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How do I compete with SLT's "Drill and kill" mentality?


From a science teacher in the north:

Today I discussed with an assistant principal ‘changes in Science’. He gave a cursory glance to my hand-crafted curriculum plan and within a matter of moments came to the decision that we would be doing away with KS3 (11-14 year old teaching content).

The rapidity of this decision suggested to me that we had not made this momentous decision but that in fact they had come to this decision weeks ago.

‘Instead we shall prepare our students for GCSEs’, I was amazed, this was revolutionary!
‘We shall look at the GCSE content, we shall identify what will appear on this exam and we shall teach that.’

‘We are an academy, we don’t have to stick to the national curriculum.’ Therefore, we won’t, apparently.

‘So what will we do?’ (I didn’t say ‘oh wise one’ but it was the moment for it)

‘We shall teach the GCSE curriculum in a simple way, this will take 2 years. We will teach it to a higher level, this will take 2 years. Then we will prepare for the exams.’

An interesting concept that has some reason to it but instantly this raised two obvious questions.
1.       What about the stuff not the GCSE exam?

2.       Won’t the kids get bored?

(All teachers should hear the mantra ‘we’ve done this before ring in their ears)

‘Well if it’s not on the GCSE exam, what’s the point?’ The assistant principal pointing derisively at my plan and highlighted ‘Rocks and Weathering’ and ‘Reproduction’ as prime examples. ‘We just won’t teach it’.

At this point I was more than a little concerned.

Fair enough rocks and weathering aren’t everybody’s cup of tea; but how will students ever learn to love or hate rocks?! How will they ever know when they sit those tedious GCSE examinations whether they are being weathered or eroded by the exam factory system?!

Then we come to that pesky ‘reproduction’.

The single thing that continues all life on Earth, is absolutely terrifying, a little bit funny and deeply personal all in one. But because it’s not on a test in 5 years, let’s not learn about it. It’s just dashed inconvenient really.

Herein lies my conundrum. Something has to be done to deal with our ever growing assessment system, one that is forced upon us. However is merely damaging a child’s love of learning and their deeper understanding of the world the correct thing to do?

I was shocked by the assistant principal’s most casual of comments ‘The kids hate Science, but they love the qualifications we deliver’.

We should not accept this, we should question, we should protect our subjects’ integrity. We should and must protect our students’ future.

So please, love rocks and don’t allow your child or students’ education and love of learning get ‘weathered’ (or is that eroded?) away.


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