http://www.amazon.co.uk/Your-Time-Yo...pr_product_top
I'm not usually one for reading accurate and depressing material in regards to the state of the lower end of the British schooling system (as I want escape from that, not to be reminded of it) however, I started reading this today and it is unbelievably spot on.
In this book "Frank Chalk" writes of his own personal experiences in a low end state school which is completely representative of many failing schools across the country (of which there are many). He writes of his intention:
It is a funny book there's no getting away from that. I passed this over to Mrs Neely to read a small section (the part where it takes a class of Y7s 40 minutes to stick a name tag in their books) and she was as cracked up as I was reading it. There are some highly amusing moments like this scattered throughout. Let's see, here's a small part of that episode:I started out as a nice liberal bloke who thought the best of everyone. I changed, over time. This book is dedicated to the good kids - there are plenty of them, but they're being slowly crushed by the bad - and several hundred thousand hard-working teachers, who do their best against the impossible odds created by our mad, politically-correct nightmare of an education system. It's a funny book - I hope - with a serious message; the time for talking is over. We need to sort our schools out now, before it really is too late.
Previous to this Frank had fallen into the rookie error of writing "YOUR NAME" on the board of which several students had of course done just that, and proceeded to write "YOUR NAME" on the front of their labels, complete rookie error, but always amusing. So there is plenty of humour in this book. (Also his depiction of the unholy grey land of the staffroom, with its heaps of dirty cups, out of date notices and piles of books is just so scarily descriptive)."What? Yes, both names."
Several groans.
"OK, OK, your surname is fine. Just put your initial...WHAT THE...What are you doing?"
Dale had just ripped up his label.
"Look," I say in an icy voice, "it doesn't matter if you've put your initial first, your surname first, your first name first or even somebody else's name first. Whatever you have written is fine."
I am approaching the end of my tether and the pile of remaining labels is getting very low now.
We manage to get past "Teacher" with only two putting their form teacher by mistake, Chesney copying the word "Teacher" and Dale writing in the name of his favourite teacher. (That wasn't my name I can assure you.)
Now the final hurdle: "OK, Only one more to do now."
Glance at the watch again.
Christ, there's only ten minutes of the lesson left!
It is also of course deeply depressing and somewhat tragic that vast sways of children are being crushed by the modern educational system, as Frank pulls no punches in expressing, with his non-politically correct diatribes which have no doubt upset many of the 1 star reviewers on Amazon. It is however, in my opinion, a very accurate and honest depiction of the troubles currently inherent within lower end state schools. He is a obvious annoyance that I highlighted earlier:
(My bold)Teachers (against their will and better judgment, in the majority of cases) spend half their lessons dealing with kids with Special Needs and the kids who can't behave, while having to ignore the pleasant, well-behaved ones, who actually want to learn but who sit there quietly being ignored, with their hands up, as their life-chances slowly ebb away.
OK, so this sort of thing is "nothing new" this idea has been done before and well, but it is nevertheless, in my view, essential reading for those who dare take a peep into what honestly goes off in the lower end of British, and perhaps even American, school system.
It's Your Time You're Wasting: A Teacher's Tales of Classroom Hell by Frank Chalk.
5 gold stars and a peer assessed green tick.