Re: BTEC in drama or A Levels
Posted: Sat Aug 27, 2011 10:23 am
Good reputations, built over many years can crumble in a single year if key people leave - and sadly, in education, the managers are frequently people who weren't very good at teaching and got promoted up out of harms way. So in school, there's no guarantee the music teacher can actually read music, and the dance teacher could well be the PE teacher who had grade 3 Tap (when a tot themselves) on their CV - and that made them qualified to teach dance. Teachers get 'redeployed' rather than made redundant. I remember one who thought Jazz Dance was aerobics to jazz music - honestly!
Colleges and school rarely explain things like BTEC properly, figuring it will confuse, so the 50% acting, 25% dance isn't actually how it really works. There are a huge pile of units in the specification, and some are kind of important foundations everyone needs - so they become a core unit across all the pathways - dance, acting, performance, MT etc. Other units are very important for the particular pathway, and then the others are specialist units which get picked. When the places apply to run the course, they pick what they fancy from the list to make the course unique to them. Most, of course, pick common sense ones. Some bigger colleges can have more on offer than are required (usually 18) - they can then afford to give students choice. So the dancers might do more specialist dance areas, the actors might have their own favourites and those with musical aptitude can pick theirs. If the college is big enough to do this financially, then the results in terms of grades are better. People always do better on units they actually like. In smaller colleges with a fixed programme - then it does mean the acting unit will have some pretty hopeless people in it, and in dance units there will be some people who are just never, ever, going to be dancers - which can if not controlled dilute the difficulty and complexity of the work. So the teacher is unlikely to pick a play to work on that the weakest ones can't manage - which if they were all better, they could. This means that sometimes upper quality levels get set by the weakest student, who has to be able to at least pass. This is something OFSTED monitor. If work set is too demanding for the weak ones, it's considered bad! Moving the iffy dancers into a different area works best - but sometimes can't be done. Sometimes colleges will dump a unit after a week or two when it becomes clear the skills of the group are just not going to make it work. Ballet is a good example. If you run the unit in an area where there is an excellent, old fashioned 'Miss Betty' type dance school, then all the kids are already really good at ballet, because they've all been having lessons for years - so they get Distinctions almost effortlessly, because they really are that good. The dance teacher can then design really tough but excellent work for them. If one year none of the intake have had ballet lessons, or worse, maybe just two or three - they are likely to scrap the ballet unit because no matter how hard they work, a year of a couple of hours a week is going to not be enough to get the stamina and discipline up - let alone technique.
Parents need to really understand what goes one and ask questions. My experience is that they very rarely do - and you can't rely on what the kids tell you because they don't understand either. The real beauty of BTEC is that you as a parent can track the kids progress, almost from day one. Colleges do assessment throughout the year, so it's easy to build up a picture. If your kids are constantly getting just passes, then it is too hard for them, or they're not trying hard enough. Within 3 months, you should know how they are doing - and if it needs a kick up the bum, it's not too late. BTEC assessment can, with the willingness of the teacher, be repeated and grades improved. This is fundamental. If they get a pass, you as a parent can look at the work they were set and see exactly what they were assessed on, and what they needed to do to get the better grades. It's not a secret - most teachers give this info out when they set the work. No surprises at the end. Every single student knows how well, or not they are doing. Many teachers even tell them what they needed to have done to get a better grade, and invite them to do it - not all take the opportunity.
This is why I like it so much - it places responsibility onto the kids and lets them make their own mind up if they wish to put themselves out and do the work to a better standard.
Colleges and school rarely explain things like BTEC properly, figuring it will confuse, so the 50% acting, 25% dance isn't actually how it really works. There are a huge pile of units in the specification, and some are kind of important foundations everyone needs - so they become a core unit across all the pathways - dance, acting, performance, MT etc. Other units are very important for the particular pathway, and then the others are specialist units which get picked. When the places apply to run the course, they pick what they fancy from the list to make the course unique to them. Most, of course, pick common sense ones. Some bigger colleges can have more on offer than are required (usually 18) - they can then afford to give students choice. So the dancers might do more specialist dance areas, the actors might have their own favourites and those with musical aptitude can pick theirs. If the college is big enough to do this financially, then the results in terms of grades are better. People always do better on units they actually like. In smaller colleges with a fixed programme - then it does mean the acting unit will have some pretty hopeless people in it, and in dance units there will be some people who are just never, ever, going to be dancers - which can if not controlled dilute the difficulty and complexity of the work. So the teacher is unlikely to pick a play to work on that the weakest ones can't manage - which if they were all better, they could. This means that sometimes upper quality levels get set by the weakest student, who has to be able to at least pass. This is something OFSTED monitor. If work set is too demanding for the weak ones, it's considered bad! Moving the iffy dancers into a different area works best - but sometimes can't be done. Sometimes colleges will dump a unit after a week or two when it becomes clear the skills of the group are just not going to make it work. Ballet is a good example. If you run the unit in an area where there is an excellent, old fashioned 'Miss Betty' type dance school, then all the kids are already really good at ballet, because they've all been having lessons for years - so they get Distinctions almost effortlessly, because they really are that good. The dance teacher can then design really tough but excellent work for them. If one year none of the intake have had ballet lessons, or worse, maybe just two or three - they are likely to scrap the ballet unit because no matter how hard they work, a year of a couple of hours a week is going to not be enough to get the stamina and discipline up - let alone technique.
Parents need to really understand what goes one and ask questions. My experience is that they very rarely do - and you can't rely on what the kids tell you because they don't understand either. The real beauty of BTEC is that you as a parent can track the kids progress, almost from day one. Colleges do assessment throughout the year, so it's easy to build up a picture. If your kids are constantly getting just passes, then it is too hard for them, or they're not trying hard enough. Within 3 months, you should know how they are doing - and if it needs a kick up the bum, it's not too late. BTEC assessment can, with the willingness of the teacher, be repeated and grades improved. This is fundamental. If they get a pass, you as a parent can look at the work they were set and see exactly what they were assessed on, and what they needed to do to get the better grades. It's not a secret - most teachers give this info out when they set the work. No surprises at the end. Every single student knows how well, or not they are doing. Many teachers even tell them what they needed to have done to get a better grade, and invite them to do it - not all take the opportunity.
This is why I like it so much - it places responsibility onto the kids and lets them make their own mind up if they wish to put themselves out and do the work to a better standard.