Gove's Education White Paper

[jackstarbright]

Is anyone interested in reading / discussing The Importance of Teaching?

The press have cherry picked from it - it's worth scan reading the actual white paper.

Glad they want to improve the quality of teaching but it concerns me that so many children are being taught by TAs/cover supervisors/HLTAs.
In one school I know a cover supervisor with NVQ Level 2 teaches classes every afternoon to cover PPA time.If they want to improve the qualifications of teachers how can that be acceptable?

These are some of the key points:

Replacing CVA (context value added) with a new floor standard to include an expected standard in both attainment and progression."

Beefing up powers to discipline pupils and discouraging the use of exclusion.

Broadening the subjects required for the GCSE league tables.

And reading tests in year 1 - which is too young IMO.

Michael Gove has been a busy boy.

CVA is important how can you compare an inner city school with lots of "English as a second language" and poor homes with a school in leafy Surrey.

As for discipline/exclusion, if a six foot 14 year old is not going to do as asked what is the "final" answer when all other avenues have been explored.

@Newwave - the criticism of CVA is that it encourages schools with disadvantaged intakes to set low standards for their pupils.

So whilst it might be reasonable to make allowances for children from more deprived homes who tend start from a lower base academically, expecting them to progress at a slower rate is actually counterproductive.

The proposal is to retain the allowance for a lower starting base, but for allowance for other circumstances such as high FSM pupils, to be applied after assessment has taken place - rather than building them implicitly.

My DS goes to a high achieving secondary with nearly 70 Statemented pupils. Many of them have ASD but are actually pretty bright. Presumably the high number of Statements counts in their favour. If it is only FSM then maybe not.