This week we’re turning our attention to a different area of Scottish education and welcoming a new Secret Teacher. They have spent several years teaching in primary schools, and in their first column they talk about how those schools have changed for the better since they were a child.

When you get talking to somebody and they find out that you’re a primary school teacher, you always get asked the same questions.

‘Does your school do this? Does your school do that?’. They’ll say ‘I used to love when this happened. I used to love when that happened’.

People assume that what they got taught is what everybody across the country has been taught, and in the same way. A lot of people have that nostalgia when it comes to schools, and believe ‘schools were so much better when I was younger’, but they will quite quickly tell you some absolutely terrible things that happened to them in school.

The Herald:
They’ll tell you ‘it’s a joke now, standards are slipping… oh yeah, I used to get hit when I misspelled a word’, to which I’ll respond: ‘Maybe things have improved…’

I think my experiences of school have informed the way I approach teaching.

The way we teach maths where I work is night and day compared to what I experienced in school. I always considered myself to be someone who couldn’t do maths, and really struggled with it at school.

I find that now I’m teaching, because I had that background and have had the training on how to teach maths, I now have a positive view of teaching maths and I understand why children don’t get it. I really enjoyed reading and writing when I was at school and found it very easy, and I sometimes find that harder, because you just expect children to get it.

With maths, it was slightly different, and I can understand where they’re having issues and that the reason for them not liking quick times table activities might be that it’s putting them under pressure, and they’re not confident about it and want to hide that from people.

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Inclusion is a real hot topic among teachers. Are we giving enough support? I remember an experience growing up, right at the start of inclusion as a ‘thing’ in Scottish education.

There was a girl with Down’s Syndrome who joined my class. While that was undoubtedly difficult for the school and they had to ensure there was additional staffing in place, there were benefits.

The child in question got a mainstream experience, and we got experience of seeing somebody different. They weren’t hidden away, they were part of our class.

My dad talks about the time when we were walking on the street and bumped into the girl and her family. I just chatted to her like any other person in my class, and he thought it was special for the family to see that their child had been accepted and was just part of a normal classroom, not being treated differently.

I always think about that when people complain about inclusion. I do get it, and there is sometimes a lot of work, a lot of support and a lot of things that need to be put in place, and systems can fail a lot of children who aren’t being included properly.

But there is that other side of it. It’s not a bad experience to meet different people in society with different backgrounds and additional support needs. Being around that is quite an important and useful thing. That’s what’s on my mind, seeing the positive side in inclusion.

The Herald:
Being more accepting of others, whether it be in terms of race or LGBT education, that has been a massive improvement. Even in the last six or seven years, there’s been a big improvement in attitudes towards diversity and recognising that people are different, and that it’s not necessarily a bad thing.

In school we say ‘everybody’s equal, but everybody’s different’. We all have our own strengths and weaknesses. I think that’s been a big improvement, just in terms of people being accepted as part of a school community.

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School is now a more enjoyable place to be. Some people would disagree with that, and would probably see that as a negative in that the children are not learning.

The learning is massively important and it’s always the number one priority, but there is a real focus on trying to get children to be happy in schools.