Read this.

[teejay100000]

www.cps.org.uk/cps_catalog/why%20can%27t%20they%20read.pdf

Rollacoasts - what you say is correct regarding litercacy and level.

My dd is about level 3 and she can read Worst Witch. BFG and that kind of thing. Therefore, not achieving level 4 doesn't mean you're illiterate. (I suspect she could read the Daily Mail or the Sun if I let her).

(luckily she is 6, so hopefully will achieve level 4 by 11!)

When my mother was teaching in the 1990s, she had many parents who couldn't read but none of her children left school 'iliterate'.

Our headteacher suggests that if you don't achieve level 4, you're not able to access the secondary school curriculum? Would you say this is correct?

hmm, read the whole thing (as DD fell asleep on me at 5pm! )

agree it's too anecdotal.

it did get me wondering though - about this whole 'child-led learning' thing. I wonder (as there didn't seem to be any research mentioned...) exactly how its success is related to the home environment of the individual children? obviously home environment affects learning in general, but I mean specifically WRT child-led learning here.

what I mean is, if a child has enthusiastic parents who encourage self-led learning - doing science experiments in the kitchen from age 3, doing research in the library for fun etc - aren't they likely to fare better in a child-led environment than a child who, say, had totally disinterested parents and spends all weekend watching telly?

because the former had been taught how to teach themselves IYSWIM, but the latter hadn't and therefore would be bored because they couldn't figure out how to direct their own learning.

don't know if that makes sense, just my random musings but would love to know what people think about that.

I would look at this from the other viewpoint mmm!

I think that child-led learning is particularly important for those children who get no stimulation at home. As most jobs these days need people to work effectively in teams, children need that initial social training before embarking on and utilising these skills during the more 'academic' years.

IMHO EYFS and KS1 are crucial in embedding co-operation, collaboration, sharing, oral discussions, proper questionning techniques (i.e. why, how, who, etc) and respect for other people.

I agree that those children who grow up in passive environments need to learn how to co-exist with other people in society.

Rollacoasta wrote: 'Didactic', I believe, is about 'instruction' rather than 'teaching'.

Since when has instruction been at variance with teaching?

Rollacoasta wrote: ?There are many things we investigate together on the internet because no-one knows the answer - even me. I feel very sad that you know it all, Breton.?

Perhaps you need some help with your reading and comprehension! If you look at what I actually wrote rather than what you think I wrote you will see that I made the point that ?I know a great deal more than they do!? I see nothing in that sentence that categorically claims I know everything!

As to your remark that,?Teaching can be done in many ways, to suit all types of learning: visual, audio, kinaesthetic, etc. Children can be actively involved in their own learning process.?

Nobody is denying that children should be actively involved in their own education. However, when children know nothing about a topic then it is up to the teacher to impart that information and this involves the children listening to someone with more knowledge than they possess.

Unlike Primary education, every issue relating to a subject covered at KS3, KS4, and KS5 cannot be taught by allowing the pupils to find out for themselves because in many instances they won?t bother. In fact, for many, doing a ?research? based homework consists of Googling the issue or event finding a website and printing it off without bothering to actually read and comprehend the information it contains. A good way of ascertaining precisely what the pupils have gained from such an exercise is to conduct a homework test, which invariably demonstrates that the majority have learned precisely nothing.

As to VAK ? I am not alone in being exceedingly sceptical about this latest government fad based on disputed research. I refer anyone who is interested, to an article in the Guardian from 2005 that discusses these issues and the criticisms surrounding them. For those who want to know more, the research papers by those mentioned in the article can be obtained via the British Library.

Finally to your comment ?Whatever the popular press say, the children only attaining Level 3 in Y6 can read and write to get by in life. They are not illiterate.?

No, they are functionally illiterate. A Y6 child who is functionally illiterate is precluded from coping with the work at Secondary school, hence the growth in 121 teaching and remedial English and Maths lessons. Indeed, even at undergraduate level this issue is still being encountered see here.

Functional illiteracy and the inability to understand what is read denies access to a wider intellectual sphere and the development of critical thinking and reasoning. This, in turn, impacts on comprehending much more complex issues. The resultant society is ill-informed and prey to accepting the most nonsensical ideas as fact, not to mention possible politically motivated indoctrination.

In a Western society at the end of the first decade of the 21st century that is not just a national disgrace, it is a terrifying foretaste for the future.

"n fact, for many, doing a ?research? based homework consists of Googling the issue or event finding a website and printing it off without bothering to actually read and comprehend the information it contains."

I HATE that. I really really do

I'm not sure what is worse - the fact that the children do this and their parents let them, or the fact that in some schools teachers seem to think it's ok! My DSDs' primary/secondary schools for example... they just let them do this. I'd be surprised if even half the students actually know how to look something up in, oh what's that thing called, erm, a BOOK!

MMM, It's called "child-led learning"!

haha

'The resultant society is ill-informed and prey to accepting the most nonsensical ideas as fact, not to mention possible politically motivated indoctrination.'

Careful here, Breton. It's not an inability to read that causes this. It's people who have a tendency to knee-jerk reactions who are putty in the tabloids' hands.

I haven't read anyone here advocating purely 'child-centred' learning, by the way. I think we all know that a variety of approaches are needed. What do you understand by 'child-centred', by the way? To me it means doing what's best for the child. Standing in front of the class and teaching/instructing is part of that.

Great points from Rolla and Mmm - the whole homework idea has to be looked at. How can it be fair that some kids have parents to help them while others have nowhere quiet to work, no access to a computer, etc?

I think there's a good argument for not giving kids homework under the age of 14. Instead, an hour tagged on to the end of the school day, supervised by local uni students working part-time, where the kids have access to computers and books would be much fairer.

I did not know that time was spent at school talking about home life and how that makes you feel.

What a load of bollocks. I dont like to swear but really and truely.
Do we pay teachers to sit on the floor and ask small children if the get on with their siblings. WTF will my 5 year old learn from that that she isnt already learning from us at home?

My year 5 DD1 comes home with work that has spelling mistakes. And she has a strict teacher. It drives me mad. How is a child supposed to get it right if the teacher isnt telling them when they have got it wrong?

I really wish that the poncy idiots who live in London will wake up and realise the damage they have done and continue to do, to the children in this country.

Sometimes teachers don't correct all the mistakes because they think it might make the child lose confidence and motivation if her whole page is covered in corrections.

Breton, your posts confirm that you favour didactic methods. They are instructional and give the impression that you know best and do not like being argued with. I take exception to the arrogance of your responses. FYI I did notice the fact that you didn't 'know it all', but was making a comment on the tone of your reply.

Of course we all learn differently! You obviously learn well if 'instructed', but that does not mean that everyone else is the same as you.

Believe me, the level 3 readers and writers could function in society. If they are 'functionally illiterate' and unable to follow a secondary school curriculum, perhaps the secondary school curriculum is inappropriate and needs differentiating to suit the lower achievers?

In times gone by, the totally illiterate sat at the back of their Secondary Modern classrooms until they left at 14,15 or 16, not being able to read or write at all, because, unfortunately, there were no intervention programmes for them.

Instruction is not synonymous with teaching. I can teach how to use commas by sending children out to find things, writing a list and then annotating with commas. I don't have to stand at the front of the class INSTRUCTING how to use commas. Many children need to do to learn.

But, what am I missing? Teachers and schools have been teaching synthetic phonics together with other approaches for years. Teachers and schools have been using a mixture of teacher talk, group and indivual learning for years. The good ideas that this woman is talking about are well understood and used.

fivecandles the writer is saying that using a mixture is bad, and claims that the best way of successfully teaching reading is exclusive synthetic phonics, i.e. not using other methods as well.

This didn't seem to be what she was saying on Woman's Hour. There she said that synthetic phonics was the way to get them to read in the early years but of course you need to enjoy whole books/ talk about what you've read etc too. The only thing that seemed controversial about that is that it's hardly new and the sense that she was saying this wasn't happening in schools currently which is rubbish as far as I'm aware.

But I haven't read the report so if that says you should only do synthetic phonics all day long and teachers should do chalk and talk all day long then she is barking mad.

These are quotes 5candles:

 Teachers would abandon the idea that imparting knowledge is oppressive and that facts interfere with creativity.
 Teachers would not underestimate the intellectual potential of their pupils. They would realise that young children are
stimulated by information and ideas that they cannot discover for themselves.
 Mixed ability teaching would be discarded wherever possible as it usually leaves children at both ends of the spectrum
frustrated. It also makes teaching much more difficult and slows down the pace of lessons.

Ronshar wrote: ?Do we pay teachers to sit on the floor and ask small children if the get on with their siblings. WTF will my 5 year old learn from that that she isnt already learning from us at home??

We do now!

Here are some extracts from ?Wasted: Why Educating isn?t Educating? by Prof. Frank Furedi.
Page 185. ?The problem of motivation in schools and in wider society is indissolubly linked to the decline of authoritative behaviour. [...] Almost half a century ago Kerlinger noted that an open display of authoritative behaviour in the classroom had become an object of scorn, and observed that the ?teacher who wants to play the boss role must now do it in a more covert and subtle fashion?. He believed that the introduction of what he called ?permissiveness? in education ?leads to the manipulation of pupils", and went so far to argue that since emotional education tends to encourage a preoccupation with feelings, children lose their grounding in a stable and objective environment and become easy prey to manipulative techniques."

Pages 186-187. ?Take the widely practised technique of circle time. This technique is used to gather children together in a circle to share their feelings and problems. [...] Circle time is used to stimulate children to divulge their feelings in public. Its practitioners often remark that children?s participation is voluntary and that participants are free to keep quiet if they choose. But as one critic stated ?most circle time manuals recommend that children are asked to explain why they do not wish to contribute?. Young primary schoolchildren are unlikely to challenge their teacher or stand up to the pressure to display emotions.? [...] Supporters of emotional education are convinced that their approach can contribute to the improvement of classroom behaviour. England?s SEAL programme is designed to improve pupil behaviour and motivation through teaching children the emotional skills outlined in Goleman?s model of emotional intelligence: self-awareness, managing feelings, motivation, empathy and social skills. Although the research commissioned to evaluate this programme indicates it lacked impact on pupils? behaviour, supporters of SEAL insist on its potential to curb classroom disruption."

Page 189-190. "Although there is a long-standing pedagogic tradition that regards formal education as potentially harmful to the well-being of children, in recent decades such sentiments have become far more omnipresent. Today, it is common to regard children as fragile, emotionally vulnerable things who cannot be expected to cope with pressure and real intellectual challenge. It was in this vein that in April 2007 England?s School Minister instructed teachers to praise their pupils routinely. [...] But the exhortation to institutionalize the praising of children is not an isolated attempt to flatter the egos of young people. Increasingly, the therapeutic objective of making children feel good about themselves is seen as the primary objective of schooling. [...] Making children feel good about themselves has been one of the main objectives of American schools during the past three decades. By the time they are seven or eight years old, American children have internalized the prevailing psychobabble and can proclaim the importance of avoiding negative emotions and of high self-esteem. Yet this has had no perceptible impact on their school performance. In Britain, too, educators who have drawn the conclusion that it is easier to help children feel good than to teach them maths, reading and science, have embraced the cause of emotional education."

So what Sykes and Stout were deploring about the USA, is now happening in the UK. Like the US we are turning out young people who can't read, write or add but feel awfully good about themselves!

I'm not sure Prof. Frank has seen a circle time in action. Circle time, when properly done, is a way to encourage co-operation (e.g. 'meet-and-greet games, fitting jigsaws together in groups, spotting who is making a different gesture, guessing who is hiding the puppet) and children love it. It is NOT all about going around the circle exploring how 'each child feels today'.

Praise is important for young children. They should be praised when they achieve according to their ability. All teachers should know each individual child well enough to know when to praise and when to admonish. This makes children aware of their capabilities, and their potential.

I don't think this is Prof Frank's area of expertise and he should try harder.

that book looks good.

I didn't hear the Women's Hour thing but from what you said fivecandles, to me it seems like she's done the usual thing of writing a really opinionated report/article and then when challenged live, mitigated it somewhat so as not to seem unreasonable. the report was totally "phonics all the way" in terms of the child's activities - it did say that obviously children should be read more difficult books but that they should not be trying to read them themselves because it'd encourage guessing etc.

Rolla, leaving mixed-ability teaching aside which is controversial.

'Teachers would abandon the idea that imparting knowledge is oppressive and that facts interfere with creativity.'

'Teachers would not underestimate the intellectual potential of their pupils.'

'They would realise that young children are
stimulated by information and ideas that they cannot discover for themselves.'

Where is the problem with any of the 3 above? But what is the 'would' for? Show me the teacher that DOES think 'imparting knowledge is oppressive' etc.

"Praise is important for young children. They should be praised when they achieve according to their ability. All teachers should know each individual child well enough to know when to praise and when to admonish. This makes children aware of their capabilities, and their potential."

Whilst I totally agree with this statement - I have my doubts how achievable this is in a class of 30 children, especially in reception and KS1, when abilities and maturity can be wide. Hence the 'over praising'.

BTW, I'm not defending her. She did not come across well on Woman's Hour. The thing that I'm finding odd is why she's getting air time at all and why she's being allowed to criticise things as they are when from what I've heard she's only coming out with things that have been long established. The synthetic phonics thing has been established and Govt policy for ages. Are there really schools that still don't use this approach?

Of course, teachers should instruct, be authorative etc,etc. Again, it's what we've been doing for centuries. But to suggest that schools should ONLY do synthetic phonics and teach from the front is really going back to Victorian schooling and ridiculous.

I wonder what she thinks goes on in school? And, since she's not (and never been?) a teacher why she thinks she has a right to comment on it.

5 candles, I agree that this goes on anyway.

However (and I may be reading too much into it ), it appears that she is putting a lot of emphasis on 'imparting knowledge' and young children being 'stimulated by information', particularly as I believe children learn better if they are actively involved in the learning process.

It sounded like a very politically-driven report to me, to whip up an uninformed public opinion that education is currently dreadful and we need the tories to sort it out good and proper.

Along the lines of, let's all acknowledge just how terrible these public sector job titles are so that we can justify why we are getting rid of them all without any knowledge at all about what this jobs entail.

propaganda, all propaganda. Nothing intelligent.

jsb - surprisingly, KS1 children are very realistic about their own abilities. They know what they are good at and what they're not so good at. They are cogent little people and are able to compare themselves to their peers. It took me a while to realise that when I was an NQT!

It is very easy for a competent KS1 teacher to know if a child is making an effort or not, and s/he will be able to praise/reward accordingly. Children in my class are aware of their (challenging) individual targets and try very hard to achieve them, to win prizes and house points.

In a weekly assembly we only praise children who keep the school rules and the same child may be 'celebrated' several times a year. I know some MNetters wouldn't agree with this, but we are identifying role models for good behaviour.

I think over-praising is becoming out-moded.