Gove kills the mockingbird with ban on US classic novels ...what do you think?

[mrz]

www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/news/article1414764.ece?CMP=OTH-gnws-standard-2014_05_24

I've never found it on my kindle, but that doesn't mean it doesn't exist...

It's pretty irrelevant at my school though - I can't imagine we'll get round a need to buy texts by asking all the kids to download to their kindle/iPads because the majority don't have one.

Also, it would be impossible for an exam, assuming texts can go in, as electronic devices are not allowed in.

Is the new spec the one just announced (is it out yet?) or an older new spec?

Those books don't sound wildly different to what is proposed, tbh. To my uneducated eye at least!

New one = the one just out - we've only had a quick look at it. Y11 time job!

It's quite different, though. Lots of demands for whole C19th novels. Early indications are that we'll need to replace OM&M with something like 'An Inspector Calls' or LOTF & TwiB with a C19th novel (I'm championing 'The Turn of the Screw').

It'll work very nicely for some of our cohort (I'd have quite liked it as a teenage goth) but it'll struggle to engage a lot more.

The biggest nonsense is the dropping of combined English, so the lower sets will have to do a full GCSE of Eng Lit - which they are highly unlikely to pass, or, in some cases, be prepared for, as we'll be concentrating on getting them the gateway grades they need in Lang.

Will they have to take it? Isn't that where media studies comes in?

These new qualifications weren't supposed to be suitable for the bottom 25%, I thought?

If it were me, I'd replace OMAM with Kindertransport or DNA.

Hang on...actually, just checked, & no, they can technically just do Lang, which will then only be single weighted for Progress 8.

My understanding, though, is that the boss wants us to enter even the weakest for both, throw the kitchen sink at Lang, allow them to fail Lit, & trouser the double-weighted award for the higher grade (ie. Lang). .

That's the outgoing spec, EvilTwins.

My school is in one of the areas of highest deprivation in the country. Most of the students come from houses where there are few if any books, where no one reads or has high aspirations. The % of adults educated past the age of 18 is 6%.
To read posts on here saying it will do them good to read Pre-20th century English novels because it will stop first year under- graduates using the word 'relatable' in reference to texts makes me furious.
GCSE English is for every child, not just the privileged minority who go on to be English Literature undergraduates. I want to live in a society where every child and adult engages with and learns something from literature, and loves reading, not where it is an elitist subject existing only to perpetuate the hallowed world of universities.
I am all in favour of further and higher education but not of elitism and snobbery.

Every child has a right to an education that is accessible, engaging and prepares them with the skills they need in life.

Forgive me if I think that does not include Wordsworth or Romantic poetry for all or Emily Bronte or Shakespeare.

Gove would like to re- create a society where education is a tool that is divisive and keeps the class structure he and his colleagues cherish very firmly at the centre of our society. He is all about keeping the working classes in their place as he sees it.

Rant over.

Raven, where's the new spec? I can't find it online.

Lulu, do you ever feel that you're damning those kids with low expectations? That's the argument Gove and Wilshaw would make.

But if you aren't prepared to even expose these kids to Shakespeare, then perhaps English Lit GCSE isn't for them.

Here you go - preliminary AQA stuff.

www.aqa.org.uk/news-and-policy/policy/changes-to-gcses/what-reform-means-for-your-subject

I've got a slightly more detailed version on my docs, but I think it's only been sent out to HODs rather than published on their website. Gist is here though.

Don't get me started on the removal of tiering....

Raven, I'd be surprised if DNA/Kindertransport were not on new specs.

They are, IMO, much better options than An Inspector Calls, which is only amazing if you get to watch the production that's been touring for a few years. On the page, it's quite dry. DNA is gripping from the outset and throws up all manner of issues for discussion. AND its characters are teenagers, which I think is important.
I agree with Lulu in many ways. The number of PP who have alluded to GCSEs being prep for A Levels is ridiculous (though not unsurprising for MN) That's not their main purpose at all.

They're currently on the 'Modern Texts' bit, so could indeed stay in the post-1914 slot. Not instead of OM&M though - that bit of the spec's going.

I don't know either of them - I've been examining that paper for 5 years & no-one ever picks them! It's nearly always 'An Inspector Calls', which I agree is dry as a text.

we do 'The woman in Black' or 'Martyn Pig'.

DNA is about a group of kids who think they've killed another kid after winding him up and taking it too far. They then go to extreme lengths to cover their tracks without leaving any DNA traces. The interesting thing is how each character behaves under the circumstances they find themselves in. I've done it with youth theatre kids.

When I said I'd replace OMAM with DNA I was looking at it as a post 1914 text. Had the rules not specified that this section had to be a text from the British Isles, then OMAM could still be done...

Ah, that's what I've already seen, I thought from what you were saying you'd already seen a list of set texts?

Tiering stays in maths . Foundation tier has been made much harder though, goes up to B grade in old money instead of C grade.

GCSE doesn't have to be preparation for A-level, but surely there's no argument to be made against the inclusion of Shakespeare??

But lula we don't argue that every child should be able to love maths so let's just do easy sums. Or every child should be able to enjoy speaking French so lets just teach them to eat baguettes.

I dislike the idea that the 'point' of literature is to be relatable to teenagers in 2014 and it should be judged on how well it achieves that aim. And I really dislike the idea that a text full of racism and victim blaming is or should be 'relatable'.

Thanks - I can't even remember if we considered it back in 2010!

I do know we rejected 'Touching the Void' & 'Kindertransport', but it was other colleagues who looked at those two.

Shakespeare - like OM&M for that matter - is one thing that does work straight across the ability range. No quarrel with the bard!

No list of set texts yet, AQA are still deliberating, I believe. OCR have their spec out this week, hence the hoo-ha.

noblegiraffe Our students make outstanding progress according to OfSTED. They love reading. We do Shakespeare with them. We have very high aspirations for them.

My point is we make professional choices as teachers, knowing our students incredibly well, in their best interests; choices that stretch, challenge and engage them, rather than having ludicrous narrowed choices imposed on us by politicians who have no idea what they are talking about and whose agenda is political gain rather than real benefit to children.

Gove is a twat.

I certainly agree that Gove is a twat. But I think it's a bizarre situation where anyone under about 25, in most cases, has been exposed to the same not very good, nice and short, fairly troubling, book as representative of 'literature'.
If OMAM stops being the default for most 16 year olds, I can't see that as a bad thing.

www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/10857133/Michael-Gove-Kill-a-Mockingbird-Id-never-dream-of-it.html

Gove says he hasn't banned anything, and loves Of Mice and Men.

I never said it had to be OMAM. There are lots of great modern novels. OMAM is one of them and is very suitable for some students, as is LOTF and TKAM.
However, it certainly is not Emily Bronte or Wordsworth for all

It is not up to Twat Gove to tell us what to teach.

Nor the elitist posters who are only concerned about first year under -grads.

I'm not only concerned about first year undergrads, and nor is where I teach elitist... But I am concerned that first year undergrads have been taught that literature is there pretty much solely to be related to: it's a good book if you can and a bad one if you can't.

I think less emphasis on subjectivity and (BLERK) relatability would be a good thing. Anyway, my dd is doing a level English lit and has no interest in an eng lit degree, and I still think she could be reading better stuff and doing more interesting things with it, whether she picks another book up ever again or not.

Why do you think Emily Bronte is impossible for most teenagers to read, anyway?

Actually, we have a huge problem with 'relatability' on our (not English lit) degree programme. It seems that many students (and some of my colleagues ) seem to think whether they agree with/relate to anything is the only thing that matters. Weighing up evidence, thinking about context (social, political, intellectual), comparing it to other ideas in the published literature, etc all get sidelined as we simply ask students 'what do you think?' or ask them to write some worthless piece of (totally uncritical) reflection on their own life.

So it's not just GCSE English lit that has this issue. It's academic effort made as egocentric as possible.