Detention for scoring *only* 81% in Maths

[Ditto]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c75zg47gzp3o

 

A school head, one who appeared on a TV series, tries to defend his policy of given detentions to top set pupils who do not achieve 90+% in tests. Now perhaps the 'detention' headline would get a different reaction if it read 'extra support' in the same circumstances, but it is hard to know.

 

I do however wonder if it is the pupils best interests being behind this, or the head or schools?

[akidosaint]

Not handing in your homework sure. A detention failing to meet arbitrarily set boundary for year 7 seems a little harsh. The excuse there are resource of teachers available at lunch and after school how many 11 year old will meet with a strange teacher and tell them sorry i don't understand what they are asking. Edited February 11, 2025 by akidosaint

[3s-gtech]

It's fine, they're just developing another cohort that hate maths.

 

While I can sort of understand the reasoning (students 'need to apply more effort', standards are too low, able students aren't being pushed) if I was a parent there I'd be cross.

[sigma]

If I were a parent I’d probably try to remove my child to a different school.

 

I was top set maths at a Grammar School and don’t ever remember being treated that harshly when I got questions wrong.

Detention was strictly a behaviour sanction.

[dmj]

If you get detained for not doing the homework, or for getting less than 90%, I'm pretty sure my motivation would be to not bother at all.

[psydii]

The beatings shall continue until morale improves.

 

When I was at school there were a few sets across a few courses where failure to meet expectations would (allegedly) result in sanctions. These were never the top or bottom sets though. It was a carefully chosen cohort - a mix of those who could get the target if they applied themselves, and those who should be doing even better but were coasting. The idea being those that could if they tried could exceed those that ought to be better but were just coasting, and those that were coasting might notice that those that those who were applying themselves were now exceeding their own performance.

 

and those who began to consistently getting 80%+ were moved up into the upper set(s), where theoretically they would be motivated by trying to keep up with their new peers - some found this worked extremely well, and others were reduced to tears by the pressure and actually moved back down again.

 

For those already in the top set(s), they were generally either motivated by the prize (offer from top-tier uni in desired course), or from the intrinsic joy of being really effin'good at it.

 

It seems a fundamental failure in helping students set their own goals and aspirations effectively if they feel it necessary to sanction the top performers for not being better.

[stevejp]

It is things (and people) like this that make me long for retirement, and the day I can walk away for good from the insanity that education has now become.

[ITGuyNW]

Completely demoralising for the students involved. It's stuff like this that has made my eldest go from head held high and enjoying school to a total lack of motivation.

[Roberto]

Punishment for doing badly in a test? This head teacher is bad, and whoever appointed them should feel bad.

[NegativeKillDeath]

My concern over this is because the homework is probably set on one of the many online maths portals that have sprung up. These portals show no nuance in marking the work, its either the correct answer or its not. Ask any maths teacher why we have to do maths now that we all have a calculator in our pockets 24/7 and you'll be told that its about having an understanding of what the answer might be so you can protect yourself against mistakes in using the calculator. They then go and set homework where they only care if its right of wrong and don't look at the working out and thought process the student used.

[paulkerton]

To me, this is parallel to staff who insist that you need the most powerful software in the world for students as "it's industry standard" or "it's what they'll use in the real world" as an 11 year old sits and stares at an impossibly complicated UI, actively put off by the learning curve.

 

It's throwing non-swimmers into the deep end and thinking that struggling not to sink will teach them how to swim.

 

It's giving a Lego Technic to a 4 year old instead of Lego Duplo.

 

All very quick ways to form life-long active resistence to something they should love.

[Cazab]

My concern over this is because the homework is probably set on one of the many online maths portals that have sprung up. These portals show no nuance in marking the work, its either the correct answer or its not. Ask any maths teacher why we have to do maths now that we all have a calculator in our pockets 24/7 and you'll be told that its about having an understanding of what the answer might be so you can protect yourself against mistakes in using the calculator. They then go and set homework where they only care if its right of wrong and don't look at the working out and thought process the student used.

 

100% this. I remember getting told off a lot for working things out "the wrong way" but still coming to the same answer. It was never a "this is why we do it this way" just a "this is wrong, do it the way i showed you".

[steveg]

I think partly this depends how the homework is set and marked. If this was a worksheet sent home, and then marked by the class teacher and detention issued then I completely disagree with it, there was nothing more the child could have done to avoid a detention.

 

At my children's school all children are required to get 100% on their homework or they get an hours detention. This would also make a great headline, except that it is online homework that is marked instantly. They have an unlimited number of attempts to get it right, it has instructional videos that are pretty good and there are a couple of sessions run at the school each week for children to go to if they are struggling.

[mikes]

Does this only apply to top set pupils? So the naughtier kids or lower ability kids who don't put any effort in at all don't get punished? I've seen a lot of - rewarding really badly behaved pupils in a vain hope of improving their behavior (to the point of buying them mcdonalds) - while those kids who try to put effort in, are polite etc, are pulled up on utter trivial things and are barely rewarded at all - isn't this totally backwards?