Let’s learn ’em.

1st January 1960

– FOCUS TRANSCRIPT

Today we have with us The Minister of Education – Mrs Shelly Wells. Good evening Shelly, I may call you Shelly?

Yes of course John. It is a pleasure to be here.

I understand that your government have identified a huge number of inadequacies in our current education system and are planning a major liberal overhaul.

Yes, John, that is so. We feel that to stream children at the age of 11 leaves those, not making it into Grammar Schools, with major psychological problems which remain with them for the rest of their lives. We want to create a more inclusive system which more readily enables us to fulfil the wonderful aims of the Butler education act. We want to create a learning environment which will develop, to a maximum, the potential of all children. After all, we don’t want an “us and them” society, do we?

Well, that seems an admirable objective Shelly and how do you intend to achieve this?

Our first step will be to eliminate the 11plus examination so that all children entering secondary education will carry no sense of failure. In its place we will introduce a skills and desires identification program which will direct children into the type of education for which they are most suited or most desire. After all, John, we need all our people to be skilled and motivated be they Artisans, Professionals or Traders. We also want to introduce an element of life skills to help develop a sense of belonging and foster a desire in our people to create a loving supportive society.

That seems to be a difficult challenge for you, Shelly. What practical steps will you be taking?

Well, what is needed primarily are larger secondary schools so that we can offer a vast range of subjects in a cost-effective manner. After all, a massive school will find enough students to fill classes in such minority activities as archery, rock climbing, historical fiction etc; in fact a school with say 3000 pupils per school we will be able to offer a massive range of academic, social and physical activities. We shall call them Comprehensive schools.

That seems wonderful, Shelly but at what stage and how in our new system will the children be tested for their competence to give the rest of society a feel for their usefulness. I use usefulness in its broadest sense, of course, Shelly.

Well, we have identified just how unfair the present external examination system is. It presents teachers with a lottery. They are required to guess what parts of the syllabus are most likely to appear on the examination papers. The result is that the teachers who guess right get better results than those who do not. To alleviate this, we intend to introduce an internal assessment scheme because we feel that the teachers can rank their students more accurately as they are with them daily.

But are teachers qualified to carry out testing?

We are aware of the need to retrain teachers so that they can become excellent assessors as well as brilliant teachers. Indeed, the retraining program has been designed already.

Oh yes. Of what does it comprise?

Firstly, all teachers/assessors will be given a thorough grounding in Bloom’s epistemological categories. They will understand the differences between knowledge, comprehension, analysis and synthesis and be given a tool bag which will enable them to discern clearly that for which they are testing. It is a very subtle area but not one that is beyond the skills of the average teacher.

Having done this, Shelly, how will your ministry judge the capabilities of the teachers and the efficacy of the individual schools?

John, I am glad that you asked me that for we have given this matter a lot of thought. We intend to monitor them on several fronts. Firstly, the internal examinations will be externally assessed to ensure that all aspects of the syllabi are covered and tested at the appropriate level. Secondly, we shall create league tables for schools so that they can compare their performance with that of other schools. Lastly, we will introduce financial incentives. Schools which have more students being educated at a higher level will be rewarded with higher grants and salaries.

I’m sorry Shelly but I think I can see a flaw in your reasoning.

I beg your pardon, John?

Well if you make it rewarding for schools to pass as many students as possible won’t there be a natural incentive for the general dumbing down of the curriculum?

But we will be assessing the exams, so I don’t see a difficulty.

Shelly, you know as well as I do that it will not work. Even I, a non-professional, can design an examination question which can purport to test comprehension but will only be testing knowledge and no assessor on this earth will be any the wiser. For to distinguish the level of testing being utilised we also need to know what has been taught. This means that you will need as many assessors as there are teachers to monitor what is being taught.

OK, so it may not be perfect, but it will overcome the current problems of young people being psychologically disturbed by the stress of external exams and the prospect of being disenfranchised.

Wouldn’t it just be cheaper to just develop the psychological skills of the kids so that they can handle the stress of the external exams.

But John, how do we stop this current business of examination question guessing?

Isn’t that a question that you, minister, should be addressing? But, as you ask, I do know how to do it!!!

Oh?

The larger school idea seems sound though. I give the rest if it about 60 years before the right wingers tear it down…………Uhm, er, thank you Shelly.