High schools told to go back to basics

‘Can’t even put a sentence together.’ A new government report reveals why too many children are struggling in high school.

Some teachers are struggling to teach high school maths. Picture: iStock

Illiterate teenagers who copy and paste Wikipedia for assignments and maths teachers who can’t teach children to count show the need for universal testing and a “back to basics” approach in classrooms, according to new government research that exposes systemic failings in Australia’s school system.

The taxpayer-funded Australian Educational Research Organisation (AERO) is warning that one in five students are struggling at a Year 4 level of English and maths when they start high school.

Its research shows that too many high school teachers lack the training, time or teaching skill to help students with the basics of English and maths that are meant to be mastered in primary school.

AERO chief executive Dr Jenny Donovan said one in five students starting high school at the age of 12 or 13 have the maths and English ability of children three years younger.

“You’ve got students who just can’t read and write, so they can’t engage in lessons at school and it translates into behavioural problems or leaving school early,’’ she said.

Dr Jenny Donovan with Stanmore Public School year 1 students, Darcy, Phoenix and Soraya in 2019 when tasked with turning Australia's education fortunes around. Picture: John Feder/The Australian

“It is a problem that high schools don’t necessarily see it as their task to teach literacy and numeracy, even though the ability to read is necessary for students to access the rest of the curriculum.

“Mathematics, of all subjects, is sequential and students will be incapable of learning if they’ve missed some of the really important steps along the way.

“Kids can slip through the net.’’

Dr Donovan said the need for all high schools to provide remedial instruction was an “obvious reform’’ to be negotiated this year by federal, state and territory governments in the five-year National School Reform Agreement.

“The answer is not to send a teenager to take lessons with six-year-olds,’’ she said “We need to have alternative support for students who fall behind, such as targeted assistance through small-group tutoring, or streamed group approaches.’’

Dr Donovan said the AERO study, to be released on Monday, showed that nearly half of high schools “don’t do anything to actively address the problem’’.

“Half the teachers weren’t very confident that what they’re doing is making a difference,’’ she said.

The AERO study is based on a survey and interviews involving 382 teachers, principals and educational consultants by the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER).

One teacher told the ACER that plagiarism checks were detecting many Year 7 students “literally just submitting the Wikipedia page’’.

“They will Google the question and then they will hope that the answer gets fed back to them, and then they will just put that answer down,’’ the teacher said.

“It is a different ball game for some of these kids who can’t even put a sentence together.’’

One high school maths teacher did not know how to teach teenagers to count. “We teach Pythagoras or we teach algebra, I’m all good with that,’’ the teacher said. “But how do I teach a kid to count? I don’t know. How do I do that?’’

A senior teacher from a Catholic school in regional Queensland blamed the shortage of qualified maths teachers as a “massive problem’’, with many schools relying on teachers fresh out of university, or those specialising in other subjects.

“We have almost high school students teaching our kids, and they do not have the skill set that they need to deliver Year 9 or Year 7 maths,’’ the teacher told ACER.

“We’ve got teachers that don’t know much more about it than the kids. That’s a tragedy, but that’s true.’’

Large class sizes were revealed as a problem, with a teacher from a Catholic school in NSW revealing: “The other day I took a class of 56 students. Trying to teach them trigonometry – it’s not ideal.’’ Student disengagement was flagged by a teacher from Sydney, who said young boys “will just put their pen down and not do anything’’.

“They don’t bring a pen, they won’t bring an exercise book, they won’t bring a calculator, and that would be probably 20 per cent of our cohort across the school,’’ the teacher said.

Maths teachers said they were required to rush through teaching concepts outlined in the national curriculum and did not have time to help kids catch up.

Como Secondary College principal Digby Mercer with students. Picture: Colin Murty/The Australian

One school that is offering a helping hand to struggling students is Como Secondary College, a public high school in Perth, which employs an “intensive learning team’’ of specialist teachers and aides who support students in small groups.

Principal Digby Mercer said all students were tested when they started high school, with one in three Year 7 students sent to catch-up classes. “The additional classes are part of the school timetable in Years 7, 8 and 9,’’ he said.

Mr Mercer said that three quarters of struggling Year 7 students had caught up with their classmates two years later.

“Those students that faced an uphill battle to stay engaged in school have had their learning transformed and, with it, their life opportunities,’’ he said.