To think the primary school curriculum in the UK is too advance

[Kerry987]

I think the primary school curriculum in the UK is too advance for the majority of children. I think it it is OK for kids who are very academic and self learners, bright, but I think at least half of the kids struggle to keep up with it and need lots of support at school and home.

What do other parents and teachers think?

I had a meeting with the special needs person at my daughter's school a couple of years ago and she told me that I would be surprised to find out how many kids need help and support. This got me to think there is something wrong with the curriculum if so many kids need extra support.

Why are we overloading with so much information? We have been home schooling and there are things that my husband and I didn't see until secondary school

Does everyone think a National Curriculum is necessarily a good thing?

I was at primary school in the 80s before the NC. I had a very good education. As well as the usual Maths, English etc, 'topics' were chosen at random by the class teacher I seem to remember. I still remember some of them now, they were interesting and inspiring and it was good to learn about something a bit different.

I don't remember much in the way of Science teaching but to be honest it didn't hold me back. Science is taught at a pretty basic level anyway from Year 7 onwards with the advantage of specialist teachers.

It's not too advanced, but they do start too young.

I think there are more children with special needs, and more of those children are in mainstream schools than in previous generations. They are generally expected to get on with it, even though many can't without more support.

this is nonsense, children are taught in ability levels from 11 in this country.

Which country are you in?
Most children age 11 (Year 7) are not taught by ability levels in England. If they are, it tends to be for English and mathematics. Some schools do stream by ability but the minority rather than the majority.

I don’t even think they start too young. Not too rigid. I’m ok with it as long as differentiation occurs well for outliers.

Not at all. My 6yr old is average I would say and gets on fine with most things.

@Iamnotthe1

To those saying that we should start later as other European countries do, you need to look at what happens before school age.

In many of the stronger countries that start later, there are clear expections on what parents do with their child before they start school and that's supported by the Government with additional leave for both parents in the early years, classes to develop parenting skills, fostering a more open culture around parenting etc. Whilst some families in England would do well with that, others wouldn't. We're seeing an increased number of children starting school with delayed or underdeveloped speech due to a lack of interaction at home. When I taught in early years, I actually had parents say things like: "Why should we teach him to use a toilet? You're the TEACHer - that's your job," about their four-year-old. For children in those situations, a later start would just make the issues so much worse.

This is a good point. And actually, I came round to having my DS start school at 4. But that does't mean the curriculum can't be adjusted to adapt for age, even if we maintain school start at 4 (possibly optionally). So reception is more like kindergarten in other countries and the KS1 curriculum then only kicks in from year 1.

The three primary schools we’ve had experience of, two in Scotland, one in England have all had different groups for maths and literacy (including reading, spelling and so on in this).
I thought this was usual.

A lot of the curriculum is focused on teaching how and why things are rather than just what they are.

Maths is the perfect example. In our country, there is a huge number of people who just say "Maths isn't my thing" and there is a social-acceptance of poor numeracy skills. Every year, parents of my Y6 children will tell me that they don't understand all of the concepts we cover. A lot of this has stemmed from just being taught what to do and not why you are doing it from an understanding number perspective. The way Maths is taught now is designed to combat this. In the short-term, it's more work. In the long-term, we should have a more numerate population.

I teach KS1. I dont know that the skills in the curriculum are necessarily too advanced, but it is just too full. There is never enough time to cover all of the skills in enough depth for the majority to understand them fully because there are so many other things that also need to be covered.

We are expected to spiral skills so that they are revisited. Fairly obvious, but then you are trying to cram in all the other objectives too.

The English and Maths curricula are so full for each year group that inevitably some other subjects got squashed. Then Ofsted noticed, so instead of recommending trimming and rearranging the curriculum, they switched the focus of inspections to include breadth of curriculum, while still expecting the same results in English and maths of course. In my school we are expected to do an hour of maths and English in the mornings plus to devoted specifically to reading, spelling and handwriting plus an extra "revisit" maths session in the afternoon, plus a focus on the foundation subjects to make sure they are fully covered - RE/PEx2/Science/Computing/Geography/History/DT/Art/Music/PSHE. Then we have to devote time to mental well-being, collective worship, story time on top of that.

However, I will say that it is completely standard for kids to learn things at primary school now that I didn't touch until the later part of secondary school in the 90s and I still managed to get a first from a good university.

Thank you for all the answers. I yet have to go through all of them.

I think some people said it is based on the wrong things and I do agree with this.

Also, apologies for the typos and errors on the post (someone mentioned it). I am not a native English speaker and only came to the UK when I was 33.

My son is in a large class, 29 girls 5 boys. One teacher. Since all this homeschooling has happened, I can see how far my son has fell behind. He’s 10, so in another couple of years he will be at high school. This week I’m actually worried for him. I don’t think he’s getting the help he needs, there is no teaching assistants in his class, especially with a class so big. I feel he’s swallowed up as he’s also quiet and shy. We are doing the work online, but as an adult I’m struggling with his work, I’m not very academic myself. After all this I’m going to get a tutor

@StopTheTrainWantToGetOff

this is nonsense, children are taught in ability levels from 11 in this country.

Which country are you in?
Most children age 11 (Year 7) are not taught by ability levels in England. If they are, it tends to be for English and mathematics. Some schools do stream by ability but the minority rather than the majority.

I'm in the UK, my husband teaches at the local comp, they're streamed by ability for everything, based on SATs for yr7 and reassessed at the beginning of each year after that. It was the same when he was at school 20 years ago.

@BlingLoving

The KS1 curriculum does only start in Year 1. Reception has its own curriculum which is largely based on observing play. There are writing and maths elements but that's true of a kindergarten curriculum too.

I think it's really good that my son is talking about clauses and so on when he's writing. It's so much easier to 'get' the correct terms in writing when they're young and therefore to ensure they're used. I was a 70s child and we were encouraged to write rambling stories without any real structure and it was a bit of a shock to the need to write structured essays later in life.
The maths he's being set is too easy but at the moment I think the whole class is being set the same work.

I'm in the UK, my husband teaches at the local comp, they're streamed by ability for everything, based on SATs for yr7 and reassessed at the beginning of each year after that. It was the same when he was at school 20 years ago.

Not the norm at all.

My son is in a large class, 29 girls 5 boys. One teacher. Since all this homeschooling has happened, I can see how far my son has fell behind. He’s 10, so in another couple of years he will be at high school. This week I’m actually worried for him. I don’t think he’s getting the help he needs, there is no teaching assistants in his class, especially with a class so big

I'm very worried about ny dd too..shes 10 and as positive as the teachers are about how hard tries and they do support her, she usually has 1:1 or a small group time with a TA but honestly her memory and writing and her spelling is atrocious. When she's copying shes ok. When she writes free hand you cant read any of it. She took forever to grasp phonics and for the most part it's been pointless because she still.misses out sounds in words. When she tries to use alexa at home half the time it's "wrong " because she can't make out what she says.

She doesn't need to know about fronted adverbials she can't even spell the basics. And yes we do support her at home.

@LickEmbysmiling

what is education, why does an 8 year old need to learn about prepositions and frontal adverbials?

Describing words, enriching language - yes.

For one thing they help you learn other languages. I'm terrible at languages, always have been but the biggest barrier has always been a lack of grammar education at a high level. I learnt Latin at GCSE which helped somewhat but was too little, too late - and I went to an excellent state primary and had very involved, well educated parents. But we just never did a break down of grammar like my parents had. It is now back on the curriculum, to a certain extent, and it is so important!

@lavenderlou

I teach KS1. I dont know that the skills in the curriculum are necessarily too advanced, but it is just too full. There is never enough time to cover all of the skills in enough depth for the majority to understand them fully because there are so many other things that also need to be covered.

We are expected to spiral skills so that they are revisited. Fairly obvious, but then you are trying to cram in all the other objectives too.

The English and Maths curricula are so full for each year group that inevitably some other subjects got squashed. Then Ofsted noticed, so instead of recommending trimming and rearranging the curriculum, they switched the focus of inspections to include breadth of curriculum, while still expecting the same results in English and maths of course. In my school we are expected to do an hour of maths and English in the mornings plus to devoted specifically to reading, spelling and handwriting plus an extra "revisit" maths session in the afternoon, plus a focus on the foundation subjects to make sure they are fully covered - RE/PEx2/Science/Computing/Geography/History/DT/Art/Music/PSHE. Then we have to devote time to mental well-being, collective worship, story time on top of that.

However, I will say that it is completely standard for kids to learn things at primary school now that I didn't touch until the later part of secondary school in the 90s and I still managed to get a first from a good university.

Or the 2019 Ofsted Framework narrowed the curriculum so much that all that matters is systematic synthetic phonics in year 1 and whether your SEN children in Year 3 have a phonetically match dreading book.

Reading- but dreading is quite a good slip up

It's too advanced for some children and not advanced enough for others.

@StopTheTrainWantToGetOff Thank you!

whether your SEN children in Year 3 have a phonetically match dreading book.

Yes, all the Ofsted insistence on banded books throughout school means is that schools now have to spend already limited resources on dull banded books for all rather than just giving perfectly accessible books that we already have in school.

@Whatwouldscullydo

My son is in a large class, 29 girls 5 boys. One teacher. Since all this homeschooling has happened, I can see how far my son has fell behind. He’s 10, so in another couple of years he will be at high school. This week I’m actually worried for him. I don’t think he’s getting the help he needs, there is no teaching assistants in his class, especially with a class so big

I'm very worried about ny dd too..shes 10 and as positive as the teachers are about how hard tries and they do support her, she usually has 1:1 or a small group time with a TA but honestly her memory and writing and her spelling is atrocious. When she's copying shes ok. When she writes free hand you cant read any of it. She took forever to grasp phonics and for the most part it's been pointless because she still.misses out sounds in words. When she tries to use alexa at home half the time it's "wrong " because she can't make out what she says.

She doesn't need to know about fronted adverbials she can't even spell the basics. And yes we do support her at home.

that sounds like she needs specialist help - an SALT or at the very least an assessment for SEN.

I have a strong suspicion shes dyslexic but I cant afford a private test and school obviously can't and they won't for dyslexia as it doesn't change anything anyway.

Shes on the SN register at her school though. But as she's not disruptive and she doesn't struggle in the "right way" it's not going to lead to anything any time soon.

I'll just have to try and keep saving

I don' think the problem is it is too advanced, it is so inflexible it doesn't take account of the kids at either end of the scale. DD is bored witless, gets through the work quickly and is allocated pointless busy work when she could be actually developing further either in that topic or in a task that gives her something to think about. She's smart, but not genius level smart and there are half a dozen kids in her class who are in the same boat.

At the other end, there are kids who struggle to keep up who are punted off to ineffective separate groups that appear to do nothing to help long term learning. This is evidenced by the kids who were sent off to these classes in P1 being the same ones doing so in P7.

The curriculum should be far more flexible to address both the attainment gap, and the issue of boredom in brighter kids.