Hierarchy

Throughout the interviews, the school system hierarchy was apparent, with TAs being towards the bottom of this hierarchy. Joanne directly addressed this when talking about the learning mentor in her school.

Well, she's higher than a TA. In fact, she's actually studying to be a teacher. (Joanne)

Joanne illustrated that in the school hierarchy, the learning mentor was higher than a TA and a teacher higher still. By stating that ‘in fact’ she is studying to be a teacher, Joanne

emphasised the hierarchical difference between a TA and a teacher. Shivani also referenced the discrepancy between teachers and TAs by discussing needing permission from the teacher to speak to children.

They can come out if I take the permission of the teacher. (Shivani) Similarly, Karen discussed needing to check things with the class teacher.

But you do have to run everything by the teachers. Well, obviously, because at the end of the day, it's their class. (Karen)

Karen referring to the class as belonging to the teacher suggests that perhaps she did not feel she worked in a collaborative way with class teachers. In other instances, the hierarchy seemed to result in participants not knowing information. For example, Rachel talked about not knowing background information.

Or is there something more. So, which is, which is, if you don't know, if there's background that you may not know about as a TA. (Rachel)

Rachel’s comment suggested that she would not receive the same information about a child that other staff would. Similarly, when Laura was asked whether she thought a child (who she had been supporting one-to-one everyday) was impacted by their background, she described not knowing this information.

I wasn't so heavily involved, I believe there was, but I wasn't heavily involved as to say, I couldn’t sit here and tell you what it was because it wasn't up to me then, it kind of went through SENCo and went on to other stages, and they kind of dealt with

it from there. But yeah, there was, I think there was a lot going on, it wasn't just an additional need. (Laura)

Despite working individually with this child on a daily basis, Laura described herself as not ‘heavily involved’. This quote suggests that Laura did not see herself as an appropriate person to know about the child’s background information, stating that it wasn’t ‘up to’ her, instead, this was a role for the SENCo. Joanne also referenced the lack of information given to TAs when she discussed requesting feedback from mental health training.

I don't know. I don't know how they feel, if they feel that they go on a course for two days, and they don't feel it necessary to talk to the TAs about it. Who am I? Who am I to say? I said to Louise, ‘Why didn't you have any feedback?’ ‘There's no need for feedback.’ (Joanne)

Joanne seemed to feel undervalued and frustrated that information was not given to TAs. By stating that she does not know how they feel, she was expressing disappointment that the staff did not think it would be important to share the information with the TAs. Joanne also demonstrated frustration at the hierarchy when asking ‘Who am I?’, not feeling she was in a position to question this decision.

For Karen, it appeared that the hierarchical system may have contributed to her undervaluing her own contribution. When asked to talk about an example of helping a child that had gone well, Karen answered:

Erm, only ones I've passed on to Catherine, or somebody else, that I know is being dealt with. (Karen)

Karen described that she had only provided help when she had referred a child to someone else. Rachel also perhaps demonstrated a lack of confidence in her ability to help children. I'm confident I can go and suggest something like, ‘Oh, I think Francesca might like this. Because she doesn't like this, why don't I do this with her?’ Then my teacher, I

know, I know that my teacher will think, unless it’s a really silly idea, will generally, will say, ‘yeah, that's fine. If you're happy to do that, then go ahead, and, and do it.’ (Rachel)

Overall, it seemed that Rachel was working collaboratively with the class teacher, although needing to check her ideas with the teacher demonstrates the hierarchical school system. Rachel stated that she was confident, however, she referred to some of her ideas as ‘really silly’ and was hesitant to suggest that the class teacher would agree with her idea. This may suggest that she doubted some of her ideas and was not as confident as she said. It could also reflect the hierarchy of the school system, with Rachel not wanting to suggest that she knows more than a teacher. From Karen, there was also a sense that she did not want to come across as suggesting that she could do things that a teacher could not.

You know, we're the ones who tend to observe, you can look around the class and observe more than a teacher can, it sounds like I’m taking things away from being teacher now (laughter). (Karen)

Karen was describing the different aspects of the TA role compared to the teacher role, however, she interpreted this as suggesting that she can do something that a teacher cannot. Her discomfort with the idea that she might be helpful in a way that a teacher could not may have also been highlighted by her laughter after her comment.