One more term and the high school years at our house are over.
One of the great insights we have been lucky enough to have over the years is in having five kids you see a lot of school and schools.
We have pretty much touched every part of the New Zealand education system.
We have been to private school, public and integrated, single sex, and co-ed. We have been to primary, intermediate, and high school.
We have been to good schools, ordinary schools, and exceptional schools.
The overarching view is several-fold.
1. Principals make or break a place.
We have seen a school who's reputation had been good, suffered badly when the principal left and the replacement wasn't seen as particularly good, only to see it markedly improve when a new one came along with a fresh focus and a firm determination.
2. Private school buys you options.
In things like extra help and facilities, money buys choice and expertise.
3. Teachers vary dramatically.
In all schools we have seen a selection of everything, from lazy to brilliant, from effective to hopeless.
4. All kids are different.
This is possibly the most enlightening thing of all. A school isn't a one-stop shop. We had kids at a school you might have thought would do it all. For one child it was brilliant and for another it was a mistake.
5. A lot of it is down to the child.
I am convinced a child who is determined will succeed in any school. A brilliant kid who can't be bothered, won't.
6. Parents have to be engaged.
Schools have become a whipping boy and a social welfare department. They are expected to take on any kid, with any problem, from any home and fix them. That attitude is criminal and too often it's led by shocking parenting.
7. There is too much wastage.
If you take the stuff out of a day that isn't needed, you'd be at school I reckon about two hours a day. We can do way better.
8. I am not sure it's all that different in 2024 from when I was there in '81.
Good teachers are rare, most schools are fine, and most kids would rather play sport. It's essentially like life – you get out of it what you put in.
The only major difference is you pay a shed load more now, than you used to.
Mike Hosking is a New Zealand television and radio broadcaster. He currently hosts The Mike Hosking Breakfast show on NewstalkZB on weekday mornings - where this article was sourced.
We have been to private school, public and integrated, single sex, and co-ed. We have been to primary, intermediate, and high school.
We have been to good schools, ordinary schools, and exceptional schools.
The overarching view is several-fold.
1. Principals make or break a place.
We have seen a school who's reputation had been good, suffered badly when the principal left and the replacement wasn't seen as particularly good, only to see it markedly improve when a new one came along with a fresh focus and a firm determination.
2. Private school buys you options.
In things like extra help and facilities, money buys choice and expertise.
3. Teachers vary dramatically.
In all schools we have seen a selection of everything, from lazy to brilliant, from effective to hopeless.
4. All kids are different.
This is possibly the most enlightening thing of all. A school isn't a one-stop shop. We had kids at a school you might have thought would do it all. For one child it was brilliant and for another it was a mistake.
5. A lot of it is down to the child.
I am convinced a child who is determined will succeed in any school. A brilliant kid who can't be bothered, won't.
6. Parents have to be engaged.
Schools have become a whipping boy and a social welfare department. They are expected to take on any kid, with any problem, from any home and fix them. That attitude is criminal and too often it's led by shocking parenting.
7. There is too much wastage.
If you take the stuff out of a day that isn't needed, you'd be at school I reckon about two hours a day. We can do way better.
8. I am not sure it's all that different in 2024 from when I was there in '81.
Good teachers are rare, most schools are fine, and most kids would rather play sport. It's essentially like life – you get out of it what you put in.
The only major difference is you pay a shed load more now, than you used to.
Mike Hosking is a New Zealand television and radio broadcaster. He currently hosts The Mike Hosking Breakfast show on NewstalkZB on weekday mornings - where this article was sourced.
4 comments:
Wise words.
" We paid our last school fee last week.
One more term and the high school years at our house are over".
Is Mrs H brining out of the bottom draw, in the kitchen, that secret folder of potential overseas holidays that can now be considered, as the outgoing on school fess can be " channeled into a trip somewhere nice"? Hawaii, Monaco, New York (all that shopping), the Caribbean, cruising out of Port Everglades, Invercargill ?? the list is endless.
You may have seen all sorts of schools through five children this century but as a tutor I have seen almost seven decades of NZ schooling. This includes my own and those as a tutor.
It has become progressively worse with every decade. Last century we didn't have one of the longest tails of underachievement in the Developed World . We excelled at the basics overall achieving the highest scores in reading comprehension and high up in maths. We didn't have among the worst rates of behaviour and bullying.
Being involved in the reading wars I have observed a Ministry of Education hellbent on pushing their ideology and even moving into Marxist theory. They become vindictive towards anyone with contrary ideas and teaching practices. Academic achievement is now no longer on their agenda but social engineering. Quality teachers are hardly attracted to teaching because of the behaviour problems and lack of rigor which have got much worse. Most teachers coming out of Colleges of Education complain they were not taught how to teach but instead had their minds filled up with theory to fit the current ideology.
When I was at school in the 1950s and '60s we were taught well . My sibling and I I don't recall a single poor teacher for our each 13 years of state schooling and we certainly were taught useful material the entire school day , preparing us well for future careers. There was also singing , music, phys. ed, art , debating , oral work , critical thinking and more . Few children needed to pay for outside remedial work and school classes were orderly and disciplined with content taught explicitly , systematically and cumulatively with much revision , correction and thoroughness. We had handwriting , spelling , grammar and times tables rote leaned . All of these subjects and methods recent cognitive science now recommends for good learning.
I am not the only one observing the educational fiasco we have but the MSM seldom features it because they support progressive - the cause of the decline.
Whose not who's
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