They are discriminating, based on religion. what next, no black people at an all white school. They should give every child the right to an education at a 'reputable' school, even if they are not religious. Religion isn't a part of english, maths or even science etc, so what should it matter? The only real grey area here is All boys/Girls schools, obviously you couldn't have any mixed schools like that.
Your own argument defeats you. It is a Catholic school - ie for Catholics. Just like a boys school is for boys, and a girls school is for girls. According to your logic, i should be able to go to a girls school because its discriminating against me. Why should gender be a grey area? According to you, religion is not a part of English or Maths - well neither is gender Im amused by all the try hard political correctness from the some of the same people arguing against it particularly in its application to Islam... So its ok to discriminate against them - "they can follow our rules or **** off mentality" but when it affects you, different story.
The reasoning behind the stages is outcomes based education. Kids aren't being graded on standards they need to achieve anymore. It's focusing more on the level of understanding they have at given points in the year. Gone are the days of reciting tables and spelling competitions, with OBE it's whether a child can understand a concept, socially and educationally. With the stages it now gives teachers 2 years to educate a child to certain level of understanding instead of 1 year to teach them how to remember things. I'm all for it in principle, but it still comes down to the commitment of the teachers.
Not really. My wife teaches grades 5 & 6. When I went to primary school I was in a 3 & 4 class as well as a 5 & 6 class. I think you'll find that they will still be doing work for their own level. Not all private schools are religious and not all religious schools are private. Wife works at a public catholic school that is funded just like any other public school. Unfortunately this is where its at. My sister did the same thing to get her daughter into a Private catholic school. If you don't want to do this, I would suggest that you compensate with your own lessons instead of going full home schooling.
how does my own arguement defeat me? Single sex schools are there as to not distract students. The teachers at a girls or boys school are the same, but its thought that catholic schools have more to offer.
That's a fair enough statement and I don't disagree, going to a religious based school it's to be expected. But there was no other choice as in my area there weren't any non-religious private schools and my parents wanted to send me to a private school. It was put up with the catholicism/Christianity/whatever it's called or travel an unholy amount of time on public transport. I think the whole argument is about a lack of private schools which aren't focused on religion
I also don't want to jump out and say that private schools are better, both private and public have their points, but in general private schools have smaller class sizes and therefore each student would get more attention. It's only as good as the teachers, and I don't believe there's a difference between teachers at a private versus public school. Generally.
Im wondering if everyone has had their head in the sand for quite a while. Composite classes have been around for ages. In brief, consider the learning opportunities for a streamed education. I think it's terrible if a child is stuck with a group of kids simply because they are a similar age and started school together. Julie, consider this: i teach a composite 2/3 class. This is difficult for me as it splits a government standard level (which works better as a 1/2 split). Aside from it being a headache for me when it comes to writing reports etc (being a split Standards level i have to use two different 'books' so to speak) it is a fantastic opportunity to group students in two very different ways. I can group kids from my year 2 group who require extended learning with kids of the same level to help consolidate new learnings - these groups can be kids from a wider age range, which doesn't really matter anymore as the kids are now grouped by ability. Alternatively i can group a lower grade two student with a far wider ability group or 'mixed ability' which really really really works to extend kids with higher needs and consolidate the learning of more advanced students through teaching (you retain 80% more information when teaching it yourself than simply being taught). So yes, it is more work for the teacher in terms of writing reports etc, but it is less work actually putting an efficient learning centre together. In a straight class a good teacher should have students grouped anyway, so what's the difference? Funding may or may not play a part. Overall it has been accepted that composite classes are actually better for the students. In the case that funding plays a part think about the old guidelines (for VIC at least). It used to stand that we had to maintain a class size less than 25 for year 2-6 and under 21 for prep and year 1 (these rules no longer occur). a school is allocated its staff based on the number of enrollments so if only 15 preps come this year but 30 come next year we have some pretty ugly numbers. a prep/1 split means that these classes can be leveled out nicely. all this increases the learning opportunity dramatically. This was the split at my last school... makes other splits look fantastic: prep/1(2), 1/2(2), 2/3(1), 3/4(2), 4,5(1) 5,6(3). the bracketed number is the number of classes of that make-up. Part of the reason it's this ugly is that there were 60 year fives, when our average enrollment would be around 30-35. Must have been a cold year.
And by that do you mean, that just because I went to a private school associated with the Anglican Church, only Anglicans can attend that school? You idiot, we had many students at my school who were Christian but not Anglican, and some who weren't even Christian. There was a guy in the year above me that was a Sikh for goodness sake! What you fail to take into account is that Catholic Schools teach in a manner as directed by the state Catholic Education body, here in Victoria thats the Catholic Education Commission Victoria, ala Christian Values. You don't necessarily have to be Catholic to go there. The same goes for Anglican schools, its values are fundementally Christian. They accept all. As for all boys and all girls schools, they cater specifically cater for the gender, ie the school program is built around their needs and interests. Private schools tend to only hire teachers they deem to be good. Every teach I had was passionate about their work and always looked to get the most out of their students. If I had gone to a public school, I think I would have got lost in the crowd.
Interesting Read! IMHO, the reson that most private schools are religious (be that Christian or Muslim) is that it is these bodies who think differently to the public school system. I work at a private Christian school not that far south of the Hawkesbury. This school contains Muslims, Hindus and non-religious, though not in numbers approaching those of Christians. It also has a very long waiting list. We currently have two children left in the schooling process. We home school them, and have for a couple of years now. Contrary to the general impression, they do not suffer socially as they are involved in sporting, music and similar group activities. In fact, IMHO this socialisation through busyness is less dangerous than the socialisation through idleness that is common in the formal school system, be it private or secular. Of course, a similar situation arises because it is religious organisations that provide the source material used by most home schooling parents. I hope that you find an outcome that makes you happy, and provides the appropriate education for your child. Might home schooling be that answer? There are somewhere around 10,000 children being home schooled in NSW these days I believe.
Yes Julie its terrible and it isnt going to improve. I also have been to that not only does school suck but so do some of the teachers. :yeah:
Read my first post - they are entitled to PREFER Catholics. I never said non Catholics were not entitled to attend such a school, but if they do attend at such a school, they are not entitled to complain about the religious aspect. The second post was a rhetorical argument to that put forward by stealthy
Your original argument is that Religion has nothing to do with English or maths and that every child has a right to an education at a reputable school. My counter argument is that gender Also has little to do with Maths and English. The parallels between the two are quite plain As to the benefits of single sex schooling, i wont disagree as i havent seen the research data. But regardless of the benefits, it is still discriminatory in the strictest sense that a boy cannot attend an all girls school or vice versa by definition of the word discriminatory. It is considered acceptable discrimination. I argue that a religious school is entitled in the same manner to prefer enrolling students that adhere to that faith.
did you miss my entire post? from reading some of your posts school wasn't your cup of tea, so don't profess to have ANY idea what you are talking about. Schools are moving toward being in better shape than they have ever been because of the commitment of teachers. Given the exponential growth of knowledge you can't expect A) that schools can teach all of it and B) that schools won't change in an attempt to accommodate this growth.
The difference is, religion is something you choose, asin you could be a muslin, christian, and countless others, but you don't have a choice with gender, your male or female (obviously you could go for a sex change, but i'm talking about the majority of people)
Julie, I'm a little interested in what you have to say about gov't and independant/catholic schools. I was a high school teacher in the Parramatta Catholic education system for four years until the beginning of this year where my wife and I had enough of Sydney and opted for a sea change and moved to the south coast. The Parra catholic system offers a fantastic education and from my experience the teachers are 100% dedicated. Now I'm back in the state system and I have noticed a massive difference in the attitudes of the kids and the teachers. The problem with the state system is that it has received such a bad rap over the years. As a result parents that can afford to or care about their childs education send them into the private or independant system. Unfortunately those in low socio economic areas either can't afford independant system or simply don't care and those that can afford it or care send their children elsewhere. So it really is a viscious downward spiral. The teachers in these particular low economic areas have low moral but at the same time the best intentions. I took a postion at a low economic area in the Illawarra area and many kids have a pretty rough homelife. They have no interests in sport or music. I've lost count the number of times I've heard teachers told to f*** off by students in the past 3 weeks. I'm trying to get a cricket team up and running for a district comp but I'm struggling to get just one team. I teach music and I can't even get numbers for a band or choir. I was told 10 - 15 years ago this school had over 1300 students. This year they have about 400. I don't have too many answers but I can offer quite a bit of insight into what I have seen and learnt. Actually I can offer one piece of advice.... some parents need to wake the F up! Last week I had two unrelated kids come to me after class and tell me they couldn't afford a $1 excercise book because their mum told them that their dads a dead beat and not paying child support and can't be found. For crying out loud, how demoralising that must be for a young teenager to hear that. No wonder a majority of kids at this school have issues with self confidence.
Just my two cents regarding the original issue. In smaller schools, amalgamated classes are quite common as mentioned by several other people. In fact I know some people who went to small country primary schools that only had one or two classes! All it means is that teaching methods have to be changed significantly from the whole teacher stands up front of room and explains concept to class as a whole type thing to small group type excercises as I understand it. I was in two amalgamated classes in primary school, (2-3 when i was in year 3 and 5-6 for both those years) and to tell the truth I never really noticed any problem with it. Unfortunately some of you city folk seem to have absolutely NFI about how things work out in the real world. Rest assured however Julie, that it is not the end of the world, you probably don't need to worry about falsely taking up a religion, (believe me they probably wouldn't want to associate with you any more than you do with them) and your child will probably get edumacated just fine. EDIT: here's a suggestion, why don't you go and talk with the school about how they plan to run things and how they intend to ensure your child gets a decent education rather than just going off your nut on an internet forum about it?
Your child doesn't have to be baptised or christened to attend a private school, nor do you have to get a reference from a parish minister if indeed you do not attend church. My 3 children all attended Catholic Primary and High schools and I am not religious and they are not baptised or christened. At the interview I merely stated I would support the school ethos. My children can not partake of holy communion naturally, but they are not alone, many children are from non religious families. You will find private schools are full of children from non religious families, you obviously picked a school that is very popular and pretty much full so they could be picky about who they enrolled. C.
Granted I haven't read the thread. But I came from a school, an education, that sorted me through in a year 3 and 6 composite class. A huge gap. But I believe I came out better for it. Teacher definately had the time for us, and I believe listening in on the grade 6 element helped step up some knowledge. Different people would react in different ways but thinking back about it, every one of my friends that I still have to this day, that were in that class. Are smart people. Coincidence or fortunate group of friends, who knows. But I honestly don't see anything wrong with composites, however, it is your right to choose your childs class.
