Election Fever!

Wow, we now face the excruciating experience of being lectured to by a pack of self-serving politicians who cannot simply let control of education go. Way to go.

On the one hand we have a Labour Government that attempts to demonstrate that education standards are improving by constantly measuring, monitoring and target setting. This has been such a success that the two major teaching unions, the NUT and the NAHT, have voted to boycott the next round of SAT tests for 11 year olds. One union is traditionally a Labour supporter and the other represents the least militant group in society, the head-teachers for goodness sake!

Does our friend, Mr Balls, at the Ministry for Goodness-knows-what-it-is-named-this-week-but-was-formerly-that-of-education appear to care? No. He has rubbished the Cambridge Report into Primary education which condemned the standards culture. He has ignored recommendations from the Parliamentary Committee on Education that testing was ruining children's experience of education. He issues yet more diktats from the Ministry to cope with the fact that children are still not passiing the arbitrary "pass" mark of Level 4 in Maths and English at age 11, rather than accepting that a prescribed and centrally controlled curriculum, teaching strategies and inspection system have failed.

What about the other lot? Our Conservative friends have a long track record of undervalueing state education. Why else do so many of the Conservative front bench send their children to public schools (or have themselves attended them)? Their answer is still to control schools centrally through a standards system. They still want league tables which compare unlike schools with unlike schools.

What is wrong with these people? Why are they so intent on micromanaging education. Why does a school in Kent need to teach the same subjects in the same way as a school in Northumberland?

Let's take an example. Does Eton College let others tell it how to teach it's students? Does it take a rather more professional line and evolve a curriculum that suits its students? Eton answers to its Governors and Trustees, as well as its parents. Why can't state schools do the same? Are teachers in the state sector so untrustworthy? If a government has a realistic inspection system rather than the madness of OFsted then this could be possible. Do children emerge from Eton as ignorant and undereducated, with an inability to learn? Based on my own experience then I would say no (regardless of other questions such as privilege, money etc).

The reason there are still children who do not perform well at school in Maths and English is that there is not enough for them to do at school that they find stimulating. In British primary schools they learn to switch off at an early age when reading, writing and maths become more difficult. Contrast this with many European Countries where children actually formally start primary education at 6-7 years old). They become habitually confused in lessons because they cannot concentrate at crucial moments. They fall behind.

The bonkers thing about this system that we have allowed to come into being in this country is that you can find in almost any classroom in the country one or two children who are being taught to write before they can even read! Subsequently, writing has no meaning for them and actually becomes a source of anguish. Similarly, they can't do maths because most maths is presented in a written form, and despite their own possible natural talents at maths they are precluded from accessing more complex maths because of their poor reading.

These children are being forced into a sausage making machine that is the school. They have to be assessed at age 11 in Reading, Writing and Maths so they have to be able to sit a test. Panicky teachers and Heads, looking at the SATs results, on which the school will be judged by Ofsted, look at these children despairingly and try to get them through a faulty system but it is largely hopeless when so much of School time is skewed towards reading writing and maths.

Where are the politicians when we get down to the nitty gritty of actual classroom experience for most teachers in the country? They are not interested because the solution (if there is even one in the English speaking world) is complex and does not lend itself to headlines that proclaim a measurable success. Shame on them for their appalling lack of leadership!

Ofsted - Aaarrrgh?

I suppose criticizing Ofsted is a bit of a bore for most teachers. How awful Ofsted are is a fairly constant topic of conversation in most staff rooms. Those same people who don't want Ofsted in the classrooms also don't want their heads in, subject leaders, parents or any adult who might form a negative opinion of their practice. They're living in Lalaland, a bit like the unions do (more on them another day). We need inspection, if only to justify the money schools spend but is Ofsted in any condition to do this reliably?
Ofsted is looking a bit creaky. The quality of their inspections from schools to children's services are under fire from many quarters. Do read this on the Parliamentary Education committee's view. Think of Ofsted's involvement in Haringey and the Baby P fiasco. Do Ofsted put bureaucracy before children's welfare? If they do then they need instant reform or abolition.
The degree of completion of self assessment evaluation paperwork that schools now complete prior to inspection is now a cause for a school to fail, regardless of quality of the observable teaching, learning and pastoral care. Many heads feel that, in primary schools, Ofsted are putting far too much emphasis on attainment in end of primary school testing, rather than consider the whole child, which is far harder to assess and would require longer, more detailed, more expensive inspections.
The outcome of an investigation is bonkers. Grades from outstanding, good, satisfactory and inadequate are meant to somehow sum up the work of dedicated and professional teams. The inadequate inspection is the most absurd. From personal experience I have visited "inadequate" schools which have been happy, safe and interesting place for children to learn in, and I have visited some which have been souless, unsafe and downright frightening (piles of wrecked, half-burnt furniture in internal courtyards, no books in the library,trashed ICT equipment etc). How can they be lumped together in the same category? For the individuals on the receiving end of an inspection this is a high stakes game, especially as the downside can be professional suicide.
How do we know that Ofsted's inspections are reliable? There is very little that a school, child care provider or children's service can do about results of an inspection. Read this to find out more about the respected children's charity, Kidscape, and their experience.
Teachers complain about the extreme variability of lesson observations. There is the story of a history lesson being observed in an Ofsted training session for inspectors: at the end of the lesson the assessments of the session ranged from outstanding to inadequate. 'Nuff said.
Just as schools are getting used to these new inspections Ofsted have changed the criteria for inspections, putting a much greater emphasis on child safety, specifically safguarding children policies (paperwork rather than practice). Early results are indicating a significant downgrading of many schools ratings. Contrasting this is the complete absence of any significant rise in abductions, injuries, or exploitation of children in schools. In fact, it has never been safer to be a child in the UK, despite what the popular press would have us believe. So, some schools are now being regarded as inadequate because of the degree of preparedness for dealing with a predatory paedophile, even though nothing significant changed in the school from the previous inspection. What next? A policy on what to do in the case of an asteroid impact?
The frustrating thing is that it is often the schools, or in the case of Victoria Climbie, child care providers, that are highlighting issues to do with safeguarding children. Schools know how to do this. It is the other agencies that place obstacles in the way (usually to do with funding issues and high caseloads).
In short, Ofsted need to inspect schools. Schools are far from perfect and many need a kick up the bum but they do not necessarily need lining up against the wall. Ofsted should do this on short notice. A school should be seen warts and all, but those warts should be allowed for, not concealed. Ofsted should publish reports on inspections but included in that inspection report should be a right of reply for heads and governors. However,the public are currently being sold a dud. Unfortunately, because of human nature, most people, much of the time, are only ever mediocre at their job. Sometimes they are brilliant and sometimes some people are always brilliant, but this is rare. Even Mozart had his off days. Ofsted would have us believe that every one in education should be brilliant because they say it should be. It is an unrealistic expectation. Ofsted should be a critical friend not a critical hatchet man.

Harrumph!

Welcome to my blog! You can read all about me (if you're really that interested) on the side bar. I hope to post reasonably regularly since there's plenty to be posting about.

Yesterday was a classic in the wonderful world of the English primary school (sorry my Celtic brethren but we English are peculiarly discriminated against with SATs). I turned up for work to find the Boss almost apoplectic about a number of things (the Boss will one day be carried out on a stretcher if he keeps popping his catapetl).

Firstly, he shared the county's latest advice (straight from central government courtesy of Mr Balls) on sustainable schools. This took the form of a conference and workshops to help governors, heads and teachers to get to grips with the concept. No problem there, I hear many say, though in fairness does it really need a conference? However, the conference started with an introductory film which included footage of 9/11, earthquakes, tsunamis, soldiers shooting children and other natural disasters, mixed in with more man made ones.

Can anyone tell me what earthquakes have to do with sustainable schools? Or for that matter 9/11? Is this an example of the sort of flagrant scaremongering that schools should be educating children to beware of? What is even more upsetting is that public money has been spent on this pack of lies and propaganda and it actively undermines the very ideals that it is supposed to be supporting.

Could this money have been channeled into actually educating (gasp!)children? Films don't come cheap and I suspect an awful lot of Forest Schools in primaries across the country could have been set up for the same price. If we assume a film cost £20,000 and a Forest School costs about £1000 (I should know since I have done it on a £1000) then 500 children could have received some direct input on sustainable schools if one assumes an average class size of 25 (and only one class per school attending). I suspect that the film cost more, as I am sure many of you do too.

More will follow about violent extremism! I might be violently extreme.