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My children are living proof of the damage done by passing educational fads. This is what makes my heart sink reading this week's government report by respected educationalist Sir Jim Rose on the primary school curriculum.
When my son attended the local primary school in 1984, he was taught core subjects well by committed teachers. He learned to love books, to memorise his tables and seriously apply himself to set tasks. By the time my daughter joined the same school in 1997, SATs ruled, joy had vanished and the place felt mechanised. She is a child of the internet age who like millions of others is less inclined to read than my son was.
Indeed it was Rose who, in previous reports, agreed with the Tories that child-centred learning had gone too far. Some say he has too much of a nose for what his masters will welcome.
Primary-school children today are even more removed from the world of books and maps than, say, nature study. Their attention span is short and a fifth of British children are unable to do the basic three Rs at the end of primary school. What an indictment of our high-tech nation.
Good teachers still know how to work their kids hard and keep up enthusiasm. Unfortunately they are edged out as those in charge abandon what works for ever more loopy ideas and technological dependency.
Most of Rose's recommendations will not, I fear stop the rot. I like the idea of children learning about relationships and emotions. But much of the report is an impenetrable thicket and key ideas are faddy. Apparently children need to learn not history and geography separately but as integrated topics along with both maths and English - and no doubt a dash of infant psychobabble.
Worse, Rose wants more IT in primary schools. Why? Children are whizzo at all that anyway but their minds get distorted when everything is filtered through TV or the internet. They are spending too long in the virtual world and that hampers their abilities to acquire other skills or use their own brains. Schools should be the antidote to that fast culture, not part of it.
If ministers heed this report, yet another generation will fail to reach its potential. It is time to stop these experiments on the young.
Reader views (6)
It is the same here in the US as it is in the UK. From my perspective, public education, no matter the country, has lost its sense of purpose.
I truly believe we have forgotten why it is our children go to school, what it is they are suppose to learn and finally what their obligations and responsibilities are not only to themselves, but to others and our respective nations, be it the UK or the US.
All the attention today on the inadequacies of our public education system fails to address purpose. Our
desire to fix education through higher scores, more specialization and revamping neglects the premise
upon which it was founded.
For our respective countries to remain strong and our forms of government vibrant, our children upon graduation must not only be ready to chart their own future, but also fulfill their obligations and responsibilities as citizens.
To do this, our children must be able to think critically and not cynically as many among us do not do
today, discern meaningful discourse from mere rhetoric as many among us can not do today, be informed versus versus misinformed as many among us do not know the difference today, have compassion and not contempt for those less fortunate as many among us do not show today, and finally, know that when called upon to make sacrifices for the betterment of others and that of our nations as so many before have done for us.
Perhaps some day public education will once again find its sense of purpose.
- Alfred Green, Colorado Springs, Colorado, USA, 21/12/2008 21:32
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When talking with a client of mine some months ago, the term 'babbling brook" came up. I pointed out that it came from a poem by Tennyson. I then became a little nostalgic and pointed out that my teacher had taught us "The brook" by Tennyson at the same time as also teaching us about the composer Schubert as we listened to "The trout". As my memory sharpened, I also recounted how we were introduced to The Pier Gynt Suite and Peter and the Wolf.
"You were taught that in school?" my client asked and I truthfully answered that I had experienced all that joy in a state primary school back in the 60's when I was around the age of 10. My client's look of surprise was enough to confirm that I had been of the lucky generation, in state education before politically correct interference.
I have a love of music, reading and language. I have no need to appear "cool" by speaking mockney.
Not only was I given an educational gift to further my career, I was given a gift to enjoy and fulfill my life in general.
Just who were/are those idiots who seem to have ruined the lives of so many people with their idealogically motivated tinkering with education?
- D Payne, London, 13/12/2008 00:40
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Quite right Thalia. The present government wants us to be dumb so we cannot keep finding out how worthless they are.
The other weapon they have is debauching the currency (as recommended by Lenin) and they are being pretty effective at that too.
- Anglo, Sussex UK, 12/12/2008 17:01
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I have actually come to believe that the current educational fashions are deliberately designed to keep the, for want of a better word, proletariat, as stupid and thus pliable as possible.
It's all part of the ID card, NHS database, child database, total control scenario.
Roll up to be bar coded.
- Thalia, london UK, 12/12/2008 01:16
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My sister's children are in N.Wales. The youngest, 6 is taught under their new system, pretty much like mine 40 years ago. The children are tested less, and SATS although still used, do not rule the roost.
- Jen Phillips, guildford, surrey, 11/12/2008 20:35
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I truly believe that the UK government's ministers, secretaries, etc responsible for education don't understand how children learn, nor do they need to know; politicians should stop constantly interfering with education and give the professional leaders of schools the authority, freedom and resources to do what those professional leaders know to be effective. Teaching and learning should never be subject to political whim as it is in the UK.
The climate of fear among teachers that is cultivated by the state is dreadfully unhealthy; The role of an inspector should be to analyse teaching they have observed then assist teachers to improve where needed, not to make a lofty pronouncement about a teacher's inadaquacies after one or two observed lessons and then walk away without offering any form of remediation.
Some years ago, my wife, a teacher with 30 plus very successful years teaching in and managing junior departments, including being a highly-regarded specialist in the teaching of reading, was downgraded by an inspector from 'excellent' to 'very good' for failing to enlarge one A4 sheet of paper to A3 during a day's teaching. Her consistently excellent results counted for nothing!
- Kiwi Expat, London, UK, 11/12/2008 11:34
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