Gove to announce scrapping of GCSEs

[Itchyandscratchy]

But before anyone is taken in by the leak announcement in the Daily Hate Mail here, take the time to then read this for a more informed version.

With any luck they'll be out of a job in 2015 when this is sposed to be brought in, but there's no doubt GCSEs will be scrapped. What I woud hope is that Labour will get is finger out and propose a system that has had full consultation with schools, teachers, employment agencies, industry chiefs and unions.

It will change how every child is currently taught at secondary school. And I hope that doesn't mean some children's futures are determined by the age of 11.

Some rote learning is important of course, but not all of it remains useful. Not least because the world has changed!

As a student, I worked in pub, with a draw for a till. I had to add up rounds in my head. At that time I needed to use the basic maths I was taught in school (I did O levels, I had both calculator and non calculator papers).

My student son works in a pub now, they have to use a till with a button of every drink. There are calculators on every phone and computer. Today different skills are needed.

Well, I was at school in the 70's when learning dates of Kings and Queens and battles was definitely out - at least in primary and lower secondary. I remember doing a great project on Medieval Villages which I loved But I dropped history before O level as it involved studying the 20th century which didn't appeal at that age, mainly because I thought it would be all about the wars. A shame as history was naturally one of my stronger subjects, and I loved everything I picked up at places like The Horniman Museum - all that anthropology and history and geography from around the world.
Having my children has made me even more interested in history and finding out about our family's own history ... and I'm sorry it's taken me until my late forties to begin to learn the order of the Kings and Queens of England - but thanks to Horrible Histories and their great song I'm starting to put that right ! I just feel it's useful to have that structure to hang other more interesting things on to

LaQueen maybe you can but most of the rest of us mere mortals are not human calculators and we manage to get by, have successful careers in banking, finance etc !! Everyone is different, different strengths and weaknesses that make us good or bad at one job or another ,and that is what the education system seems to have evolved to accommodate better, even if the standard of some teachers recruited etc has deteriorated. It seems to be a direction we should be going down to equip our DCs to best contribute to a successful UK plc not consigning large swathes of the population to be labelled useless by a very narrow measure. 10% of our very brightest have SLDs by the rule of thumb used by our most superselective schools and this measure is certainly going to affect their chances to achieve their potential.

I actually think that it is sad you think we should be sitting students down in class reciting the structure of complex sentences as I did at Grammar School. Of course we all need to know the Key stage 2 basics which are hardly the stuff of rote learning. I will admit that some of my students do not conform to the strict stadards of grammar that were inflicted on me (and neither do I you will notice wink) but they communicate effectively and often better in terms of a liveliness or passion. I have friends who are sticklers for the minutiae of English and they have gravitated to professions like design, teaching and editing which is fine but I went to see the Writing Britain exhibition at the British Library and what was fascinating was looking at some of our greatest works of literature in draft. It was clear to me that quite a lot of the authors were Dyslexic, JG Ballard's draft was practically a mind map but they are the people responsible for some of teh most sublime achievements in Literature

'I actually think that it is sad you think we should be sitting students down in class reciting the structure of complex sentences as I did at Grammar School.'

Recitation and repetition are vital. They concretize language in the mind. They make it real, 3 dimensional and stereophonic, they embed the structure of language in the brain. They are much more effective than merely reading. Spelling out and sounding out are more effective ways of ingraining spelling and pronounciation than simply reading off a page or a laptop.

Learning times tables and dates and facts trains the mind, expands it and helps it to store and retrieve all sorts of other information at will.

Reciting poetry will eventually turn you into a poet. You are what you eat, you become what you speak.

If you really want to learn Italian or French, start singing some Italian and French songs to records. The structure of teh language will become second nature and your pronounciation will improve dramatically. Reading can't compare to speaking.

My DS's primary school rote learns times tables in Y2, in preparation for morning mental maths daily at the start of Y3.

It teaches them the difference between a homonym and a synonym, how, where and why to use an apostrophe, how to lay out a formal letter, similes, all the things you need to have a good handle on English.

They also teach Spanish from YR right through to Y6.

All this information was information that my DD just CAN'T retain. Rote learning times tables made no impact on her ability to recall that information when she needed it.

Yes, my DS1 has amazing recall of his times tables, and even my DS2 who has SN's has a decent recall. My DD would have to use her fingers and toes or a calculator to know what 3*4 is.

Even rote learning just doesn't work for my DD. the only way information is recalled with my DD is if she finds the lesson fun and engaging, and can use her hands to physically DO that thing.

This is why she knows what cutting vegetables 'paysanne' means, but couldn't tell you that 3x4=12.

Chanting is vital. The Buddhist monks knew it and have been doing it for millenia. The sound and rhythm of language is transformative.

For centuries, children have recited and memorized facts, verses and times tables. All of their teachers knew a thing or two. The progressives have tipped the apple cart over and the result has been dumbing down.

Gove's proposed 'reforms' are ill thought out, intellectually incohesive and clearly a rushed job. I'm particularly concerned with the further 'downgrading' of certain subjects which I personally believe are some of the most important elements of a rounded education (which should be oh so much more than merely preparing for a job).

However.

Several posters have commented that coursework is much better for children with SENs. (As far as I'm aware the kids don't do coursework anymore, they do controlled assessments, but maybe there are boards or specific subjects that do still use coursework and they just aren't impacting on my Dd1) While this may be true for many SEN conditions, maybe even most SEN conditions, it is certainly not true for all SEN conditions. Speaking as a person with an SEN and a mother of daughters with the same SEN condition. For many people coursework is a complete and utter nightmare and it's complete abandonment can only be a cause for great relief.

As Boewuld wrestled the serpent, so Gove wrestles the progressives, determined to change things for the better and to restore rigour to the realm.

Oh claig do get off your anti 'progressives' soap box! There is no one size fits all solution to education or assessment, no matter what you say. Let's face it - not everyone back then had what it took to become a Buddhist monk, did they?

And your Gove-grovelling actually blankets the fact that you do make some pretty sensible points. Stop preaching and engage with the issues like the rest of us, you're better than this.

OK.
But what we have here is a fundamental difference of philosophy. Gove wants to crack the Gordian nut, he has called time on a failed philosophy.

I think, claig, our minds may work not dissimilarly - I think in mad mixed metaphors too.

I did very well with traditional O Levels & I'm sure you did too. When I started teaching, my biggest struggle was to get my round the fact that not everyone learns like I did.

Gove doesn't grasp that at all, this much is clear. I think you might be able to, if you give the waffle about 'progressives' a rest.

Yes, but he appears to be going back to a philosophy that has already failed the majority back in the 1950s - 1970s.

I am in favour of change. Don't get me wrong on this. I would like to see a system much closer to the one I went through in the early to mid-80s in Holland. I did not have to go through constant assessment after assessment. Assessments happened at fixed points in time, starting towards the end of my pre-A level year. All assessment was controlled assessment bar one or two items, so 90% of what I did was under exam conditions - exam length usually 2 hours but sometimes 3, especially towards the end of the final year.

Controlled assessment was set and marked by the school, with a system of spot checks and external moderation run by the state exam board (one exam board for all subjects, not one per exam subject, and not run for profit). On the whole the exams set by the school were much tougher than the central exam at the end of the year - that was deliberate, to toughen us up to the point where the real deal felt like a breeze.

The marks of all the controlled assessments for a subject were averaged (with some weighting for topics considered particularly key). This generated a mark. The central exam generated another mark. The two were then averaged, and that was the exam mark.

Resits were limited to one per term. Note: One per term, not one per term per subject. Final exam resits were also restricted. Across all subjects (usually 7, sometimes 8) you were allowed two minor fails *if you had a higher mark in two other subjects to average it out to a pass. Example: A 5 was a minor fail (marks were out of 10). You'd need a 7 elsewhere to make it up. For two fives you'd need either two 7s or one 8. You were allowed one 4, but needed a 9 to compensate for it. Anything more (either three 5s or a 4 and a 5) was a fail and you'd have to repeat the exam year. A 3 anywhere was an automatic complete fail.

The problem with this system is that the government needs to trust the schools and the teachers to teach and set exams and mark appropriately. However, this could be achieved because a school with a huge disparity in marks between its internal assessments and its central exam scores would show up, and parents would vote with their feet. (There are no catchments in Holland, real school choice is much better).

It worked. It was rigorous and testing. It certainly weeded out the best. However, and this is important, the system also provided very high quality vocational education which included workplace-based learning where the young person was also earning a wage. The vocational courses included compulsory essential maths, Dutch and English. It's this last component that I do not see in Michael Gove's plans, and that really worries me.

claig
"As Boewuld wrestled the serpent"

OK, it been a while since I looked at that region of mythology but wasn't Beowulf in the end a liar as he didn't kill the grendel's mother but made an illicit deal with her?

I can't remember. I will have to look it up. But great stuff it is.

If that is the case, then I was wrong to compare Gove to Boewulf. Maybe someone like Sir Galahad is more appropriate, unless you tell me that he was a liar too.

nope :)

Sir Galahad was Lancelot's illegitimate son with Elaine.
Brought up by an Aunt in a nunnery.
Seen by some as an embodiment of Jesus in knight form.
Slade bad guys, rescued damsels and took the grail to its final resting place with Sir Bors and Sir Percivil.

Also known as the perfect knight and pulled a second sword from a stone.

My memory of Beowulf has been twisted by watching several films.

LaQueen

"We have done today's students a huge dis-service, by spoon feeding them bite-size knowledge, and skimming over the dull bits, and doing-away with the tedious stuff."

I agree completely, but whilst ofsted can and do fail teachers and schools because the pupils are not fully engaged, because the lesson pace is not fast enough or because they are being made to complete rote learning it will continue to happen.

claig if you read 'The Once and Future King' (and I really think that everyone should read this - am trying to get DD1 to read it once she's finished LOTR) you'll learn that Galahad was not all he was cracked up to be either - a sanctimonious self-righteous little twit who condemned his own father for not being perfect. The only thing he does right in the book is die after he finds the Grail. .

And really, Gove is just another career politician trying to make his mark so he can move on to greater things. Politicians, no matter what party they're from, do not give a shit about education. They just kick it around the field, score a few goals, then walk away leaving it in the mud.

Lastly, I was reading your earlier comments about how Gove blew away the opposition with his fabulous speaking - I would share a quote from a well-known playwright with you: 'full of sound and fury, signifying nothing'.

LaQueen I agree with you that in terms of basic literacy there is a lost generation out there. However, my DDs at 9 and 11 know their tables inside out and can dissect a sentence with surgical precision - they have been taught grammar and know their subordinate clauses from their elbow, so to speak. Gove and his ilk make it sounds as if the entire state system is rubbish so that they can hand it over to the for-profit sector. The dishonesty of the rhetoric is what makes me so angry.

Its going to be interesting to see exactly what happens when all of the changes finally meet up.

gove hasn't left an area untouched, so we don't know if any of his changes are compatable with each other yet.

"Are teachers failed by Ofsted for not making lessons 'fast-paced' enough?? How silly.

Some stuff you simply can't fast-pace through. Them's just the breaks...as they say."

unfortunately that isn't how ofsted think and its one of the main barriers to what people want.

These changes may mean that the ofsted criteria changes again but that will be three times in as many years.

When learning a language in Germany we were, and pupils still are, simply told to go away and learn pages of new vocabulary, then they get tested on them. Here, every new bit of vocal is introduced and endlessly repeated in class. Why? Why aren't British pupils trusted and expected to just go away and learn stuff off their own backs?

'Galahad was not all he was cracked up to be either - a sanctimonious self-righteous little twit'

OK, so that is another one who is nothing like Gove.

'Politicians, no matter what party they're from, do not give a shit about education.'

I don't think that is right. Don't forget that it was the Tories who scrapped O levels and CSEs and created GCSEs. They did it to increase "fairness" and end the divide between pupils of differing abilities. They did it out of progressive motives. It contained may good points, but also contained flaws.

There was a fundamental failure to understand human nature. They should read Boewulf and the Arthurian legends to understand how the human psyche works. It was inevitable that coursework would sometimes be done by parents and tutors instead of pupils and that it woulkd disadvantage poorer children who did not have teh same access to books, Ipads and internet and who did not have parents who could help them. It was inevitable that league tables and competing exam boards would lead to competitive dumbing down. That is human nature - always looking to maximize individual advantage.

It has taken many years for the great and the good to accept the mistakes and to do something about them. New Labour rode the wave and waved the flag of ever increasing numbers of A* grades. Each year they told us that standards were increasing and pupils were getting brighter and brighter. And at the same time, employers were telling us the opposite and universities were creating their own entrance exams and putting on remedial classes. When the Daily Mail dared to report the truth, they were called the Daily Hate in a Big Brother style two minute hate.

Now, Gove has grasped the nettle and decided to rectify some of the mistakes. He has scrapped coursework and is going back to a single exam board. He has not sat back and let the decline continue, he has proposed change.

I think he has done it because he feels a responsibility to the country. He could have sat back like New Labour and carried on trumpeting more and more A* grades, but he has told us that grades will fall. He is not prepared to do nought, he is enaged in the bout and wants to kick dumbing down out.

TBH I stopped sending my kids to independent schools a few years back when I found that some local state schools were doing a better job (IMO). My lot are certainly getting an extremely good education, equivalent to my public school one. I can't see what more they need, TBH. And Education is my day job.