For all his faults, Gradgrind was right

Sally Chatterjee

Look to Germany, children don't even begin compulsory, formal schooling until the age of six. Yet we are obsessed with forcing four year olds into assessments.

As for writing with chocolate, this is not new. The Department of Education seems to use lots of fudge in its press releases.

seb

'Making learning fun'. The solution is, wouldn't ya know it, indistinguishable from the problem. State schools provide no education worthy of the name because 'making learning fun', as opposed to simply 'learning', has been their guiding principle for decades. Sorry. 'Making learning fun' won't work. You can't possibly infantilise our primary and secondary schools to any greater depths than those to which they've already sunk. Any more 'fun' and our schools would be indistinguishable from puppy obedience schools and lessons would consist of teaching children not to piss on carpets or chew the bottoms of curtains.

Dennis Churchill

“Two conceits underpin Primarolo’s guidance. One, that government tests can alter the course of nature and print a league table to enshrine that evolution”
The real conceit, and the one that inevitable will lead to the failure not only of our education system but much else, is the denial there is Human Nature.

RMH

Dippy Dawn is a seriously clueless ass.

She does not get issues and simply repeats policy verbatim.

Nicholas

I once had the misfortune to watch Dawn Primarolo on Daily Politics and was astounded to discover that she was a government minister and not a representative of the Greenham Common wimmin suffering the onset of early senile dementia.

Dippy is one way to put it. With namby pamby muddleheads like her making policy it is no wonder . . .

Boudicca

My two sons spent much of their first 5 years exploring the world with their mum; getting messy outdoors and at playschool having fun. If I had the time again, I'd do the same.

What I wouldn't do is let any of Labour's child indoctrinators anywhere near them until it was legally necessary for them to attend primary school.

When/if I become a grandmother I will perform the same service for my grandchildren, if their parents allow.

wrinkled weasel

Anything that comes out of the mouth of babes like her deserves to be taken with salt, quantities of which are to be seen currently on the Highways of Britain.

Poor Prawn has never worked in the real world, has always been dependent on the public sector to earn a living, did a Mickey Mouse degree in "Social Science" and proceeded to do a PHD in Wimmins studies which she later abandoned. Her academic profile is thinner than a strand of DNA.

This woman is rather typical of the kind of third rate thinking we associate with New Labour: she got on because of political activism, not merit. It's the same reason David Lammy is a minister and Diane Abbott is not. They may both be the right colour, but poor Diane suffers from thinking for herself. Stupidity and blind loyalty trumps intellectual rigour and principles.

The reality is, they do it better in other parts of Europe. Not only that, it works. How bright do you have to be, Dawn, to get yourself a freebie to Sweden and take a good look around:

According to a writer at Teacher's TV:

Most Swedish children who leave pre-school at the age of six cannot read or write. Yet within three years of starting formal schooling at the age of seven, these children lead the literacy tables in Europe.

(http://www.teachers.tv/video/12090)

Within ten years, England will be on the same educational level as Kazakhstan.

Paul Wakeford

Thankfully the pathetically voiced Primerolo will soon be a fading echo of a past we wish we had not trodden.

jaymason

My 5 year old is more than capable of graffiting surfaces as my hallway bears the scars of my little Banksys efforts. Unfortunately the only bit I can read is where he has written his name under under the scrawl, but at least that bit is legible

Yow Min Lye

Why not just let boys be boys and 'have fun' learning the way boys always have.

When I was little - in addition to the basics of reading and writing that I picked up at infant school - I also taught myself to read by studying the words on the sides of my toy buses, trains and aeroplanes.

Thus I learned that putting letters together in one way spelt 'London Transport'; or another 'Birmingham New Street'; or in another still 'Royal Air Force'.

Mind you, sometimes the learning process threw up some howlers. Fascinated by one particular word that I'd encountered on a bus destination blind I once spent a whole afternoon flicking through my dad's road atlas trying to locate this illusive place called 'Depot'!

Occasional Ostrich

Long after Gradgrind, learning things by rote worked very well, up to a certain level. Having my 'times tables' and other things dinned into me served me very well compared with the slacker regime that existed when my younger brother entered the system

Maggie

"Look to Germany, children don't even begin compulsory, formal schooling until the age of six."

Maybe not but German children do go to kindergarten much earlier than that and by the time they leave to start "formal school" their development is far in advance of anything the authorities here expect from British children of the same age.

Austin Barry

Rather than Thomas Gradgrind perhaps Wackford Squeers should be the exemplar for our teachers. His school's prospectus should be substituted for the National Curriculum:

" ...instructed in all languages, living and dead, mathematics, orthography, geometry, astronomy, trigonometry, the use of the globes, algebra, single stick (if required), writing, arithmetic, fortification, and every other branch of classical literature. Terms, twenty guineas per annum. No extras, no vacations, and diet unparalleled."

A kind of Eton for the Great Unwashed.

Graham Clark

In Dickens, Mr Gradgrind was so fond of 'Facts, Facts, Facts!'. It appears that Pa Broone and his 'Wrong Trousered' cohorts in the likes of Ed 'balls' Balls are trying to social engineer everyone under school age now into a similar mould (allegedly).

If Neues Arbeits (New Labour) get into office for a 4th term (No, No Ye Gawds and Little Fishes no), will we be having armies of Jobsworths demanding 3 year old children to be able to recite the speeches of Dear Leader Broone on 'Economics', and speak 'New Speak' before they go to school?

Blair, Brown and their 'Education Experts' for all the money that has been thrown at education, has resulted in very little for the effort, except much bureaucracy, interference, policy changes and many semi-educated people leaving school.

Its all about 'Targets' and trying to make the Labour Government look 'Good'!

Well, hopefully, all this will soon end in a few months. Assuming people vote intelligently that is!

EyeSee

I can see no other conclusion from the issuances of this government, than that it is their earnest intent to ensure the children leaving school are as dim-witted as Labour politicians. I would consider education curently to be a joke, were it not for the need in a joke to have as it's outcome, laughter. It may induce hysteria were one to contemplate the level of stupidity input into our schools, but that is not the same thing. On balance, if there were such a thing as justifiable homocide then few Labour politician would rest easy in their beds.

EyeSee

Seb 9:33
I think you will find that preventing children from chewing the bottom of curtains would be against their human rights. Take care, Mr. Brown's legions are massed against persons thinking such things and your liberty should be considered in jeopardy, with re-education awaiting you. If you want to murder someone you should be OK though.

seb

Eye See

Nothing, not a single word, that any Labour politician bar, perhaps, the MP for one of the Mancunian constituencies, Graham Stringer, indicates that a single one of them knows anything about the mess education in the UK is in or that a single one of them gives a flying **** whether kids here can read or write. I'm inclined to suspect that many Labour MPs view literacy and numeracy as 'elitist constructs' designed by the evil ruling classes to make children feel unhappy.
With your words of caution in mind, I'll avail myself of the anonymity offered by the internet to say true and humiliating things about the complete inadequacy of our schools in such a way that Kirkcaldy's Leading Autist's thought police will never find me.

Marcher Baron

The key to getting boys achieving is not "making learning fun" it's competition! They thrive on it. That provides the fun element in structured teaching. The key to getting them reading is providing utterly non-PC real adventure stories. Labour don't have the solution because they are the problem!

Rob

A false belief that guides the government, and all lefties is that the brain is a general purpose learning organ. It is not. That is why they believe that they can tell us anything and as long as we do not hear much dissent it will eventually be accepted and so they will have ushered in the socialist paradise. The reality is that inherited abilities, emotions, drives and fears are a critical part of our mentality and much of it is driven by competition. The only way for governments to behave is to make progress to the school of ones choice dependent on competitive exams, then progress to the next level of exams, the one after that etc. and jobs dependent on the skills you have and how well developed they are. Then, the government can step back and simply pay out vouchers to schools and HE according to how many students they have on their books, with double rate vouchers for those who are rejected by all and special schools. Competition between schools for the best behaved, most able and most lucrative children will see to the rest.

Holly ......

Where are all the mums of these children who just roll over and take everything fired at them?
Where are all the 'good' teachers who should be refusing to bully children into learning what they are not yet ready to learn.
Why just lay all the blame on the dumb gits at the top?
She is so priggish.

ACN

Just who is this bloody woman anyway? Not long ago she was lecturing us all on some health issue. I suppose she'll be ministry of defence spokestwerp giving advice on terrorism, avoidance of, next. Around our way she is known as Dim Prawnerolo. Yet another half-witted, half educated, over-promoted, jumped-up New Labour ex-councillor apparatchik. Just watching and listening to her is enough to bring on the deepest despair at the thought that these people are paid by us to run Britain (into the ground it seems.) As for their pensions..... If there was a God we would have an election tomorrow.

Tendryakov

wrinkled weasel 11.24

"Within ten years, England will be on the same educational level as Kazakhstan"

Kazakhstan has an education system inherited from the USSR, with traditional learning methods and a literacy rate of 99.5%.
I very much doubt that Kazakhstan could ever sink quite as low as the UK when it comes to education. British people vaguely know it is bad, but quite how bad, they don't really comprehend. They are, after all, mostly monolingual.

EyeSee

Seb 2:56. Caution is the watchword now Brown's Stasi are taking to the streets. But I would remind you that The One Eyed Son of Mange is spending fabulous sums on systems to collect and detect every phone call and email issued throughout the land. So, unless you are the Scarlet Pumperknuckle, I suggest you pull the duvet far over your ears. Me, I am watching out for the Romans.....

Fergus Pickering

The Germans were always better at education than we were. We don't really believe in it. However, we were better at winning wars. I think education is overrated. Churchill, G.K.Chesterton, and Shakepeare didn't have a lot of it. I'll bet that berk Balls has a first class degree. I rest my case.