Today I'm angry about.....

[Puskas]

If teachers can't know anything about the 'real world' then necessarily those who work in the 'real world' can't know anything about teaching now, can they?

I can't see why a teacher must know less about the real world (though with a teaching-orientated perspective) than some one who works in business would (though with a business-orientated perspective) or law (though with a law-orientated perspective) or... you get the picture. S'just one of many careers.

Maybe those with close relations as teachers defend them because they're biased, or maybe it's because they actually know what goes on rather than half-arsed Daily Mail reckons. If you come out with bollocks like 'they don't work half the year' they simply, you don't know enough about it.

And I'm not a teacher, nor am I particularly close with anyone who is, though I have a couple of friends.

I think that some of that is true. Of course you need teaching specialists or experts in how to teach. And it is unfeasible to suggest that all teachers should have done something else or even a majority of them.

I guess that my direct experience is that they often don't fully grasp what matters to businesses and employers. Teachers aren't alone in this though, educational leaders, politicians etc all have the same issues.

Education in general is I think fairly slow moving. Which is probably a nature of the beast to an extent. I will say that the best teacher I had at school spent most of his life working in engineering. I'm not saying that is a hard and fast rule. But that I think that in general education should be slightly more integrated with employers and businesses. Not hugely but just a little more.

Those on here who interview lots of graduates or school leavers (I have done) may have a different view but kids come to interviews with absolutely dreadful advice (or career knowledge) from teachers etc sometimes. And you can't help but wonder.

Fully agree with this. Because education should be solely about churning out diligent little workers who can slot neatly into whatever function "business" has in mind for them.

Nothing else. Nothing at all.

[jaffka]

That's nothing to do with what I was asking.

I thought it was a fair question really.

Well this conversation is only going one way.

If the subject is difficult for you due to having a close relative involved, I can understand, to an extent, your reluctance and inability to discuss this sensibly.

You were asking if the people defending teachers all had close relatives in the profession. I asked, quite reasonably if that was the only criteria whereby they could be defended, or whether people who feel they had benefitted from education could defend teachers too. I then asked if you felt you hadn't benefitted from education. A fair question from which you seem to have shirked, questioning my understanding of the subject.

You're right actually. This conversation IS going nowhere. Because nothing you can say is going to convince me you haven't benefitted from your education. You seem an intelligent man, but you aren't self taught.

You actually didn't answer anything, although your sarcastic post earlier revealed otherwise.

I haven't shirked from anything, I just don't see the relevance to what I have asked.

However in relation to education and benefitting, I like to think that life is a learning experience, so do I attribute to where I am now in life solely to some teachers, most of whom I have forgotten? The answers no, there has been some benefit but this lessens each day I get older.

[Gary the Enfield]

That's nothing to do with what I was asking.

I thought it was a fair question really.

Well this conversation is only going one way.

If the subject is difficult for you due to having a close relative involved, I can understand, to an extent, your reluctance and inability to discuss this sensibly.

You were asking if the people defending teachers all had close relatives in the profession. I asked, quite reasonably if that was the only criteria whereby they could be defended, or whether people who feel they had benefitted from education could defend teachers too. I then asked if you felt you hadn't benefitted from education. A fair question from which you seem to have shirked, questioning my understanding of the subject.

You're right actually. This conversation IS going nowhere. Because nothing you can say is going to convince me you haven't benefitted from your education. You seem an intelligent man, but you aren't self taught.

You actually didn't answer anything, although your sarcastic post earlier revealed otherwise.

I haven't shirked from anything, I just don't see the relevance to what I have asked.

However in relation to education and benefitting, I like to think that life is a learning experience, so do I attribute to where I am now in life solely to some teachers, most of whom I have forgotten? The answers no, there has been some benefit but this lessens each day I get older.

So the answers yes. You recognise the benefit which you have gone on to add to. Congratulations, we agree.

[BWFC_Insane]

If teachers can't know anything about the 'real world' then necessarily those who work in the 'real world' can't know anything about teaching now, can they?

I can't see why a teacher must know less about the real world (though with a teaching-orientated perspective) than some one who works in business would (though with a business-orientated perspective) or law (though with a law-orientated perspective) or... you get the picture. S'just one of many careers.

Maybe those with close relations as teachers defend them because they're biased, or maybe it's because they actually know what goes on rather than half-arsed Daily Mail reckons. If you come out with bollocks like 'they don't work half the year' they simply, you don't know enough about it.

And I'm not a teacher, nor am I particularly close with anyone who is, though I have a couple of friends.

I think that some of that is true. Of course you need teaching specialists or experts in how to teach. And it is unfeasible to suggest that all teachers should have done something else or even a majority of them.

I guess that my direct experience is that they often don't fully grasp what matters to businesses and employers. Teachers aren't alone in this though, educational leaders, politicians etc all have the same issues.

Education in general is I think fairly slow moving. Which is probably a nature of the beast to an extent. I will say that the best teacher I had at school spent most of his life working in engineering. I'm not saying that is a hard and fast rule. But that I think that in general education should be slightly more integrated with employers and businesses. Not hugely but just a little more.

Those on here who interview lots of graduates or school leavers (I have done) may have a different view but kids come to interviews with absolutely dreadful advice (or career knowledge) from teachers etc sometimes. And you can't help but wonder.

Fully agree with this. Because education should be solely about churning out diligent little workers who can slot neatly into whatever function "business" has in mind for them.

Nothing else. Nothing at all.

I absolutely agree with you that education should not be totally geared towards churning out worker bees. But ultimately the bottom line is that at 16 or 18 or post degree people will in the main need to get a job. And whilst education should be rounded and provide people with a whole range of skills and experiences and expose them to ideas and cultures and thoughts, there also has to be balance to ensure that the right skills are given to kids to give them the best chance of employment and a successful career.

There is a gap in my experience between education and employers. A gap that has existed for a while. I'm not advocating letting business leaders run education or anything just that the gap is not allowed to grow too wide.

[jaffka]

If that floats your boat, I am pleased for you.

[Gary the Enfield]

If that floats your boat, I am pleased for you.

Really? Thanks.

[Puskas]

Anyway, I need a complicated heart operation, however, on the basis of this thread, I've thought "what do they know of medicine who only medicine know", so sacked off the surgeon who was due to perform it, because he's only ever worked in medicine since leaving education.

I've managed to find a new surgeon who spent 20 years in the real world before changing careers. He was a project manager - a proper job. His first medical role was on the maternity ward, where, using his project management experience, he determined that nine women could produce a baby in one month. He was shunted on because of the politically correct thought police who ran the department, but I'm looking forward to him bringing his real world experience to my triple bypass operation.

[Gooner Girl]

^ A point well made Puskas.

[jaffka]

Aye, all junior doctors, straight out of med school are trusted with complex procedures.

Strange really, absolutely no need for specialists.

[Lord Kangana]

Sigh. Do I bother? Okay then...

What's stupid about your post is yes, the school might not have been very helpful/organised in getting your certificates to you but you then use that one incident to proclaim that:

"Schools, every last one of them are useless unable to cope with life in the real world"

"Given that I now work full time (in the real world) I know realise just the complete and utter ineptness of our schools"

"school every single one of them full of idiot unable to deal with he really world, all filled with employees with 100s of qualifications but absolutely no experience of the real world."

"Best of all the are the same teachers who then moan about what an idiot Michael Gove is. To sum it up pot, kettle black."

"so thus such and outburst on teachers and just generally anybody lazy and simple enough to work in schools."

Teachers and other people that work in schools are generally not idiots, simple or lazy. Teachers do a hell of a lot of work and have to pass qualifictaions in order to teach (that you wouldn't pass as spelling and grammar are considered important) A vast amount of teachers come into teaching later on in life with plenty of experience of the real world.

To sum it up Dan, your post is rude, very generalisitic, completely inaccurate and laden with poor spelling and grammar. That's why its stupid.

I'm backing dan on this one.
For every good kid turned out by the schools there's a dickhead.
Teachers allowed standards to drop through the 70's and 80's whilst busy striking for their pensions and pay alongside allowing them to be used as political tools by the socialists, instead of fighting for standards to be maintained.
It was the liberal inflitration of the education system, including a lot of support from teachers, that destroyed discipline in schools now look who's moaning.
Dan tell the feckers find them or you will write to ofsted, mention of that name usually puts the fear of God up them.

Good lord Hoboh, have you been snorting pure uncut DailyMail this morning?

[Prufrock]

though I have a couple of friends.

Do you? What's it like?

I don't have any. I once thought of getting a couple, but then realised I hate people, so changed my mind.

Are they electric?

Meh. They're all right. Not convinced they're worth the hassle, but it gets me out of the house. Don't be fooled by the marketing though, you need three, maybe four tops. They're pretty samey.

[Beefheart]

Dan, just to warn you, you will encounter idiots in this 'real world' too. Yes, even in accounting!

[KeyserSoze]

To be honest I feel more surrounded by idiots as an adult than i did as a kid. This is probably due to a quite astonishing superiority complex and the fact that when I was a kid i was too busy sticking pencils in my nose.

[Lost Leopard Spot]

Good lord Hoboh, have you been snorting pure uncut DailyMail this morning?

Surely that's lethal. Nobody can absorb that kinda shit, straight!

[Bruce Rioja]

Dan, just to warn you, you will encounter idiots in this 'real world' too. Yes, even in accounting!

But then the idiots will have to encounter Dan. How will anyone know who's who?

[KeyserSoze]

Dan, just to warn you, you will encounter idiots in this 'real world' too. Yes, even in accounting!

But then the idiots will have to encounter Dan. How will anyone know who's who?

The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which.

[Harry Genshaw]

Dan, just to warn you, you will encounter idiots in this 'real world' too. Yes, even in accounting!

But then the idiots will have to encounter Dan. How will anyone know who's who?

The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which.

That man's had an education. Burn him! Or get him into the real world sharpish

[Lost Leopard Spot]

Dan, just to warn you, you will encounter idiots in this 'real world' too. Yes, even in accounting!

But then the idiots will have to encounter Dan. How will anyone know who's who?

The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which.

That's from Animal Farm, by George Orwell.
The last time I read that book was over forty years ago - in school.
Despite not having picked it up again since, I know that it is an allegorical tale about Stalinist systems.
Teachers taught me that.
The fact I even know what an allegory is is down to my time at school.
The fact I can even spell allegory is down to the teachers who took the time to instil the basic building blocks of my education.
So to sum up: basics like letters and numbers; integration into sentences and maths; interpretation and meaning of the integrated stuff; the provision of useful wayposts like Animal Farm; the revealment of hidden worlds behind the prosaic; and the desire and means of attaining your own knowledge through the tools that were developed over the course of your school years.
And all because I went to school and was taught by teachers (even though they spent three quarters of their life on the beach and went nowhere near the real world of life).

[BWFC_Insane]

^ A point well made Puskas.

It isn't a good point really because

a) One part of medical training is that they are given a broad experience across a variety of areas within medicine. So the training actually enforces experience across the field. Yes they are limited to medicine but certainly not to one area.

b) The very point is that a surgeon is (or should be) the very best in his field. The absolute pinnacle. They have to keep abreast of the latest developments and changes in science and medical knowledge. The point with teachers is that they teach subjects that often (and lets not pretend this isn't the case) they are far from the leading experts on and sometimes their knowledge is out of date. They may be excellent teachers in that they are superb at passing on knowledge to their class, but again it is a balance argument.

[Gooner Girl]

^ A point well made Puskas.

It isn't a good point really because

a) One part of medical training is that they are given a broad experience across a variety of areas within medicine. So the training actually enforces experience across the field. Yes they are limited to medicine but certainly not to one area.

b) The very point is that a surgeon is (or should be) the very best in his field. The absolute pinnacle. They have to keep abreast of the latest developments and changes in science and medical knowledge. The point with teachers is that they teach subjects that often (and lets not pretend this isn't the case) they are far from the leading experts on and sometimes their knowledge is out of date. They may be excellent teachers in that they are superb at passing on knowledge to their class, but again it is a balance argument.

Teachers generally get into teaching because they have a passion for their subject and a good teacher will always want to learn more and develop their understanding so they can pass on more to the kids they teach. Do you really think that teachers don't go on courses, undertake further development throughout their career? Do you really think they sit around and drink tea on inset days and don't spend days at weekends and in the holidays on courses learning more about their subjects?