be bitter about it. What alternative is there? Principal teachers are responsible for class allocations, speaking from experience, any good Principal will not give an exam class to a teacher about to go on maternity leave. It’s bad management. I do accept your point Jackie, but there is no easy answer.

Considering the different learning styles of students – brilliant – actual stuff that really works!!! You also have SEAL (Social and Emotional Aspects of Learning) over there. I would not be a fan of the number of assessments of children in the UK system, but they do have a more enlightened approach to the engagement and involvement of young people in their own learning than we have in Ireland, leaning as we do towards a more authoritarian approach. I love the values that the Finns decided on to underpin their education system and wish we could see more of this in Ireland, because it clearly works, and too often in these conversations the actual learners themselves and what they feel and think about their learning is the invisible elephant in the room.

“The learning environment must support the pupil’s growth and learning. it must be physically, psychologically, and socially safe, and must support the pupil’s health. the objective is to increase pupils’ curiosity and motivation to learn, and to promote their activeness, self-direction, and creativity by offering interesting challenges and
problems. the learning environment must guide pupils in setting their own objectives and evaluating their own actions. the pupils must be given the chance to participate in the creation and development of their own learning environment. (Preamble, national core curriculum for Basic education, Finland 2004)