So you think your child needs better teachers—teacher quality is not a simple issue     037

These days it seems that every school term or so there is an article in the media about Australia’s declining educational performance. Always it seems that children’s performance here ranks below the performance of other English-speaking countries. Indeed we are only average on OECD standards. Then of course every year we have articles decrying the falling NAPLAN standards. Last year, for example, it seemed that half of Year Six children were “failing basic maths questions… [such as] problems involving time, directions on maps, calculating percentages and adding and subtracting fractions”. Primary maths teachers were said to “often lack confidence and competence” according to Steve Dinham, President of the Australian College of Educators (see Justine Ferrari, Half of kids failing basic maths, Australian, 21 Feb 2015, p. 9). Even worse than this other articles sometimes reveal that NAPLAN results are not really improving despite the government giving schools extra funding. Well, imagine that.

Unfortunately it isn’t imaginary and both State and Commonwealth governments are becoming concerned. Entry standards to teaching courses, and teaching methods within schools, are the two areas which appear to be receiving the most emphasis. From this year, 2016, forward there are compulsory literacy and numeracy tests for graduating teachers right across the country, and in NSW, there are also higher entry standards for education courses. The whole idea is that a teaching degree should be harder, and that education students should be at least in the top third of students. Some universities it seems have been accepting applicants with ATARs in the range of 50-70, or in extreme cases, even lower.

Teaching methods are another important area for action. It seems now that the national curriculum states that there should be increased focus on the teaching of reading and writing using basic phonics approaches. Of course one might wonder what schools have been doing before this in regard to the teaching of phonics. Elsewhere I have written a long article ‘Is your child only pretending to read?—take this two-minute test’ in which I explain the importance of teaching phonics if reading is to be effectively taught.

But is teacher academic quality and specific teaching methods really the answer or are things far more complicated. You already know the answer to that but let me give you a few examples. Consider last year’s NAPLAN results (of 2015). In the area of Reading, combining Year 7 and 9 results, it seems that nearly all of the schools in the top 20 places were NSW, and every school in that top 20 group were selective schools. See The Weekend Australian, 20-21 Jun 2015.

Typically in HSC results, within the top 50 schools (about the top five or six per cent of the state) most of these top schools are either selective or well known private schools. Could it be that the other schools are not as successful because they are held back by low performing teachers who can’t teach properly?  Consider, just for the moment, how selective school is created. Well, the state government, after due research and consideration, consultation with all stakeholders etc., simply decides that the school will be selective from a certain point in time. The government does not go through the school removing teachers who don’t seem to be smart enough. Not at all. The teachers remain the same, and this is very much the position in all schools. Collectively teachers are pretty much the same anywhere.

The key word here is ‘collectively’. Schools very much operate as a team, with each teacher having both strengths and weaknesses. By joining together the strengths, and minimising the weaknesses the school as a whole becomes a very effective unit. In the same way for example not every sailor on a man-o’-war could furl sails at the top of the mast, navigate, or command a cannon.  School students themselves well recognise how a ship of education sails. Children know for example which teacher to go to if it is a first aid problem or a maths or physics problem, or even if their parents are being divorced. All skills are necessary in a school.

So what should government policy be in the area of entry to education courses for example? It is clear some minimum academic entry standard is necessary but attention would be better focused on standards within courses and indeed teaching conditions and salaries. Teaching in the area of maths and science definitely needs attention as Australian schools are desperately short of such teachers. It seems that across the country about 40 per of Year 7 to Year 10 maths classes are taught out of area by non-maths teachers (Professor Geoff Price, director of the Australian Mathematical Sciences Institute, A push for more maths education really adds up, Australian Financial Review, 26 Jun 2014, p. 47). Anecdotally I know that in some states, in some high schools, the position is far worse.

The government should also develop alternative entry points for students who at the present time may not be meeting entry standards, but who with additional time and assistance, could. These are teachers who have other talents and strengths which would enrich the performance of both schools and the students in those schools. An article by Kevin Donnelly (Top ATAR scores don’t necessarily mean top teachers, Australian, 10 Oct 2015, p. 22), quotes opinions on the notion that teachers with high ATAR scores are not necessarily more effective.  Donnelly stresses other factors such as resilience empathy, commitment and the ability to communicate. Ironically perhaps, top performing selective schools recognise the importance of diversity in selecting their students, when they have an intake of new students in Year 11. You might think that each new student would be an academic gold medal performer, far superior to the existing students. However, anecdotally, such appears not to be the case. If they have something else to offer the school, and if their academic standard in the general range, then they can be accepted.

So parents, remind yourselves that achievement is about what the whole team can accomplish; that’s parents, students and teachers. It’s not about what this or that teacher can or cannot do. Besides, individual teachers disappear in the end. Remember the example of the James Ruse school community—first place for many years, far outlasting particular groups of students, teachers, parents or school principals.  See my article ‘The secrets of success of James Ruse Agricultural High School’.

All content copyright—Mark Thackray—Australian Educational Services