Secondary school students get stuck

Tekst Het Onderwijsblad - Rob Voorwinden - 23 november 2020 - 9 Minuten om te lezen

Picture: Type tank

“Some students have had their eyes on screen saver since the first month of this school year. They really can no longer follow the curriculum. " Iris Offermans, chemistry teacher, feels sorry for them. "I just think it's pathetic."

Last school year there were fewer students than usual. Percentages of almost 100 percent transferers are reported from all over the country. Because having students double after a few difficult months with a lockdown - you don't do that. But some of those students were already in bad shape halfway through last school year, when corona was only circulating in China. Their school results often did not improve in the second half of the year. They too were given the benefit of the doubt and were often promoted to the next group.

Promises

“Of course those students promised to make up for their arrears,” says chemistry teacher Offermans. But yes: the lockdown ended, the catering industry reopened and the holidays started. And then suddenly it was September again and the train continued at full speed. The result: screen saver.

I wrote a very simple sum on the board and no one knew the answer. Really bizarre. It is underestimated how far the level has dropped due to corona

Lecturers all over the country recognize Offermans' problem. 'There are certainly students who could have done better again part of the year,' writes a teacher on the Facebook page of AOb. 'Sometimes the parents still helped them, but unfortunately in the wrong way. And if you do not master your previous subject matter enough, you will get stuck. '

'Many seventh graders from last year have reached a level that is too high,' adds a colleague on Facebook. 'At the moment the points are lower than normal. That is disappointing for students, parents and subject teachers. '

Quite a number of students in my havo-2 class should have been in mavo-2

'A considerable number of students in my HAVO-2 class should have been in MAVO-2,' teacher Iris Wall writes on Facebook. 'They are now noticing their own disadvantage and cannot keep up with the level and speed of havo-2 sufficiently. It is demotivating for them and provides the teachers with extra work because of the extra explanation, guidance, time and control that they require. '

Irregular

“I hear from many colleagues that students' knowledge is more volatile and superficial,” says Ebrina Smallegange, president of the Dutch Association of Mathematics Teachers. And of course, this could be a coincidence or gut feeling. After all, no wide-ranging research has been carried out, so as a good math teacher, keep a close hand. "But I often hear that students have only learned to do the math, and not to apply their knowledge."

Marlise Kruishoop, chair of the English section of the Association of Teachers of Living Languages, also thinks it is still too early for generally applicable statements. "But I hear from my colleagues in Dutch and chemistry that the results are very disappointing." Kruishoop himself works at a school for adult education. "Here at the VAVO some exams have already been marked and colleagues are very shocked."

Bizarre

A teacher who prefers to remain anonymous now has a number of students in 4-VWO who do not actually belong there. At the beginning of this school year he wrote a first-degree equation with one stranger on the board. “Nobody knew the answer. Not even when I got them started. Really bizarre, I've never experienced this in fifteen years. It is underestimated how far the level has fallen due to corona. ”

The students are completely disorganized because they have not had lessons for a while

And not only the substantive knowledge of the subject matter has decreased due to corona: the work attitude of the students has also suffered from the lockdown, as teachers observe. 'The students are completely disorganized because they have not had lessons for a while,' writes a teacher on Facebook.
“My students just don't get to work,” also notes Smallegange of the association of mathematics teachers. "Normally we need a week to get used to after the big vacation, but now we're still in that phase around the autumn vacation."

Incentives

“The pupils are no longer used to sitting in a class and concentrating all day long,” says English teacher Hanne Kouwenberg. “As a teacher it also takes some getting used to all those stimuli at school.”

Kouwenberg notices that students from different school types have reacted differently to the lockdown. “Many VWO students enjoyed planning themselves, while they now have to go back to school and we suddenly pretend they cannot work independently. Vmbo students, on the other hand, have a need for classroom lessons. And at HAVO it can go both ways. One student literally said he just needed a kick in the butt. ”
The experience of math teacher Annemiek van Leeuwen is quite different. “VWO students also need contact and feedback. They, too, will be irrevocably bothered if the direction by the teachers is lost. ”

Get to work

Research by the Radboud Teachers Academy and the secondary education council shows that learning motivation across the board has suffered from the corona crisis. Yes, there is some difference between the grades and types of education, according to the answers given by some 22 students for the summer holidays. But the real difference in motivation is in a good home workplace. Students who have a good home workplace participate more in online classes, are more confident and more diligent.

The big question is of course: what do you as a teacher do with these disadvantages and the lack of motivation? It may partly depend on your subject, say teachers. If your subject is divided into themes, the students may have largely missed one theme, but they can get started again with the new theme this year. Although the lack of knowledge will break them up during the exams.

Border

But if your subject continues in a linear way, it will immediately bother you a lot as a teacher and student. “What you learn in chapter 1, you need in chapter 2,” says chemistry teacher Offermans. "And the knowledge of Chapter 2 in Chapter 3, and so on." That is why Offermans has started this school year to repeat the material from last year. But there is of course a limit to that. “In the end I have to deal with ten chapters this year, in three lessons a week. The students also have to proceed to the exam. ”

Students who want to look through the old material again have to go back almost a full year. Then the courage will fall into her shoes

And of course she tries to motivate the students whose eyes are already on screen saver. “As a teacher, you have the tools for that. But yes: it's not about students who scored an average of 8 in February and a 5 in June. It's about students who already scored a 5 in February and then the crisis had yet to start.” Those students have to work really hard. Offermans: “If I tell them to look through the old material again, they have to go back almost a full year. Then the courage will fall into their shoes.”

Catch-up program

It is never too late to learn the knowledge that does not yet exist, says math teacher Smallegange. But it is hard work, also for the teacher. And in the meantime, education is far from what it was before corona. “In any case, I hope that the schools will remain open, because at school you learn better than at home. Even if you see, certainly with the older students, the viruses, so to speak, floating through the classroom. ”

“Today I had 9 students in my class, of the normal 25,” says teacher Kouwenberg. "There are so many of them in quarantine." And understand her well: she is well equipped with cameras and microphones, online teaching is well facilitated at her school. "But it mainly continues to transmit."
Even in the classroom with a blanket on, because the windows are open, it remains to make do, at a distance of XNUMX meters from the students. Kouwenberg: “You have less sense of whether the material comes across.”

Corona subsidy

Lecturer Van Leeuwen has built in extra repetition on subjects that were discussed last year and that are important again this year. And her school has a catch-up program, set up with a corona subsidy from the government. As a result, her students can sign up for support from homework helpers.
But: is it enough, that extra help and that support? Or do the students who got the benefit of the doubt last year get stuck this school year and we get a record number of duplicates?

No teacher who dares to say anything about this at the moment. But: suppose there is no record number of retirees at the end of this year. Then it might be a good time to kick off the discussion about the meaning and especially the nonsense of sitting down, says VAVO teacher Kruishoop. "Maybe you shouldn't let students sit at all, but teach summer school for a few weeks and then let them continue."

Will the final exam be a massacre this year?

Some of the students who got the benefit of the doubt are in an exam class this year. Will the final exam be a massacre this year? In any case, Minister Arie Slob has the Board for Tests and Exams commissioned to consider 'an appropriate standardization method' for the central final exams of 2021. For the profession-oriented profile subjects It has already been decided at VMBO to end this school year with a school exam instead of a central exam. Van Leeuwen: “The standards could perhaps be a bit more flexible. And you can even determine that afterwards, immediately after the exam. "

Wood

Some teachers have already started doing this on their own during the school exams. “I hear from colleagues that school exams are getting a bit easier,” admits the teacher who wants to remain anonymous. And with him too, by the way. "Normally I expect a spread in grades between 3 and 8. For the first pre-university secondary school exam I try to sit between 5 and 10 this year."

He continues: “In recent years the difference between the school exam and the central exam has been about half a point for my groups. This year that may well be a big point. They deserve that too, because these were two very strange, difficult school years. ”

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