Headmaster Anthony Seldon’s calls for an urgent debate on the future of education, because it’s become “formulaic and mechanised”, have received widespread coverage in the media. So is he right – do we need another shake-up, or is that the last thing that should be on the agenda?
Writing in The Observer, Anthony Seldon, political commentator and headmaster of private school Wellington College, called for a new education debate – 35 years after James Callaghan called for his great debate because of apparent public concerns over informal teaching methods. This paved the way for the national curriculum.
“Our schools and universities are geared towards the requirements of the 20th century, with students assessed on regurgitating information, but often incapable or unwilling to think independently,” argues Dr Seldon, in his Observer piece (14.2.2010).
“Concerns are now heard that the new focus on league tables is narrowing the quality and breadth of education,” he says.
“‘Punch-drunk’ with constant reforms”
The Daily Telegraph quoted a spokesman for the Department for Children, Schools and Families, who said Dr Seldon’s view was “very negative”. And the Telegraph also reported John Dunford, secretary general of the Association of School and College Leaders, as saying that “changes were unlikely to be popular with staff who were already ‘punch-drunk’ with constant reforms”.
Meanwhile news blog EducationState welcomed the call for a debate, but one that is “genuine and open to all”, not one monopolised by what it describes as “Establishment figures”.
* Are we teaching pupils to think or just to pass exams? Is it time for a Great Debate, or is that the last thing pupils and teaching staff need? What do you think?
23 Feb 2010
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As a teacher of science since 1978 I deplore the fact that what goes on in our schools is reduced to getting students to jump through hoops to pass exams. The curriculum is fragmented and incomplete, with no time to explore the really exciting stuff. So, yes, maybe it is time for that debate.
ReplyDeleteTeach8ng with a 3 Part lesson plans etc is far too formulaic. One never knows in a History lesson where EXACTLY the lesson may go because of pupil responses to questions. What we should seek to achieve in the end of their time at school is pupils who can think for themselves, be questioning and not easily satisfied, who are tolerant and unselfish and who are in a;; senses of the word: EDUCATED. in brief a person who has acquired cargo for life's long journey, who realizes the beauty of music, art, etc and above all is a human being.
ReplyDeleteI ended my 40 year teaching career a few short years ago and left feeling frustrated. I have worked in higher, vocational and school sectors in Austrlia and overseas, managing, teaching in the classroom and working in curriculum, registration and audit.
ReplyDeleteThe changes introduced and poorly maintained by federal and state governments over the last 15 years has resulted in a measurable deteriation in the design of programmes, programme implimentation and the standards regulation of educational benchmaks.
A few short years ago, teacher training entry standards were lowered. As a consequence, teaching strategies have now been reduced to blindly following the pages of published text books rather than the innovative design of teacher driven resources and assessment items that would meet the needs of the student and the many different classroom environments, presented to staff every semester.
For me personally, the senior school sector came as the greatest disspointment of all.
I saw very little evidence of documented planning or schemes detailing learning strategies or student study guides. What I found was rushed lists of topic headings and the photocopying of pages from text books and online web pages, often completed just before the start of the class.
Very few teachers recorded strategies about where they were going and failed to document important historical records. Many experienced and mature casual staff were rarely provided with teaching resources other than the odd word game or video that the students had so often seen a few weeks before. Clearly, casuals were not employed to teach.
At one metropolitan school I can remember having to use a team managed text book that was only available for alternate classes as there were not enough copies in the library. When I enquired about any evidence of planning, I was informed by school staff and the teachers union that schemes and progress records were the intellectual property of the teacher.
On another occasion I was asked to conduct an english comprehension examination and given strict instructions to read from a text book to my grade class. The students informed me that only 50% could read the examination text.
Vocational training has suffered a similar fate. There is valid and reliable evidence that our skill shortage is underpinned by the many thousands of poorly educated and trained gradutes that seek employment every year.
Our governments need to understand that if we are to face a future and manage global warming, pollution, diminished oil reserves (5 years) and other natural resources, we had better get our act together. IT driven systems and programmed learning strategies are a poor substitute for the delivery of effective learning strategies and teaching students to manage their learning.
An effective teacher can teach a student core skills in a air conditioned tin shed or even a
new sports hall (thank you Julia)
richardaust@optusnet.com.au
I totally agree. The kids I teach can't bear it when it's not spoon-fed. They're so used to not thinking that when they're asked to they protest!
ReplyDeleteI think the whole school system- except, that is, the private schools- need to be done away with and some form of military style requirement take over. A lot of the secondary schools I go to are in impossible situations with very demoralised staff.
As the song says "Well it's alright now...I learned my lesson well..you can't please everyone so you gotta please yourself."
ReplyDeleteHaving taught for over 25 years now, like many in my position I have taken what I found useful from the many initiatives, strategies and so on, and applied them to my teaching. Essentially however, I must confess that I teach much the same now as I have always done, believing that what I think, or know is right is the only way I can proceed in this task. Of course one has to make a contribution to the ever-growing mountain of unread text that seems to be required these days, but I have to go forward with the notion that it is what is in my head that matters, and my clarity of what is needed to be taught and learned.
When it come down to it, we have to find our own way to teach and though the many, too many initiatives and so on are useful, I have never found that they work entirely for me. I have to internalize the material and find my own way to put it across that makes most sense to me. Somehow this individual need to find one's own way in teaching has been lost, overlooked or simply taken for granted. To me it is what makes me want to get up in the morning and do the job. It is this that fires the enthusiasm and the "charisma" of the task which in turn transmits to the students. The authorities don't need to give us more "systems". They need to allow us room to enthuse, and connect with young people in a meaningful way. As we learnt many years ago, we are not merely filling buckets, nor do such buckets gain from being weighed so often with all the testing now ...
The students will still pass the exams I think you will find, and well...but without becoming neurotic, knee-jerk unthinking vegetables. It is about time the powers at large listened to the people who do the job and who have all the fire and enthusiasm to achieve success. And above all know in their bones what to do and how to do it. Let us continue the call for an end to incessant testing, tick lists and overload of material. It is quality of education which matters, not quantity...always... when will the authorities realize this?
No more idiotic systems drawn up by beaurocrats please, but freedom to do the best we can, which most of us do anyway ( ...and pretend...like the Emperor's clothes)
But let us do it without the hindrance, the unbelievable dead-weight of all the present baggage.
What did Jesus say...something like "give to Caesar that which is due to Caesar, and give to God that which is due to God."
Let us all ask the question "Who needs Caesar?"
Having just left teaching I could not agree more with Dr Seldon. The curricula, internal assesment and examinations are a joke.
ReplyDeleteI am no statistician but when exam results rise year upon year should we not be questioning why, rather than congratulating ourselves, and in the process letting down those who we are paid to teach and support? The English system, with multiple exam boards, allowing schools to pick and chose those which provide the easiest exam is simply wrong. The Scottish system, with a single exam board and a consistent level of achievement year upon year is not only fairer but gives students and higher institutions a real idea of standards.
I left secondary education for further education a few years ago and am still shocked by the appalling levels of grammar and arithmetic shown by the students. We are not only robbing them of the delight of a good education but cheating them into believing that they are earning "degrees" which in fact are less than worthless: they not only don't equip them for work but they are left with huge debts to pay off.
All this emphasis on so-called tertiary education has downgraded the trades, not that many are equipped for them any more, being barely able to add up or to read a plan.
Grammar has declined to the extent that even the BBC and The Times use "sat" when they should be using "sitting."
It is time to overhaul education as well as teacher training; many teachers, trained in the past decade or so have the same limitations as the students I have just described. In my opinion this does not require throwing money at education just using what we do have in the best way possible.
As a final rant, I would question whether students should be using computers to produce their work. Recently in a class of thirty plus, asked to write a short presentation on a simple aspect of reproductive biology all but one "cut and pasted" their work from the internet, not always from reliable sites - another area in which students need teaching. My impression, as the classroom assistant in this instance, but also as a biology teacher, was that the one student who wrote her work in the old fashioned way, using the internet merely as a source of information, was the only one who showed that she actually understood what she had written. Others clearly were clueless, as they had veered off their set topics without even realising it.
Led by a "biology teacher" who who did know the meaning of "totipotent" I wonder if they will ever understand their set topics. Cynically, though, I suspect that they will pass the "set criteria" for their qualification and be off to some ex-technical college/university to gain another useless degree for the benefit of the U.K.
Incidentally, with all the technical colleges turning into universities where will we get the technicians/tradesmen of the future? Will they all require a worthless degree too?
These are issues that need to be addressed, and soon, before we are left with the lucky few who attended decent (often Grammar) schools and the underclass who will write in "textspeak" and add up only with the aid of a calculator. Calculators will not require division or multiplication functions as no-one will know when/how to use them anyway.
Teaching is too mechanical and robotic.We expect the children to learn what we know and the way we want them to. This is putting them in 'straight jacket'. We are teaching less and instructing more, we have lost the art of getting children excited and tickling their curiosity to explore new ideas and new thinking.Every aspect of teaching even playing on schoolground is controlled and this not good.
ReplyDeleteChange always brings a lot of negative things with it - extra work, more training etc but change has to happen - or we'd all still be teaching the Victorian way! I think short term pain equals long term gain and although the initial changes would be hard, once in place, hopefully these new directives would stay around long enough to have made the change worthwhile.
ReplyDeleteTime for a Great Debate? We are miles beyond the deadline. Show me a school without a Samaritans poster in the staff room. Show me a child who understands the role they play in their own learning, a school who believes that all the answers aren't found on the outside or a teacher who feels trusted. I am horrified at what I have experienced in the reality of our education system. Unfortunately, I don't believe that those who have the power of say, know what to say at all.
ReplyDeleteMy experience is that students have lost respect and teachers are burnt out, myself included, with overweighted manuals, curriculum, textbooks and testing. Somehow everything has to slow down, the burden taken off the backs of teachers and the academic year brought back to sanity. Some parents have forgone the necessity of disciplining their kids and that has fallen to teachers, with school administrators wary of enforcing respect themselves. The result is a revolving door of unruly students who can ruin a class with no redress. Junior teachers have to be shown the art of teaching, of engaging, entertaining and educating the future. It requires a ruthless purge of unnecessary academic junk, maintaining disciplin, keeping to a life outside of school, and remaining true to the passion of teaching
ReplyDeleteYes, we need change! I can't speak for secondary schools, but in primary schools teaching and learning are like swimming against the tide, as children and staff are being pushed in impractical and ineffective directions.
ReplyDeleteI am never surprised when I read reports about how basic literacy and numeracy standards have slipped - the clues are there in the beginning, in primary schools.
Would that schools were allowed to be flexible enough to meet the individual needs of particular classes and children, rather than children being expected to meet the needs of the national system. And would that teachers had the time, space and freedom to teach in ways that suit the actual children in front of them.
So many children are being pressured to move along with the curriculum pace, rather than the other way around. There is so much packed into the timetable that many are only just getting going with a subject activity, when it's time to stop. Furthermore, theory (often at a level above the heads of many) has taken the place of practice.
Children learn best by seeing and doing, but barely get the chance to do more than listen ...and get bored and frustrated. Every student has the ability to experience the satisfaction of learning and succeeding in some subject area(s) and in some type of activity; but the needs of many are ignored as the fact that children learn in different ways, and have different types of intelligences, is ignored.
Of course, teachers do their best with the situation in which they find themselves, but it is far from ideal for either staff or children (and both are important).
Let's meet the needs of the children and the staff. And let's remember that they, above all others (education department and parents included), are there on the front line and know what they need and what works for them.
Rather than maintain our current establishments where uniformity and conformity rule, let's make schools relevant, exciting, diverse, stimulating places of learning and success.