Sir Philip Rutnam's resignation

I am genuinely interested in why some children are failing at school. Maybe if they got off to a better start in life they wouldn't end up in the institutions where I have come across them. Tackling this situation is really important.
Studying where schools are going right to try to see what could be transferred to schools where things are not going so well. I've always found that a useful approach in several spheres in life. What are successful protective factors. Probably a subject best discussed face to face rather on thread posts. It's such a massive topic.

I agree with you * Jane10* on the general principle of studying best practice. We should look at what works elsewhere and learn from it.

Jane10 You need to look at Mossbourne and Michaela Schools in London. Both appear to be achieving fantastic results in deprived areas. I'm not sure whether it's just superficial, but on the face of it, they're both very successful. Their "secret" is strict discipline and high expectations.

trisher No decent headteacher should ever allow that kind of behaviour to persist. In my experience, there's a culture in schools that teachers are reluctant to report that they have problems with discipline in their classrooms. It should be the pupils being blamed for poor behaviour, not the teachers.

As regards a 'better start in life', food and sleep are important.

Parental love is important.

Finland maintains a very high standard of education, and consistently excellent results. All their teachers are educated to M.A. level in Education and are as highly regarded in the community as Doctors and Lawyers.

I am convinced this has a great deal to do with their consistently good results and that the lack of training and vocation in British education is responsible for our declining standards.
Too many students seem to regard teaching as a branch of social work and see their role as helping the deprived; they invest £9,000 and nine months in a PGCE, enter teaching, realise it isn't what they expected but can't afford to leave.

What this has to do with Sir Philip Rutnam's resignation I am not sure, but heigh-ho.

Finland is a very successful country and a good example of what can be achieved by egalatarian, social democratic, liberal policies which result in a much more cohesive society.

Maybe Finland doesn't expect tiny children to sit behind desks and write when they should be playing.

I believe that Finnish children start school at seven.

I don't know much about Mossbourne, but I do know a bit about Michaela. As far as I can see, it was much easier for rigorous behaviour management to be implemented because, being a Free School it built up from Y7, adding a new Y7 each year. I think last year was the first year that their pupils took GCSEs (with excellent results). I rather think that starting with Y7s only and adding a new intake each year meant that rigorous behaviour standards could be implemented from the start, without any resistance or poor examples from pupils higher up the school. I know that other HTs have produced similar standards with previously failing schools, but starting small and building up did help Michaela. But, it was highly criticised by other teachers at the time, and still provokes some division.

I know this because I follow quite a few teachers on twitter because of my interest in another area of teaching. There's quite a big divide in beliefs about what should be taught, how it should be taught and approaches to behaviour.Some regard places like Michaela and Mossbourne as positively unkind to pupils... so not even school approaches are straightforward.

Yes, it's a big topic.

Finnish children start school later but they have been through a preschool system first and most can read before they start 'proper' school. If they can't, Finnish is extremely easy to learn to read as they don't have such a complex orthography as does English. I strongly believe that ability to read is a key part of successful learning. English children take about 2 years to learn, Finnish take about a term...

But, Finland has apparently been dropping down the international tables (such as PISA) since they started to adopt 'discovery' learning instead of 'traditional' methods. Big divide among teachers about that, too.

I wasn't aware that very tiny children were sat in rows at desks being made to write all day.

As far as I knew reception children learn through play rather like kindergarten.
Y1 start the National Curriculum but much learning is through play and they may have to sit at a table with others for a part of the day but are not pinned to desks for hours endlessly writing.

Although, like eazybee I don't have the foggiest what this has to do with Sir Philip Rutnam

Perhaps I didn't concentrate enough at school

Thread has wandered, Call

I'm not aware that Early Years children are sat at desks beining made to write ll day. My DGS (now Y1) certainly isn't. But he is learning to read and write and is a whizz at number. Perfectly happily.

It wasn't me who thought that, I should have made it clear that
I was commenting on another post by Greymar.

"Must try harder"

Back to Rutnam …

It appears more evidence has emerged about her previous bullying.

I think her days are numbered.

I'm not sure.
If she has the backing of those in No 10 then it will be the professional civil servants who disagree with them on a point of principle who will be the scapegoats.

It's also been leaked that:

a) There's a hit list of civil service staff Number 10 wants to get rid of.

b) The current disagreement with Rutnam started because Patel wanted his team to find a way round defying the court order on delaying the deportations to Jamaica.

I'm not sure either. A few days ago, I would have said definitely not, but Hilary Benn raised it in Parliament today. It's not going to go away and I think she might be seen as a liability, despite the support from the PM and some other sycophants.

Johnson is lazy and I wonder how many fronts he wants to fight on. He's opened quite a few and this might be just one too many.

The DWP has paid out £25k to a former employee who tried to commit suicide after an allegation of bullying by Patel according to a report on Radio 4 yesterday. It also seems that Johnson is going to lead the investigation, after giving her his full support. No clue there as to the outcome.......

Hasn't he got more pressing things to do with his time?

Apparently not...

Of course, when he says “I will do X” he actually means “Dom will do X, I’ll be on the tennis court and don’t expect to be disturbed”

Not just on the tennis court SirChenjin I assume there are other activities he pursues without Dom (although now I think of it do your think Dom ordered a baby )

The Cabinet Office is advertising for a new HR specialist.

www.google.co.uk/search?sxsrf=ALeKk02kzlBp68KzYBkEIglBAhvGIBPwEg:1583236036252&source=hp&ei=xENeXsvXDMLLgwfYhYWYBQ&q=hr+vacancy+government&oq=hr+vacancy+government&gs_l=psy-ab.3..0j0i22i30l7.981.7208..7587...1.0..0.318.2083.16j3j1j1......0....1..gws-wiz.......0i131.lK804nezSnQ&uact=5&ibp=htl;jobs&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjXyajwnf7nAhViolwKHTiLAZQQp4wCMAF6BAgLEAE#htidocid=hxZLiNrx4RMLk_8AAAAAAA%3D%3D&sxsrf=ALeKk03IRtWB8CGK6jBW2Prq5f8PMKcwtQ:1583236044700&htivrt=jobs&fpstate=tldetail

At least sackings will, hopefully, be legal. I guess the person recruited will be kept busy over the next few months.