Help Sitemap Home Skip Navigation Contact Us Disability Statement


The new curriculum for excellence: No physics, chemistry or biology lessons – but pupils will study 'air'

Click on thumbnail to view image
Click on thumbnail to view image
Click on thumbnail to view image
Click on thumbnail to view image
Click on thumbnail to view image

Published Date: 27 October 2008
By FIONA MACLEOD
SEPARATE subjects could be ditched in the first three years of secondary school, under new government plans.
Parents fear the move could leave pupils struggling to choose what to study for exams.

And teachers also warn studying subjects in six-month blocks could leave pupils sitting for exams in subjects they have not taken for years.

Consultation on the format of future school qualifications ends on Friday and groups, including parents, teachers and council representatives, have been giving their views.

Judith Gillespie, of the Scottish Parent Teacher Council, said: "My understanding is that they are actually looking for something that is far more radical than rotating subjects.

"They are looking for totally cross-curricular teaching in eight areas rather than divided up into the 17 subjects currently available in secondary school."

She said pupils would study projects on topics such as air, which would bring in physics, chemistry and biology.

Pupils would struggle to make exam choices, she warned, as they would not know which subject within the project they enjoyed or excelled at.

Every school is expected to be teaching the new Curriculum for Excellence from next year.

However, The Scotsman revealed earlier this month that teachers have called for a delay on its implementation by of at least a year.

The Scottish Secondary Teachers' Association (SSTA), passed a motion demanding more detail on the format of the first three years of secondary before it begins.

Anne Ballinger, president of the SSTA, said: "The Scottish Government has not guaranteed no subject will be lost.

"We would really appreciate time, to delay it for at least a year to give everyone involved an opportunity to get it right first time."

She warned the idea of rotating subjects would leave children with a huge gap between studying a subject and taking it as an exam.

She said: "They are talking about wrapping subjects together into a project or having a rotation system where you get perhaps one subject for six months then another."

Ken Cunningham, general-secretary of School Leaders Scotland, said: "There is a move on the part of some people to remove discrete subjects. But the reality is we also need the basis of individual subjects to evaluate achievement."

Earlier this year, the Scottish Government announced standard grades would be scrapped and replaced with a new general grade from 2012.

With major changes to exams, teachers and parents say the format of the pre-qualifications years must be clear before the curriculum can begin.

A Scottish Government spokeswoman said: "Curriculum for Excellence provides a coherent, more flexible and enriched curriculum from three to 18, focused on the needs of children and young people.

"The consultation on national qualifications is one of the components underpinning successful delivery of the Curriculum for Excellence programme."

After the consultation ends, the Scottish Government is widely expected to agree to delay implementation of the controversial curriculum.

We appear to have an extra year of general education and a two-year slide

OUR biggest challenge in the secondary sector is the S2 slide. S1 pupils are enthusiastic and interested, at best they soak up new ideas like wee sponges and the vast majority of them love the challenge and the subject specialisation of "big school".

S2 is very different, with hormones playing up and the prospect of "option choices" encouraging pupils to think about favourites. Added to that is the feeling of no longer being the little ones, of having seen it all before, which causes some pupils to resort to the P7 mind set reported by so many primary teachers.

We hoped the Curriculum for Excellence would provide us with the tools to tackle this, freeing us up to engage these pupils, allowing for the development of cross-curricular collaboration.

We even began planning social subject projects around Stirling. What we appear to have is an extra year of general education with the prospect of a two-year slide. There is no information about what this three-year curriculum will look like, but one alternative seems to be a reduction in the number of subjects taken each year, perhaps on a rota basis.

We'd love to see a fair model for this. How many pupils are likely to choose to study a subject in S4 when their last contact with it was in S1? We know S2 rotas are detrimental to the subject taken first and can only expect this effect to multiply if the rota covers years rather than months.

Of course, we're worried about jobs, but we're even more worried about the future. With no history, geography, business, modern languages or music taught, how will we be able to function in the 21st century?


Page 1 of 1

  • Last Updated: 26 October 2008 9:18 PM
  • Source: The Scotsman
  • Location: Edinburgh
 
1

Resolutions,

27/10/2008 00:26:55
Can we see a 'model' of what is actually being proposed please?

What is being reported is a hotch potch of incoherent and unnconnected 'stuff', therefore cannot judge what is actually being proposed.
2

Tom in Belmont,

Belmont 27/10/2008 00:47:38
We called this "integrated science" in the US and it enjoyed a brief fad in the early 1990s. It has disappeared because the leading universities judged it inferior to subject-based courses for preparation for university programs, and because the largely undefined curricula were suspected of removing the tougher topics to work in "social issues", compromising the integrity of a college-prep program.
I'd be wary, were I you.
3

Thelma,

Australia 27/10/2008 01:21:40
As an ex Scottish teacher I think the whole idea of "projects" in secondary school is complete madness!
Can anyone tell me what is wrong with Standard Grade anyhow?
And is this whole thing just a way of justifying all the non teaching people employed by the education department? When they could spend the money on more teachers...

Primary schools can do "projects" because they have one teacher for almost all their subjects(and the subject matter is easier) How on earth would you organise all the different subject teachers needed for a secondary project? English, maths, science (all three specialist subjects) geography, history, economics, art, music, IT and drama could all be involved. So how could that be organised...timetableing would be a nightmare! Not to mention the various teachers idea of what was important for the pupils to work on. More time for Maths and less for IT, more time for English and less for Art...I could go on and on. Teachers having very personal ideas of what is "essental information" Plus, of course, as soon as the word "project" is mentioned all the good parents get into gear to help out...
4

Helene,

Ontario, Canada 27/10/2008 01:22:57
While subject integration sounds appealing, only some of sec school pupils have the ability to weave together the essential points of individual subjects. Many just need the comfort of subjects taught discretely. Later on they can put the pieces together. It will become increasingly difficult to offer standardized exit exams (Highers in your case) in these blended disciplines as the distinction between them subjects blurs. I speak as a veteran teacher.
5

Tom in Belmont,

Belmont 27/10/2008 01:46:26
Since we're introducing ourselves: I have 27 years teaching secondary science, chiefly chemistry and physics.
Helene: you are correct that integration is for advanced, not beginning students. As we say here in the south: Been there, done that, doesn't work.
6

Brown beer drinker,

Down under 27/10/2008 01:57:27
Having seen the rota type system in action in Victoria I think it is an appalling way to run an education system. Not only do the students have no continuity, but the staff don't know whether they have jobs from one year to the next. If there are not enough students selecting an option (e.g. one of the sciences) one year then there is no need for staff in that specialist area. Staff are made redundant or transferred & the school no longer has the available expertise to offer that subject in the future & so it is no longer an option for the pupils.
7

Guga II,

Rockall 27/10/2008 02:59:42
It sounds like yet another method of dumbing down the whole education system, and the sort of thing which will have been dreamt up by the "social sciences" trendy lefties.

Never mind, we can always import any mathematicians, physicists, chemists etc. that we need, and all the local "social scientists" can be given SatNavs to find their way home rather than studying geography.
8

W Smith,

Middle East 27/10/2008 03:10:00
So the no-thicky-left-behind education policy continues.

The daft Lefties have decided even the village idiot has to get a certificate after a hard slog at school studying "air".

What next?

Daft courses at Uni?

Oh..... sorry..... I see we're doing that already.

The real winners, as always, are those kids whose parents can afford private schools and who will escape this dumbing down madness.

Well done to the Left for making sure working class kids get lumbered with an inferior education.

Curriculum for Dumb Ass-ence more like.
9

Mallory,

Edinburgh 27/10/2008 04:31:46
Child centred, dumbed down, socially engineered educashon.

Been there, done that, doesnt' work.

Poor kids.
10

djd,

Rio de Janeiro 27/10/2008 05:22:35
I would love to know what the mandate is for this change.

It seems to be another example of Educational Cyclicity, now 56 I remember a doomed effort at combined science for years S1 to S3 in England when I were a lad.

Maybe our great educational theorists should study some educational history and not go down long failed paths for the nth time.

With several grandchildren going into S1 in Aberdeen in the next few years I find this very worrying.
11

John Cameron,

St Andrews 27/10/2008 06:25:52
Instead of the hard sciences they could study Global Warming. Since this wondrous prophecy from St Al Gore, Nobel Laureate and Saviour of the World, is both a fundamentalist religion and a "pretendy" science, it covers RE, Physics, Chemistry, and other "pretendy" things in our increasingly "pretendy" educational system. This would free up more money to be spent on daft ideas from the Scottish "government".
12

siochain,

Oregon, USA 27/10/2008 07:16:57
We tried this idea in Oregon in the 90's. It was called "The Integrated Curriculum". It was shallow and boring for students and for teachers.
It's a way to save money by offering fewer classes, often some thematic mish mash of watered down opinion or unsubstantiated theory. full of sound and bla bla bla, signifying nothing. Students are smart enough to crave real knowledge and be excited by learning a specific subject in depth and detail.
Students will need discrete knowledge to fix the many problems they will encounter in their world of the future. They deserve better than a mediocre education. Public schools are the last democratic institution, perhaps even the foundation of democracy. Knowledge is power. Parents and teachers, speak up for high standards in public educaton.
13

Graeme,

Guangzhou 27/10/2008 07:22:49
Dumbing down to an even greater extent. Not that it worries me too much as it just has the effect of making my children, when they eventually move out of the public school system, a lot smarter compared to the mass population.

The trendy lefty liberals score another own goal…
14

cabrach loon,

inverness 27/10/2008 07:55:15
politicians should be kept out of education / they have political agendas / surely it should be decided by universities, employers and teachers with no dumbing down for political, psychological or sociological agendas. Education is required for earning a living first and foremost and being able to cope with needs in the home, hence mother tongue (english with a strong groundi of grammar and literacy), biology for health, physics for home appliances, motor cars, laws of motion etc., chemistry for the effects of various compounds their uses and dangers etc., comparative religion to understand peoples and morality, maths for shopping, home economics and simple cookingprocedures, mortgages etc., a second language for travel and mind broadening, some botany to understand plants and gardening, agriculture etc., and a course on citizenship including history, laws, morality, rights and wrongs etc.
If basic education does not cover these aspects it is failing all children.
15

,

27/10/2008 07:55:40
Comment Removed By Administrator
Reason:
16

Red Tower,

Dunoon 27/10/2008 07:57:53
And so the dumbing down of the educatioinal process continues.The government is now doing to education what Tracey Emin and her cohorts have done to Art.

The motto appears to be: do what you like as long as it is specious.

17

Tracy C,

Aberdeen 27/10/2008 08:03:37
There is nothing wrong with doing subjects like science or social subjects on a rota and then knowing which to choose for your Standard Grades. We had rota's for both subjects when I was in S2 but still was able to pick the subjects I wanted to do in S3/4.

Even when studying a topic, you don't continually do the same thing you build on what you've learned to learn new things. You will only revisit what you learned at the beginning of the year properly when you are studying for exams.
18

Bramley,

Lanark 27/10/2008 08:11:17
They are systematically destroying the quality of Scottish education.

Integration of subject teaching saves a considerable sum of money since they are able to "max out" classes, save on accommodation and use fewer teachers.

This scheme, together with the faculty approach, which has one Principal Teacher responsible for ensuring quality in a variety of subjects, some of which he/she has no background in, will seriously affect the education of young people. How can a PE specialist ensure quality of education in music or art?

The only beneficiaries of this will be fee-paying schools.
19

Bramley,

Lanark 27/10/2008 08:21:57
They are systematically destroying the quality of Scottish education.

Integration of subject teaching saves a considerable sum of money since they are able to "max out" classes, save on accommodation and use fewer teachers.

This scheme, together with the faculty approach, which has one Principal Teacher responsible for ensuring quality in a variety of subjects, some of which he/she has no background in, will seriously affect the education of young people. How can a PE specialist ensure quality of education in music or art?

The only beneficiaries of this will be fee-paying schools.
20

Auld Twa,

Edinburgh 27/10/2008 08:28:15
Consultation ends on Friday, there is no final format as yet.
It would be of interest to see what the SSTA has proposed rather than the negative attitude shown in the article.
21

Boy Wonder,

27/10/2008 08:45:19
The curriculum has been experimented with, modified, changed, gone back and indeed every ways till Sunday!

The elements of the basic core subjects haven't changed all that much in decades. So why monkey with it at all? Science subjects ... okay, I understand changes apply there all the time, so fine ... but as for Reading, writing, 'rithmetic ... why change at all?
22

Alikin,

Nr Hawick 27/10/2008 08:48:14
Integrated approaches may be "easier" in the primary school where one teacher teaches the class for almost everything. But are they any good? For decades kids have emerged from primaries not knowing what history, geography and science really are or understanding the importance of organising knowledge in this way. The death knell for quality in Scottish primaries was sounded round about 1965 when "the project" was introduced and its corpse was finally buried when someone introduced "environmental studies".

Whatever is needed to improve the quality of experience of S1 and S2 pupils it certainly isn't integration of subjects and the discredited project approach which has served primary schools so badly for decades now.
23

Claire22,

Edinburgh 27/10/2008 08:54:52
This is a joke isn't it? Some sort of spoof?

Diddums - is Physics too difficult for the little kiddies? Never mind, we'll teach them about air instead, and they'll all get an "A". We wouldn't want anyone left out, would we?
24

Club Player,

Aberdeen 27/10/2008 08:58:37
I though the SNP was about producing a smart, successful Scotland, or was that the other lot.

Either way this plan heralds the demise of quality science acedemia in Scotland and a move to dim, dumbass Scotland.
25

common sense voice,

27/10/2008 09:06:20
I think too much theoretical stuff is studied anyhow. Core science and core engineering would suit most (90%) students best for the work place. A tougher PhD degree can get the brilliantly minded up to speed in a single subject.
I studied for a long time, most is a wasted effort in hindsight, not much comes up in conversation in the pub etc


26

WJohn,

Wonderland 27/10/2008 09:30:31
Wonder if music classes will have Rodrigo on the air guitar? Very low cost instrument.
27

tomislav,

home 27/10/2008 09:35:03
doesnt really matter does it, I mean look at the millions of people who have Economics degrees and then check how the financial markets are doing
28

hertscot,

27/10/2008 10:12:59
FFS the students have to study air, that way they can understand what's between the ears of the the numpties who come up with this stuff.
29

Alan B,

27/10/2008 10:24:45
Having fewer wider based subjects in the early yrs of secondary would be a good idea.

Kids get too many subject with far too many teachers, and see these teachers for too short a time as a consequence. Having about 5 core subject areas is all that is needed. That way kids would see each of their teachers every day. Build more of a relationship with the teacher and help classroom management.

I would suggest something like: 1) Social studies (history, georgraphy etc with a big push to improve england language skills reading and writing), 2) Practical Science and Engineering, 3) Maths (artihmetic, accountancy along with traditional maths) and Computers, 4)foreign languages (with those that have difficulty in england going to a sort of english remedial). 5)sport to ensure kids are fit and enjoy school.
30

Alternative (High-Octane) Fuel Head,

Edinburgh 27/10/2008 10:49:33
And the fuss is about precisely what?

I studied "general science" at secondary school until I was nearly 14. Only then did we break into the separatre science subjects like physics, chemistry and biology.

Is this not simple a case of returning to what we had a few decades ago?
31

Calvinist,

27/10/2008 10:50:09
Sounds more like a curriculum for ignorance.

Science should be compulsory for all pupils at all levels. We are scathing about illiteracy and innumeracy but why is scientific ignorance almost a matter of pride? In Scotland we still produce excellent scientists but paradoxically have a population with one of the highest levels of scientific illiteracy in the developed world. Meanwhile we have a 'government' which is undermining our science base by underfunding our great Scottish Universities, presumably because they all have backgrounds in 'soft' subjects such as economics, accountancy and law and have no understanding of how science works and how it relates to a successful economy. Now Obama is talking about an 'information based economy" so watch this space. If Scotland is serious about taking charge of its own affairs, then it is time to reverse this tide of ignorance.
32

Tarchin,

Lothian 27/10/2008 11:02:40
Surely the public are entitled to know what the Scottish/British universites think of this "air-brained" idea. Will it disadvantage children educated in Scotland from studying medicine, dentistry, veterinary medicine, engineering, science etc. etc.?
The SNP front bench seems to consist of economists, lawyers, politics and sociology graduates, not a group well placed to propose changes to scienced based education.
33

Agent 99,

27/10/2008 11:39:51
[27] Tomislav:

Wrong. They don't have economics degrees. They have MBAs, a pseudo qualification that confers nothing. 'Bout the same as all the meedja studdies lot.
34

Agent 99,

27/10/2008 11:52:32
[25]

There's something to be gleaned from the choice of handle. You should fall into the same category a 'The man who knows' and 'Allknowing' in that you clearly don't.

There's bound to be a university for you somewhere: I heard the AlfredENeuman university offers plasticine modelling courses. Though perhaps your final sentence holds the clue, pint pulling might be your true vocation.

As to your assertion on core science, if you have no theoretical background there is little hope in understanding its applications; its like trying to write a sentence while not understanding the meaning of individual words.
35

Agent 99,

27/10/2008 11:57:01
[32]: "The SNP front bench seems to consist of economists, lawyers, politics and sociology graduates, not a group well placed to propose changes to scienced based education."

Point well made. But its par for the course for politicians. It is rare, is it not, to find either captains of industry or brilliant scientists in the forefront of a political party? They're not that kind of animal.
36

Marcus Fenix,

The Valley 27/10/2008 12:30:44
Gone are the days when the Scottish educational system is highly thought of.

37

G,

dundy 27/10/2008 12:32:37
Very difficult to judge for this frustratingly written article but this seems like a lot of rot!!!!!!!!!
38

SOFBTRC,

Abroad 27/10/2008 13:35:41
What a lot of utter nonsense!

The quality of undergraduates that we receive into the first year of our medical science courses has been falling steadily for a number of years. These kids can barely count, and they are, to all intents and purposes, functionally illiterate. Their understanding of basic chemistry, which is the cement that holds various life science disciplines together, is laughable, and as for simple mental arithmetic - well, we may as well ask them to do differential calculus in their heads, such is their inability to tackle the simplest of problems.

In a nutshell, the quality of the product being turned out by high schools these days is "inferior". And, as a result, the quality of university graduates is also, for the most part, falling dramatically. Why? Many factors contribute, but grade compression and grade inflation, a result of trying to "keep students happy", has a lot to answer for. Students are now consumers, who pay for their education and expect a piece of paper at the end of it to say they are "qualified". As such, their opinion matters, and they may openly criticise lecturers who teach material which is "too hard". Yet, they take no responsibility for learning and understanding the material, and many have very little interest in the subjects they are studying.

This drop in standards MUST be addressed at the grass roots level if the trend is to be reversed. However, the current proposals to dumb down further the core subjects will do nothing to arrest the decline - indeed, the decline is more likely to accelerate. The idea that "everyone should have a chance to attend university" is laudable, but we're going about it the wrong way. Everybody does have a chance, but that chance occurs during 5 or 6 years of secondary school, when you must obtain good marks in very challenging exams to show you are capable of moving on to tertiary education. And the fact is, the majority of school leavers are NOT capable of moving on to attend uni
39

Bigwull,

edinburgh 27/10/2008 13:58:50
Its either to make sure the state educated pupils are too far behind to enter further education, thus generating cheap labour and reinforcing the private schools for the well off or just an idiotic idea.
40

R. Brown Moir,

Cambridge 27/10/2008 14:57:53
The article has the wrong title to make you not like the proposal: "The new curriculum for excellence: No physics, chemistry or biology lessons – but pupils will study 'air'" Read the article and you'll see pupils actually do learn physics, chemistry or biology. And they learn more when the disciplines are applied to real situations like why the sky is blue or how does the water cycle work.

Those of you who love the ivory towers of elite academia will hate any proposal that knocks your silos of learning. Get real, just because you had to suffer through lectures and cramming for tests, does not mean it is the best way to learn.

Nobel physicist Philip Morrison said it best: "playing with science will not make good science, playing with science will make good scientists."

Cut 'em loose away from the weekly drill of assessing how many facts and factoids are recalled. Let 'em pursue real questions, real challenges, and you'll find greater mastery of education.

Scotland was once the most literate nation in the world. This was not because of the education in school; it was because everyone was reading their bibles in order to the better study the airs, better comprehend John Knox's totally cross-curricular preachings. We'd didn't just take his word like good students, we dug into bibles to challenge and confirm the reformations he was making.

What worked for John Napier, James Clerk Maxwell, James Watt and Robert Alexander Watson-Watt should turn the S2 slide into an ascent. In interdisciplinary problem-oriented studies students discover and experience the importance of math, science, engineering and technology courses. As a result more students choose to pursue such disciplines. They tackle difficult disciplines because through interdisciplinary studies they have come to know why such hard work is critical.
41

R. Brown Moir,

Cambridge 27/10/2008 15:35:38
Scottish reputation for ingenuity finds promise in ingenious Curriculum of Excellence that provides new tools for increased learning and challenges Secondary School S2 students with more complex subjects.
42

Mcsnagpile,

27/10/2008 16:15:30
All this air study sounds a bit light headed –as they say air today gone tomorrow.
Rotational studies in diminishing circles.
We could have how to work out your losses on the stock market.
Or how to get sweetie money from Russian billion heirs.
43

Mcsnagpile,

27/10/2008 16:16:15
Opps I meant Russian Billion airs.
44

Keep Scotland Green,

Doune 27/10/2008 18:03:22
What about just teaching the IB curriculum? Internationally recognised as "the" standard in education. It's tough, but it is a qualification that means something. For kids who can't reach this level, keep the standard grades...for those who can't do standard grades, bring back vocational training. All forms of education are valuable, but we can't dumb down to suit all as we end up suiting none.
45

Ewan Oosami,

27/10/2008 18:38:13
I just wish these morons who change things for changes sake realise what their idiotic policies are doing to our children (or maybe they do). The education system of the 50s and 60s was brilliant, it turned out educated kids - it now turns out dumb kids who aren't even qualified to take a village idiots job. They have systematically removed any competition from the sports field and the classroom and introduced nebulous subjects in place of the three Rs. The universities are overcrowded with Mickey Mouse degrees and parasitic professors of nothing. This country needs engineers and scientists to continue the innovative inventions that have marked this country higher than most. So stop phuquin aboot with the education system
46

Western Gael,

27/10/2008 18:46:00
Once again, the education professoriate takes a functional, if not perfect, education system and b****rs it to fit their own needs. What are they doing? Trying to make over Scotland in the image of the US, where pupils get a good education only in spite of the teaching staff?
47

The Island,

Scotland 27/10/2008 19:02:24
As a probation music teacher, the move to Curriculum for Excellence has been a big concern of mine for as long as it's been in the brewing mixture. I am all for cross curricular activities as long as they are appropriate and relevant to the schools, and do not infringe too much to the development and skills of the students within the individual subjects. As an "expressive arts" teacher, I feel in my future, that I will be encouraging students to write jingles for "adverts" for the products they have been making in other subjects. Relevant?? Interesting and challenging?? I don't think so.
48

Scimitar1,

Glasgow 27/10/2008 19:36:52
Everything has been dumbed down from the FE colleges to the lower tier universities. As a mature returning student studying at a Glasgow FE and at a "new" Uni I was appalled at standard of tuition and the calibre of the school leavers to the point of embarassment. A once proud and rigorous education system has been trashed by trendy left to the detriment of us all.
49

Tom Renwick,

maths on track, Glasgow, G3 7XR, www.mathsontrack. 27/10/2008 19:44:29
Why don't we just concentrate on getting the bairns to be fluent with their reading and number? Then, they'd be excellent with any curriculum. And while I'm at it, why did we get rid of 'borrowing and paying back' as the method for subtraction (being replaced by the method of 'exchanging'). If we'd kept the original method we wouldn't be having a credit crunch now.
50

John Brown,

Glasgow 27/10/2008 20:45:48
Until Scotland bites the bullet and gets rid of the disasterous comprehensive system and returns to a selective method we will continue to fail all pupils. Pupils of similar ability can only successfully learn when challenged by their peers, the bottom level and the highest ability and all in between. The only question that should be considered is when to have the assessment? But then again that is never going to happen and the kids will continue to regress, with employment opportunities going to our east european guests who have worked harder to succeed. Then again those coming with families are beginning to return due to the poor education that their kids get in dear old Scotia.
51

RichieSF,

San Francisco 27/10/2008 21:08:54
Thank heavens for private schools who don't have to follow educational experiments with no evidence pointing to their success and all anecdotal reports support what we all know that this is just nonsense - change for the sake of change. We will be teaching children the phlogiston theory next. Another lost opportunity to really examine what our children need - literateness (english, history, languages) and numeracy (maths, algebra).
52

Moder8,

EDINBURGH 27/10/2008 23:58:40
I recall that a similar scheme was foisted upon Secondary Education in the 1960's and was known as the Brunton scheme or as bats across the curriculum by teaching staff.
Bring back the core subjects Reading and understanding, Writing formal and informal, Arithmetic social and personal (not Maths),in S1 - S2
When a student has a solid foundation in the core subjects they can then branch out into the various fields of Maths, Science and Technology.
Personal Fitness 40 minutes per day.
Languages started in Primary school, along with the 3 R's. Drop all the playing/discovering Technology in Primary.
Teachers curtail the constant monitoring of progress and report writing, get back to teaching the basics.
53

SOFBTRC,

Abroad 28/10/2008 00:25:37
#40

What should work and what does work are not necessarily the same.

The education system has been tinkered with, disassembled and rebuilt more than once over the past 25 years, based on the latest fads that tell us how people can "learn better". Well let me tell you - it has not worked. The average quality/ability of school leavers now is, quite frankly, dreadful. Both their factual knowledge and their ability to apply these facts in a problem-solving context are embarrassing, compared with school leavers of 20 or more years ago. I know - I am at the sharp end of it. If you want an example of just how ridiculous things have become, type "fuzzy math" into Google. It took the intervention of several Nobel laureates to prevent that approach being introduced into Californian schools.

I was taught the basics, I was forced to learn the basics, and the examinations I sat demanded that I was able to apply the basics to problems. That's what we need to get back to. To suggest that I am saying that the kids of today should do it that way just because I had to do it that way is nonsense. It's because these "old methods" worked, and what has come since does not. What has come since is more interested in making all pupils "equal". All winners, no losers. Everyone does well. Wake-up call - the real world is not like that! It's intensely competitive out here, and most of these kids will not be able to cope.
54

Ewan Oosami,

28/10/2008 11:13:39
#47 - 'expressive arts'? WTF - another Mickey Mouse subject. Why can't the kids get taught REAL subjects by REAL teachers? remember Maths, English, Literature, History, Geography, Physics, Chemistry, Biology, French,Latin,Sports......ok include computer science now.....the rest of these nefarious subjects are BILGE hence the majority of uneducated morons that leave school unable to add up, write their name or hold an intelligent conversation.....these are our future...God help us and save us from the indoctrinated hopeless teachers that socialism has produced. Bring back the grammar schools, all kids will never be equal....live with it.
55

,

29/10/2008 07:48:36
Comment Removed By Administrator
Reason:
56

Cassy Blyth,

Shetland 12/05/2009 22:52:13
From what I've heard, nowone actually knows what the 'Curriculum for Excellence' is. Confused much?
It won't be implemented- because the majority of teachers think it's ridiculous. I'm a pupil, and I think it's ridiculous. But what annoys me most about this charade is that the people who are coming out with these crackpot ideas are running the country and taxing us to pay for this kind of c***.
Off the top of my head I'd say- start standard grades in secondary two, and start highers in secondary four. Raise the age in which children attend school to five. Make examinations more course-based rather than exam based. I feel slightly smug now. Tee hee.

 

Comment on this Story

 

In order to post comments you must Register or Sign In

 
 
RSS Feed of this article's comments
Delivery formats: RSS, Atom, Javascript & Email
 
  

 
 


Sister Newspapers:
Press Complaints Commission

This website and its associated newspaper adheres to the Press Complaints Commission’s Code of Practice. If you have a complaint about editorial content which relates to inaccuracy or intrusion, then contact the Editor by clicking here.

If you remain dissatisfied with the response provided then you can contact the PCC by clicking here.