What subjects do you think should be compulsory in school and how similar should each school be?

[Jbr]

I think IT and typing should be compulsory at GCSE level. It would save a fortune later on and then nobody could complain they had missed out on basic skills. Of course English and Maths should be compulsory but what else?

I didn't have to take a language at school (I believe you have to take French or German now) but I still took French. I had to choose between doing Modular science (different topics every 6 weeks) or taking Biology, Chemistry and Physics as 3 separate lessons. I didn't need that much depth for my chosen career so I took modular.

Should it be the same at all schools? Should all children get the chance to take the lessons they need for their chosen jobs? I took an NVQ during the summer holidays between school and university and I met lots of different people and some of them took GCSEs in subjects I had never even heard of. While they did all the compulsory stuff eg English, Maths and a science, they had much more choice in their other lessons. A friend of mine did Classical Studies which was basically the history of the Romans and Ancient Greece with music and geography thrown in. I would have loved to have taken that and likewise she did English but couldn't take Oral Communication!

I know there is a lot of choice between which exam boards individual schools and even teachers within schools can use. I took English A Level with one exam board and re-sat it with a different exam board and found the second time much better.

Should all children have access to the same subjects? Do you think it is fair that some schools give their students less choice than others? I realise now the National Curriculum is much more narrow but I bet some kids are still not getting a lot of different choices.

I went throught the NZ system where we all took 5 School Certificate subjects (gcse equivalent), 6 for the really academically bright ones. English and maths were compulsary. You could then do a one years sixth form, doing 5 subjects, and ONLY if you wanted to go to university did you do a seventh form. This is what I think the new AS levels are trying to emulate. I took English, pure maths, history, biology and chemistry for 7th form, started a science degree and then switched to Arts. I think it is ludricous that teenagers are expected to effectivly choose at 14 or 15 what they want to do with the rest of their lives. 3 A levels is far too restricting. Our 6th form timetable left a period free each week, which we covered with an 'option', that changed every term. I studied drama, cloth dyeing and I think basic IT (dates me, computers were very new then)

The key skills part of the curriculum covers IT anyway, and as far as the numeracy and communications part, you would only have to look at some of the work I get handed in by students who have apparantly passed GCSE English, to realise that it is absolutly necessary. Many of my students still haven't realised that it is necessary to put a capital letter in their name! I wouldn't knock the numeracy or literacy hour. Something had to be done! Husband is involved with training MSC students in laboratory techniques and is contantly amazed at the amount who cannot dilute a one in ten solution. It appears that one part soultion, 9 parts water is beyond the mathematical capabilities of people with a first degree in chemistry. Go figure.

Access to a wide range of subjects is largely a matter of logistics. I would love to teach the new citizenship GCSE on offer from next year, but we just don't have the resources. I'm with the headmaster who told the parent to find a school that offered the choices they wanted. If enough parental pressure built up, eventually something might be done about the ludicrious funding system.

Lil, I was taught that one as well. I think it was from some book of parables, but can't remember. I still think its a good one for trying to get across the idea that things can be hell if we all look out for ourselves, but heaven if we help others. I've told my little girl it as well, so she will perpetuate this 'myth'.

lil, there you go, you were right! debsb, i am still surprised though, how did jesus know about chopsticks?

slug, i agree that the literacy and numeracy hours are doing a good job, it's just the length of time they take up to the exclusion of other useful things like music, swimming, pe, craft work etc i was concerned about. "literacy three-quarters of an hour" isn't a very snappy title but it would leave an extra one and a quarter hours a week for other stuff.

funding is at least better now than it was under the tories; i became a parent governor in oct 95 and the school's budget had been cut in real terms to such an extent that we had to lose a teacher.

i just wish that at some point they would decide that the balance was ok and let it stay unchanged for a bit instead of experimenting all the time!

Janh, I'm not sure they were ever referred to as chopsticks. As I remember it, someone was being shown around heaven/hell, and was told that the people in both places were given exactly the same things, plenty of delicious food but only long sticks to eat with (there must have been some reason why they couldn't just pick it up!). As the door to 'hell' was opened, the boy saw lots of struggling frantic people, all trying to get food into their mouths with these long sticks. As the door to 'heaven' was opened the boy saw lots of happy, smilimg faces, as they fed each other. As I write this, I'm starting to remember more, and I think they key to this is that it is a Chinese parable, as the mental image I have is of a little chinese boy in white smock with a pigtail. This suggests that it wasn't heaven & hell at all - ah well, another memory exploded.

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and, bloss? do you get HIM in a corner and sort him out?
aren't dads rotten teases sometimes. and the kids always believe them too. candy from a baby....

I'm with Joe on the nutrition and cookery one, then perhaps we'd have less of a market for cheese strings and Sunny Delight. No-one has mentioned music and drama. Confidence boosting, fun, food for the mind on all levels (a bit like philosophy). And PE - the fun sort which lets children try out skating, canoeing, gymnastics etc rather than requiring you to freeze on a hockey pitch.

please, miss, i have mentioned music, pe, swimming and various non-academic activities. and when i said music i meant drama too because the 2 tend to go together, at primary school anyway!

Hear hear on the cooking and nutrition score. "Home Economics" as it was then called is certainly the ONLY subject I did at school where I use what I learnt on a regular basis.

they do cooking and nutrition at my kids' secondary, but only for one term in the first two years, as part of the tech cycle. in the third year they can choose 3 of the 6 options (and my son WANTS to do cooking, i am so pleased!)

nutrition could/should form part of the pse thing - teach them how to read labels on prepared food, esp. the sugar trap (sucrose, dextrose, lactose, fructose etc) and looking out for fillers - and about vitamins, fibre, fat and all that stuff. i think at primary they do do foody things a bit but not in any structured way.

btw debsb, i wonder if your story is one of those "confucius he say" things? they had some pretty good ideas in china back then!

The House at Pooh Corner! Bloss, you're origninally from Australia aren't you? Where did you grow up? I seem to remember a pre-school called The House at Pooh Corner!!.....maybe it was a franchise!??

Janh, how many times have I told you Miss is always right? Where do pupils go who answer back? In the Naughty Corner.
I blame near enough a whole day of not being able to post (strange authentication error) for overlooking your suggestions. The feeling of e-isolation fried my brain.

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Bloss, my cousins were from Sydney. May have heard of it through them, or may have been a franchise with others scattered around the countryside as well.

I was watching one of those real life emergency programmes on TV with my husband. He said, as he said many times before, 'if I or the boys stopped breathing you would have three minutes to save us before permanent brain damage becomes likely. You wouldn't know where to begin,would you?'

He's absolutely right.

I know some first aid is taught to many school children, but I would like to see far more emphasis on it and a course made compulsary, with the possibilty of taking 'O' and possibly 'A'levels in the subject.

Religion might save your soul. First aid could save your body.

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Yes I agree. First Aid and British Sign Language. First Aid was compulsory in my school but only in the 6th form and no re-sits were allowed if you failed. Also the people who passed still weren't capable of it; they managed to pass the exam on the day, both theory and practical but a lot said they still couldn't deal with an emergency. Maybe personality comes into it? I don't know. I failed and was quite relieved. I knew I couldn't do it. I actually tripped in the exam!

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