Scenes From The Battleground

As usual I have updated this guide for the holidays.

This blog is about the state of secondary education. There is an introduction to it here:

• Welcome (or welcome back) to the Battleground

There is a discipline crisis and a lowering of standards both academic and professional. The following posts sum up what is typical in schools these days:

• The Top Five Lies About Behaviour
• They Call It PSHE, I Call It Hell
• The Naughty Boy
• The Disruptive Girl
• How To Find Out If Your Teacher Is Gay
• Unsolved Mysteries of Teaching
• Getting “Terrored”
• Mixed Ability Teaching Doesn’t Exist
• The Appeasers
• The Joy of Sets
• Not-So Special Needs
• The F***-Off Factor
• Ten Things to Know About the Kids
• Political Education Goes Down the Toilet
• Values
• Excuses, Excuses: Part 1
• Excuses, Excuses: Part 2
• Excuses, Excuses: Part 3
• Excuses, Excuses: Part 4
• The Two Discipline Systems
• “I Don’t Get It”
• Zen and the Art of Going to the Lavatory
• Ammunition
• The Year 11 Tipping Point
• 10 Things You Never Hear In Teaching
• A Few More Words About Appeasement
• Excuses, Excuses - This Time from the Grown Ups
• And On the Plus Side
• Seven Habits of Highly Defective Headteachers
• Heroes of SMT
• Three Myths For Teachers
• It’s Not Just Me
• The Good Kids

As well as the advice for teachers included in many of the other posts, I have written advice specifically for new teachers:

• FAQs for NQTs
• Is This Normal?

These deal more directly with my own personal experiences:

• The Corridor of Death
• The SIG Group
• The Anonymous Questionnaire. Part 1
• The Anonymous Questionnaire. Part 2
• The Behaviour Management Database
• More from the Behaviour Management Database
• A Good Class
• Non-Discipline Day
• Five Incidents That Didn’t Result In A Permanent Exclusion
• The Culture of Blame
• The Most Ridiculous Complaints Against Me Ever Made
• Being Supported by a Year Head
• Meanwhile, Elsewhere in the Education System
• The Core Business of Schools
• I Have A Dream
• Doctor What?
• I Have a Bad Relationship with the Kids
• Insane Teacher Bothers the Prime Minister
• God
• Shoot The Messenger

I have also written a number of posts exploring and explaining how this situation came to be, discussing the arguments in education and suggesting what can be done.

• Modern Education is Rubbish Part 1. Where Are We Now?
• Modern Education is Rubbish Part 2. What Should We Be Trying To Do?
• Modern Education is Rubbish Part 3. Why Are Our Schools Failing?
• A Brief History of Education. Part 1. Educational Thought
• A Brief History of Education Part 2. The 1944 Education Act
• A Brief History of Education Part 3. The Rise of the Comprehensive
• A Brief History of Education Part 4. The Assault on Professionalism
• A Brief History of Education Part 5. The Battleground School
• The Cast of Culprits Part 1. The Students
• The Cast of Culprits Part 2. The Teachers
• The Cast of Culprits Part 3. The School Leaders
• The Cast Of Culprits: Part 4. The Bureaucrats
• Why I Like Being a Teacher
• If Only They Didn’t Have to Learn
• Gag the Student Voice
• Bad Ideas for Dealing with the Behaviour Crisis
• Bad Idea for Dealing with the Behaviour Crisis #1: Make Lessons More Fun
• Bad Idea for Dealing with the Behaviour Crisis #2: Bring Back Selection
• Bad Idea for Dealing with the Behaviour Crisis #3: End Compulsory Education
• Bad Idea for Dealing with the Behaviour Crisis #4: Have More Vocational Subjects
• Bad Idea for Dealing with the Behaviour Crisis #5: End Parental Choice
• The First Law of Behaviour Management
• The Second Law of Behaviour Management
• The Third Law of Behaviour Management
• The Fourth Law of Behaviour Management
• Teach First, Repent at Leisure
• Just For The Record, I Don’t Hate The Kids
• Why Education Shouldn’t be Run by Bankers
• “But They Have To Go Somewhere”
• Professionalism
• The Devil’s Own Education System
• In Praise of Harshness
• Detentions: Part 1
• Detentions: Part 2
• Strike!
• Scabs
• The Driving Lesson Revisited
• Lesson Observations
• The Appeasers’ Creed

I have also outlined what I would expect from schools willing to do put things right:

• My Dream School: Part 1
• My Dream School: Part 2

Finally, there are a few posts I wrote purely for a laugh (although some of them perhaps make a point at the same time):

• The Driving Lesson
• The Cult of INSET
• The Theory of Multiple Fitnesses
• The Kennedy Assassination: A Headteacher’s Perspective
• Blood and Guts
• Blame The Teacher - 1947 Style

Also to be found on this blog is The Battleground Forum where you can start a discussion on a topic of your choice, or introduce yourself to the readers of this blog.

Can I also remind you that you can vote to say what you think of this blog by following one of the following links to: BlogHop.com!

‘the best’ ‘pretty good’ ‘okay’ ‘pretty bad’ ‘the worst’

Also if you want your name and face to appear in the “recent readers” column then you can go to Blog Catalog and register for an account there (and rate my blog while you are at it).

This entry was posted on Sunday, July 20th, 2008 at 10:10 am and is filed under Guides To The Blog. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.