Why are people so upset with Mr Gove?

[nlondondad]

An invitation to people to give an explanation as we can take it as given that people ARE upset.

Note: Two kinds of possible answers to this question.

1. Why you think other people are upset

1. Why you are upset...

Answers which do not give reasons, will be marked down.

Now to go away for a bit, I wonder what will happen while I am gone?

I don't think you responded to my post about gradings. You have not explained the advantage of fewer kids getting higher grades. Clearly, that would not provide evidence of standards improving would it?

I have no idea what you're talking about Crumbled and I'm not sure you do either. You responded to my quotation about Gradgrind (which sounds scarily like your own attitude towards education) by asking me if I was dealing with 'anecdotes'? I explained quite patiently that it wasn't an anecdote but a quotation so I'm left wondering why on earth you're still going on about anecdotes.

Odd.

Here is my response to your post about gradings. You didn't miss it as you tried to make it about the word "stuff" rather than the substantive point about how grades are less important than the "stuff" learned.

*If you make exams harder you have to teach children more "stuff" to help them pass the exams.

If you teach children exactly the same "stuff" and make the exams harder then grades will fall. The education of the children won't be any different. They will still know the same amount of "stuff". I don't think it's a good idea to elide the importance of grades and the importance of the "stuff" learned.

You say:
b) fewer children achieve A, B, C etc and the government is the first government to have to take responsibility for what will appear to be a FALL in standards.

Standards would be the same, as you acknowledge. So unless the curriculum is changed, or teachers change, there would be a fall in grades. But not a fall in standards. But Mr Gove also wants to change the curriculum, improve the rigour and widen the "stuff".

The point of making exams harder is to improve the preparation of the children for the exams, that is, teach them more "stuff". Grades aren't an end in themselves. It would be a mistake to think that; unfortunately a mistake made by Labour to very devastating effect.*

And if you are going to insist that standards in education have been missing you really must support that assertion by explaining what exactly the 'component parts of a rounded and full education' are that have been missing.

FGS crumbled, even Gove has not suggested that the problem with education is the lack of 'stuff' being taught. That's your own very particular take on the debate.

And you have yet to explain what stuff you feel has been absent

Teaching more stuff does not mean that kids are going to learn the stuff or that standards would improve.

If 'stuff' does not mean 'facts' then what does it mean?

What 'stuff', for example, has not been taught in English or Maths which has meant that in your view there has been a lack of rigour in education and standards have deteriorated.

Dodgy internet connection.

Don't try to smear me with your lack of understanding - we cross posted a couple of time so you probably lost track.

Gove has not suggested that the problem with education is the lack of 'stuff' being taught.

Again with the stuff comment. It may be an easy approach for you, but I think you know exactly what I meant, as I explained it above, and you are a teacher, so you should understand the meaning of the words "all the components of a full and rounded education".

I see a really sad obsession with grades. What makes you think Michael Gove shares it?

All the evidence is that he doesn't. He's obsessed with standards. Indeed, he's willing to sacrifice himself to poor grade PR (with maintained standards) in the long term hope of improving real substantive standards. (My child is a victim of this at the moment. I only hope that employers and universities realise that lower grades this year don't mean lower standards.)

And now you can respond to my post about gradings: I've repeated it.

'so you should understand the meaning of the words "all the components of a full and rounded education".'

WTF?

That statement may mean something to you but it means nothing at all to me or probably anybody else.

If you assert that there have been things missing from the curriculum that have meant our kids have not been receiving 'a full and rounded education', that have resulted in a lack of rigour and standards deteriorating then you must explain what these things are.

Crumbled, I don't think you've understood my point at all.

Suppose Gove does add this mysterious 'stuff' to the curriculum, where is your evidence that this will improve standards and rigour?

If there are many kids that struggle to get their heads around the curriculum as it is then adding to it is going to mean there is more things for them to struggle with isn't it?

So, either grade boundaries go down or grades do.

Either way standards have not gone up.

I'm bored now. If you're a teacher and you don't have any idea at all what that might mean it's not worth the convo. Bye.

'WTF' says Fivecandles.
From an English teacher/ Nice.

Some people argue that O Levels were harder than GCSEs and yet there is no evidence that standards were any higher then or that there was any more rigour.

And the context was different. More people went into unskilled or partially skilled work rather than staying on in education but society and the economy has changed even if Gove doesn't recognize that and doesn't recognize that we need a modern education system for a modern society and turning back edcuation to the 1950s is not going to help our economy or society as it is now.

And then there are those 2,055+1 (and counting) curricula to deal with. I daresay some will have 'stuff', and some won't.
And who will know?

'I'm bored now'

Meaning that you have absolutely nothing to add to the debate except hot air.

You've asserted that there is a lack of 'stuff' in the curriculum which is preventing a full and rounded education and getting in the way of rigour and leading to a decline in standards.

But you are absolutely unable to suggest one thing that is missing.

'If you're a teacher and you don't have any idea at all what that might mean'

How on earth am I supposed to know what you think is missing if you don't tell me??

NO fivecandles - meaning I'm bored by your deliberate misunderstanding and misinterpretation and swearing and exclamatory tone.

I really hope it's deliberate. If you really, really don't know what "all the components of a full and rounded education" might be, and you're not just pretending for the sake of awkwardness, then that is very worrying, coming from a teacher.

Crumbled From Head of one of country's most selective indies "History as narrative was set aside by the National Curriculum and GCSE reforms of the 1980s as lacking in rigour and as an unappealing exercise, in the regurgitation of dates and facts. It is now being posited as the central pillar of the new curriculum. While narrative history has its place, particularly when dealing with the broad sweeps of history, so do other approaches, and no attempt at reform should be allowed to place the analytical skills history is so good at imparting in jeopardy." In their judgement, and mine as an academic historian, Gove's reforms will achieve the opposite of greater rigour. "Stuff" is exactly what Gove is proposed that children will be taught, one bit of it after another, as opposed to analytical skills, the ability to develop an argument and to reach an opinion based on a balanced appraisal of the issues and evidence.....oh and that History in all it's dimensions is fascinating.

Gove is making the British education system the laughing stock of the international education world.

Until very recently, private and international schools chose the UK NC, along with GCSEs and A levels, as a trustworthy and rigorous qualification structure. It is so unstable now, with Gove at the helm, that the IB and IGCSE are being taken on by more and more previously British-curriculum international schools.

In a few short years, our country's status as providers of a robust and rigorous curriculum will be decimated.

As a British teacher in an international school in Asia, I find his campaign frankly embarrassing.

He talks of trying to emulate Asian teaching methods, when in actual fact the Asian elite were (until recently) choosing a British education for their kids. Now the preferred option is IB. Asian schools across the continent, both state and private, are moving away from rote learning towards the active and pupil enquiry-led methods that Gove dislikes so much.

I don't fully understand Gove's motives, but I suspect it has a lot more to do with ego and legacy than it does with proper academic improvement. He certainly is hell-bent on making significant changes, and it worries me that, not only is he continuing to ignore most proper advice from specialists, but he is being supported by his fellow cabinet members in this endeavour.

That quote doesn't at all say history as a narrative doesn't have a place. It just says it should go with analytical skills. And?

By the way, you're making the same mistake with "stuff" as fivecandles - a mistake I'm bored by.

Your sentence should say

""Stuff" - or all the components of a full and rounded history education- is exactly what Gove is proposing that children will be taught."

That's something I happen to agree with. But I'm really bored by the idea that facts are the work of the devil. Really, really bored by it. Thank goodness for Michael Gove.

'WTF' says Fivecandles.
From an English teacher/ Nice.

That remark is beyond ridiculous, Catherine. If you do have some ludicrous notion that teachers in posting on an adult forum should not use sweary acronyms, then bloody well keep it to yourself fgs.

by the way, I am not a teacher and so would be really interested to know what the phrase

"all the components of a full and rounded education" actually means. Could Crumbled walnuts please explain?

Or FFS perhaps?

NorthLondon, I share your interest in what teachers think it means. At least one here seems to have no clue at all.

Facts, the ability to analyse them; any diversity of opinions and the ability to critically analyse those; the ability to use knowledge to arrive at new conclusions; to devise experiments and studies across fields and analyse the results. One could write pages about the different subjects.