Advertisement
If you have a new account but are having problems posting or verifying your account, please email us on hello@boards.ie for help. Thanks :)
Hello all! Please ensure that you are posting a new thread or question in the appropriate forum. The Feedback forum is overwhelmed with questions that are having to be moved elsewhere. If you need help to verify your account contact hello@boards.ie

Asked to teach a subject not qualified in

124

Comments

  • #92
    Michael D Not Higgins
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,223 ✭✭✭Michael D Not Higgins


    jimbo28 wrote: »
    I don't accept that at all, maybe teachers and management need to be reminded that if a subject is being run, then the school has a legal obligation to provide a person that is capable of teaching it.

    How can the union refuse such a request.........what are teachers paying subscriptions for if they cannot sort out matters like these.I know it happens....but it is disgusting to think that one should have to go so far as to have to get the union involved.

    The alternative is go get a competent teacher full stop.

    Yes but while they sort it out, what's the alternative? There's no way they're getting a part time physics teacher in the next week or two. The union is being pragmatic for the meantime while it's sorted (probably to no one's liking). Times are tough and the government are cutting education spending.


  • #93
    RealJohn
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,099 ✭✭✭RealJohn


    cb7 wrote: »
    No tax of course armelodie! Would not do that to someone.
    And here's the sentence in which you lost all sympathy from me. Why exactly wouldn't you "do that"? This person is stealing from you and from me. You have a responsibility to report them. If you're not going to do it, can you give me their details so that I can report them? Even if there wasn't an incentive to do it, you should do it out of honesty.

    Money is the reason so many teachers have to teach subjects they're not qualified for. Now more than ever, we need people to pay their fair share of tax. The rest of us are paying more than our share and you're happy to let this person have a free ride? A person who is not only cheating the country but is undermining our profession by making out that anyone can teach any subject? And you're here moaning about being made to teach a subject you're not qualified to teach? Is this all a big wind up?


  • #94
    jimbo28
    Closed Accounts Posts: 328 ✭✭jimbo28


    Michael D Not Higgins wrote: »
    Yes but while they sort it out, what's the alternative? There's no way they're getting a part time physics teacher in the next week or two. The union is being pragmatic for the meantime while it's sorted (probably to no one's liking). Times are tough and the government are cutting education spending.


    The problem is that it does not look like they are getting a part-time teacher at all!

    The alternative is to have a teacher cover said class until a qualified teacher arrives, one or two weeks under the op wont do them any harm.................a whole year will!


  • #95
    Michael D Not Higgins
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,223 ✭✭✭Michael D Not Higgins


    jimbo28 wrote: »
    The problem is that it does not look like they are getting a part-time teacher at all!

    The alternative is to have a teacher cover said class until a qualified teacher arrives, one or two weeks under the op wont do them any harm.................a whole year will!

    This is what the union will push for and in the meantime they are being pragmatic with OP covering. If it turns out that nothing is done then yeah sure be outraged, but at least wait to see what happens. OP has done all they can for the moment.


  • #96
    experiMental
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,137 ✭✭✭experiMental


    Could the school in question get a suitable college graduate to teach the subject?

    Also, is it fair to say that our education system is well and truly f*cked?


  • Advertisement
  • #97
    RealJohn
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,099 ✭✭✭RealJohn


    jimbo28 wrote: »
    The alternative is to have a teacher cover said class until a qualified teacher arrives, one or two weeks under the op wont do them any harm.................a whole year will!
    And how does the school fill the rest of the OP's hours once the replacement in? I imagine the school doesn't have the hours to spare. I know mine wouldn't.


  • #98
    jimbo28
    Closed Accounts Posts: 328 ✭✭jimbo28


    Michael D Not Higgins wrote: »
    This is what the union will push for and in the meantime they are being pragmatic with OP covering. If it turns out that nothing is done then yeah sure be outraged, but at least wait to see what happens. OP has done all they can for the moment.

    You are dead right.................Now it comes back to the integrity of the op, does he have the nodes to stand up and be counted...........I don't think he has clarified in an objective manner the course he is going to take!

    Unite the clans op:D........or else go away and do what your told(and that would make me sad, not for you but for the kids)


  • #99
    jimbo28
    Closed Accounts Posts: 328 ✭✭jimbo28


    RealJohn wrote: »
    And how does the school fill the rest of the OP's hours once the replacement in? I imagine the school doesn't have the hours to spare. I know mine wouldn't.

    It may mean taking hours from an R.P.T, but needs must.You cannot justify him taking the class on these terms.


  • #100
    RealJohn
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,099 ✭✭✭RealJohn


    jimbo28 wrote: »
    It may mean taking hours from an R.P.T, but needs must.You cannot justify him taking the class on these terms.
    The reality is there might not be an alternative without redeployment.


  • #101
    ted1
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 24,272 ✭✭✭✭ted1


    Miss Lockhart wrote: »
    I wonder what the Social Welfare stance would be on losing a job because you refused to teach what your employer told you to.
    Could a carpenter do a electricians job ? There both tradesmen?No.

    As a teacher you have a duty of care to your students and delivering a miseducation is not what you should be doing.


  • Advertisement
  • #102
    jimbo28
    Closed Accounts Posts: 328 ✭✭jimbo28


    RealJohn wrote: »
    The reality is there might not be an alternative without redeployment.

    Excuses, Excuses real john, we could go through a multitude of circumstantial situations as you well know ......put this story in a broadsheet and see how long it takes the school to get a teacher!


  • #103
    jimbo28
    Closed Accounts Posts: 328 ✭✭jimbo28


    ted1 wrote: »
    Could a carpenter do a electricians job ? There both tradesmen?No.

    As a teacher you have a duty of care to your students and delivering a miseducation is not what you should be doing.


    Correct young man, top a d class:).simples


  • #104
    RealJohn
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,099 ✭✭✭RealJohn


    jimbo28 wrote: »
    Excuses, Excuses real john, we could go through a multitude of circumstantial situations as you well know ......put this story in a broadsheet and see how long it takes the school to get a teacher!
    And someone else loses their job or gets redeployed, possibly to the detriment of other students/the school.


  • #105
    Miss Lockhart
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,639 ✭✭✭Miss Lockhart


    ted1 wrote: »
    Could a carpenter do a electricians job ? There both tradesmen?No.

    As a teacher you have a duty of care to your students and delivering a miseducation is not what you should be doing.

    Once again, if you would care to actually read the post, I did not say anyone should be doing anything. I'm wondering, based on experience of dealing with sw officers, where one would stand. That's it, it's that simple. So please, redirect your pointless moralising towards a more suitable subject.


  • #106
    Michael D Not Higgins
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,223 ✭✭✭Michael D Not Higgins


    RealJohn wrote: »
    And someone else loses their job or gets redeployed, possibly to the detriment of other students/the school.

    This is the reality of spending cuts. Schools can't afford to keep a full complement of teachers to deliver their classes. Something's gotta give.


  • #107
    jimbo28
    Closed Accounts Posts: 328 ✭✭jimbo28


    RealJohn wrote: »
    And someone else loses their job or gets redeployed, possibly to the detriment of other students/the school.
    Do you honestly think that that situation would be allowed to happen realjohn.........Honestly?


  • #108
    evolving_doors
    Closed Accounts Posts: 11,812 ✭✭✭✭evolving_doors


    jimbo28 wrote: »
    Armelodie wrote: »
    I think you are missing the point yourself.. OP is highlighting the possibility that .Parents are forced to get grinds as the students are not being taught adequately by qualified teachers (of course there is always the issue of class sizes/discipline/motivation/issue for points etc.). The OP doesn't want to see this situation arising because of what he is being told to do. Hence these situations give rise to the grinds industry.

    The op is about to single handedly provide employment for said grinds teachers himself, not to mention anyone else!

    Can you explain how I am missing the point?

    You asked what is the point of this discussion after the OP mentioned grinds.. He fears that the students couldl be forced to get grinds because of his inexperience. How is that not relevant?

    OP at this stage of the game the union and principal are not going to help.. maybe just cut your losses and get yourself a few grinds just to lay out the course..or speak to the retiring teacher...failing that just refuse outright and be prepaired to lawyer up..
    Those are your only options really...


  • #109
    ted1
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 24,272 ✭✭✭✭ted1


    Miss Lockhart wrote: »
    Once again, if you would care to actually read the post, I did not say anyone should be doing anything. I'm wondering, based on experience of dealing with sw officers, where one would stand. That's it, it's that simple. So please, redirect your pointless moralising towards a more suitable subject.

    No employer can ask a employer to conduct work they are not qualified for . The social welfare office won't and can't say anything.
    However a judge may decide that the teacher was unfairly dismissed


  • #110
    Miss Lockhart
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,639 ✭✭✭Miss Lockhart


    ted1 wrote: »
    No employer can ask a employer to conduct work they are not qualified for . The social welfare office won't and can't say anything.
    However a judge may decide that the teacher was unfairly dismissed

    I have actual firsthand experience of this from a sw point of view. What the sw should do and what they actually do are often miles apart. They are very fond of ignoring their own policies. Of course, you can appeal, but that can take months and meanwhile you have little or nothing to survive on.

    It seems many here are operating in a moral vacuum devoid of actual reality.


  • #111
    RealJohn
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,099 ✭✭✭RealJohn


    jimbo28 wrote: »
    Do you honestly think that that situation would be allowed to happen realjohn.........Honestly?
    There isn't an alternative. Schools are allocated funding for a certain number of teachers which translates to a certain number of teaching hours. If they can find someone willing to cover those physics classes (and we had a post last week talking about a maths job offering just three hours and the absurdity of the idea that someone would have to work that job), those hours would have to come out of another teacher's hours. The school isn't going to get extra teaching hours just because they don't have a qualified physics teacher. That's the reality.

    Of course under the current system, the government have allowed schools to use counseling hours as teaching hours so I imagine that's the most obvious way to deal with the problem. Less counseling probably won't harm the students though, will it?

    Do you think the school will be just given extra teaching hours (and more importantly, funding for them) in the current climate?


  • Advertisement
  • #112
    jimbo28
    Closed Accounts Posts: 328 ✭✭jimbo28


    RealJohn wrote: »
    There isn't an alternative. Schools are allocated funding for a certain number of teachers which translates to a certain number of teaching hours. If they can find someone willing to cover those physics classes (and we had a post last week talking about a maths job offering just three hours and the absurdity of the idea that someone would have to work that job), those hours would have to come out of another teacher's hours. The school isn't going to get extra teaching hours just because they don't have a qualified physics teacher. That's the reality.

    Of course under the current system, the government have allowed schools to use counseling hours as teaching hours so I imagine that's the most obvious way to deal with the problem. Less counseling probably won't harm the students though, will it?

    Do you think the school will be just given extra teaching hours (and more importantly, funding for them) in the current climate?

    Again this is not a justification for it.But there is always an alternative real john, but some other teacher will be at a loss and that is what causes the upset! You know this just as I do!

    On a lighter side do you know that banging your head off a wall burns 150 calories per hour:pac:. Anyway I think its time to bow out, Ive made my points and i don't think that the issue will be resolved here anytime soon.


  • #113
    experiMental
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,137 ✭✭✭experiMental


    Michael D Not Higgins wrote: »
    This is the reality of spending cuts. Schools can't afford to keep a full complement of teachers to deliver their classes. Something's gotta give.

    Yes, but imagine a whole group of students who don't know about physics because the school didn't have the money to teach them.

    One needs to know some basic physics to drive a car or operate some equipment. Knowledge is power, but lack of knowledge can be dangerous.

    You can't take away a subject that is essential for understanding how the world works from a child's education.


  • #114
    Michael D Not Higgins
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,223 ✭✭✭Michael D Not Higgins


    experiMental wrote: »
    Yes, but imagine a whole group of students who don't know about physics because the school didn't have the money to teach them.

    One needs to know some basic physics to drive a car or operate some equipment. Knowledge is power, but lack of knowledge can be dangerous.

    You can't take away a subject that is essential for understanding how the world works from a child's education.

    They've done basic physics in the JC. Anyone can drive a car without understanding the mechanics of it.


  • #115
    Seanchai
    Closed Accounts Posts: 1,401 ✭✭✭Seanchai


    RealJohn wrote: »
    Of course under the current system, the government have allowed schools to use counseling hours as teaching hours so I imagine that's the most obvious way to deal with the problem. Less counseling probably won't harm the students though, will it?

    In my school, oh yes it will. And the entire class. And the entire school. Without councillors and SNAs some schools might as well be ruled by security guards. Lifesavers. The biggest thing the Irish state could do is spend money on early intervention with these young tortured souls. The financial sense of early intervention is screaming at anybody who has watched kids go from lost in the classroom to alienated to angry to academic failure to crime. The state should be in there helping them at the "lost" stage. Even a rational rightwinger should see the longterm financial savings in such early intervention.

    * Yes, I get you were being sarcastic, but I just wanted to rant on that particular bit of ignorance spouted by people in power (usually, like Ruairí Quinn, educated in fee-paying schools) who haven't a bull's notion of what's going on in classes in deprived areas especially.


  • #116
    Seanchai
    Closed Accounts Posts: 1,401 ✭✭✭Seanchai


    jimbo28 wrote: »
    Again this is not a justification for it.But there is always an alternative real john, but some other teacher will be at a loss and that is what causes the upset! You know this just as I do!

    What teacher do you know who'd go into a school to work the 3 classes in Physics per week which the OP has to teach? That's about two hours work. After tax and other deductions, that's about €50 for the qualified teacher of Physics (not forgetting that the three classes will be spread across the week thereby making it almost impossible for her/him to keep a real job at the same time). Where will you find such a teacher?


  • #117
    rainbowtrout
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 15,407 ✭✭✭✭rainbowtrout


    Seanchai wrote: »
    What teacher do you know who'd go into a school to work the 3 classes in Physics per week which the OP has to teach? That's about two hours work. After tax and other deductions, that's about €50 for the qualified teacher of Physics (not forgetting that the three classes will be spread across the week thereby making it almost impossible for her/him to keep a real job at the same time). Where will you find such a teacher?

    Not to mind the fact that the classes will be spread out across the school week making the person ineligible for any social welfare if they are only working these hours.


    OP - aside from the rights and wrongs of the situation at hand, next week you are going to be teaching leaving cert physics one way or another. So you can sit at home and go 'I don't know any physics' or you can take out the physics book and go through a bit each night until you understand it, know how to answer the questions at the end of the chapter etc and then go in and teach it. All you need to do for now is keep a chapter ahead of the class. You have a degree in science and while it's biology and not physics where there is no overlap, you have a far higher level of education than the students that will be sitting in front of you next week. You know how to study at a level about leaving cert. You could just decide to get on with it. You won't know everything but you'll be able to cover most stuff if you keep on top of it.


  • #118
    doc_17
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,307 ✭✭✭doc_17


    And practice the experiments before you do them with the students. Maybe try to get a bit of time ( maybe CP hrs) to do a stocktake of what equipment is in the lab and what you need to order. Did our predecessor use light gates or ticket timers etc!!!


  • #119
    cb7
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 146 ✭✭cb7


    The experiments are my biggest concern. Not sure if they were light gates or ticker timers. Trying to get in touch with previous teacher to find out. Will probably just be a chapter ahead. Don't like this way of teaching but have no choice.


  • #120
    Peregrine
    Moderators, Education Moderators Posts: 26,403 Mod ✭✭✭✭Peregrine


    As a student, I know that I definitely wouldn't feel comfortable at all if my Physics teacher wasn't qualified to teach Physics. And don't mean to offend you or anything, you really shouldn't be made to teach a subject you know nothing about. Even if you were a maths teacher I still wouldn't fell comfortable.

    Physics is one of those subjects where the teacher's patience and ability is crucial, much like Maths or Chemistry, it's not just a subject that you can make your students take down notes for and get away with. I mean, my teacher is good but even still I know that the majority of the class still get lost with most concepts and have to have it explained in three different ways - and he can do that.

    You could try and learn some of the chapters between now and when school starts and try to stay ahead of the class but you'd still have less understanding of Physics than a sixth year.

    Think about the students. Even if they get a proper teacher next year, there'd be so many of them who didn't understand most of the 5th year material and that's going to affect their Leaving Cert. They would have been better off if they chose a different subject from the start of 5th year.

    Try your best to get out of it or else you'll spend way too much of your time trying to learn a subject from scratch and still maybe get it across to half the classroom.


  • Advertisement
  • #121
    evolving_doors
    Closed Accounts Posts: 11,812 ✭✭✭✭evolving_doors


    experiMental wrote: »
    Could the school in question get a suitable college graduate to teach the subject?

    Also, is it fair to say that our education system is well and truly f*cked?

    You mean a suitable college graduate with the teaching diploma? Id be surprised if there ain't anyone willing to do even these small hours unless the school is way out of the way

    Minor things with low uptake i.e. physics (especially because of low demand from girls) is first to go, same as special needs...I'm surprised intel never fought this drop in physics...always banging on about maths...


Advertisement