Excluded - BBC2 drama

[Kathryn]

I thought it was quite good although it touched on issues which couldn't really be explored in depth - like the Academy issue. It captured well a slice of school life, but ended a bit inconclusively I thought, e.g. there was no indication of what the school would go on to do to help the child involved. In that way it was true to life I guess!

 

K x

[Karen A]

We watched it by default when our broadband provider failed to get timing of recording ''The Great British Bake Off'' right.We were 15 minutes into the grand final when the recording cut to ''Excluded''

 

However once I had got over my grief I thought excluded was very interesting but it did end very inconclusively.

[Kazzen161]

I also thought the ending was abrupt. It was interesting seeing the pressures on the Head to exclude vs not to exclude. It really only touched the surface - it was not clear what help the boy had already had or what help he would now get.

[baddad]

I sort of enjoyed it, but thought in some ways it seemed to be written by 'tick box'...

An overbearing, bullying teacher, other teachers who were just inept/useless and a Mister Chips who brought out the best in the boy just by offering him some r-e-s-p-e-c-t... I thought the boy was far too passive - hardly representative of a 'disruptive student' (why did he keep getting sent out of class to be 'shadowed' while all the other equally disruptive students were ignored?) apart from when goaded by the overbearing, bullying teacher into throwing a chair across the room.

Unhappy home life, bringing it into school.. isolated and alone on the playground... inner city comp, drastically under-resourced with a largely ineffective/disinterested staff team (apart from the model headmistress - was this written by a headmistress, by any chance? - and the new kid on the block). I just couldn't figure it. Maybe they didn't want to risk offending anyone?

I can understand that it would have been equally tick-boxy and cliched to have gangs of brutal thugs roaming the playground picking on the vulnerable as the root of the boy's problems, or to have had gangs of brutal thugs disrupting classrooms as the root of all the teacher's problems, or to have had an entire staff of overbearing, bullying, inept, useless teachers as the root of all the problems, but at least it would have had some sort of 'context' rather than just dribbling along aimlessly.

The only bit I did like, actually, was the ending! I think to have taken it further - to have found a 'solution', either by exclusion or reform - would have been a bit too neat and tidy and possibly made it a bit of a 'moral tale', sort of, this is what we can achieve if the system tries harder or this is what we lose when we throw children on the scrapheap, or this is what happens when school and home aren't working together or... there are lots of variations, but all of them a bit too pat when the reality is often much grittier than we're being presented with here. At grass roots, though, I don't think disillusioned kids who will blossom if given half the chance are the major problem we have in our schools, or that ineffective, uninspired teaching is the cause of the kid's disillusionment.

 

L&P

 

BD

Edited September 22, 2010 by baddad

[mygifts1306]

I havent watched it but hope to watch it.

[Kathryn]

I think to have taken it further - to have found a 'solution', either by exclusion or reform - would have been a bit too neat and tidy and possibly made it a bit of a 'moral tale', sort of, this is what we can achieve if the system tries harder or this is what we lose when we throw children on the scrapheap, or this is what happens when school and home aren't working together or... there are lots of variations, but all of them a bit too pat when the reality is often much grittier than we're being presented with here.

 

I agree, as I said above, it's more of a slice of real life. Actually I fear in real life the reality would be that the kid would have been permanently excluded and with a parent who seemed incapable of challenging the process, would have ended up languishing in the nearest PRU, mixing with the rough kids and embarking on a life of crime.

 

On passivity/disruptive students - you may be right, but from my experience of teaching it is sometimes the passive ones - the ones who appear to silently and insolently challenge your authority - who get under your skin: it's often easier to deal with the ones who are blatantly and obviously difficult. Sometimes as a teacher it's possible to keep a lid on things to a point and then it's the one quiet but challenging comment that gets to you and causes you to overreact. A new teacher has to learn to handle those situations so I did find that quite realistic - he wasn't obviously inspiring from the beginning but gradually found a way through to his pupils.

 

A timely reminder of why I gave up teaching teens - never had the knack.

 

K x

Edited September 22, 2010 by Kathryn