Teacher Spotlight

This is the first in a series of interviews with teachers working in secondary education in the UK. At Stairway Learning, we believe that teachers are doing some of the most important work in the world. We want to highlight some of the stories of teachers working on the front line, and provide a platform for their ideas about the future of education.

Name: Grace Dang

How did you get into teaching, and what were some of your motivations?

I fell into teaching after doing a degree in Psychology, but I had always thought about going down the educational route. For me, the dream is to become an educational psychologist working with students with special needs, so the first step for me was to get teaching experience. I joined Teach First as they provided a fast route into teaching, and had a fantastic experience with them.

With Teach First, I worked in environments and schools serving the most disadvantaged students, having come from a similar background myself. After two years with Teach First, I realised that teaching students with special needs is really important, but actually, every child, regardless of what needs or labels they have, needs fair access to a good education.

You’ve hit on something there that we are really interested in at Stairway. There is a very clear gap in access to educational opportunities depending on students’ backgrounds, and there are many reasons for this. What are your thoughts on the key challenges for students from more disadvantaged backgrounds, and how we can look to close the gap?

I think that one of the big problems is rooted in aspirations. I went to school in Islington, and most of the people there came from similar working class backgrounds to me acrossHackney, Islington and Haringey.

I was a young carer from age 11. When I was looking after my brother and was unable to get my homework done, my teachers often told me not to worry; that they weren’t expecting much from me anyway. This really hit home with me, and I was left wondering why I was bothering to do my homework if my teachers weren’t expecting me to do it anyway.

As a result, I fell out of education and didn’t take it seriously for a while. Thankfully, a little later on, I had some inspirational people who forced me to be the one to decide that my education was important. My Dad had come from Vietnam during the Vietnam War, and had seen his hometown burned to nothing, but still came to university and started his own business in the UK. His encouragement and belief in the value of education, alongside some of my teachers, really helped me to take it seriously again.

A lot of students have parents who have been through a similar struggle, but have not seen the light at the end of the tunnel. This can leave them subconsciously giving the impression that education doesn’t matter, that it hadn’t worked for them, and students can easily take on this attitude. It is sometimes left to the teachers to be flying the flag of education.

Do you think that the difference in mindset is key, and that your role as a teacher in many ways is to identify when the mindset is negative, and find ways to provide motivation?

It can be a vicious cycle coming from a working class background. Something I am really keen for students to realise is that you can break this cycle by going through the right experiences and putting in the effort.

Some students set up in their mind that they just aren’t good at Maths, and unfortunately it doesn’t matter what a teacher or a parent says in this case.

For me, it’s not just about providing motivation for the academic side, but also about giving students the opportunity to explore what they might do in the future. With all the technology that is available, it is really easy for students to go home and switch off with games or TV, without any conversations about their future happening. I think talking about the future and careers is a key part of developing the right mindset in education.

What do you see as the potential for technology in education over the next 5 years?

I feel that a lot of potential lies in moving away from reliance on pen and paper. From the teacher’s side, we spend a lot of time marking work, and taking work online has the power to free up some of this time. From the student side, it gives them a different way of engaging with Maths and it can be very powerful. Students are very technologically literate, and technology forms a large part of their lives. Its great to incorporate something they are so familiar with, and it can help it to feel less like work!

However, I am conscious that we should proceed cautiously with technology. I do worry that students may forget how to write! I had an interesting experience with a student recently while we were learning circles for the first time. I introduced the idea of pi, and wrote it up on the board. But one of my students couldn’t stop calling it ‘tt’, because he couldn’t see why you would named two capital T’s as pi! He was saying “It doesn’t look like any pie that I’ve ever eaten!”.

I also think technology has potential in the classroom. I have seen teachers take videos of themselves explaining concepts, and allowing each student to watch the video on their own device at their own pace. The teacher is then free to answer questions, and it avoids of pausing a lesson for students who don’t quite understand something. A platform that is able to do this could be something exciting in the future.

What are some of your key challenges on a daily basis in the classroom?

As well as we try to teach and give feedback, there is still a large proportion that is down to memory. There’s so much to learn, especially across 10 GCSEs, and this is a lot to remember in one go. This also means that having a day off ill, or having a week off ill, can cause students to lose a lot of lesson time, and create even more of burden in terms of material to remember. I am really interested in how we can help students to remember everything they have learned more effectively.

I think that focus can also be a challenge. It’s tough, because you are aware that students are sometimes listening, and sometimes not. They may be paying attention at the start of explaining something, but lose that focus along the way. I think this is where misconceptions can be introduced, and I spend a lot of time making sure that I give enough examples to catch these misconceptions before they happen.

What are your thoughts on the GCSE curriculum in its current state, particularly through the lens of what is required in the job market?

I met some friends last weekend, and we were actually talking about our education and how we remember things. I am in full support of the education sector, and often highlight how much it has improved even since I was a student. I feel like students are learning a lot which can help them in the future. There is a huge range in what is being taught, particularly in the Science and Maths curriculum.

However, I was talking to a group of engineers, and they made the point that even in their highly technical careers, they don’t use a many of the ideas in the GCSE curriculum. This is something I deal with from students, too; it can sometimes be hard to give them an explanation of exactly where they will use the concepts they are learning.

I do worry whether we are making the syllabus applicable to students of all levels of understanding. Some students sitting the foundation course may not fundamentally understand the number system, so bringing in more complex ideas might not be the priority.

We would love to hear your feedback! If you have any comments, feel free to add them below 👇. You can also contact us at Stairway Support, or via our Website.