Sito met some friends for dinner
recently some weeks ago. One topic came up - education. Two of us had a brief discussion over breakfast. I want to put down some thoughts here.
Two ideas:
1) Dedicated form teachers
Why:
Two reasons - (a) reducing admin of teaching staff for the staff's benefit, and (b) having a main teacher who truly knows the form kids for the kids' benefit:
a) This started off from the topic of flexi-adjunct teachers. The work scope is to be agreed upon between the school and the teacher. So the teacher could effectively just teach, no CCA etc. And they're apparently free to teach tuition unlike MOE teachers.
That sounds a lot more attractive than to be a regular MOE teacher with all the admin, CCA and committee work (e.g. organise children's day cele) on top of teaching responsibilities.
Over the years, we've heard of teaching staff being burdened by admin. The recent
findings from the OECD Teaching and Learning International Survey showed that full-time teachers in Singapore spent four hours a week on admin work, above the OECD average of three hours.
I don't know what this admin work entails but I think there is bound to be some amount of admin no matter what. I thought things should be much better these days with the PG app. Perhaps the admin pertains more to the lower primary kids and even Sec 1 kids coz new to school, new to a lot of things?
Actually, as I write, I think this dedicated form teachers idea is more for the kids' benefit, haha! Ok, I move on...
b) During my school years, the form teachers taught the whole class at least one subject, spent a lot of time with us be it teaching in the classroom or taking attendance at the assembly area. Think we also had this thing called contact time or something.
Now?
Let me consider this in the primary school context, as I'm more familiar with this level.
Kai had three form teachers in P5-6, and only one of them taught him. The other two taught the GEP kids in his form class - his was a mixed form class comprising mainstream and GEP kids who are in different classes for English, Maths and Science. So none of three form teachers knew all kids equally well. After they changed the format from parents-teachers meeting to parent-child-teachers-conference involving only the form teachers, we couldn't really get much out of the session.
Oh, and now with subject-based banding in secondary schools, Kai's form class has G1-3 kids so the form teachers do not teach all the kids unless they teach DnT, FCE, music, art or PE.
Back to primary school. Yang is in a mainstream class (i.e. no GEP kids) and Yu is still in lower primary, but it's a 50-50 chance that their form teachers teach them in any subject at all coz students are split into groups for the four academic subjects. Based on what the kids told me and parent chat groups, there are usually two groups - one regular and one for those who need more help. For Chinese, I have seen four different spelling lists so could be four groups - foundation (from P5 onwards), 核心班，深广班 and higher Chinese.
I don't know if they split the 核心班 into regular and those who need more help... But I know that for any subject, those who need a lot more help would be offered remedial after school - I asked for English remedial for Yang and was told it was to help those scoring below 40% 😱
The kids then take all the non-examinable subjects together as a class, with the exception of Character and Citizenship Education (CCE) which is taught in mother tongue languages.
So if the form teacher teaches non-examinable subjects, lucky for the kids coz the main teacher actually teaches them and has more time to know them. Otherwise, it's as good as having no form teachers.
Idea:
Since form teachers already may not teach their form kids, why not have a dedicated form teacher for each class, supported by a subject-form teacher? This would be similar to P1 and P2, where the form teachers teach all the kids and know them very well.
There are already designated slots for Form Teacher Guidance Period (FTGP) and Programme for Active Learning (PAL) in the timetable, currently taken by the form teachers. A dedicated form teacher can also take on some subjects common to all students, e.g. Social Studies and even PE - see my next point far below. Music and art may be challenging... But well, see below too..
Further, academic teachers need to complete the curriculum. The form teachers can devote more time to psychological and social wellbeing, and be the kids' cheerleaders in school. They work at a manageable ratio of 1:30-40, compared to the one or two school counsellors who cannot possibly be everywhere. Students are probably more familiar with their form teachers too. Of course, serious cases will still need to be referred to counsellors.
Ultimately, the aim is to have someone who is the main point of contact for the kids, who know everything about them be it academic or otherwise, who will find out more about them from other subject teachers, who will liaise with parents and the community when necessary. The dedicated form can follow their classes as they progress through the school, like how the kids don't change classes from P1 to P2 and from P5 to P6. As such, they become sort of a surrogate parent in school, which could be very beneficial for the kids.
While this would require significant additional manpower resources, such resources may be quite different from the usual teaching requirements which require a degree in maths to teach it, for instance. I would argue that this may not require a degree but someone with the heart to guide young people.
2) Review teaching for non-academic subjects
Apparently, it is difficult to hire teachers for certain subjects like music, art and PE. Even the languages - not just mother tongue but also English.
Ok, put the languages aside - maybe I'll talk about them another day coz I sometimes imagine myself a Chinese teacher, haha!
I took a look at Kai's timetable, which is in a document with the timetables for all classes. There are as many PE teachers as there are classes per level but only about three each for music and art. I think it's coz there are more periods of PE per week vs. the other two subjects. It's similar for the primary school kids based on the teacher list online.
Now, music, art and PE require some technical knowledge. Not everyone can teach them properly - and safely too when it comes to PE. So they are not easily replaced. But truth be told, apart from the handful of MEP/AEP kids and those taking lessons outside school*, how well can we expect kids to do in the aesthetics?
* Somehow, many kids learn piano in Singapore... How many truly enjoy it? Yang tried a few months and stopped coz not interested anymore.
Look at me - love to sing, yes, but can't read notes or play any instrument. Yup, not even the recorder that we were made to play in school. And don't talk about my art.
Kai had a music WA last term which required him to write notes and play a tune on a digital keyboard. He has probably forgot all about it right after that.
For the aesthetics, I think it is more important to expose the kids and teach appreciation. There are many music and art enrichment schools out there. Why not outsource the aesthetics? I can't find the info but I believe swimming lessons for primary school kids are already outsourced, with the PE teacher present during the lesson. My kids have their swimming lesson in school but I once saw a lesson at Delta Swimming Complex where parent volunteers were present to help the teachers with the kids.
If swimming can be outsourced, so can entire PE lessons. And PE lessons can take a different form - besides the usual physical training to prepare for NAPFA tests, students can be brought to different sports facilities for exposure to different games. Schools cannot all be equipped with squash courts or gym, for instance, and the many well equipped Active SG sports complex will be even better utilised throughout the day.
MOE can still retain curriculum control. The dedicated form teachers can be the school reps present in outsourced classes to be responsible for the kids and external coaches.
Granted, outsourcing would be extra work for school admin - tender or framework agreement under MOE! But if hiring is a perennial challenge, this is a possible solution. More importantly, back to the first idea, it gives the dedicated form teachers more time with their charges, and be more involved in their school life.
That's all, folks!
