Young worse at maths and English than grandparents

and yet GCSE and A level results have gone up 30 years in a row

I know.

When I did A-Levels (1983), if you got three or four A grades, you were a candidate for Oxbridge

It doesn't surprise me that standards are declining. What does surprise me is that we are so near the bottom of the pile. In fact, we are the only developed nation whose 55-65 year-olds perform better than the 16-24s

The standards have gone down because we have so many immigrant families with English not being their first language....I postulate.

They decide how many kids they want to achieve A levels and set the level accordingly.

It stops people asking questions of the education system.
Well it does until you do a comparison with other countries like the one above.

The British State Education System Phoney Miracle at work again.

Record truancy in schools, record volumes of teachers leaving profession in last 2 decades, record violence in schools, record fatuous legal actions against schools and their staff...... yet record passes at GCSE and A Levels for the last 20 years.

And simultaneously, the very same pupils are worse at Maths and English than their disciplined grandparents, who are no doubt "racists" into the bargain.

Leopard - isn't that the same in Germany, France, Norway, Holland...?

The school kids are out of control no wonder they don't learn much.
And the poorer the families they come from the worse they perform in exams.

The Leopard has a valid point.

It's true, my boys are 3 and 1 and they're both shoite at maths, my mother in law wipes the floor with them in tests. Idiots.

Hmmm. DNA?

Yes, DNA also matters, and people are getting dumber.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/22/people-getting-dumber-human-intelligence-victoria-era_n_3293846.html

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/4548943/British-teenagers-have-lower-IQs-than-their-counterparts-did-30-years-ago.html

Search and you shall find more on the subject.

CLYDEBANK29 09 Oct 13 11:59   and yet GCSE and A level results have gone up 30 years in a row


probably because the markers are evidently less intelligent each year

tax evading escort earned £300k last year

How much does a maths teacher earn?


30 years ago they didnt have google to answer all their problems

and in 30 years time no one will know how to fix a problem

Well no one knows how to fix a boiler or a timing belt now so we haven't got that far to fall.

They haven't had to learn their multipletimes tables, multiple choice question and answers.. never stretched.. inevitable consequences. Well done son - 95%!

The basic stupidity and lack of common sense of the current generation of school leavers bemuses me greatly.

Elvis lands on moon

daft report and pretty obvious ,it was like it in the 1980s too


Schools do not teach numeracy and literacy and haven't done so probably since the 1950s

Plenty of A graders can't spell or work out basic numbers - it's not required for most employment anyway.

I had to teach myself numeracy as i was told to USE a calculator and not try to do complex sums in my head ,i was given black marks as a consequence as my answers were never exact ...ie 122,900 as opposed to 122,858 etc .

Anyway, glad THEY got it wrong as it's served me very well in my betting years 

Coach, I could settle a yankee in my head aged 12! My nephew who is a bright lad in subjects like history couldn't work out the cubed root of 64

Slippy ,i guess we all have our strengths and weaknesses  - mine was  History and a few other subjects   but worse by far was Woodwork where i had  to tie my jewellery box together with elastic bands 




Funny how things like that stay with you,  i had a real bad time installing a toilet seat the other night 

weakness = History that is *

how many mathematicians does the world need?

I was good at maths at school (1990s school so probably a retard by 1950s standards) and I can only think of minimal benefits outside of betting. After you've learned basic numeracy it would be much more beneficial to learn a trade or skill focused on employment. Or just generally mess about learning people skills

correct zazu - there are few jobs ,numeracy used to come in handy in the old days for getting good deals in the supermarket ,although most are listed as price per kilo these days .

i think most of us who are decent at numercay at the expense of other skills may even have  slight autism

too much "teaching" at school is to improve kids skills to get a better grade in s a t exams

this does kid little good but boosts school performance



doing all that bores the kids at the time they are most ready to learn interesting stuff


comprehensive schools then tootle along at a low level so the thickies dont get upset

It is worrying when we're only when 22 other countries are better than us at English

delete when we're only

Eh?

The standards have gone down because we have so many immigrant families with English not being their first language....I postulate

Nail on head

My wife teaches in an inner city school and they have a class for kids who speak no English

It doesn't help either that costs are being cut in schools so the priority is to employ cheaper teachers and not the better teachers.

Its not rocket science !

there probably are 22  nick

How many mathematicians does the world need?

I was good at maths at school (1990s school so probably a retard by 1950s standards) and I can only think of minimal benefits outside of betting. After you've learned basic numeracy it would be much more beneficial to learn a trade or skill focused on employment. Or just generally mess about learning people skills

...

How about: engineering, physics, all forms of accounting, banking, share dealing, risk assessment, in fact any assessment, scientific research, in fact any research and ..... darts

gambling was a great way to improve your maths

profit / loss / fractions / multiplications (accas) etc it was all there.



Could never understand why the kids weren't taught gambling at school

From Jan 2012, Gove giving evidence to the Education Committee:

"Q98 Chair: ... if "good" requires pupil performance to exceed the national average, and if all schools must be good, how is this mathematically possible?

Michael Gove: By getting better all the time.

Q99 Chair: So it is possible, is it?

Michael Gove: It is possible to get better all the time.

Q100 Chair: Were you better at literacy than numeracy, Secretary of State?

Michael Gove: I cannot remember."

.
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201012/cmselect/cmeduc/uc1786-i/uc178601.htm

During the recent 'attack' - I told two late 20 yr-olds there was an incident in progress on Capitol Hill. NEITHER had a clue where that was! Would that be true of many dya think?
They must watch, hear, read things every day and not assimilate much or any of it. Sadly to me :(

if they were dead it doesnt matter

.

Grade inflation innit.  What was kindergarten sums is now a first class mathematics degree.

It's almost the other way round kincsem. Kids are expected to do way more at Nursery level than they should. At the current rate they'll be doing degree stuff by the turn of the next century.

There's no point comparing today's kids with their grandparents - it's an irrelevance. The key issue is how they fair against those of similar age in other countries. That's the reality for the future of the country.

The main priority for education in this country should be to move away from the utter b0llocks that we're saddled with at the moment of "the sooner kids do something, the better they'll be at it". Here you can draft in the experience of past generations. Grandma and grandad wouldn't have started school at all until the year they were 5. These days in many cases the age is 3. We do too much too young and as a result get two things:
1. Brilliant 7yr olds
2. Disaffected teenagers

Do we look at the rest of western Europe who do it properly, beginning formal education when children are sufficiently emotionally, socially and intellectually developed and then teach them - around the 7yrs old mark? Do we fck? We plod down the route of something that doesn't work. Naturally.
Why?
Because the education system is run by politicians and not professionals. We pay politicians peanuts, when you consider they're running the country, and therefore we get the intellectually stunted ingrates like Gove in positions of power. All the evidence is that there's a man who hasn't had an original thought in his life, other than "I'm enjoying this secret affair with William Hague". He's a man of little natural intelligence and yet he holds the key to our children's future. It's not a pretty sight.

Franzi     09 Oct 13 17:39 
From Jan 2012, Gove giving evidence to the Education Committee:

"Q98 Chair: ... if "good" requires pupil performance to exceed the national average, and if all schools must be good, how is this mathematically possible?

Michael Gove: By getting better all the time.

Q99 Chair: So it is possible, is it?

Michael Gove: It is possible to get better all the time.

Q100 Chair: Were you better at literacy than numeracy, Secretary of State?

Michael Gove: I cannot remember."

The questions here are loaded and don't present the full facts. The how is it mathematically possible is a nice line but deflects from what he is trying to achieve. Gove is intending to lift the expected bar therefore schools will have to improve significantly to be in line.

He is intending to bring in a 'high school ready' level of attainment for primary schools. This is significantly higher than the current bar (a year) although you can currently reach the national expectation for 11 year olds whilst being a year behind therefore his improvements will see those children who currently just scrape national expectations having to perform effectively two years higher.

Currently a school needs 60% of children to hit level 4 in english and maths (up from 55% at the last election) and this will rise to 65% next year. The new bar will be higher with an expectation of 80% of children reaching it.

Gove is looking to substantially increase the level of competency amongst 11 years olds.

If he is successful raising the bar he will have got more 'good schools'. This will be achieved by having better leadership in schools and more effective teaching.

His aims to improve the level of attainment for 11 year olds can only be a good thing.

f off  how are you going to prove that you thickoes  - all my grandparents are dead ... in fact I am so old..................etc

How many times on this forum have you read remarks such as "what is this, a spelling/grammar test?" etc, when a poster is corrected, or "what does it matter?" Usually some insults follow of course. The abysmal use of English, along with regular requests of "how do I settle this?" "how much will this be?" etc (usually without the question mark), stem from laziness and lack of attention/interest at school, simple as that. Add use of calculators and PCs, and you have a mighty problem.

Should/could/would of
Were/where
There their they're

All of the above three and others done to death, but "it doesn't matter". YES IT DOES.

Here, here.. well sayed that man.

Compulsory age of starting school in European countries

Four: Northern Ireland
Five: Cyprus, England, Malta, Scotland, Wales
Six: Austria, Belgium, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Republic of Ireland, Italy, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Switzerland, Turkey
Seven: Bulgaria, Estonia, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania , Poland, Serbia , Sweden

I live in Ireland and started at four.  (Why do people keep reminding us it is a republic?)

How does starting later improve education?

I left school at 16 in 1980,but when I started school aged 5 I could read and write, my Mother and Grandmother taught me before I ever went to school. I was not an only child with doting parents but the oldest of 6, they didn't want me or them to be embarrassed by having a thick son.
On my second day during a counting exercise, the Teacher asked me what comes after 5.
I replied "11/2 Miss".

I told my niece and nephews the same as I told my daughters - as long as you get a good grade in maths amd English you'll get a fairly good job.

The niece said maths are too difficult because she can't remember formulae, typical lazy teenager. Ask her the volume of a cube with easy numbers, and she's stuck.

But she can sing along to some facking hip hop crap from start to finish with no mistakes, and that rubbish lasts 3 minutes plus.

I blame the parents.

Just got back from the local Co-op. The teenage Saturday assistant thought I must be possessed because I had the exact change ready for my groceries when she rang them through the till.

my old next door neighbour became a teacher(was a police sergeant)and taught all the kids that found it difficult to understand,and managed to get big improvements.
He used playing cards and horse racing odds (fractions)to teach these kids.It was Clacton so can't have been that successful

It's not when they start school kinc - it's when they start formal education. Some total misunderstanding here of
1. How children learn
and
2. How the Education Dept work

The results are sitting out there. All the evidence is there. What is lacking is political will.
Our 7yr olds, in tests, would p1ss all over Norway's, (for example). By the age of 11 the gap has all but disappeared and at 16 they're ahead. The same is true of France, Germany, Sweden etc. Doing things earlier does not mean you do it better.

By "they're ahead", I mean the children being educated overseas.

Gove is looking to substantially increase the level of competency amongst 11 years olds.

If he is successful raising the bar he will have got more 'good schools'. This will be achieved by having better leadership in schools and more effective teaching.

His aims to improve the level of attainment for 11 year olds can only be a good thing.

On the face of it hunky dory. However, it collapses when examining his methods and how this "attainment" is measured. Your statements are very naive I'm afraid.

I wasn;'t saying i agreed with Gove I was merely pointing out what he is trying to do.

The attainment will be measured as it always has through exam results, he is raising the expected level.

From a recent edition of the Sunday Times:

A third of university-trained nurses are being rejected for jobs in the NHS because they are unable to answer simple maths questions such as how many 15mg tablets are required to make up 30mg.

I find this hard to believe - I thought you had to have five GCEs including maths and English and two or three A-Levels to get into university.

If it's true, we really have got problems.

yes it does sound hard to believe

perhaps they're on 45mg of it when asked the question.

Next door

Next door

FFS, next door have two teenagers. If I asked them what was the capital of say Germany was I'd take evens neither of them would get the answer right.

Last Sunday I said to my 11 year old grand-daughter 'This time next year, you'll be sitting your first maths exam in senior school. How would you like to learn how to multiply two digit numbers by two digit numbers, but not do any multipling?'

Her answer 'No need to fry my brain grandad. We're allowed to use calculators.'

Ironically, its because of maths that the pass rate goes up every year.
Prior to 1984, each year was banded, so the top 10pc got an A, the next 15pc a B, the next 20pc a C etc.
So even if the top score was 70pc in the test, you could still get an A with 65pc.

After 1984 it was changed, so everybody who scored over 80pc in the test got an A, even if 50pc of the country scored 80pc or more. Therefore if you make the test 1pc easier each year, the pass rates will improve year on year.

The Government could then gloat about how it was improving education.

That is extremely sad cmat. My niece has just completed her Masters degree at Edinburgh University which took five years to do and I don't think she is capable of multiplying 14 x 13 on paper let alone do it in her head. In fact I'm pretty certain she couldn't do it. I despair.

this is fantastic news  - it keeps my gambling career on track for the forseeable  future


carry on kids  -keep using those calculators

I was at school in the 60's. I didn't take 'O' Level maths until 1976.  It included differential & integral calculus.

I started a BSc course in 1998.  Maths was compulsory in the first year.  It included differential calculus but not integral. 
It also included quadratic equations, which I had learned @ 12.

Not all our parents were maths wizards. I have a bitter memory from 1983 of my mum going round to the house of a friend who had a telephone so I could ring her up and tell her my degree result.

"I got a 2:1!"
"Oh well. Never mind."#
"No! That's good. It's an upper second class degree!"
"Well, you can't come first all the time."
"Nobody gets a first unless they're sleeping with their tutor. I'm in the top 35%"
"Yes, well. I'm sure you tried your hardest."
"You don't understand. That's the top third."
"Eh?"
"Look. Imagine you've got an orange cut into three pieces ..."
"Oh, you know I don't understand them fractions."

She and my dad were both convinced I'd failed until I persuaded them to attend the degree ceremony and they saw me in a cape and a mortar board. That picture went straight on the sideboard and sat there proudly for the rest of their lives.

I wouldn't stand a friggin chance of a Masters degree at Edinburgh University ,  but 14 x 13 takes like 2 seconds

My parents are generally thick as pigsh!t , Dad is dyslexic (or so he says) Mom is just a headcase , you only notice just how much as you get older & smarter than they are , then they start to turn on you & hate you for it !

I remember my first day at Slough Grammar School. My mum had filled in the address label on my bag with the words SLOUGH GRAMMER SCHOOL. One of the teachers noticed it and told me to write out SLOUGH GRAMMAR SCHOOL 100 times.

"My mum wrote it, sir! I didn't think it mattered."

"Not taking responsibility either, eh? Write it out 200 times."

30 years ago they didnt have google to answer all their problems Cool
very zazu

we don't need to know anything now...we just have to know how to Google it

We don't even have to spell just stick a couple of letters in the right place, our spell checker does it for us

Her answer 'No need to fry my brain grandad. We're allowed to use calculators.'
taxi

true

You're spell chequer just failed with punk tuition.
It's not the same - clearly, many of us here have the 14x13 answer very quickly whilst the youfs are reaching for their mobile phone calculators. We all KNOW 'Berlin' and most other key cities long before 'they' have even opened up Google and typed the question.
I know a 25 ear-old now having the maths tuition of a moderate teen just to enable her to cope with the council work with which she struggles.
Somewhere along the line, SOMEONE with 'great new educational theories' influenced some great new politicians and knocked us backwards several generations.
I consider myself (and brother) to have been EXTREMELY fortunate to have had pushy parents, 11-plus, grandmaskools and university when just the few % got there. 
No doubt that's on a par with being a 'racist' these days - but the evidence is right befour our very ayes!