To think Gove does not know what happens in a primary school

[enimmead]

So we've had:

All KS2 children to learn a foreign language (announced in Rose report 2009, abandoned by coalition but happens anyway - sort of)

All children to learn tables to 12 x 12 by age 9 (which most schools try to do anyway despite the fact some children still struggle - but schools do try to do this)

I think Gove just makes these announcements because they sound good without actually checking to see what schools actually do.

All MFL teachers in secondary are currently shaking with anger. Primary schools don't/won't have an MFL teacher so they will look through staff CVs and hope someone has A Level, and if not anyone who has a GCSE will be expected to teach that language.

I think you are wrong, I think he is looking at the evidence and trying to ensure that all children get the opportunity to learn most effectively.

I am a teacher too, I don't get all this Gove hatred. His championship of synthetic phonics over mix methods (which leave 20% of children struggling. 20% labelled special needs ffs) is worth his appointment imvho.

We were doing SP before Gove came in - Letters and Sounds?

And of course, primaries don't have MFL teachers - but why should Gove worry? We don't really have maths specialists but are expected to teach maths to a high level.

It sems de rigeur now to have major bolshie public service run by people who know nothing about them.

But Education has been a political football my entire life, it won't change anythime soon.

Gove is an ignorant twat, and is systematically destroying the state school system which of course is his evil Tory plan I am so so so glad I am in Scotland and not subjected to his shit.

Gove is clueless. He thinks all children fit neatly into a mould with the same learningmethofsworking equally well for everyone.

He will not rest until schools return to a 1930s style arrangement of 50 children in rows , sat in silence and being talked at by a teacher. Children will learn their times tables, Latin, and Bible Study from the single Gove Vanity Bible in each school.

His pals Lansley , Osborne and Shiney Dave are driving the rest of the plan to turn back the clock by dismantling the NHS and bringing back the workhouse workfare.

sassh: "All MFL teachers in secondary are currently shaking with anger"

Isn't that something of an extreme reaction? As the OP said, this was originally recommended in the Rose report, so even if Labour had stayed in power it would have been introduced at some point. The principle of teaching an MFL in primary school is a good one - the problem is the practical difficulty finding people who can do it.

Sorry for typing fail there. Sausage fingers on phone.

methods of working

My KS2 child is learning French so I don't see what the problem is. Surely all children should start to have an appreciation of a foreign language? It is the norm in Prep schools so why not Primary schools?

learning methods working .

Gah!

oh, anything to have a go. whatever any tory says is fair game.

the fact that Labour would have done it too is no reason not to call Gove a twat, it proves how morally superior we are

MoreBeta: maybe because at the moment 1 in 5 kids leave primary school without being literate in English?

Gove is a twat and bases his view of Primary Education on his privileged private schooling.

My KS2 child is not learning French as no-one in his school seems competent enough to teach it. However, I couldn't care less, as when they start Secondary they start at square one anyway - there's no way a Secondary school could accomodate all the different levels of prior experience.

On the langauges point, I know a number of people emplyed in primary schools as language specialists, with degree level qualifications in a MFL, and not just in the leafy suburbs where they would be teaching Jocasta in advance of her annual trip to the family's place in Provence...

AIBD (Am I being dense) to assume that this is common place in other primary schools? I don't have primary school aged children, so could be being very naive...

My impression (purely as a parent, not any kind of expert) is that Gove would like to take us back to a 50s style public school education, learning poems parrot fashion, learning only about British history and then only certain kinds like Elizabeth I and the war of the Roses kind of stuff. If the foreign language could be Latin, so much the better.

That's the impression I get of him.

I think the really weird thing is this: Gove has announced this new highly prescriptive national curriculum, all about spellings and timetables etc. But at the same time he's allowing loads and loads of schools to turn into academies, where they have the "freedom" not to teach the national curriculum. So he's got two diametrically opposed policies running at the time - at once exerting stricter control over schools and at once giving schools greater freedom. It's completely bonkers.

I don't understand why the secondary MFL teachers would be so angry either. When I did my PGCE 6 years ago we all had a subject specialism and there were many doing MFL as their specialism, all people with degrees in languages. Someone like that starting the language teaching in primary would only be a good thing for the secondary teachers.

Now obviously there probably aren't enough of these people to go round all primary schools, but that's what the government needs to focus on...stop spending the money training hoardes of EYFS and primary teachers with generic skills who then flood the market and can't find jobs (50% of my cohort went overseas or into supply teaching because there weren't enough jobs), and instead train teachers with the specialisms that we need, including MFL, maths and science. They made all that fuss about trying to find secondary teachers with specialisms, but just left primary as the anyone-can-do-anything style of teaching, which clearly isn't the case.

Oh and on the academies point, it's my understanding that academies will still follow the National Curriculum. It's more about financial freedom than what they teach.

As a secondary maths teacher I'm concerned that there are announcements about new things to be taught at a time when I am sure there will be no accompanying money to ensure that primary school teachers receive training to do it properly.

On the MFL front, the previous govt introduced this- we were working towards it being statutory in September 2010, but the Education Act it was in never made it through parliament. LEAs had primary MFL advisors in place, thousands of pounds had been spent on training and resources, a fantastic Framework for teaching Primary MFL had been sent to every school. This has now been abandoned in many schools, many advisors have been made redundant and people like me, class teacher and MFL coordinator, have had their roles 'reassigned' as if it isn't statutory, many (not all) heads are not interested.
Never mind secondary MFL teachers being furious, we primary ones are seething!
YANBU.

Much of what I read of his proposals yesterday sounded like what dd does already.

Just heard this morning that now all children have to be able to recite poems in front of their class at the age of 5.
Why?

I agree with CurrySpice, I think Gove is obsessed with turning all state schools into replicas of 1950's private schools. He is also deeply suspicious of all LAs and is desperate to get all schools out of their control so they can be run by his friends as academies.

As pointed out above, he is taking forward recommendations from a report commissioned by the previous Government. Does that mean they were equally poorly advised and unaware? And, as boattoBolivia points out, roll out was already underway before the election. I hadn't actually realised it had been shelved, and I'm glad to see it reinstated.

I agree there are insufficient language teachers to introduce MFL well at primary stage, but I see that as a logistics problem (a huge one), not a problem with the concept.

The maths targets seem wholly unexceptional too.

LisasCat: "Oh and on the academies point, it's my understanding that academies will still follow the National Curriculum. It's more about financial freedom than what they teach."

No. Academies don't have to teach the National Curriculum.