Mr. Tea
Let's Talk About Ceps
Oi! Teacher! Leave them kids alone!
michael gove
- Thread starter don_quixote
- Start date
Oi! Teacher! Leave them kids alone!
dd528
Well-known member
This new plan to scrap GCSEs and introduce the EBacc as some kind of replacement seems like one more in a series of ill-thought out policies to emerge on Gove's watch.
In June we find out in the papers that the government plans to scrap GCSEs and bring back something like O-levels and CSEs. Unfortunately the LibDem members of the government also seem to have found out in the papers, having not been consulted, then proceeded to hurl (accurate) accusations at Gove that he wanted a return to a two-tier system.
Fast forward to September and the EBacc announcement. Now Clegg and Gove are hand in hand, writing in the Evening Standard about how they share a passion for education and believe this new qualification is just what is needed.
So the policy that has replaced the two-tier suggestion seems to be a one-tier system that some kids just don't get to participate in at all? What employer or further education institution is going to look at a "record of achievement", written by a pupil's own school, and consider it to be worth the paper it's written on?
There is plenty wrong with the current system but it does at least seem that, at the moment, a comprehensive school can offer a fairly wide range of routes by which their pupils can access the curriculum. The division of examination into Foundation and Higher tiers means that time isn't wasted teaching more able kids material that does not challenge them, nor in teaching less able kids material they cannot realistically be expected to engage with or understand.
Coursework means that children who have academic talent, but do not perform well in exams, are still able to demonstrate their ability. More than that, coursework is absolutely necessary preparation for the independent learning and research skills that are so important as part of a student's further and higher education. It beggars belief that Gove can talk about wanting to best prepare kids for the rigours of university, and then wants to scrap coursework from English, foreign languages, and humanities subjects.
Plus, as it stands, GCSEs in a range of supposedly less academic subjects (arts subjects, PE, religious studies, technologies, etc.) are to be binned and replaced with something that the government hasn't found the time to come up with on the back of an envelope yet. So that is yet another dividing line.
The worst of it all is that it seems to have come out of the blue. The policy announcement has come before any consultation, which is the only way it could have happened because no teaching union has had anything positive to say about it. Nor have the devolved administrations in Wales and Northern Ireland, who have had it sprung on them the same as the rest of us. Labour have come out against it, which means if the whole thing is to be brought in, it will have to be rushed through before the end of this parliament.
Then there is the proposed switch from the current system of grading to a normative system, which seems like a fudge to circumvent the need to actually have a sophisticated debate on standards and assessment in schools, even if it would end up being the reasoned outcome of that debate were it ever to take place.
It's frustrating because I think some things of value have been put forward. The idea of one exam board per subject is a good one. A move to writing coursework in supervised conditions in schools rather than at home would go a long way to tackling some of the current problems with that mode of assessment. The modular nature of current GCSEs is also a problem. Not, perhaps, so much because of the fact that it gives students the ability to resit ad infinitum, but because having exams frequently over the course of years 10 and 11 is extremely disruptive to the teaching timetable, and because it necessitates rescheduling (or missing) teaching in one subject to allow for the sitting of an exam in another subject, which has a negative educational impact and increases tension between departments within a school. But it's hard to focus on the good within these policies when so much of the rest is just bollocks. It's policy for policy's sake. And even then it's only half a policy.
Whatever happened to the Tomlinson report? When a long, thorough, bipartisan consultation took place and a fairly broad consensus was achieved, with a raft of commonsense suggestions for addressing problems in the education system? When advances in allowing the maximum possible number of kids to access the curriculum were to be built on? When measures were proposed to deal with other issues based on research and study of what works around the world, rather than by only paying lip service to those things? Obviously too good to be true.
In June we find out in the papers that the government plans to scrap GCSEs and bring back something like O-levels and CSEs. Unfortunately the LibDem members of the government also seem to have found out in the papers, having not been consulted, then proceeded to hurl (accurate) accusations at Gove that he wanted a return to a two-tier system.
Fast forward to September and the EBacc announcement. Now Clegg and Gove are hand in hand, writing in the Evening Standard about how they share a passion for education and believe this new qualification is just what is needed.
So the policy that has replaced the two-tier suggestion seems to be a one-tier system that some kids just don't get to participate in at all? What employer or further education institution is going to look at a "record of achievement", written by a pupil's own school, and consider it to be worth the paper it's written on?
There is plenty wrong with the current system but it does at least seem that, at the moment, a comprehensive school can offer a fairly wide range of routes by which their pupils can access the curriculum. The division of examination into Foundation and Higher tiers means that time isn't wasted teaching more able kids material that does not challenge them, nor in teaching less able kids material they cannot realistically be expected to engage with or understand.
Coursework means that children who have academic talent, but do not perform well in exams, are still able to demonstrate their ability. More than that, coursework is absolutely necessary preparation for the independent learning and research skills that are so important as part of a student's further and higher education. It beggars belief that Gove can talk about wanting to best prepare kids for the rigours of university, and then wants to scrap coursework from English, foreign languages, and humanities subjects.
Plus, as it stands, GCSEs in a range of supposedly less academic subjects (arts subjects, PE, religious studies, technologies, etc.) are to be binned and replaced with something that the government hasn't found the time to come up with on the back of an envelope yet. So that is yet another dividing line.
The worst of it all is that it seems to have come out of the blue. The policy announcement has come before any consultation, which is the only way it could have happened because no teaching union has had anything positive to say about it. Nor have the devolved administrations in Wales and Northern Ireland, who have had it sprung on them the same as the rest of us. Labour have come out against it, which means if the whole thing is to be brought in, it will have to be rushed through before the end of this parliament.
Then there is the proposed switch from the current system of grading to a normative system, which seems like a fudge to circumvent the need to actually have a sophisticated debate on standards and assessment in schools, even if it would end up being the reasoned outcome of that debate were it ever to take place.
It's frustrating because I think some things of value have been put forward. The idea of one exam board per subject is a good one. A move to writing coursework in supervised conditions in schools rather than at home would go a long way to tackling some of the current problems with that mode of assessment. The modular nature of current GCSEs is also a problem. Not, perhaps, so much because of the fact that it gives students the ability to resit ad infinitum, but because having exams frequently over the course of years 10 and 11 is extremely disruptive to the teaching timetable, and because it necessitates rescheduling (or missing) teaching in one subject to allow for the sitting of an exam in another subject, which has a negative educational impact and increases tension between departments within a school. But it's hard to focus on the good within these policies when so much of the rest is just bollocks. It's policy for policy's sake. And even then it's only half a policy.
Whatever happened to the Tomlinson report? When a long, thorough, bipartisan consultation took place and a fairly broad consensus was achieved, with a raft of commonsense suggestions for addressing problems in the education system? When advances in allowing the maximum possible number of kids to access the curriculum were to be built on? When measures were proposed to deal with other issues based on research and study of what works around the world, rather than by only paying lip service to those things? Obviously too good to be true.
jenks
thread death
Lucid observations there. Not much to add except to add that interestingly the recently introduced Controlled Assessment (coursework done under classroom supervision) has been a success - has stopped kids/parents cheating, has stopped the nightmare of trying to chase it up, has stopped kids redrafting ad infinitum to try to get that grade but will be replaced (despite working) because Gove's view is that anything marked by teachers is not rigorous enough. Be interesting what he makes of the wildly varying quality of examination marking then.
Also the idea that some kids won't sit these exams, like now, those numbers are almost non existant - kids all sit at least their GCSE Maths and English unless there are extreme circs but this new EBacc is likely to disenfranchise more kids than the current system. Don't worry we'll give them a pointless scrap of paper that might as well be headed NEET.
I am no fan of Estelle Morris but I heard her speak recently and her point was before changing something have a good look at what the system you are replacing was trying to fix. GCSEs got rid of two tier systems, introduced marks for Speaking and Listening - proper life skills - gave teachers a degree of choice of choice within an established National Curriculum and brought the examination system screaming into the twentieth century. Back to the Future indeed for the EBacc.
Finally, what do we mean by standards? No real hard evidence as to what they might be - people who can spell? People who know which side to place the address when writing a letter? People who don't play their music too loud on the train? It seems to me that 'standards' is somehow about spelling, punctuation and behaviour, as if somehow they are all of a piece. Whilst they remain this nebulous abstract noun the coalition can have a field day slagging off teachers, undermining kids' achievements and prosecuting their continued class war.
Also the idea that some kids won't sit these exams, like now, those numbers are almost non existant - kids all sit at least their GCSE Maths and English unless there are extreme circs but this new EBacc is likely to disenfranchise more kids than the current system. Don't worry we'll give them a pointless scrap of paper that might as well be headed NEET.
I am no fan of Estelle Morris but I heard her speak recently and her point was before changing something have a good look at what the system you are replacing was trying to fix. GCSEs got rid of two tier systems, introduced marks for Speaking and Listening - proper life skills - gave teachers a degree of choice of choice within an established National Curriculum and brought the examination system screaming into the twentieth century. Back to the Future indeed for the EBacc.
Finally, what do we mean by standards? No real hard evidence as to what they might be - people who can spell? People who know which side to place the address when writing a letter? People who don't play their music too loud on the train? It seems to me that 'standards' is somehow about spelling, punctuation and behaviour, as if somehow they are all of a piece. Whilst they remain this nebulous abstract noun the coalition can have a field day slagging off teachers, undermining kids' achievements and prosecuting their continued class war.
baboon2004
Darned cockwombles.
Can someone give me an explanation of the alternative exams to GCSEs that academies are reportedly using, the practice of so-called 'gaming' to shift their results upwards? I can't seem to find much detail on what these equivalents actually are...
jenks
thread death
This used to be known as teh Telford effect, whereby schools would artificially bump up pass rates. These would be courses like BTEC qualifications in various subjects which often are for big chunks of the timetable and are therefore sold to kids as 'equivalent' to 2 or sometimes even 4 GCSE C grades. You get your kids to get a pass in one of those and one other GCSE and you've got your 5 A*-C - one of the league table key 'performance indicators.' This is going to change in two years' time where the table will expressly be for GCSEs.
dd528
Well-known member
One thing I would say is that although courses like BTECs are often (rightly) derided for their ridiculous 'GCSE-equivalency', that does not make them worthless in themselves. My mum is a science teacher in a state comp. Her school is in a very deprived ward and as a result they have a higher-than-average number of pupils of very low attainment standard or with SEN. For some of those students the GCSE (even single award) would simply be a waste of time. Due to their domestic circumstances they cannot be counted on to show up for their exams, let alone perform to the best of their ability in them. Their basic literacy and numeracy is often very poor.
The BTEC allows them to do long-term project work where the assessed goals are tied directly to their month-on-month learning. And in turn, the subject matter focuses explicitly on teaching science in the most applied and everyday context possible. To allow students to understand why their electricity bill will be what it is, or how the mobile phone network functions, etc.
And at the end of their 11 years of schooling, most of those kids will leave school with some science qualification, even if it is not the once-precious GCSE that Michael Gove has now decided is worthless. Employees can look at their BTEC and see that at least they will not be technologically ignorant, and that they were capable of engaging in their education in some long-term capacity. That has a value to the holder of that qualification because it demonstrates to them that there is some reward for their effort and perseverance. There are kids who will open their envelope on results day and one pass at BTEC will mean more to them than the handful of A*s means to the kid they are stood six feet away from.
The question of how we value the aspirations of those who will only ever be academically mediocre at best is a really fundamental one if you are interested in the goal of building an egalitarian educational system.
It is not clear yet what, if anything, will be replacing courses like BTECs and GNVQs at Key Stage 4. It is not clear whether Michael Gove actually feels like he needs to bother to provide educational opportunities to the children at that end of the spectrum, or whose strengths lie in non-academic achievement.
The BTEC allows them to do long-term project work where the assessed goals are tied directly to their month-on-month learning. And in turn, the subject matter focuses explicitly on teaching science in the most applied and everyday context possible. To allow students to understand why their electricity bill will be what it is, or how the mobile phone network functions, etc.
And at the end of their 11 years of schooling, most of those kids will leave school with some science qualification, even if it is not the once-precious GCSE that Michael Gove has now decided is worthless. Employees can look at their BTEC and see that at least they will not be technologically ignorant, and that they were capable of engaging in their education in some long-term capacity. That has a value to the holder of that qualification because it demonstrates to them that there is some reward for their effort and perseverance. There are kids who will open their envelope on results day and one pass at BTEC will mean more to them than the handful of A*s means to the kid they are stood six feet away from.
The question of how we value the aspirations of those who will only ever be academically mediocre at best is a really fundamental one if you are interested in the goal of building an egalitarian educational system.
It is not clear yet what, if anything, will be replacing courses like BTECs and GNVQs at Key Stage 4. It is not clear whether Michael Gove actually feels like he needs to bother to provide educational opportunities to the children at that end of the spectrum, or whose strengths lie in non-academic achievement.
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dd528
Well-known member
Sorry also to answer your question baboon:
The BTEC is available at a range of levels from Key Stage 4 (i.e. GCSE-age kids), through to a higher education level. There are BTEC courses worth 2 and 4 GCSEs, and within that, depending on the tier of the qualification, that is supposed to be equivalent to either 2/4 D-F grades at GCSE or to 2/4 A*-C grades at GCSE. Once a student has been entered for a particular course, the only outcomes are pass, fail, merit and distinction. There is no A*-whatever grading system like with GCSEs.
BTECs are typically offered in an range of subjects with a highly vocational leaning, e.g. science, business, construction, media, healthcare.
The BTEC serves, by and large, as a replacement for the GNVQ. The GNVQ was similarly available at Key Stage 4 or 5, and provided a foundational qualification for school age children to possibly go on and acquire an NVQ through work or further study after leaving education. The GNVQ was scrapped a few years ago, but the NVQ continues and is one of the most common work-based qualifications available. An NVQ at the appropriate level remains a prerequisite for employment in a wide range of professions (in the leisure industry, social care work, in construction and manufacturing, etc.).
As jenks says, the league tables will stop recognising these vocational qualifications soon. It is frustrating because it is very important that schools excel at preparing students for vocational development when students show an interest or aptitude in that direction. And so schools that are good at doing that should get some recognition.
At the same time, including those subjects in the league tables just causes huge numbers of kids to be diverted into vocational courses that are unsuited to them just to bump up the overall GCSE pass rate and the 5 A*-C percentages. The year after I took my IT GCSE my school switched its entire KS4 IT entry over to a GNVQ course that took up far more of the timetable than my GCSE course, which was far less academically rigorous, and which was supposedly worth four times as many GCSEs. Undoubtedly this course was suitable for a small number of students who showed little aptitude in humanities, languages, etc., but who had a talent for applied IT. But the entire year was entered for the same qualification, simply in order to force up pass rates.*
The problem is that league tables are the bluntest of blunt instruments for demonstrating the strengths of schools. If the new EBacc policy goes through then the current form of GCSE league tables will be scrapped and replaced with something that is as-yet unannounced.
* I'm being a little disingenuous here. There are obviously other complications with teaching a number of different IT courses to one year group when it takes up so much of the timetable and there is a limitation on the physical computing resources actually available in a school.
The BTEC is available at a range of levels from Key Stage 4 (i.e. GCSE-age kids), through to a higher education level. There are BTEC courses worth 2 and 4 GCSEs, and within that, depending on the tier of the qualification, that is supposed to be equivalent to either 2/4 D-F grades at GCSE or to 2/4 A*-C grades at GCSE. Once a student has been entered for a particular course, the only outcomes are pass, fail, merit and distinction. There is no A*-whatever grading system like with GCSEs.
BTECs are typically offered in an range of subjects with a highly vocational leaning, e.g. science, business, construction, media, healthcare.
The BTEC serves, by and large, as a replacement for the GNVQ. The GNVQ was similarly available at Key Stage 4 or 5, and provided a foundational qualification for school age children to possibly go on and acquire an NVQ through work or further study after leaving education. The GNVQ was scrapped a few years ago, but the NVQ continues and is one of the most common work-based qualifications available. An NVQ at the appropriate level remains a prerequisite for employment in a wide range of professions (in the leisure industry, social care work, in construction and manufacturing, etc.).
As jenks says, the league tables will stop recognising these vocational qualifications soon. It is frustrating because it is very important that schools excel at preparing students for vocational development when students show an interest or aptitude in that direction. And so schools that are good at doing that should get some recognition.
At the same time, including those subjects in the league tables just causes huge numbers of kids to be diverted into vocational courses that are unsuited to them just to bump up the overall GCSE pass rate and the 5 A*-C percentages. The year after I took my IT GCSE my school switched its entire KS4 IT entry over to a GNVQ course that took up far more of the timetable than my GCSE course, which was far less academically rigorous, and which was supposedly worth four times as many GCSEs. Undoubtedly this course was suitable for a small number of students who showed little aptitude in humanities, languages, etc., but who had a talent for applied IT. But the entire year was entered for the same qualification, simply in order to force up pass rates.*
The problem is that league tables are the bluntest of blunt instruments for demonstrating the strengths of schools. If the new EBacc policy goes through then the current form of GCSE league tables will be scrapped and replaced with something that is as-yet unannounced.
* I'm being a little disingenuous here. There are obviously other complications with teaching a number of different IT courses to one year group when it takes up so much of the timetable and there is a limitation on the physical computing resources actually available in a school.
craner
Beast of Burden
matt b
Indexing all opinion
Just shows how intellectually vapid the Tories are- Look at Gove's new great idea:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2012/nov/14/michael-gove-backs-learning-by-rote
Oh look and here's a Gove policy outcome:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/u...close-to-make-room-for-academies-8313131.html
Mr. Tea
Let's Talk About Ceps
Excellent! Within a decade we should have a whole generation of school-leavers entering the workforce with all the skills they need to succeed in the 19th century!
Edit: heartening to see the comments are pretty much 100% on the side of anti-Gove righteousness.
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crackerjack
Well-known member
jenks
thread death
I think this is on of the clearest assessments of what Gove is up to:
http://howardstevenson.org/2012/12/09/its-class-war-jim-but-not-as-we-know-it/
and good to know that lawfully union action is being respected:
http://www.standard.co.uk/news/educ...y-of-disruptive-worktorule-staff-8411365.html
http://howardstevenson.org/2012/12/09/its-class-war-jim-but-not-as-we-know-it/
and good to know that lawfully union action is being respected:
http://www.standard.co.uk/news/educ...y-of-disruptive-worktorule-staff-8411365.html
