Ministers have been accused of failing to listen to sound advice they were given by teachers' unions after they eventually chose to shelve plans to introduce new baseline testing for reception pupils across England and Wales.

Earlier this week, it was announced that the tests would be scrapped for this year, because the three testing systems that were being used would have proven incomparable. The Department for Education said this means the tests would be unfair and would offer an unreliable source when it comes to measuring the progress of children across the whole country. However, while this move has been welcomed by teachers' unions, they have been fast to criticise the government for taking so long to come to this conclusion, with one even quipping that "it is hard to avoid saying 'we told you so'." The baseline tests were supposed to be a way for schools to be able to have a starting point, from which they could measure the progress of pupils throughout their time at primary school.

However, they faced stiff opposition from the get go, and National Union of Teachers' Christine Blower said: "Flaws in the scheme were well known to Early Years educators." She added: "They were pointed out to the Department for Education when it first consulted on the scheme. "The attempt to make baseline work has cost millions, has prevented children from settling into their school and increased the workload of their teachers." In its statement about the pulling out of the scheme to introduce baseline testing, the Department for Education said: "That study has shown that the assessments are not sufficiently comparable to provide a fair starting point from which to measure pupil progress. "In light of that, we will not be using this year's results as the baseline for progress measures. This would be inappropriate and unfair to schools."

The number of young people applying to get onto teacher training courses has fallen in the last year, according to the latest statistics released by the body that deals with college and university applications.

UCAS data shows that this year's applicant numbers for teacher training courses were down, with as many as 6.5 per cent fewer people looking to get themselves onto such a course. However, while this will be a huge concern for the industry that it appears teaching is becoming a far less popular profession, and that the government appears to be doing little to rectify this issue, there was good news as well.

Despite a drop in applicants, the number of people accepted to teacher training courses actually climbed. Some 42,400 people applied in 2015, which was a drop of 3,000 people when compared to 2014.
However, of these applicants, as many as 25,300 gained places, which gave courses an acceptance rate of nearly 60 per cent. This was compared to the year before, when the acceptance rate sat at around 52 per cent, and only 23,700 people were accepted onto courses.

Despite the fall in applicant numbers, the Department for Education said there are still plenty of people who want to teach in the UK. It said in a statement that "many people relish the chance to change lives on a daily basis". "There are over 1,000 more graduates training to teach secondary subjects in the 2015-2016 academic year compared to last, including record levels of trainees holding a first-class degree." Nansi Ellis, Association of Teachers and Lecturers assistant general secretary, was less optimistic, saying that even though there were a higher number of people accepted onto courses in 2015, there's still an issue with targets for recruitment not being reached. "While these figures highlight a small rise in the proportion of applicants accepted on teacher training courses, they don't show the rise in numbers needed to combat previously unmet teacher training targets," she said.

The government's decision to announce a plan that would see all schools in England and Wales removed from local authority power and turned into academies has been criticised for the past few weeks, and now a headteacher has quit his position in protest against the plans.

Since the government announcement, various teachers' unions up and down the country have carried out protests to show the government that the academies plan is not welcomed by the education sector itself. However, ministers say that it's all about bringing parity and fairness to the funding schools receive, making it universal across the country.

Jeremy Gargan, headteacher at Aycliffe Village Primary School in County Durham, wrote to parents of his pupils, telling them why he personally opposes the scheme, before he sensationally quit his role. In his letter, he heavily criticised the National Funding Formula announced by Education Secretary Nicky Morgan. "The government appears to be very blinkered in its approach. "If the route to raising standards was through academisation, why have only 2,500, out of nearly 17,000 schools, chosen to become academies?"

Mr Gargan also told BBC Tees: "I believe that the enforced route of converting everybody to an academy won't actually raise standards." "I believe that we run our school effectively here ourselves, and if we were forced into a multi-academy trust, there's a likelihood that another school would actually be calling the shots and telling us how we should be running our own school." In the letter he sent to pupils' parents, Mr Gargan also said that national targets that are being set for achievement at present are setting pupils up to fail, potentially turning them against school at a time when it is critical they engage with their education.

People applying for teaching jobs in London may think the process is the same all over the UK, but in Scotland it could be about to change.

A series of tests have been published that could see aspiring teachers quizzed on grammar and basic arithmetic. The papers are devised by Education Scotland in partnership with several universities and are a direct response to a report published in 2011 by the former chief inspector of education, which called for an improvement in teacher training. As they are already online, people can see if they are of the standard required.

The tests work alongside a separate grammar guide for serving teachers who are not fully confident about language nuances, but will still be secondary to traditional university assessments.   

People who are looking for a teaching role north of the border should know the extra tests are not mandatory, but Lindsay Paterson, a professor of education policy at Edinburgh University, believes they could be helpful as evidence shows many trainee teachers have "extremely poor" literacy and numeracy skills.

He told The Scotsman: "The key thing is that people are coming into teacher training who haven't picked up these skills anywhere else. If people with better basic skills were coming into the profession, that would solve the problem."

The original recommendation in the 2011 report said threshold for entry on a teacher training course should allow for some candidate weaknesses to be addressed by the student during their study, but outlined a "demanding level" was necessary as a "prerequisite for competence to teach".

If you are working towards applying for a teaching job, what do you think about the plans? Do you think they are demeaning and unnecessary considering the standard of education on your course, or would you welcome the chance to address any nagging doubts that you may have?

People in primary and secondary teaching jobs know that there is a lot the government can do to help schools, teachers and pupils.

However, the latest ministerial announcement looks like it will come to the aid of hard-pressed parents. 

Education minister David Laws outlined new guidance to end the practice of using a single school uniform supplier in a bid to help reduce the cost of school uniforms. He said: "The fact, for example, that it is too easy for schools to have these single supplier arrangements where parents can end up paying more than they need to."

"And there are also things that we feel we should get rid of." "For example, it's possible at the moment to have cash back arrangements where schools can have these arrangements with single suppliers and in return get some of the profit from the business."

Mr Laws explained that school uniforms can be an important sign of identity and pride, but these factors should not come at the detriment of parents who are being forced to pay more than they need to for their children's clothing.

The government does not feel that the issue needs to be enshrined in law, but an Office of Fair Trading investigation last year suggested three-quarters of UK state schools placed restrictions on where uniforms could be bought and teachers' unions believe that without official rules, many schools could ignore the guidance.

Last month, the Local Government Association stated schools had a "moral duty" to help parents with costs, but explained that many uniform changes have been imposed by name alterations with the shift to academies.

As a teacher, is this something that you feel parents you speak to will be happy with? Or does the government need to back the guidance up with law changes? 

A senior academic has claimed that the methods used by Ofsted inspectors in England for making their judgments about schools may not be reliable.

Professor Robert Coe, voiced a concern of many people in maths and English teacher jobs, namely that there was no proof the watchdog's lesson observations led to valid judgments.

The director of Durham University's Centre for Evaluation and Monitoring told a major educational research conference that Ofsted needs to show evidence that its techniques are valid and evidence-backed because millions of pounds are being spent in the hope that inspections can be a method to help raise educational standards.

Speaking to the BBC, Professor Coe pointed to some studies that suggested inspections are detrimental, with schools taking a long time to recover from negative inspections.

He said: "If you sit in a classroom, everyone thinks they can judge how good the lesson is - but can you really?

"Quite a lot of research says that you can't."

"Teachers are trying to do what Ofsted wants - but does it really make things better?"

Ofsted inspections could be affected by variables such as the charisma and confidence of the teacher, the subject matter being taught, students' behaviour in the classroom and the time of day, said the professor, who questioned how ratings could be consistent.

Sir Michael Wilshaw Ofsted's chief inspector responded by saying the claims were "tosh and nonsense".

He told the Times Educational Supplement that he is unaware of any head teacher who doesn't believe that classroom observation isn't anything other than an aid and highlighted Ofsted figures showing a nine percentage point rise in the proportion of schools judged good or outstanding as a way inspections had "galvanised the system".

As a teacher or someone looking for a teaching job, who do you think is right? Are inspections necessary? Are Ofsted conducting them in a thorough and fair way? Do they galvanise the system?

People in English and maths teacher jobs know the benefit of time and consistency when guiding children through a syllabus. 

They may not be surprised to hear that two new reports have found an increasing use of supply teachers is affecting pupils' learning and an over-reliance on temporary cover when teachers are absent is resultingin children being tasked with work that is not demanding enough.

The claims come from the Wales Audit Office and watchdog Estyn and the groups believe that it is secondary school pupils who are the most affected by teacher absence.

A lack of continuity in teaching is magnified in Wales where nearly ten per cent of lessons are currently being covered by supply teachers and on average, each teacher in Wales is absent for seven days a year, compared to 4.5 days in England.

If the absence levels in Wales could be brought in line with England, it is estimated Welsh schools could cut the number of days requiring cover by around 60,000, which would save more than £9 million a year in the cost of teacher cover.

Estyn states: "Supply staff who do not normally work at the school do not know the needs of the learners as well as their usual classroom teachers and the work set is often too undemanding and does not engage learners."

A spokesperson for the Welsh government said the reviews were carried out so authorities could have a clear idea of the impact that teacher absence has on pupils and classrooms.

Shadow minister for education Angela Burns said: "Over-burdened with red tape, demoralised, stressed and dealing with ever-moving goalposts, our teachers are not being allowed to do the very thing we need them to do - teach.

"It is these staff who know what's best for our children and these staff who should be allowed to work with them freely - and permanently."

A report that has revealed details of attacks on teachers in Cambridgeshire by pupils as young as 4 may not be unique, according to a leading specialist education recruitment company.

TLTP Education (The London Teaching Pool).

TLTP’s most recent survey of teachers found that 69% said that they or their colleagues had been verbally abused by students in the previous twelve months compared with 64% in 2011.  Physical assaults on respondents or their colleagues were down slightly from the 20% recorded in TLTP’s previous survey; however, 8% said that they had been assaulted and 9% said that a colleague had been assaulted.

“Teachers accept that very often they are working in complex situations and working with children from very challenging backgrounds and with serious issues of their own to address. They accept that and for many helping those kids is one of the reasons why they have entered the profession. But when you have, as we have had, teachers having had a compass thrown at them in class by a student you have to say a line has been crossed. Teachers are entitled to the same protection in the workplace that any of us have a right to expect.”

TLTP Education (The London Teaching Pool), which is a member of the Recruitment & Employment Confederation, is an educational specialist with more than 60 years’ combined recruitment experience. It has placed more than 5000 candidates in jobs in London and the Home Counties in the last seven years.  And as experts in the special needs sector, it also provides psychologists, speech and language therapists and physiotherapists for school environments. 

Just days after concerns were expressed over the amount of classes being covered by supply teachers, a separate report has said that supply teacher numbers are dangerously low.

Several Scottish councils have told the BBC there has been a dramatic drop in the number of supply teachers registered locally, while Scotland's biggest teaching union - the EIS - responded by stating the situation is at crisis point.

EIS believes that the shortage is due to the reductions in supply teachers' remuneration and also the fact that teacher training graduates are now finding full-time secondary teaching jobs and are no longer available to cover lessons.

Stirling Council stated: "We are currently experiencing difficulty in the primary sector and also in with subject specialisms such physics, maths and home economics in secondary sector."

The union claims more than a third of supply requests from councils are not being met and it is the pupils who are losing out. General secretary Larry Flanagan said: "That means that pupils are not being taught by subject specialists or they're in extended assemblies or sometimes they're sitting in the canteen being supervised because no teacher is available."

Just this week, Welsh authorities claimed that an over-reliance on supply teachers was also detrimental to the quality of learning that students received, with the country looking to try and cut the number of lessons that are covered by temporary teaching staff to give children some consistency in their lessons.

Watchdog Estyn explained that supply teachers cannot know pupils and their learning habits as well as regular teachers and too often they set undemanding work that does not engage learners.

If you are looking for a teaching job or already work in a classroom what are your views on the subject of supply teachers? Do you know of any particularly good experiences your pupils have had with them? Would you be willing to consider a supply teacher role?

Performing arts could be marginalised by new plans to alter school league tables, head teachers have argued.

From 2014, schools where students take both dance and drama subjects at GCSE level will see the qualifications listed as one in league tables and this could have a dramatic effect on pupils' choices.

"Some schools may be tempted to say, 'If we can't count both we won't let pupils do both,'" explained Duncan Baldwin, deputy policy director of the head teachers' union ASCL.

The changes are also set to limit other pairs of subjects that the government believes have syllabuses that are too similar, such as art and photography or music and music technology.

Speaking to BBC News, Mr Baldwin, agreed with the government that there was scope to change the league tables as some schools had been manipulating them by running two very similar courses and counting grades twice. However, he believes the changes will affect other schools, courses and pupils who were learning very "distinct disciplines", stating there needs to be a debate "where you draw the line". 

The union leader pointed out the changes stand to penalise arts more than humanities, with similar subjects such as history and ancient history to be continued to be counted as two separate grades in the league tables. As such, ASCL has asked the Department of Education to take advice from subject specialists before swinging its axe.

In a statement, the government responded by saying: "We use discounting to discourage schools from entering their pupils into a number of similar qualifications."

As someone who is looking for a teaching job or already works in a school, what do you think about this? Have you seen evidence of courses that are too similar to count as two distinct grades? Are pupils who favour arts subjects being unfairly punished?