In Stephen Petty’s recent Tes article, he defined primary and secondary as being like “alien worlds”. In this figurative space race, Petty argues, primary teachers have the tougher job, be it in terms of pupil need, assessment or simply the number of snotty noses they have to contend with on a daily basis.

As a secondary-trained teacher, it wasn’t this conclusion in his article that made me feel deeply uneasy, but instead the reinstatement of a division that is still so woefully entrenched in the world of education.

As a secondary-trained English teacher, I’ve been regularly faced with blunt comparisons between the end of key stage 2 expected standard for writing and the quality expected in the GCSE English language exam. “What on earth do students do for five years?” comes the irritating and short-sighted complaint.

Of course, in this example, as many primary colleagues will recognise, it doesn’t take much reflection to see that there are numerous new social and educational demands on students as they begin KS3: the widening breadth of study, the more challenging mode of assessment and demand for independence, all against reduced or less flexible curriculum time for individual subjects.

Of course, it is perhaps unsurprising that relationships become frayed when there are so many external pressures in both phases. We become inward-looking in a kind of Blitz spirit as we batten down the hatches and prepare for what is on its way. 

Bringing primary and secondary together

What we must strive to do is ensure that cross-phase conversation doesn’t begin from this position of value judgement which nurtures feelings of superiority on the one hand and resentment on the other. This is the trap which Petty readily falls into.

If we can ask questions of one another without the need to create yet another taxonomy not only will we be modelling the empathy we expect from our pupils, but we may also be able to develop a greater understanding of the wider educational world we find ourselves working within.

Of course, there is a quicker way to build this understanding - one that Petty omits completely: that of the all-through school. What happens when “these two endangered species” don’t, in fact, work “in very different habitats” but on the same site, in the same school?

This is the rare position I find myself in. At our school pupils range from age 3 to age 19. We have one staff body, one leadership team, and our school buildings sit scattered around one central school playing field.

We have teachers who routinely teach cross-phase: our head of languages teaches Year 6 Spanish, our cover supervisor can move between EYFS and KS4, and our NQT in PE moves between our primary and secondary phase. Added to this, we have an assistant headteacher who leads across KS2 and KS3, and our primary pupils are taught science in the same well-equipped laboratories that are also used for our sixth-form provision.

So, not only do many of our teachers have the knowledge of what it means to teach in that “different realm”, but also real empathy born out by direct experience to bring back to their base.

Of course, failing that, nothing quite builds bridges so much as the shared pint at the school night out or our annual leadership residential.

And yet there is one area where I do agree with Petty: whilst the opportunity for joined-up thinking in an all-through context is immense and exciting, we need to be hesitant of “solutions” that purport to address all educational ills at every key stage. He is right to warn against the “generic, irrelevant or unworkable”. This is arguably much the same between subject disciplines - something which is now being recognised with the renewed value being placed on subject-specific pedagogy.

At my own school, it’s why, despite regular coming together as a single school and many whole-school policies, we still maintain significant autonomy for each phase and give quality time to phase-specific training.

Even if you don’t have the luxury of working in an all-through school like my own, I hope that moving forwards we can all agree to meet one another in a space that is judgement-free. Let’s ask open, honest questions that challenge our presumptions. Let’s recognise that we are all working towards the same end.

If we can do this then we need not perceive one another as extraterrestrials but rather as extraordinary individuals responding to pressures that, as yet, we might not fully appreciate or understand.

Caroline Spalding is director of English at Tupton Hall School in Chesterfield