Yet more from the Professional Association of Teachers...
First we had the PAT's chair shocked that she had not been told how to change a nappy, and now another representative of that organisation reckons it is a bad idea to refer to children as being clever. I am *not* making this up. The whole item is full of jaw droppers, like this: "Last month, an "excellent" student revealed she had had a mark taken away in a mock GCSE exam for giving an answer which a teacher deemed "too sophisticated".
Even supposing that Simon Smith (presumably not the one with the dancing bear) was on the right track with this plan of his, any of my readers who remember being a child will recall that children are quite capable of working out whether they or their peers are clever or not, without having to have a teacher tell them. It’s like swimming through glue sometimes, isn't it?
Meanwhile, if Simon Smith and Lynn Edwards are 'professional teachers', what in the name of all that is holy are amateur teachers like?
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tHE TEACHER MAY HAVE BEEN TRYING TO GET SOME EXAM TECHNIQUE INTO THE PUPIL'S HEAD. I was warned (too late) that it was no use giving answers in O-level that would "go over the examiner's head". "They're not looking for clever stuff at O-level; that comes later."
Dearieme, that is a pretty poor state of affairs.
I did Geography for O and A level, and was told in about the first week (by the same teacher) of the A level that what he had taught us at at O level about rivers slowing down as they progressed was completely wrong.
I'm at something of a loss to understand what woulf be the point of deliberately giving out misinformation, and ponder now on the 30 or so pupils who did not do A level and now carry around an error, always supposing they remember it.
I wasn't subject to anything that bad. It was more the case that, even when answering a question headed "Shakespeare", at O-level you'd lose marks if you didn't point out who wrote Macbeth.
Ah well. If 'free' marks are on offer, I suppose they are worth taking.
On a similar tack, I was introduced to a rather broader vocabulary for lit crit at A level, as apparently the board didn't like the use of words that showed evidence of having been taught theory. I think the idea was that we would use lay terminology when writing. I still think it is silly to mark down a candidate for 'sophistication' though.
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