Teaching Styles / Sorting Hat

[Shaun Hately]

No: HPFGUIDX 157879

dumbledore11214 writes: 

> Alla: 
> 
> I thought about cutting this part of your post entirely, since I've 
> said many times what I think about Snape um... "teaching" Neville ( 
> sorry, there is absolutely no way I would call what Snape does here 
> as teaching :)), but then  I could not help myself with giving piece 
> of advise for Severus dearest, if this is indeed his mindset in this 
> scene. 
> 
> Um, Snape, you taught this boy for three years by now. Think harder 
> as to how reach him. Talk to the teacher who was succesful in 
> reaching him without threatening to poison his pet. Sorry, I just 
> cannot view this scene as humorous, I find to be well... you know.

Shaun:
It isn't Snape's job or role to 'reach' Neville. It is his role and job to 
'teach' Neville. They are not the same thing at all. 

It would be nice if Snape was able to 'reach' Neville, but the simple fact 
is that virtually all teachers have some students they cannot reach 
effectively. Every child is different, every child has a different 
personality and it's really not reasonable to expect every single teacher to 
always be able to find a way of connecting to every child. It is great when 
they can - it really is - but it isn't reasonable to expect total success 
all the time. 

And when it doesn't happen - when a teacher cannot 'reach' a child should 
they just give up on 'teaching' the child as well? In my view, while it's 
wonderful to do both, if you can't manage one, then trying to accomplish the 
other is still worth while. 

I've been teaching a class of 26 recently. With 25 of the children, I had 
absolutely no problem getting them to learn without having to resort to any 
real unpleasantness. But #26 was a different matter. Nothing I tried worked 
with him - and I tried quite a few different things - until I started taking 
a heavily punitive approach. Basically, I found myself forced to scare the 
poor kid in order to get him to take care and pay attention to instructions 
in class. And that works with this kid. 

With regards to Neville and his toad - in my view (and I've outlined the 
evidence why I hold it on previous occasions), Trevor was never in any real 
danger. Snape let Neville think his toad was in danger to frighten him, but 
that is all. And considering the class I have a hard time seeing that as 
unreasonable. If students misbrew potions they *could* kill themselves or 
others. There are *very* serious consequences for carelessness in that 
class, and students must learn to take the risks seriously. So far that 
doesn't seem to have happened with Neville. 

Alla:
> To make a long story short, I love it, but the question to you is 
> why would you want it? I mean, you seem to like House system, but 
> wouldn't the Houses be truly houses anymore?

Shaun:
In the real world plenty of schools that have house systems have house 
systems that are based on random allocation. Whether or not the Houses are 
truly Houses or not doesn't really have much to do with how the students are 
assigned to them. If a school makes houses important, if they actually play 
a role in the life of the school, then they will be important regardless of 
how students are assigned to them. 

Alla:
> Would you just prefer for the names to be there? What if the 
> students be just sorting in four different dormitories with no 
> names? What is the significance left in House system?

Shaun:
It could still have significance, if the school chose to make it 
significant. For a start, at Hogwarts, the Heads of Houses seem to have 
primary responsibility for the welfare of their students which is (in my 
view) an eminently sensible idea - it allows a particular teacher to focus 
on particular students, meaning they are likely to get to know those 
students better, which is important in terms of student welfare. 

At the school I attended with the strongest house system, our placement in 
houses was *mostly* random - this school had the advantage of many students 
having previously been together at its prep schools, and so they did tweak 
house allocations for particular reasons based on the knowledge they 
gathered on students, but at least 80%, probably 90% of allocations were 
random (during my time at the school, they started looking at the idea of 
having a less random selection). 

And these Houses formed the core of the schools 'welfare' approach. Your 
Housemaster had ultimate responsibility for your welfare during your time at 
the school (we also had a 'tutor' system run within the House where teachers 
took personal responsibility for a small number of pupils all from that 
House). By having this divided on House lines, it meant you were within the 
same group for the whole time you were at the school, and that meant that 
the people responsible for your welfare really had a good chance to get to 
know you. It also helped those who had a problem making friends in large 
groups to find smaller groups that you knew would remain consistent - who 
was in your classes every year changed - who was in your House remained the 
same. 

And that was *mostly* based on a random allocation system. 

BTW, even though it was mostly random, quite fierce rivalries could develop 
between Houses - especially on sporting matters. 

(I visited my old school again recently and was somewhat amused to discover 
that our Great Hall is now hung with banners representing the Houses on a 
permanent basis - we used to hang them only rarely. I talked to some people 
and discovered that like many other schools here, they've started making a 
bigger deal of Houses in the wake of the Harry Potter books - there's even a 
House points system now for good behaviour - when I was there, House points 
were solely based on sports results).