196. Q&A: Unannounced Learning Stalks, Parent Emails & Are SATs Pointless?

0:00 Hello everyone, Welcome back to another episode of TC Repeat. My name is Dylan and my name's Hayden, and we're back with another question and answer. You lovely listeners have been writing in to us. You can join our WhatsApp community down in the description below. Let's get cracking. First one, Hayden. Go on. Oh, you're so kind. He's such a sweetie. I'm so nice. Following on from a recent video you did about learning specific facts being pointless, what what room do you think there is for children memorising facts at all? Where is the line? Is it all completely pointless now that there is so much information at our fingertips, or is there still a case for remembering things? Yes, of course there is. That's not what I meant. We're seeing a lot. Maybe it's because it kind of highlights maybe I'm being quite divisive sometimes when I do these maybe or a little bit. What's the word provocative?

0:46 Perhaps because like, I, I feel like it's quite clear that's not what I meant. Like I didn't remotely say let's not learn anything absolutely ever. My actual wording was specific facts. And my example was, for example, in history. Do I really, really care if at the end of a unit, a child can't tell me the exact year that Tutankhamun's tomb was discovered? Right. And my point there is I think that kind of level of we must learn all of the facts and the things. And then next lesson, I'm going to start with a bit of a recap on the exact facts and see if you remember them or not. It's a nice thing to do. But like then then I've heard of schools being told check the gaps for those mini retrieval tests and make sure you fill them. No, Yeah, yeah, yeah. No.

1:27 What a waste of time. I don't care. No, it's not. It's not remotely necessary. So I'm just trying to clarify where I was. There are some specific facts that, because of the advent, I think, and the dawn of more technology than ever before, become less important for children. Do you find it particularly weird, like in that situation you just gave there over history, for example, Is it because there are so many facts about everything? Yeah, maybe that it's weird to put on a pedestal to that to the NTH degree of light to the point we have to then do retrieval tasks the next day to make sure they remembered these strange subset are very specific facts. Is that is that the reason that you find it? Essentially, yeah, I think maybe it was. It's rooting the fact I did a history degree and for a long time people were half joking and half serious when they would ask me what happened in like 1347.

2:10 I'm like, well, I actually don't know. This isn't the the the actual, you know, what skills require someone to be a good historian aren't rooted in knowing all the facts, but it's a good thing to know all your facts. It's important. I listen to the rest is history podcast. Dominic Sambrook and Tom Holland know their facts, right? They know them and it's really helpful when they're putting together this kind of narrative and this story. It helps that they have it off the top of the head because it makes the presentation better. Of course it does. And it makes like what you're talking about. It's rooted more in that you know what's going on. So then you're going to interpret it maybe, and you have you understand where the facts came from, etcetera. So I'm not saying it's a bad thing, but yeah, I agree. It's like we've decided where this arbitrary line is, where it matters what individual facts, you know, And it just happens to be the facts that I've chosen for this lesson. I could have chosen 10 more facts. Do you know what I mean?

2:53 I could have chosen the fact. Where did Lord Carnarvon travel from when he went to Egypt to find this? Like where did his money come from? Like, OK, it's, it's some like at some point it doesn't matter anymore. But I, I do genuinely also think that when it comes to knowing facts, facts and knowing things, then yeah, of course it's still a good thing to do. And even within history, we still have to understand chronology. I think children should still understand the order in which things happen and why there's a cause and effect. Maybe that's gone through history and and in different interpretations of what have happened and when the fact something happened before something else is clearly important. That's that that that you are required to understand that in order to have a good chronological base and a good understanding of why things happened.

3:34 So I'm not I'm not against knowing facts. I was very specifically talking about really specific intricate facts that at the end of the unit. I don't necessarily think I failed as a teacher if every child doesn't remember. Yeah, but I think there's some more broader things and and there's a whole discussion we can have about working memory, right. And I know we've had this before where we've talked about how if you learn certain things, that could be a process in maths. But also I'm thinking about mathics. It's where, you know, our our passion lies. You need to know things. Yeah. You need children need to know. To make the connections. There, there is 10 millimetres in a centimetre, yeah, you need to know that there are 10, sorry, 100 centimetres in a metre. And we can come up with different ways of children working out and why and what milli means. And there's 1000 in a metre or what centi means that you can kind of work out, but you still need to know what senti means. But at some point it requires you to understand a fact, which then if you know these facts, think about times tables, division facts, all this kind of stuff, number bonds. We want children to know them as facts, to record them because it frees up your working memory.

4:35 So I don't think there's a contradiction here. I think there's different levels of facts and what we can say is important for children to understand. Sure. I guess the difference is I'm really thinking more deep about this now because I definitely used to fall into the trap of being like, oh, in the modern day, like we've got Google at our fingertips. We don't need to to learn anything. We can just find out. But you're right though, because we gave the analogy even about this is still quite niche. But even in the example of the rest is history, imagine, imagine if they didn't know anything, but they were just really good historians. They're really good skill set, but they didn't remember any facts ever. Like it would be boring because they'd be constantly looking things up and they wouldn't be able to innately make those connections and links through their vast understanding of history. Like that's obviously important, but in maths like the same so that the argument I was thinking of in my head regarding history was I have a problem.

5:18 I think you're, I think it's what you're trying to say. I have a problem with the fact that we pick a a very specific subset of facts and we determine their progress and attainment based on those exact facts, when really we should just be saying it. Having understanding things and having facts and knowledge is good. But I don't want to be in a system where that child who's learned 57 facts about ancient Greece, but happened to be none of the 12 facts that we learn in our lesson is now determined worse at the child that just learn those 12 facts. Like, I don't like the fact that that can exist, which is basically what's happening, right? Whereas in maths, I don't think it's quite the same because the curriculum, so it's so broken down and structured where it's sort of like there kind of is a specific subset of facts that you need to learn. And they and they are, they are important. And there probably are some more fringe facts you can learn as well that OK, might fall into analogy of or you're not going to get extra Marks and you're a test that determines your attainment.

6:09 But there is there is a really core set of facts. You do, you do just need to know what is how to define a square, how many sides are in a pen? Yeah, exactly. You do kind of have to be able to do those things. You need to know what perimeter means. Yeah. But you just have to, yeah. And I still do think there's a grey line, right? There is a grey line eventually, like you could start to argue things like, you know, and I think at what age as well. That's also important, like days of the week, clearly important to know, right. How many hours are in a day? Clearly important to know. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Is it vital that children understand what pie is like? But you, you could. My point is you can start to argue that it may be stretching into the point of, well, well, I don't think you need to know that in order to have a good base understanding of maths. But you do need to have a good understanding of π if you want to go into that field of learning about circles, if you want to go into that field of solving problems in that area. So I think it's the same of history, right? I think if you're going to become a specialist when you're like, if it becomes your job that you're a, you're an ancient Greece specialist.

7:03 Yeah. Actually, do you know what you do need to know those facts at that point. So what I'm saying is just stripping it back to the context of being in a classroom with Year 4 doing a history lesson. We could have chosen a number of different points in history, right? Yeah. We we could have chosen a different point in history. The curriculum could have said actually learn about this time and children would learn only facts about that. And in that scenario, they wouldn't know any facts about ancient Greece. We could still determine that they're good historians though, couldn't we? And I think that goes to show that it's not necessarily about the facts you remember and the specific things that determine how good a historian you are. It's the things we can do cross topic. So whether I'm doing, you know, ancient, you know, ancient China or whether I'm doing ancient Greece or whether I'm doing is something from South America or I'm doing World War 2. The specific facts themselves I don't think necessarily mean that and a better historian, but I could absolutely draw lines across them.

7:55 All of do you understand how civilization came about? Do you understand cause and effect in that situation? Do you know the chronology of that time? Do you know the social factors, what's going on with people at home when war was raging? Do you know about invasion? Do you know about the borders changing? All of those things can be crossed no matter what you do in history. That I think I'm much more of a good indication of whether a child is better at history or not than simply saying to them, oh, OK, actually, what year did that happen? I think it's just not is important. And I think there's other ways that are still vital. Obviously, we can still judge children. And when I say judge them, I mean we can see how much historical skill they've picked up. Yeah, I personally think without being hung up on, well, retrieve this fact, please.

8:36 I just don't think it's important. Yeah, I agree. I agree. I think that's it, isn't it? It's not all or nothing in any of these situations. The facts are obviously important. If we're measuring the attainment of children in history, it's going to be based on those skills. And ultimately, like, I actually do think that's what the curriculum is aimed to do. Yeah. Yeah. Like when you when you actually read the curriculum for history. It doesn't say learn when Tutankhamun's school was discovered, does it? Exactly. It doesn't say all four lines of the curriculum, right? But and even when we had Ofsted and they looked into history, it was very much about the skills. That's what they were interested in innately. So yeah, it's just a case of if schools are a bit, they can become a bit too obsessed. I think of the facts as if like that's the be on end or not. The skills like, yeah, they're important, but ultimately it's for this wider lens that you talked about. 100% And I think just one thing to say absolutely it's this is not us saying that it's not a thing that if you learn facts, your working memory is is increased. OK.

9:23 I think that the comparison with different subjects is different Now I think with maths, if you have a really good understanding of the process and what's going on, that frees up your working memory. If you have a really good understanding of your time stable facts, you can focus more of your attention on actually solving that equivalent fraction question because you're not thinking how do I times by 4, you just know it. So there is definitely a benefit to knowing facts in certain situations. I just think that we can calm down a bit and the situation that we're in depends on how important that fact is. 100% Nice one let's go to the next one. I've got a parent who emails me at at 10:00 PM most nights and expects a reply before school the next morning. Sounds like you got a bit of a tough mum and dad. You're a grown adult, why are your parents messing you? That is banter that is funny. My SOT have basically told me just to manage the relationship. What would you actually do?

10:09 I mean in a way I'd do that and my managing the relationship would be not replying at any time outside of work hours. And then I'd tell my SOT cheers for that advice, here's what I've done, I've managed it. And if they don't like that? Just a quick one. I've had that mum call back, you know, you mentioned the other day you asked what should I do and I said you should manage a relationship or they have messaged me and said that you're not actually replying to them within 12 hours. Well, they're messaging me at 10:00 PM, mate. But did you manage that relationship? Yeah, yeah, I did manage it. I I told them I'm not gonna reply outside of work hours. It's funny, 'cause you didn't ask me for anymore. You don't give me any advice, so I presumed that you'd be OK with me sorting this situation myself. Yeah, what I kind of hoped would happen there if I gave you some vague kind of just mersh that something doesn't really make any sense. I was kind of hoping you would just do all the stuff I can't actually ask you to do, which is to work outside of those. Times so I.

10:58 Was kind of hoping that I could exploit you. Why, why, Why did you not let me exploit you? I see, I see. So I read it in the lines here. When you said manage the relationship, what you were saying to me was just reply to the do. Everything that I can't actually tell you to do just against your contract, but I fully expect you to just to be replying. OK, we're now telling me to do that, aren't. You No, no, I'm saying no, I'm. But it's hypothetical, isn't it? Layers of hypothetically right here, yeah, I just, yeah. But OK, OK, OK. I'm just gonna narrow it back down again and we can joke and laugh about how it's just absolutely ridiculous what we're talking about here. Obviously you shouldn't be OK, but if your SLT do genuinely just expect you to just deal with it. Yeah. And that does happen. They're like, Oh yeah, well, kind of just got to do it.

11:38 Yeah. My advice is don't just don't do it. And, and we've said this a million times, we're gonna risk repeating ourselves over and over again. If you're in that situation, don't bow to it because then it becomes normal. Think about not only you, if you're someone who, OK, here's here's, here's the crux of it. If you're someone who can't put yourself on a pedestal and and respect yourself enough to say no to that in terms of you're thinking, oh, I'll just do it, It's only me. Yeah, it's only me. But this is see a lot of this in teaching where it's like, oh, I'll do that. It's just me. But even they'll fight for other people as well. And they'll be like, no, it's not fair. It's not fair. I'll do it, I'll do it. Yeah. Think to yourself then in this situation, if that's you, and you'll just justify yourself doing this because you're thinking, oh, it's just me. Think about how it's going to have the effect on the next person this happens to. Because the next person this happens to SLT will not only just be able to say, manage your relationship, they'll say, oh, yeah, this happens quite a bit, actually. And they just reply, yeah.

12:27 So you become the enabler in a way. Yeah. So true. If you're, if you're not, if you're not able to put yourself in a pedestal for whatever reason, it might be justified or not to think I'm going to look after myself and say no. Now let's put it in the lens of how it might affect other people. Yeah, I'm actually in the next class teacher exactly that. They're doing the same thing next year, right? Or the last teacher applied whenever this teacher is rubbish, going straight to the head teacher. The last teacher did all these things, it becomes a new normal and it was already absurd. And this teacher, now I have to wait 24 hours, sometimes 48 hours to get a reply and it's always within school time. I'm at work. Exactly, exactly. So that one to me just, it just strikes me as I think in general, what do you think about schools that give out work e-mail addresses like on their website?

13:08 And like, it's because obviously we worked in school that did both. It's just for people listening. And it does seem like a bit of a split where if you're in a school where your e-mail address is just public knowledge, it's on the website. Parents can just e-mail you directly. A lot of teachers have heard me say, well, in my most recent school that that didn't happen. Everything came through the office, everything came through SLT. And they're like shocked. They're like, what? How do you do this? And we're like, we don't. And they can't fathom that there's a world where you don't have to do. That I couldn't, to be fair when we started because obviously I'd come from a school where they have Direct Line team and we were getting emailed all the time. I think there's a middle ground. I used to be very, I think I used to be quite quick to say or the way our new school does it is is the best and only way to do it. Like no school ever should be given out direct emails.

13:49 And I do genuinely think that's the case probably for most schools. There is probably a middle ground where a school that's well run and well managed, with really clear policies and strict boundaries in place, could have a system where parents and teachers can e-mail directly and it doesn't actually become. Horribly. Well, that looks like a. Burden. I think it would just have to be some sort of either some really strict policies towards the parents that are upheld in terms of you will not get a reply between certain hours or you have to, you know you can expect to wait at least 48 hours before you get a reply. You still got a replacement. At some point, yeah, of course you can of course, of course and it will have to be done in in school time because I because the way I imagine it is those but.

14:29 It's just a job you're adding on, it doesn't matter when it happens. It's true, but someone's going to do it. It's a job that someone's going to take on. Either the SLT are forgoing some part of their role and taking on all of the burden of all their teachers, or the teachers are taking on the individual burdens themselves, or the office are taking on the entire burden. All those conversations are just pushed to conversations you have at the end of the day anyway, with parents at the. Door. Yeah, that's a good point. So it's like it's going to happen anyway. Did you not find though with that policy where parents didn't have the e-mail, what it ended up doing was actually just reduced them to the sheer number. So it's not a case of necessarily like think of all the emails individual staff would have got and now my SRT has got them all. Actually, I think it reduced it massively. I still think SRT and the office staff and our old absorbed way more than we thought and then kind of sorted it. But their, their whole policy was if they can nip it in the bud, like, OK, 90% of these things aren't needed for the class Teacher.

15:14 This is just someone asking what do we wear shorts tomorrow? I'm sorry, as a teacher, don't message me now, don't e-mail me. I don't care if there's a policy. I don't need to reply in two days. You shouldn't be in my inbox. It's pointless. So it kind of that that all your points were really valid. Absolutely. And I think someone does have to take on the burden at some point and we're just sharing it around. But I do think that burden is reduced and I do also think that it it kind of, it allowed our leadership actually, if anything, they had a really good relationship with parents in high school, didn't they? It was really strong and I think that might be why. You're right, actually. And that's, that's something that I don't take into account as much as I should, which is how many of the emails that went through the first layer SLT and things didn't actually make it to us anyway. Because my point before that was going to be the counter argument is there's just two steps now. The e-mail goes to the office and then they forward it to me anyway.

15:58 They might as well just emailed me. But you're right, I definitely definitely got significantly fewer emails to me because things were just absorbed and sorted by SLT by the office. I would, I would genuinely say it'd be interesting. You're obviously higher up in the school. Maybe I don't know if it's more or less actually, you know, it seemed to me we were in a Junior School of Year 3. When I was in year 3. I probably had the most interaction with parents I've ever had because they were joining our school, knew they were young, there was more stuff going on. And I wonder if year six it dips back in. But when I was in year 4, I can genuinely say now that in my, let's just take my last year of teaching, I reckon I had probably. And and this is not including like the office messaging me, forwarding me to say someone's been picked up by someone else. That's just nothing to me, right. That's like, yeah, that's just information, an actual e-mail. Yeah, it's just the information that the the parent has emailed the school and I need to know who's picking the child up. So I'm not counting that actual emails to me as a teacher. I reckon it was less than 5.

16:50 I was literally thinking like under. 10 it's honestly like I can really truly think of, I can think of two and there's probably a couple more where it was like, we've had this e-mail from a parent have a read and it was really something quite specific and it was like, actually, do you know what? I should have received this e-mail. What I didn't need was what I had in my old school, which was people just thinking I was their mate. Yeah, like, like when's this thing? Sorry, did you do you think to check the PDF that's on the website before just emailing me? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Because it'd be information there. That's so true. Just became like a crux, became like Google 2 point O might as well have got an e-mail saying when does Tesco open? Oh, sorry, let me just double. Just check. I don't care. Look, look, look at for yourself. There's a lot of nonsense that they could have just found out themselves. Yeah, it's true. I think back and it was a big burden actually.

17:32 Yeah, amount of emails had to do with and some of the sometimes some parents we'll send an essay. I know, I don't know what it is. TLDR didn't we give me a summary please? So it's great about large language models now straight in. Can you summarise this please? I'm not reading this. Yeah, yeah, yeah. As long as it's not got any sensitive, of course. I'm sorry. This hypothetical question, this hypothetical situation is me having a safeguarding issue hypothetical. You're going to get fired from your job, mate anyway, right? We've we've diverged. So yeah. It was good though. Yeah good question. Next one our school does learning walks without any notice and then you get a two line e-mail feedback the same afternoon with no chance to respond or discuss. One week I got told my working walls were too busy, the next that they lacked evidence of learning. Classic.

18:16 How is anyone supposed to win? Why is feedback so poor? Do these people go, do they get training on how to do feedback or do they just barge themselves into positions of power and go, wow, actually, I need to give you some feedback now. It's going to be the listing because it's not even consistent, complete and utter nonsense. I like learning walks, by the way, Just saying out there, it's probably an unpopular opinion. I like learning walks, but it's it's not what you might think in your head straight away. Yeah, because to some people you say learning walk to me, I'll just be like, cool, the head's going around. Yeah, nice one. He's a nice bloke. He'll just come in. That's that's a learning walk. And other people think, you know, four people in suits I've never seen before. I've been hired from Ox dead to come in and actually walk all over you, walk all over you.

18:57 It's just so I think there's a way to do learning walks without notice. Like my deputy, our deputy head and head teacher would just walk in. They wouldn't message us, but it was normal and they weren't judging and they just wanted to look at the kids. The amount of times I'd see them walk in and they were just honestly late. They made the point of just looking at the kids, looking at the kids checking out. Oh, your mum said this, by the way, going through. Oh, that's not good work. Well done. Just watch through. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And obviously I'm not stupid. I know the back of the head. They're think they're they're seeing what's happening in the lesson, but they're not said they're staring at me with a clipboard. So learning what's about notice depends on the situation and in this situation, I think it's just nonsense. Do. You know what, that's the whole time all I was thinking was but I hate the term learning more. Does it just sound?

19:38 It just sounds so like, what's the right word? And the patronises are obnoxious. Obnoxious. Maybe I'm just a learning walk. Yeah, shut up. You're the head teacher and your job is to go around and check the school's running. It's just about it. It's a. Learning walk, not just what you do. Hey kid, we're going on a learning journey. Like what? A lesson. Now what you're doing is you're walking around the school checking that we're all doing our jobs properly and the kids are behaving. Just say it for what it is. But that's a lot more words than learning. Oh. Yeah, I'm coming around today, but don't even say anything. Words don't say anything. Words don't say anything. They don't. I'm doing my job in September. I say everyone. I'm the head teacher and I'm going to do my job. Yeah, yeah, that's, that's what happened here, yeah. Gorgeous. Don't even say learning more, just. I'll go to Lolly Box.

20:19 Much shorter, I guess. Yeah, I hate it. Yeah, I guess you're you are definitely someone who when you think of learning more, yeah, you're absolutely thinking of the worst version of that. Right, not even necessarily. I just don't like this. I just honestly, I don't know what it is. I I know this is the pettiest thing I've ever said, but there's just something about the phrase when I hear someone saying deadly serious or we're doing, you're learning more country, I'm going to shut up. What would you say more? Country. I don't even know at this point. I just, I just hate the phrase we've LED. Back I definitely said we're doing a learning. I'm coming around to observe. I know I've said it. Because it's people know what it is straight away. Yeah, I know, I know. It's really. You know, I can imagine someone joining, you know, like some like Hotshots come in. Our new CEO is coming. We don't do learning what's anymore. We do learning sprints. Obviously it's the. Same vibe to me. I get the same thing, yeah. So learning what?

21:03 So I think, I think learning what was about notice can be fine, right. Yeah. But what we didn't get when we did that was a two line e-mail feedback. No discussion, no nothing. I, I found that the most frustrating. I don't know if it's a personal thing of how I am. You know what I'm like for my personality in general. Yeah, if I if. Thank you. No context. Just horrendous, awful. I I really struggle with receiving feedback without the opportunity to just talk about it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like I, I, I it really, really went as if it's done as it's done. It's, it's like, it's the feedback, the feedback, it's done. It's like, well, I am also a professional. No, no, no. Get over it man. I've got other stuff to do. Use your feedback. Just crack on. Just action those things. I'm sorry.

21:44 I'm your leader and I have got other people to lead. I've. Got a learning Sprint to get around. You just crack on. I'm jogging at the moment. I need to be sprinting. I'm a manager. I've got, I've got mental age that's. Enough, you've talked to me enough. I've got to go and speak to this teaching magic feedback. Just learn from it and do better next. It winds me up because the point is I've had feedback before and you know what? It's not nice. You know it's not nice receiving feedback that's negative, right? It's not nice, but now I can get over it. It's fine. It makes sense. Yes, I agree, actually. That's cool. Oh, I didn't notice that. And that actually does make sense. Thank you for explaining that. Sometimes you get feedback and you think there are five reasons why this didn't happen the way you think it should have happened that are all legitimate. And I would have just liked an opportunity to tell you those things. Why didn't you just do that? Oh, maybe it's because I didn't have that in my classroom at the point.

22:25 You could have just used the overhead projector. At this point, it's broken. Do you know what I mean? Like there's that level of stuff where it's like you're not even getting the basic understanding of how my classroom works. And then there's the grey area nuance bit where it's like. It's just a preference you. Just have a preference right now that you're saying I've done badly because it wasn't your preference, right. It's almost as if like on Wednesday we're going to talk about different preferences and setting for maps and stuff and how it's just one research paper away from actually you've just been completely wrong this whole time. Yeah, yeah, definitely. That's an exaggeration. Listen on Wednesday. But yeah, I think the no the no feedback or chance to respond once melt. Yeah, me too. Yeah, and you're right. The one, the one that is most annoying is when is when you feel like the feedback has been given and they've fundamentally missed something really important about your practise that absolutely, completely would change their feedback. And you're like the fact that you think I've done this for like a bad reason, you haven't even considered that I've actually done.

23:15 I'm working on a higher level than you mate. I'm playing 4D chess. Literally. But there have been situations where I've thought to myself, I can understand why someone might, my son might come to this certain conclusion, but they just haven't considered that. I had already thought of that conclusion and realised something else that that Trump's it even more and you just haven't considered that. So I need that conversation. Yeah, 100%. You like to when you're like when they come in and they, they might look on the surface of like how to save time in transitions or something, right. Yeah. And then I'd be like, actually, do you know what you could have saved time here if you hadn't, if you haven't got them to do this task at the start and it could have saved time, you could have got to the the chunk of it a bit more quickly. And like that on the surface can be a really reasonable bit of feedback. But then like you said, you're, you're in your, you're there and you think, oh, but I just teach them for four lessons in a row before this. And actually, I found when I do this little task at the start, which just gets them to talk on their table or something, it really helps them in the end.

24:04 And it's a, it's a worthwhile 5 minutes because the quality of the work they did at the end increases. And it's like, you've not even taken into account that I could have thought that all you're thinking is that I'm an idiot because I thought, let's waste 5 minutes doing this. It's like I'm not though. And there might have been a different situation where actually that feedback could have gone unchallenged, and they might think that's good feedback because it could have been actually in that situation. Yeah, they were right. We didn't need to do that task. Yeah. But there are also some other ones where you just don't think far enough. So I think poor, poor feedback in school is is a poison. I really think it's a poison big time, because receiving negative or constructive feedback is inherently not a nice thing to hear, and if you're doing it badly consistently it's just going to brew up resentment. That's exactly what I was going to say is resentment is is absolutely the word.

24:50 And I know it because I felt it and I've been there and it made me want to leave schools. It does it impacts you massively. So just finishing off this question then, because we kind of went off on tangent again. What would you say? We never do that. What would you say? There's a part. In the middle. Again, not again to this person who said like, what do they do? Basically they've had they've had a learning 2 learning walks. Yeah, stupid name. Yeah. And the first one was it's too busy. The next one was I would lacks evidence of learning. So basically contradict themselves. What do you actually do in that? Situation So what I would do in that situation is and knowing I've got to stay in this school, right. That's because it's just ridiculous. It's quite yeah. Anyway, who goes? I would. I would say that that to me personally, would be enough proof.

25:30 This whole process is bollocks. But this to me is proof. You're saying it's too much. It's too little. I've changed what you said last time I took it on board. Maybe I thought it was busy because actually it helps my class. But you know what you said? It's too busy. I'll just change it. That's fine. Next time you come in. Oh, yeah. It's lacking, isn't it? Not much on there. It's like, Oh my God, I don't even think this is the way to do things. I'm only doing it this way because last time you told me to change it. I already think this is stupid, and now you're telling me it's stupid. Yeah, that's enough information for me to know that I should not be taking this feedback seriously at all. So all you do is you wait for the next one. Wait for the feedback. Yeah. No problem. Yeah. And do what you want to do and do nothing and do what you want to do anyway. Genuinely, just do what you want to do anyway. Because. Because no, Even if you changed it, they'd give you some crappy feedback next time. If you don't, they'll give you some crappy feedback. You're going to get crappy, awful feedback. Yeah.

26:14 Cool. You've made this whole thing pointless. It could have been really constructive and helpful, but it's not. I'm not going to waste my time over this anymore. I'm going to do what I want to do until you prove to me that your feedback's good. Just because you're in a position of power in this school does not automatically mean that you're always right off. Some some people would argue that even though that's that, that basically that's the easy way out, like disengaging with it and ignoring it is kind of the easy way out and they're. Only once it's been proven to be bollocks. That's my point. Only once you've seen it does it's it's not even rooted in anything useful. That's what my. Point is there a space here for actually pushing back and fighting back and trying to make the point that you the thing that you're ignoring and just rolling about whatever is there a space for saying actually no stand up for yourself and say to them and call them out on this stuff repeatedly until they start to listen and a. 100% but like it just gets to the point where I can imagine it being like they clearly don't care.

27:02 They've clearly been told, like I've had leaders before tell me like middle leaders who like in between who've said to me, like if it's felt like they're on side, I just, I do just need to put something down now. I need to put something down that was bad. Basically, I need to put something down that wasn't good. I have to give you something. It's the rules that I have to be seen as a manager to be managing you to get better. And if I don't have anything in here that makes you better, then it's going to look bad for me. And you just both sat in a room knowing it's complete and utter nonsense what you're going through. But someone above who's not even stepped foot in the classroom has said you need to have that it that that's the point where I'm like, OK, whatever. Yeah, that's the point where I'm just like, OK, I, I am just going to not care. I will never ever. I've told the Story 3 times on the on this podcast, but it's been a long time I.

27:43 Want to two? 100 I will never forget the moment in which our most recent head with the school we worked at the longest did an observation of some sort, and the feedback had no constructive There was nothing. He was like, oh, it was just a really good lesson. It was just an afternoon lesson. It wasn't. You thought I made it sound bad. No, no, no, no. Had no constructive feedback. No good thing. Yeah, yeah. No, of course. Had no negative. Had no negative. He wasn't. Basically, he saw a lesson and he thought the lesson was really good and he really enjoyed the lesson because I'm such a good teacher. That's what I'm trying to. Say and but the point was he wasn't like doing that thing you just said there of like, oh, I've got I've got to say something was bad. He just went, yeah, it was a really good lesson. Yeah, Thank you. Carried on. And I and I couldn't believe it because I was like, hey, this can't be possible because I'm so used to schools just picking about everything and even stuff. I don't disagree if they're still picking it apart. And I was like, oh, that's cool.

28:30 And then whenever I did get constructive feedback from that person, I really took it on board and listened to it because I was like, I respect this person because when? Because when they didn't have to say it. You sure you talked about the primary Norden last time? He said it was perfect. What's changed? Yeah, true. True. But I didn't. I respected his opinion because it was real. Yeah, He didn't just force it because all the structure of this format form, the formality of this tells me and I have to give you 2 points that are good and actually at one point, OK, you just, you just told me you're honest reflection of the lesson and I happen to be a, well good teacher. It's true. It's true. It's fine. Yeah, I completely agree. I completely agree. It's this obsession, isn't it? It's just a it's a toxic obsession. We've always, always, always happened to get better. It can be fine.

29:13 Do you know what he could have done? He honestly, and I've seen you teach, so I know he could have found something wrong with that's my bubble. He he could, he could have found something. Of course, there might be people listening going, Oh, actually, that's bad leadership. That's bad leadership, because obviously there's always something you could just say and you could do it in a nice way, right? You could do it in a nice way. And it's just always a bit icky to me that they would he would suggest that it's fine. He wasn't even suggesting that. No, he wasn't even suggesting that. He was genuinely just saying like as a that is a completely acceptable lesson. If anything, it was a good lesson. I'm happy the children, you could say. I'm happy the children in my school are receiving this from you and just making you feel good. That's the end of it. Oh, cool. Yeah, it's fine. It doesn't mean that you've reached a, that you've completely teached perfection.

29:54 Yeah, it doesn't mean that. It just means that you wanted to give you some praise. Yeah. Which in it's in of itself is a good motivator to make you teach better next time. Yeah. How much better was your next lesson after that than it would have been if he'd come in and been like, oh, this, this, this, this actually? He put the bar so high. Next time I was, I came with my feet up. I was like I don't need to work this hard. You're really still managing to paint this as a bad thing I'm just doing. Anything I can to troll in this moment? The, the overarching point, exactly what you said was in that moment that head teacher decided to just be nice and make me feel good. And it worked really well, yeah. That's it. And and legend has it that two of your hairs grow back. Yeah, that's true. It's just true. I'm on 5. Heads, now explain why you've got so little working with me. Yeah, OK, cool.

30:35 Next, next question. Am I in the minority thinking that Sats in year 6 are a good thing? Every other year group does end of year tests. It narrows the focus for staff in English and in math lessons, and it sets kids up for when they do more formal testing later in their school life. Obviously it can be done badly, but when people say we should outright scrap stats, I do feel like it's a little bit of an overreach. It's a really good question, really good question because I've, I've always struggled to articulate where I stand on this whole argument because my gut, if I'm just going to be honest, right, I'm not try not to be persuaded by the way people think online and and the the status quo, right? My genuine gut feeling is Satsa pretty good. They're all right, They're all right.

31:16 Like I've never actually thought to myself, these are so damning that we should immediately scrap them and not replace them with anything. Like I actually have never thought that I've considered it based when we had like COVID time, I definitely thought to myself, interesting. Had a couple of the analystics teacher for that whole period of time, didn't have SATS for a couple of years. Didn't seem to make much difference. Whilst also ignoring the fact that we did mock Sats anyway with those kids to get data points. So they kind of did have sats, you know what I mean? It was like I just in my head, I was no official sats. Wow. Didn't make much difference, still did it anyway. Chose to do it you. Know, I know we're going to go into a few things here, but I want to pick you on that a bit more because I think what you've described there is what a lot of people still think SAT should be like in terms of it's scrapped, right?

31:57 So I don't think, I don't think many people, correct me if I'm wrong, there might be some people out there, but I don't think many people are saying we shouldn't do any kind of formal assessment whatsoever. Because like this question says here, like the end of year 3, we do a, we do an assessment, see where they're at end of year 4, end of Year 5. So I think you saying we did it anyway. I'm like, well, that's not really the point. Like, I don't, I don't think if people got their way who wanted to scrap Sats that finally got that, I don't think suddenly we wouldn't be assessing children at the end. I think what maybe people are talking more about is the pressure of league tables, the pressure from the top down, the the, the obsession with getting to a certain point because it's going to look bad for the school and then leadership getting stressed and then governor's getting stressed. All of that can be removed from scrapping sacks in terms of scrapping the system. But I think you can still maintain an end of year assessment to see where the children are at. So did did you notice a difference between when you had a a formal SATS before COVID and after COVID compared to when? Yeah, well we just did SATS in the VA 6 anyway in 2020 and 2021 just to see where they're at.

32:56 Did you notice a difference? Well, it's a difference in the in the children or the way we everything, the whole. Thing everything like did you think to yourself, but you know what, this is actually better because I still get the benefits of assessment. I still get the benefits of seeing where they're at in the benchmark or compared to their peers, etcetera. But we're not going to get published league tables. We're not going to get the pressure of actually our school is here, it's there. The the progress points haven't been acceptable blah blah blah. What did you feel that or? Kind of, yeah, like the pros and cons, right? The, the pro was, it was like SAT's light. It did take away the things that I think are very valid arguments by the way, of, you know, getting rid of the the league tables, put on all this unnecessary pressure, blah, blah, blah. But on the on the on the, the cons side, it like it would have been maybe nice to have some national data just as a benchmark just to see kind of where we were or local data.

33:40 I don't know. And I, and I think I don't know where I lie on this, but there's the severity of the way the Sats are taken and administered it. Without that, it would have been easy to cheat on those tests. It would have been easy for teachers to just, it's always all just chill kids. I'm just going to read out the paper to you today. It's not the real. Sad, but they don't go any much. Doesn't go anywhere but like, what's the point then? Like, I don't know. That's my point. That is that is lit. So this is what I'm saying. Yeah, because it doesn't go anywhere because there aren't league tables. What is the point in cheating? Like it's it's almost as if saying the end of year 4 test is pointless because it's not got severe invigilators and rules. It's not pointless. We, we, we, if anything, we administer it more strictly in a way in terms of it's just useful information for my colleague next year.

34:21 I don't think that's true. I think based on my experience of every other year group where it's not SATS, I think cheating is way more rife potentially. I, I from my experience, I think SATS cheating is rife. I, I do also think that genuinely, but I think it'd be worse. My point is I think people are way more relaxed on the end of year three tests and the year 4 tests. That's true. I do think that. And and then I count this countless times I've seen like just crappy data going up to the next year group or from key stage 1 to key stage 2. There's different schools or whatever and where I'm like. Do you think sats? Do you think like having really strict, you know, rules around it, it's national debt, do you think that improved that? I think so, yeah, a little bit. I think it puts the fear into people of like maybe I shouldn't this time. I really do think it's I don't think it's perfect. I think that plenty of people still cheat on the Sats. We'll find other ways around it. Let's say they're they're choosing 5% and they maybe would have done it 10% if they didn't have anyone, you know, standing on the shoulder knowing there's official administration, we could be observed at any point and completely barred from the Sats.

35:11 I do think they have that has some impact. Whether it makes me think therefore we should keep the system exactly as it is is a stretch, I don't think. That's OK. What would be your answer then? Would you, if you really just, you know, deeped it for a second and thought, OK, end of year six, it sounds as if you do want the bar to be like a national, you want that national data, you want it to be like a, a more formal task. Yeah, yeah. You wouldn't change anything then. I would remove I think. I think I'd remove any link between SAT's progress data and GCSE because most schools just disregard it anyway and just do RE and just reattest kids at 7:00 and just have just get rid of the link completely between like. Benchmarks and even if they don't, a voice found that a bit odd where, you know, I think we all agree that it would be a bit daft to take a snapshot from when the child is 11.

35:57 Therefore their predicted grades are this. Therefore, I'm not saying schools don't do this because schools do, but they look at their predicted grades and be like, we need to get to here and then it will help you with the support you need, etcetera, etcetera. Even even though that is used by some schools, I mean, you said lots of schools disregard it, lots of schools don't because they are literally judged on it, right? It's still important. I I still think like whether or not that's used correctly or not, it's stupid. Yeah, really I agree it's stupid. Kids learn at different rates, etcetera. And what, what you got in year 6 in a, in an English and maths test shouldn't really give it all your predicted grades to see what, you know, intervention you need for every subject. Like that seems daft to me anyway. So I I think a lot of secondary school teachers feel the same way, where it would be nice to not have that burden on the secondary school as well to get them to that level.

36:39 I agree. I agree. So I get rid of that. I'd also get rid of the league tables. I just don't think they're. I don't. I just think they're. Only comparing. You literally just said it'd be nice to get national. Data OK yeah interesting. You just need two different lenses. I think the kind of public perception of like posting, oh, this school's got this data. I think there could be an internal database that professionals could use fine, but I don't think we need to be just dragging about. Maybe maybe that maybe that's the middle ground. I don't know. I I think having access to national averages is useful. I don't think I need to be able to go on to actually, I'm going to take back what I said. I don't think I need to even go into an internal system to be able to look up what every single. School. I think it'll be a weird middle ground to to have it but then. Just you don't need it. The only reason I was thinking we have it is the averages, but we don't even need to see this. Like I just honestly all that's useful to me each year is literally like how roughly how is everyone else doing? Cool.

37:24 Do you think, do you think it it's that data should exist though at all? Do you think, like, you know, officials should be able to see it, et cetera, people above the government, et cetera? I mean, I guess so, I guess because the data will exist like by definition. I just don't think it needs to be published. Yeah, genuinely, it just doesn't need to be the league tables. They just. The league tables seem insidious. They, they are insidious, that's all. They don't, I don't think whatever net gain they get, like whatever gains where they give there's, there's a lot of. Loss. Well, the gain is it's pressure. Yeah, isn't it? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Think how many people think, oh God, yeah. Got to get higher up that league table. If anything. It promotes more cheating. Yeah, it promotes more flirting around the lines and it promotes more horrendous timetables leading up to SAT's where all they do is English, maths and the kids just can't stand it. Yeah, there's so many messages of people saying that the kid, they've got messages from year six teachers saying the kids can't stand school now.

38:07 Yeah, what are we doing? It's rubbish. So again, how do we tackle that as well? Because I still think about despite all this, I think there's probably one more point to this. I still think having having it more formalised in the year 6 is just going to make it more likely that that data is trustworthy and it is useful to have that national benchmark when kids transition from primary school to secondary school. I think there is still use for that, right? I think the SAT's has a use. So how else do we make it so that it, it doesn't become this horrible burden on on staff and children? Probably not linking performance pay to it as well. Genuinely, there's little things like this that probably applies really just to all like that happens in year 4 as well. In Year 5, like quite often it's the, some schools will link, you know how the results essentially to the performance and they'll judge you as a teacher based on those stats.

38:49 There's lots of little things. I think generally, systemically, not necessarily just the stats, the stats, sorry, that could help schools alleviate pressure with these tests and actually just use them, what they're good for, which is finding out the attainment of children in English and maths and having it and running it across the benchmark to know roughly where we're where we're going. Like gap analysis is still extremely useful. Yeah, of course. So either maybe I need to think about it a bit more, but I, I overall, I'm not on the camp of being the SAS. No, I'm also not, not in the camp of let's reform it and do it a different way. I still think we could explore other ways of doing it. Not in that. I'm not in that. Do you mean you're not? In that I'm in it. So you want to reform it.

39:29 I'm also in the case, yeah. But what I'm saying is I'm like, I'm not in any. I'm not taking a hard position. Yeah, of course. I think we could make the stats work. Yep. I think we could reform the stats and do it entirely differently. Yeah, life went on in 2020 and 2021. Yep, life went on after. Exactly. But I don't think we should just straight up scrap it and do nothing about it, which is what you said, which you you're basically saying. I don't think many people think that anyway. I actually know quite a lot of people think that online. Maybe they think they should just abolish the stats, like straight up and replace it with nothing and just do learning at school and then they just go to secondary school. I don't actually think that's the best. Do those people also think you shouldn't have an end of Year 5 test? I don't know. Because that, that that's my point. Like like you can still have an end of year assessment probably like so. But that's what I mean. Like people say stop testing primary school children.

40:11 I'm like, why? Yeah, yeah, I think testing is good. Like, like as in I'm seeing what you know or don't know. Yeah, yeah, especially on these things. Like do you know how to do long division? Well, I've tried it 10 times and you, I got every single one wrong. So I'm going to help you. So I'm going to help you. Yeah, which is fine. But they're probably referencing something along the lines of things that we've said in the past, which is I don't actually need that. There is a level where I don't need to test children to know what they can and can't do because I'm teaching them everyday which is more efficient. I agree. I still think there's a place for them. But some people I think will argue you've been teaching them all year. You should know what they can and can't do without a test at the end of it telling you. But but OK, true to an extent and in terms of do the act of completing a test does nothing for you to get better at the stuff, right.

40:53 But it's a it's what you do with that information after. I think that's people's problem with SATS. You do the SAT paper and it's like we all agree that, Olivia, an act of doing a test does not help anyone in the moment. Yeah, right. It doesn't help anyone in the moment. Oh, it prepares them for tests later on. Well, yeah, OK, cool. The test later on where what happens after is what the important thing as well. So you do the test in the moment. I think everyone understands. And if your argument is to not do tests is that testing doesn't help improve knowledge. I was like, no, it never does. That's not the point of testing, but if you do a test and then how that information is interpreted afterwards, it's really useful. That's why I still think you can have the Sats, still think you can do a gap analysis, still think at the end of every year group you have some kind of assessment to see where they're at.

41:35 Where have you ended up at? That's interesting for me to see in a snapshot. It's not to be or an end all, but it's interesting for me to see in a snapshot when every other person in the whole year group and maybe even country has done the same questions. I can't control that. Otherwise, I'm just going to see what they can do on their own in the snapshot and understand the pros and cons, and then from there look at those gaps and fill them. The issue I think a lot of people have year 345 in our school, gaps will be passed up. We don't understand what children can and can't do. It might inform intervention, it might inform what the children get in terms of helping them to do the bit that test doesn't do. Year 6 comes along, it feels as if it's just a test, see what they can do, they get a score. Nothing happens with that information.

42:15 And that's where I think it falls apart is where if we're testing just simply for a snapshot of where they're at, your argument makes more sense. But I don't necessarily think that therefore means we shouldn't have testing at all, which is what I think people jump to. It's like, if we're just taking a snapshot, what's the point? You know, your kids are really well, it's pointless. Well, no, I I think the snapshot should then be used as a more formalised way of getting information from everyone all at once. Then secondary schools and see that information and work from it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. See where their gaps are. So I don't think, I think it's a weak argument to say that testing you already know your kids and testing doesn't tell you anything more. Well, it kind of does. And it's what you do with that information that's important. So given that, then there's going back around to one of the sort of first hypotheticals we asked, which was the person who thinks we should just abolish that entirely.

42:59 And you said, what do they think about year five and four tests if they use what you just said there and say when are we OK with year 4 and five? And because we use gap, we actually use the gap analysis in all of those tests to inform future teaching, whereas the six SAT one is the outlier because we don't they just do the test and then we move on. Yeah. Would you? Would you be more inclined? To agree there is, there is an argument at that point, because all that's happening with the SAT really is all that's happening now, to be honest with you is that it's judging the school and the kids get the and I understand why people won't be like just sod that, right? Because it's just being used for the school. We're not getting that bit after that makes more sense. And people always say when they go to secondary school in year 7, a lot of schools just do their own baseline test then, right? No one's saying they're pointless because they're really useful because the school get the information of a snapshot and see what they can do from then. So all all I think should happen is there should be a bit more transparency perhaps between.

43:48 If we're going to do a test at end of year six in the same way we do in end of year 345, the end of year six data is given to wherever they go to and it's used to inform what they do. If they're then just going to sit another test at the start of year 7 to see where they're at then then yes, I agree. One of those is pointless. Yeah, one of those is completely pointless. And it's probably the probably the Sats one because they don't have a whole summer off. And also it's between schools. It's just. Exactly. It's not in your control of the new school. That I can I completely agree with that, but I still I still have this inkling in my where I'm like, OK, do you know what I think it's gone way too far. The pressure's on the children when the outcomes for the IT doesn't actually help the children that much. Do this test like it does in the previous years. This is more about seeing where to, but I do think schools do need some accountability to wear so.

44:30 This is the. This is the. Problem, my brain. So. So my point here is that's why I'm saying something more along the lines of what happened maybe in 2020-2021 where schools carried on, maybe for the fact of helping the children. We do need to look at those league tables and think we can still do a test at the end of year 6, but there has to be where there's pressure on the schools. Yeah, and or if there is the same amount of pressure in the school, because we're saying we need to hold schools accountable and see what they've done, we have to enforce more rigidly that that something's ring fenced in the curriculum where children aren't doing mass in English all day for six months. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's stupid. Ofsted need to be able to drop in. If we're going to have Ofsted and they drop in, and if they see that happening, it should just be we're going to be more strict about it saying this is not good for the children.

45:13 Let's not pretend this doesn't happen. It does happen. Of course it does because of pressure. I get all that. But we need to do something about it because at the minute, what's happening is the pressure trickles down, trickles down, trickles down, trickles down to the kids who get all the pressure for the school's outcomes without the benefit of doing a test because it's just scrapped off that they go to secondary school and they do a new test anyway. Yeah, it is. I completely think it is broken right now. I just don't like this. Scrap it completely. It's like, OK, we just need to have more nuanced conversation that we just had. Yeah, Yeah, definitely the headline of scrap sats can be interpreted so many different ways. I think we have to definitely change. It yeah, you have just articulated why I always struggle with this conversation because sometimes I'm like, yeah, no, we should scrap it. Because everything you said about the point of the point of basically the point of asking kids questions, whether it's in a test format or a lesson format, is to find out what they know, analyse that, you know, through your gap analysis or whatever in the moment and then act on it. Right.

46:03 And when the SAS actively doesn't do that and it's literally just a benchmark only for us, I'm always, and then I'm like, oh, yeah, maybe we should just scrap it. But then I'm like, oh, but then, but then there's no accountability for schools that we've decided we have key stages. And at the end of those key stages, like they're pretty sparse or they're pretty spread out already. Like, is it the worst thing in the world just to have every couple of years there's one thing where we just go just double, just double check that we don't get to, you know, the kids don't get to 16. And then we find out that the schools have just been laughing. So I'm doing nothing. We need some accountability. So I'm always torn in my head as to that. And you, yeah, you've pretty much just summarised why I can never really quite land somewhere and why honestly, if you probably listen to this podcast, there's probably other times where I've been way more one side and other times I've been way more the other side because I can't quite land myself. I think we've been quite consistent in understanding that there is definitely benefits of both. Yeah.

46:48 And I think, you know, we're not shy of landing on one side, right. But I do think when we discuss stuff we do, we do take into account both sides. And if we do land on a side, it's just because there seems to be more evidence. It's not because we're ignoring it. So I find that fascinating. That was really good. Loads of questions, still loads more questions. We'll have to put you on next week. Yeah. So we'll actually getting better at that now, guys. Thank you. So much do join the WhatsApp community down below and if you've got this far, I'm going to be a bit begging now because we would love your ratings we'd love you to share it. The biggest thing you can do to help us is to share this podcast. So if you enjoy it your colleagues probably will as well whack it in the WhatsApp group, put it on your social media, tag us and just spread the word. It helps us so much. We appreciate you guys. Anything you want to say the? Biggest thing you can do to help yourself enjoy this podcast more is join the WhatsApp group to add your questions for the next Q&A because we might answer your question and then you'll enjoy it more. Because it's yours.

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