Thinking Allowed E-Book

Mick Waters

• Herausgeber: Independent Thinking Press
• Kategorie: Bildung
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2013

Beschreibung

Mick Waters has consistently been a down-to-earth voice in the increasingly complex world of education for many years. He has regularly endeared himself to school communities in the UK and overseas by talking the sort of sense they needed to hear - practical, challenging, inspiring, insightful, engaging. His unique perspective, closeness to the classroom and ability to see innovation in terms of its impact on learners mean his views are always worth listening to. In this long-awaited book, Mick tells it how it is. The things he believes in. The things he wants to see differently. Wry reflections, humorous insights, astute asides and simple ideas to change the system - and the future - for young people everywhere. This is the book you have been waiting for.

Leseprobe

Praise for Thinking Allowed on Schooling

Mick Waters is a calm, seasoned voice in the rising clamour of debate on the future of education. Drawing on his long experience in classrooms and in national policy, Thinking Allowed on Schooling offers a wise, well-informed and practical perspective on the challenges that face education and on how to meet them. Unlike many passing politicians, Mick Waters has spent his life in education. This insightful, compassionate book distils the essence of what he has learnt and what we can learn from him. An essential read.

Sir Ken Robinson

With his characteristic lightness of touch, Mick Waters maintains a steadfast hand on the tiller as he navigates the challenging waters of today’s fast-changing educational landscape. Highly accessible, eminently readable and earthed in the experience of teachers, this book exposes the absurdity, complexity and utter joy invested in the business and busyness of schools. Through reflections, anecdotes and distinctive humour, the authoritative voice of Mick Waters liberates education from its historical, political and cultural context by offering a compelling critique of educational policy, based on the belief that public service, pride in the teaching profession and an unequivocal commitment to the most aspirational outcomes for children and young people provide the only way forward.

Ann Jones, Principal, CTC Kingshurst Academy

Mick Waters has produced the right book for the right time. He penetrates to the heart of the many open discussions we are having about education today. We may not agree with all he says, but we cannot help but be stimulated to think at a deeper level by reading this book.

Dr Anthony Seldon, Master, Wellington College

Thinking Allowed on Schooling is a truly seminal work, which should become required reading, not just for head teachers and those charged with delivering education, but for all those with an interest in how our children become educated rather than simply schooled, how they become engaged members of our society rather than tabloid stereotypes. Mick Waters goes beyond analysing the triumphs and failings of our system. He suggests practical solutions to the miasma of challenges facing us today, with a clarity and sharpness of thinking, liberally interspersed with humour and humility – things our political masters only achieve unwittingly. This is a brilliant contribution to the informed debate that is yet to be had.

Ian Fenn, Head Teacher, Burnage Media Arts College

This is a ‘must read’ for anyone involved in education, including the politicians! Mick’s common sense approach to education – that is so evident in his inspiring, motivational talks that have endeared him to teachers across the country – is exemplified and expanded on in this book, which is full of words of wisdom. In this era of radical educational change, this book should be our educational bible as we strive to find a better educational system that, in Mick’s words, ‘moves away from undue, short-term political influence,’ towards a system and curriculum that truly serves the needs of children. I shall be buying multiple copies of this book, to ensure that all of the staff at our school have the opportunity to read it!

Iain M Erskine, Head of The Fulbridge Academy in Peterborough

Listening to Mick is always a pleasure – his down-to-earth, common sense beliefs are forged from exhaustive research, vast experience and a commitment to providing high-quality learning experiences for our young people, regardless of their backgrounds. His book is no different – it is as thought provoking and challenging as I had hoped it would be. I am looking forward to some very interesting and productive staff development sessions, using his questions and suggestions as the basis for discussion and change.

Siobhan Collingwood, Head Teacher, Morecambe Bay Community Primary School

Professor Mick Waters is not afraid to challenge our beliefs and our practices in this new book.

His holistic approach takes the reader beyond questioning and evaluation with a passion that demands action. He offers so many suggestions for new ways forward that it will have your head spinning.

Whilst I do not necessarily share all the views expressed, this book is stimulating and thought provoking at all times and I would recommend it as a ‘good read’.

Mrs Brenda Bigland CBE, Education Consultant, Trainer and Coach

Thinking Allowed on Schooling is, of course, an inspiration!

Unlike most educational books, this one will not be read and then shelved. Mick’s absolute commitment to the best education for our children is apparent throughout, as he shares his wealth of knowledge and experience. The book, whilst being accessible and colourful, provides enough hard-hitting research and challenging quotes and examples to make it a very interesting read for people at all levels of education and a credible point of reference for years to come. I hope that Thinking Allowed on Schooling will become both a valuable source of guidance for educators and an essential read for future Secretaries of State!

I am a head teacher and therefore not in the business of critically evaluating and editing material for publication, so I can’t be of help in reviewing the language, organisation and structure of the text itself. But I can comment on how the book could, and has already, helped me as a practicing head teacher. Thinking Allowed on Schooling justifies my exhaustion; it also revels, with me, in the joy of schools and education, making me laugh out loud and nod my head at shared experiences! Thinking Allowed on Schooling sets out, with real clarity, the very complex context for education and the huge agenda faced by schools. It gives enough history for us educators to understand how we got into this educational situation, and enough inspiration and guidance to help us prioritise, refocus and manage things better for our children and our communities. I liked the book being crammed with page after page of things I’d wanted to have explained, and reminders of why we are all trying so hard to get ‘it’ right. I felt reassured that I could have this book on my desk as a constant source to tap into – for clarity, reflection and deeper thinking. It is helpful to have chapters focussed on crucial things like pedagogy and curriculum, aspiration and assessment. It worked well for me that each section concluded with What could we do/What might be done? – clear next steps which we can all consider and/or act upon. I have pulled out key messages to help clarify our strategic thinking as a school (when I’m given the go ahead to share the content) and have clung onto ‘innovate with integrity’ and ‘learning which is irresistible’. The book has highlighted some key questions I need to ask of myself as a leader, of our team within the school and of the parents and children. I think that this book will become invaluable to senior leaders within education and could go a lot further towards raising standards than Ofsted Inspections, testing systems or political grand speeches ever will!

I feel very privileged to have been asked to read this book and even more privileged (though not surprised) that Mick is willing to share so much with us all.

To conclude – what could Mick do next? Find a structure to update schools leaders and teachers with filtered information to help us prioritise; a way to help us feel informed but not overloaded with information and political claptrap. Press for a National Council for Schooling. Pat himself on the back (for once) and know that he has provided us with something practical and tangible that WILL make a difference to education in our schools.

Caroline Vernon, Professional Colleague

Mick Waters has done it again. Sometimes you read something so blindingly obvious that you wonder, ‘Why didn’t I think of that?’ But whereas most of us only manage to glimpse parts of the problem and fragments of possible solutions, he pulls all those elements together, succinctly and coherently. He presents educators and policy-makers alike with a challenge that is huge and daunting, to be sure, but which, in his masterly analysis, is eminently capable of being addressed – if only we have the will to do so.

That analysis is dispassionate, but there’s no mistaking Mick’s passion for education and for its purpose that we owe to our children, but in which we so often fail them. Notwithstanding his clear love for teaching and for teachers, he doesn’t flinch from criticising the uninspiring and formulaic; nor does his flinch from laying the blame firmly at the doors of the qualification-obsessed policy-makers and the data-dominated inspection system for creating and perpetuating the focus on what is narrow, tedious and purely utilitarian.

Mick is a positive thinker – hence the book’s title. So, although he paints a bleak picture of the current state of affairs, he also offers solutions: they are challenging but realistic, if only policy-makers would find the courage. If we don’t pick up the gauntlet Mick throws down, we risk (as he writes graphically) continuing to ‘beat the drum of progress and march to the drum of tedious accountability’.

Dr Bernard Trafford, Headmaster, Newcastle upon Tyne Royal Grammar School and former Chairman, HMC

In this highly readable book, Mick gives a brilliant review of the Good, the Bad, and the Plain Old Ugly of the current educational landscape. He is right to conclude that we need ‘an Education Spring - a rising of intolerance about the way schooling is being manipulated in a piecemeal and uncoordinated way to serve too many purposes with unclear measures’. His call for the establishment of an elected National Council for Schooling as a way forward is also spot-on. It is, indeed, time for politicians to hand over the direction of the Profession to the Profession itself.

Andrew Chubb, Principal, Archbishop Sentamu Academy

Dedicated to three lads: Philip, Thomas and Matthew

Author’s note

Dr Ishmail ran the end of his reflex stick up the sole of my foot and his expression changed. Apparently my toes curled the wrong way. Within no time he was organising MRI scans. A few weeks later and a couple of days before I was due to chair the annual three-day North of England Education Conference in Leeds, I found out that I would need tricky surgery on the spinal cord in my neck and it would take a few months before I was up and running. Not that I often run.

Here was the chance to write the book I had been asked for before and so often put off because of pressure of work. When, coincidentally, Ian Gilbert offered to edit it the project was underway.

How long does it take to write a book? It depends when we start counting. It could be said that this book has taken a career to write. It is a collection of thoughts that have built up as I have reached the twilight of my career. The shadows are long behind me as I head towards a setting sun. At the same time, it has taken just a few months of actual writing during my convalescence and the Olympics and then onwards through the autumn and winter of shifting educational activity. Some will expect a book on children, teaching approaches and classroom practice, a book full of ideas to try, for that is how I have always worked. There is relatively little of that here. Instead, it is a book about the state of schooling in England and it reflects the many conversations I have had with those I have met who are trying to make the system work for all our children and young people. It is a book to pick up, dip into and hopefully debate, wherever it is that we work in the schooling system.

While we might write a book alone we also need help and support. The team at Independent Thinking Press has helped me enormously and Ian has been a great source of wisdom. In my career’s worth of thinking, I have been sustained by a family that has tolerated and supported my unending appetite for getting involved in schools and their work. Across the country and beyond, I am proud to know professional friends who have provided me with so much inspiration as I have worked alongside them, glimpsed their incredible practice, shared their enthusiasm for teaching and wondered with them how it could all be better. In the book there are references to schools but I do not name them; the people involved will recognise themselves and for each of those I mention, there are many similar examples.

I hope you enjoy the book and that, whatever your involvement with schooling, there is something in it to make you think. I have always believed that improving schooling is about shedding light, offering challenge and building confidence and reassurance. I hope the book does that in fair proportion.

It is a book about schools so it will hardly be a blockbuster. My operation was a complete success and my follow-up tests came to a climax with the repeat reflex test on my feet. This time the toes went the right way. This book is for you, Dr Ishmail, and all the colleagues who helped me to recover. It is my educational toe-curler.

Mick Waters

Contents

Title Page

Dedication

Author’s Note

Some background, explanations and disclaimers

Thinking allowed

… on the confused purpose of schooling

… on the search for equality

… on marching to different drums

… on national politicians and education policy

… on school autonomy, markets and competition

… on business, industry and other professions

… on professional integrity and game theory

… on Ofsted inspection

… on pupils, teaching and classrooms

… on unleashing aspiration

… on assessment, international comparison and research

… on qualifications and examinations, academic and vocational

… on curriculum

… on the national curriculum

… on a few aspects of the school leadership outlook

… finally

Bibliography

Index

Copyright

Some background, explanations and disclaimers

It was relatively early in my teaching career when I realised the point of the old joke about someone asking directions and being told, ‘If you were trying to get there, I wouldn’t start from here.’ It dawned on me that there was a world of difference between education and schooling and if we were truly trying to offer education to young people, we really would not organise schooling in the way we do.

As a novice head teacher I found myself restrained by resources, staffing structures, tradition, habit and parental expectation. Maybe I couldn’t change the world but I could change a bit of it; I could make it as good as possible for the people we are meant to serve, the children in our care. I remember thinking that my task was to make the most of a bad job or to make a silk purse from a sow’s ear. This is not to be negative but realistic. I have taken the same attitude to every job ever since: keep the highest ideals and at the same time be pragmatic. Do the best for the young people in whatever way you are allowed and give them the best experience and prospects possible.

I reflect that it must have been the same for the bosses of the train companies in the mid-1980s. If we were really to run the rail system properly we would want to start again. Wider tracks, bigger, longer trains, more lines in the right places, better tunnels and modern stations would all be top of the list. However, the infrastructure was already there so it was a case of making the most of it and giving the passenger the best travel experience possible. It may not be perfect, and there are plenty of moaners, but the reality is that the railways are generally better than they were.

The history of the school system in England places a similar burden on those trying to make it work for the future. This is one of the reasons why sections of this book dwell on the background to our current situation. History can create insight, although it may not stop it repeating itself.

I have tried, though, to make the book readable without too many references to academic texts and official papers (although these are listed in the bibliography). The risk in this is that points may appear to be unsubstantiated or conjecture. There is personal opinion and much of what I have written is a commentary on what I see in the hundreds of schools in which I spend time in the course of a year as they go about their daily business. I am with them because I might be teaching a class or two with the teachers watching. I still think this is one of the best forms of teacher development; watching your own class with someone else. I don’t do it a lot, but enough to still be that teacher I was when I started out. I might be in schools at the invitation of a head or governors to discuss ways forward. I might be speaking at a conference or seminar with teachers, heads, governors, parents or employers. All of these exchanges over many years have fuelled the writing in this book.

One real problem I encountered in writing the book is the use of the collective noun. We all do it to describe teachers, schools, children, parents, inspectors and politicians as though all of their category was the same – yet we know they are not. We generalise and in every generalisation we recognise there are subtle differences and polar opposites. Maybe not all children in Africa walk ten miles each way to school and there are many children in Africa who wouldn’t wish to go to school if the opportunity were freely available. We realise that not everyone who left school with few qualifications, like Lord Sugar and Sir Richard Branson, ended up as successful multimillionaire business leaders. Not everyone who goes to private school ends up as a success and some people who can’t read do very well for themselves as adults. Please forgive the use of the collective noun where it needs forgiveness and be charitable as you read the text in the way I might have intended.

I hope the book is one that can be opened at any section and enjoyed as a ‘think piece’ for its own sake. Because of this, there is the occasional repetition as the same issues can affect a range of agendas. Some sections are longer than others and some much more focused on the practice of schooling that might be discussed at a staff or departmental meeting. I have integrated some previously written articles into the text where they fit and I have tried to respond to changes of policy late in the process of publication. Here and there are some musings and passing thoughts that might make the reader think again about the routine of their world. Sometimes these are humorous, a wry reflection on the odd world of schooling.

Schools are fascinating and busy places and there is much that happens in them that is very funny and sometimes absurd. One of the sadder aspects of recent years is that teachers and others who work in schools seem to have less time to laugh with the children and each other at some of the amusing things that happen. Childhood should be joyous and schools should feel part of that happy outlook.

… on the confused purpose of schooling

During the month that you are reading this around 50,000 babies will be born in England. Most will be greeted with joy and be referred to as wonderful and a miracle. Some will be unwanted but most will be loved. What might we hope for these children as they begin their life’s journey that many predict will see most of them living into the next century? Most parents would say that they want their child to grow up to be contented, happy and fulfilled.

During their lives our young people will have more opportunity than ever before and will face more complex challenges. The chance to travel is greater than ever with the prospect of journeys into space becoming fact rather than fiction. Most will need to work to sustain themselves and their families; some will move beyond routine work and achieve significance, celebrity or greatness. At today’s rate, one in every three month’s batch will become a star for a while on television or film and one every month will make a music recording. Some will take on representative roles; ten of our babies every year will become a Member of Parliament. One baby in every six month’s batch will become an Olympian.

In our batch of babies, society needs some who are pioneers, exploring new frontiers in science, technology or engineering. We will need people who can make things and sell them. We will need people to grow things. There will need to be some who seek a just and fair society on behalf of all of us and there will be those who seek to help us to avoid conflict and uphold rights. We will need people to entertain us. We will need people to do the dirty jobs and the unthinkable tasks that most of us would turn away from. We will need people who are happy to work behind the scenes to make things happen. We will need people to whom we can turn to for organised solace and comfort. We will need people who are brave. We will need those who will care for others and nurture talent. On top of all this we will need leaders to organise the very society in which we live.

Our hopes for our young are a compromise between their personal fulfilment and our needs as a prosperous and secure society. Can we describe our hopes for all our children so that they might enjoy fulfilment in their adult lives?

Our hopes for our young people

Most would agree that we would want our young people to be competent and confident in themselves. What that means might provoke debate but surely we need individuals who are able to cope in familiar and novel circumstances. They will require the basics of reading, writing and numeracy plus those even more essential skills of concern for their own health and well-being.

Next we might want our youngsters to grow up and act with integrity. This is a challenging aim – easier to say than do and with lots of implications in many contexts. It is about more than behaving in the way demanded by elders; it relates to self-control, being critical and developing and retaining a sense of honour and respect. How can we encourage our young people to act in a decent way towards themselves, towards others, their community and towards their planet? From an early age children are aware of many examples where adults do not act with integrity and there are harsh lessons to learn about the ways we might not trust each other.

We would expect our young people to be ready to take responsibility, to support and nurture others. This would involve working hard, sometimes in teams, sometimes leading, showing determination and commitment and developing character. It would demand willpower, self-control and respect. It would encompass many of the qualities that business leaders constantly emphasise as vital.

Most would hope their children will grow up being fascinated by the natural world and intrigued by our attempts to manipulate that world, including a growing recognition of human achievements and failings. These are the elements that have been part of the English school curriculum over time; the aspects that are organised into subject disciplines and over which there is so much debate about what should be included.

The importance of enjoying and taking part in the creative, cultural, sporting and innovative aspects of society and recognising the valuable contribution they make to our lives is also something that would be included in our hopes for young people.

Growing up in a modern society means we would need our youngsters to appreciate the cultures, orientations and sensitivities of other people. Again, this is easily said but makes high demands in terms of our own society where we see communities both at one and at odds with themselves and others.

It is vital that young people are ready and qualified to take on the next stage of their learning as they pass through the gateways in their adult lives. This does not necessarily mean having exams or certificates but it does mean that they have sufficient resources to convince others that they can take the next steps – the tickets to pass through doorways.

Within all this, we would want our young to develop the capacity to reflect on and recognise their contribution to their world, its value and their developing spirit. Essentially, though, we would want our young people to be fuelled with a desire to learn that will be with them for the rest of their lives.

Most would agree with the hopes described above; there is a broad general consensus about our ambitions for our young people. The various elements of this list are interdependent on each other for success. It is easier to appreciate the differences in society if there is some knowledge of history and geography. Innovation comes more easily when basic principles of science, engineering, art, design and mathematics are clearly grasped. Enjoying and working hard at sport or culture helps to develop responsibility and in turn is much more easily developed if conscientiousness is already there.

The difficulty comes when we decide which aspects of the list are in the province of our schools. Schooling sets out to support society in nurturing its young people. All schooling is part of education, but not all education takes place in school. School is but a small part of a very big whole. Should that small part be a segment of the education experience – the subject disciplines? Or should the small part of education that is schooling be an inner or outer concentric circle giving a rounded experience that complements life’s wider education? Schooling happens for about 1,200 hours per year between the ages of four and eighteen. Matthew Syed, in his excellent book Bounce, quotes research that reckons that high-level performance comes with 10,000 hours of practice. On that basis, each child will be excellent at one-and-a-half things by the time they leave school. Perhaps we need them to practise the specific art of learning so that they leave school as excellent and committed learners ready to take on all they meet.

As our children leave the schooling system they will be less than a quarter of the way through their lives and they will have spent less than 20% of their time in school. We are surely not expecting finished human beings at school leaving age? Is it not more realistic to expect that when they leave they are primed for the future – ready to move forward with confidence, curiosity and commitment? That is not to say they should be without knowledge or working skill sets in literacy, numeracy and oracy, but to have the presence of mind to know that their educational journey has only just begun. They need to be aware of the markers and signposts that lie ahead.

We have recognised standards in schools which are easily definable: test and examination results. Through tests of literacy and numeracy in primary schools and a few GCSEs in particular subjects at the secondary stage we seem to assume that we have a shorthand method for evaluating the quality of schooling. We apply this evaluation on a national level and, through various subsets, to the individual school. Those who find their school standards high or rising find it difficult to disagree that their school is good. Yet are results in exams and tests all we seek? What about the list of hopes above?

Society seems to want more from its schools than the basics established during the Victorian era that heralded state education, yet it finds it difficult to express exactly what it does want. The infant school that decides to abandon the nativity play because of the need to teach the basics would probably be castigated for denying the children one of life’s formative and memorable experiences. But is seeing our child on stage really about their education or simply one of those rites of passage that as parents we have come to expect? Is teaching them to recite a line, sit here, move there and not pick their noses really educational? Is it formative? There is a big difference between being directed and being creative. Do we think enough about not only the purpose of having all children appear in a nativity play each year but also about the purpose of school itself?

Is the annual round of treats, visits and parties that follow the tests and exams really a good use of time if children are meant to be acquiring standards? Is the post-SATs residential for Year 6 a break from the slog of the previous months or is it a more meaningful educational experience (building independence, teamwork, sharing success, learning new knowledge and skills, seeing subject disciplines in context and forging lasting memories) than the SATs preparation could ever be? Are schools meant to be less of a factory producing ‘scores’ and more of a chance for our children to be supported in meeting our hopes for them collectively? Do we really think our schools can take responsibility for the behaviour of all of our children? If so, the claim that educational standards in London are better than ever rings hollow in the face of the riots of 2011.

Schools can only achieve so much and should be seen to complement and supplement what a good society already offers. In our schools we teach little linguists, budding artists, fledgling mathematicians, growing scientists and emerging historians. We teach future engineers, architects, lawyers, performers and journalists. Schooling can help society to do its job and secure all our futures but it is not the sole provider of that education.

By their first birthday, 70% of this month’s babies will have learned to walk and, in the following few months, only those with special needs will find walking difficult. Similarly, by the age of two, most will be talking and by five this talk will be fluent with extensive vocabulary (though a sizable proportion will be struggling to talk easily). Most parents take naturally to their role in helping their child to walk. The child sees nearly everyone doing it, wants to join the club and grown-ups make it a good game. Early toddles are supported and encouraged, failure is brushed aside and effort is praised. The spotlight shines on the successes. So it is with talking. Babbling to babies comes naturally and the child mimics the noises it hears. Supported by focused repetition, a delight in books, endless commentary on experiences, praise for trying and a ready audience, the child will soon enjoy being able to communicate.

Can we capitalise on this natural urge to learn and encourage the intellectual, physical, emotional and social aspects of development in the same way that we might encourage walking and talking? Where walking and talking appear to come naturally, involving much effort on the part of the individual – not to mention the nurturing on the part of the carer – we seem to think other types of learning need more effort on the part of the teacher. In the development of walking and talking parents don’t stand and instruct children: ‘Shift your centre of gravity, lift one foot, place it down … good, now the other.’ No, the parent moves obstacles, teases and tempts by placing enticing treats just out of reach, cheers and celebrates, gently coaches and opens up many opportunities for practice. The parent does not outline a learning objective and set up success criteria. In teaching, however, there is a belief that structure, often linear, is necessary in order to speed progress towards our goals for our young. Yet often this progress is not speedy. There is a lot of repeated content. Children forget and need to be re-taught the same skills or knowledge over and over. We feel that a lot of time is lost where there is no time to lose. Nevertheless, the time is there to use and use well.

When we watch very young children learning it is almost as if they cannot help it. They explore, set themselves an impossible task and often apply themselves until they achieve it, failing endlessly, delighting in small discoveries and applying one idea to a new situation to test out possible solutions. They do all of these things without being told to, although the guiding adult will sometimes offer a helpful model or put a stepping stone in place or add a twist of confusion at just the right moment.

Leapfrog forward to the university years and the same process gets repeated – exploring, setting tasks, trying one idea in a new situation, experimenting, discovery.

At both ends we see self-structured learning, hypotheses being tested, conjecture and discovery. What do we see in-between these ages as children travel the school journey? Too often they experience learning which is linear rather than rounded, incremental rather than expansive and tested rather than testing. The most obvious difference though is the way the learning is set by others rather than the learners themselves. Is this because the learner cannot determine their own paths or because we, the teachers, know the best route? Is it because the learners need their experience to be channelled to save time? Is it because the learners suddenly lose ideas and imagination which return after they have passed the necessary examinations? GCSEs and A levels seem to become indicators of promise rather than achievement. So it is with SATs, and there is a danger that the Early Years profile will also become a predictor of potential. The point of schools is to accelerate learning so they need some incremental structures. The challenge is to use those structures to complement what we know about how young people learn.

The fact is that many schools feel inhibited about using the interests of the learner in designing and building learning experiences. We listen to central government for guidance about what and how to teach rather than believing or trusting the professionalism of teachers, or the consensus among stakeholders or the pupil voice.

Many would argue that schools are for the ‘whole child’ and fundamentally should address the list of hopes above. Others see the role of schools as providing that which lies beyond the scope of the home and family. They believe that the driving force for schools should be the knowledge and understanding of events and phenomena with a little bit of attention to affective experiences. When things wobble in society, and questions are asked about the outlook of our youngsters, the focus seems to be on schools to ensure that behaviour is good, which usually takes us into the realm of personal qualities. Some assert that the utilitarian purpose of schools is as a method by which children can acquire qualifications that will allow them to pursue an employment-related status in life.

Whatever schooling does it cannot do everything. Most schools in England seem to try to communicate what and how they do things by suggesting that they are adding to what parents do, trying to fit the child for their future and promoting the sort of society we would want to see develop. Most teachers appear to see their role as investing in the future and making a difference to the life chances of the children they teach.

Other so-called stakeholders have a range of views: business wants a workforce for the future, able to fulfil a range of demands from invention to production; universities want individuals who are ready to research and think; and parents, by virtually every survey, want their children to be happy, though how they define that varies from parent to parent …

What do our children need?

We don’t have to listen to Radio 4’s Today programme for many weeks to get a picture of what children should be learning. Personal finance, healthy eating, drug awareness, crime prevention, bereavement, sexuality, alcohol abuse, internet grooming, pensions, dementia, culture, parenting, voting responsibly, swimming and design all featured within a two-month period in 2012, with all the advocates asserting something like, ‘Of course, it all starts in the school’. The fact is that all these claims will be appropriate for some children somewhere. There is a view that, since we have a national curriculum and if something needs to be taught, it has to be on the national curriculum, and so the lobbying begins. The problem comes with an old-fashioned perception of what schools are intended to do. Some hold the rather charming view that schools should teach lovely and interesting things about our world and not foist the challenges of adulthood upon the young. Then there are those who believe that the list above is the province of the home, or at least ‘pastoral’ or ‘incidental’, and has little place or importance in what we should intend our schools to teach and our children to learn.

Few would disagree that our children need the basics, almost going back to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child that enshrines the rights of survival, protection and participation. Schooling fits into our wish to provide well for our children. Traditionally, schools exist to offer organised, structured and accelerated learning. In striving to improve schooling we believe we are creating a better childhood. Successive education secretaries of all parties have been able to chant the terms ‘social mobility’, ‘excellence’ and ‘equality’. In recent years they have also added ‘accountability’, ‘diversity’, ‘choice’, ‘market’ and ‘autonomy’ to their list. One problem is that putting emphasis on the latter set means that the first set is virtually unachievable. We cannot seem to balance the need for equality with striving for excellence for each and every child.

Social mobility has become an easy issue for politicians to discuss, but efforts to address it are tripped up by the stress on high-stakes accountability in a market-led system. Parents (an example of that collective noun problem) typically want to do the best by their children and support their schooling in the belief that the school is a guide for them as parents as well as for their children. Business and employers have grown used to criticising schools for not producing ‘work-ready’ youngsters. Culture, arts and sport judge that they also have something to offer young people and want to do it, in part, via schooling. Very few adults are in one particular group alone. We are parents and employers, we are teachers and parents, we are innovators and parents. What parents want for their own children is often different from what they argue children in general should receive. As a result, the picture of what we want from schooling is confused. Educationalists, spurred on by successive secretaries of state, talk of a ‘moral authority’ where we rise above all the arguing and do what we know is best for children and seek to convince the wider population. The pity is that what many of the policy-makers actually mean is that the profession should rise above the arguing and agree with them and their policies.

Into this confusion steps central government, utilising the general lack of clarity about what education is all about in order to be assertive about policy. Over the last twenty years, central government has convinced us that qualifications are the prime measure of school and individual success. The parent who might worry about a school’s practice in regard to many of the hopes for our young people will be compromised by the ‘you can’t argue with results’ conundrum. It might not be pretty but it does deliver.

A lack of credible examination results leads to a question mark over a school’s future. Maybe that is right – most other things lead to results and therefore all is not well where results are poor. But should a school with good results be compared equally with a school with poorer results when the parents of the first have paid for private tutoring and the parents of the second could not? Do statistics tell the whole story? How do we know whether a school at the top of the league table is ten times better than the one in tenth spot? Are two schools with the same results comparable in every way? Where does children’s happiness and experience come in?

Previous generations needed to be work-ready; ready for the world of toil manufacturing or mining, shipbuilding or car making, fishing or agriculture. They took up employment in these industries and accepted their lot or they learned on the job and made progress. Sometimes they needed to be ready to answer their country’s call and be prepared to lay down their lives. Only a few needed to be ‘checked out’ and examined to see whether they could stand the test. Examinations were specific to a particular chosen pathway. Nowadays, examinations are taken by all to check on the growth of the child and, at the same time, to confirm the efficiency of the schooling.

Being efficient is not always the same as being effective. This system has led to considerable concerns about the notion of ‘teaching to the test’. If the test were an effective indicator of capability there would be no need for concern. But it is not. It is a turnstile and, once through, children need to be able to navigate all manner of complexity that no exam could ever prepare them for. Since, today, all children take the examinations, it stands to reason that all cannot get through the chosen gateway with the same ticket. Hence the need for a broader school experience which addresses the wider hopes for our young people.

Politicians run with the tide for their own electoral gain. The euphoria over the 2012 Olympic Games led to announcements on competitive sport in primary schools being made compulsory. The politicians probably thought this captured a public mood but almost immediately various well-known people came forward to recount their purgatory in school sports as youngsters. Top competitors talked about the joy of sport being derived from its many health and social benefits. Leading coaches described enjoying sport for its own sake and then, gradually, specialising if appropriate. Yet the government grabbed the compulsory and competitive elements and waved the wrong end of the stick as if it were a javelin.

The politicians somehow failed to see the impact of arts and culture on the Olympiad; the acclaim for the opening and closing ceremonies should have led to an equally bold statement on the need to support creative and aesthetic disciplines. The ceremonies, which included classical and popular music, comedy, dance, poetry, ballet, circus, pyrotechnics and stunning visual effects, should have led to an exposition on the brilliance of the stars of the arts, design and technology, stagecraft and innovation. The Olympics showed examples of architecture, construction, journalism, photography, logistics, venue management … and sport. The elements of internationalism, health, companionship and mutual respect were all potential influences on society.

But no, competitive sport was the message to come out of the Games according to the government. The fact that thousands reported the positive effect on them as torch bearers – as they were recognised, supported, celebrated, acknowledged and thanked – did not lead the politicians to think that a ‘chance to shine’ might be important. They did not seem to consider that maybe all children should have an opportunity for a moment in the limelight; but rather that we must end the ‘all must have prizes’ culture. Somehow they think that the prospect of a moment on a podium will spur on a generation. They should talk to the Games Makers – the thousands of volunteers who volunteered and for two weeks made London actually feel friendly. For them, the Olympics were a chance to be part of something wonderful, to come together in human endeavour and celebration. This was a collective, social motivation, not a competitive one.

Still, 2012 offered a more positive vision of Britain than 2011. That summer saw riots and looting in various English cities. The political statements that followed the awful scenes centred on the need for better behaviour in schools and the requirement for effective discipline. But schools were out when the riots were on and most of the rioters were past school age. Ofsted has actually observed that discipline in schools is good, but what does evidence matter when it doesn’t fit? If there is a problem that government is unsure what to do about, it is easy to place the responsibility in the lap of the school system. If there is a great achievement in our society, then the credit goes to government but the responsibility for making sure the good times continue is still placed with schools.

While the Olympic Games were taking place, the Curiosity rover was successfully guided to Mars and began taking soil samples and transmitting analysis to scientists on earth. At about the same time, the English astronomer and architect of Jodrell Bank, Bernard Lovell, died. Within days the passing of Neil Armstrong was also announced. Politicians were silent on these matters, but they might have asked how we inspire youngsters to emulate great scientists in the same way that they are inspired to emulate athletes at the peak of their performance. The opening ceremonies of both the Olympic and Paralympic Games made this connection with celebrations of the achievements of Sir Tim Berners-Lee who invented the internet and Professor Stephen Hawking. The creative directors found the connections that our policy-makers struggle to make.

Politicians often select a focus of schooling in order to catch a public mood that will fit in with their overall need for election. They rarely seem to see a big picture or question their own policies. For example, if schooling is intended to address society’s issues, different measures of quality and success will be needed rather than relying on the crude measure of exam and test results.

Exercise and diet are major health concerns, while the declining impact and involvement in religion, anti-social behaviour and the lack of participation in elections and community activity worry many. All of these are crucial social issues of our time and some would be addressed by having a better educated, more literate and numerate adult population. That said, interestingly, when the 2008 banking crisis occurred, few people blamed the school system in spite of the fact that many of the culprits had achieved the very highest standards in education. Perhaps it is difficult for politicians to cast the spotlight on the failings of those who have been, up to that point, the premier products of a testing and competitive culture.

The challenge is surely greater than all of this. If schooling is to play a part in transforming society, it has to be offered the chance to do it as a respected influence with a serious contribution to make rather than a mere tool of national politicians. If building character is part of the challenge for schools, along with raising horizons, encouraging positive lifestyles and broadening experience, then we have to promote this as a serious agenda rather than see it is an add-on or an imperative in a crisis.

Schools cannot do everything although most try. The majority of teachers come into the profession to make a difference and with strong core values about public service and improving society. Many have taken on a social care role in the communities they serve, trying to help set the foundations for the children they teach. Many are driving forward with innovative pedagogic and institutional development. Some are researching the impact of new techniques. Many are confused by the unending change to the system. Many are distracted from their core role as teachers by spending time and energy on strategic planning around elements of structure and restructuring. Many are working with employers and higher education to develop links which support the progress of the pupils they teach. Many live by the annual cycle of test results. Most are hitting the targets set by government. Some are driven by keeping at bay the fear of inspection failure. Almost all care about the children they teach but the drivers and pressures on their work are extremely varied. For so many, the base level is exam and test results, inspection outcomes are next and securing pupil numbers to protect the budget relies on the first two. Yet their professionalism desires better schooling for the pupils they teach than they feel they are currently receiving. Too many are frustrated and feel powerless which can lead to a dwindling sense of professionalism. The high numbers of those leaving the profession within five years of qualifying should be a source of great concern.

My experience tells me that the morale of the profession is generally good in front of the children but low elsewhere. For many years political posturing has created a set of tensions such that, even as results improved, new buildings were built, salaries increased and budgets rose, for many the innate joy and pride of being a member of the teaching profession diminished. This has accelerated under the current coalition government, not just because funding has been pulled from building projects and salaries frozen, but because the combative rhetoric from government has driven many teachers and school leaders to despair. The satisfaction of working with youngsters is outweighed by the political meddling which plays school against school, head against head, teacher against teacher and child against child.

So what might be done?

We need an ‘education spring’ – a rising of intolerance about the way schooling is being manipulated in a piecemeal and uncoordinated way to serve too many purposes with unclear measures. We need to build a rational, apolitical debate and ensure that schooling moves away from undue, short-term political influence.

In turn, this means establishing some sort of National Council for Schooling to guide schooling, which is built on evidence and research and has agreed and clearly defined aims for our young people.

The National Council for Schooling would drive us towards a different view of accountability and bring more balance to the market-driven approach to schooling.

We need to build a sense of purpose for schooling into all parents and pupils and to help them determine their own responsibilities in education, which is wider than simply what goes on at school.

As a society we need to see young people, particularly teenagers, as a positive group in our communities and part of the solution for some of society’s challenges.

We need real engagement from and with employers.

We need clearer parameters for the important teaching of social and moral responsibility in schools.

We need a better definition of what a ‘rounded education’ really is and clarity about where schooling fits into that picture.

… on the search for equality

The English education system still presents itself as a race with the first past the post as the victors. It likes to portray this race as a fair test but the reality is very different. Imagine the 400-metres event with lane allocations according to wealth, with the most wealthy on the inside lane and the poorest on the outside. Then take away the staggered start.

Children are born into a family. It might be the most secure or fragile beginning in life but even as they enter life their educational chances are unequal. Imagine the 1,500 children born on any one day in England being placed on life’s starting line. The children from the privileged upper classes would be on the inside lane. On the extreme outside, in what is often called ‘the gutter’, would be the children who are born into poverty and are surrounded by society’s ills. Very few are in either extreme but the distance between the two is enormous. In-between are the other stereotypes: the hardworking families, those trying to better themselves, the deeply in debt but coping, people on benefits, the newly wealthy and celebrities. Their children are placed on the educational track in order of the wealth of their parents.

For most families, the aim would be to edge towards the left, to have a better existence and lifestyle and to move further away from the desperation of the outside lane. Some are happy where they are and content to play a middle course, satisfied with their lives and enjoying fairly modest ambitions. Edging to the left means trying to have some of what they are having and many believe that hard work will get them there. A few resort to cheating or making the system work for them; some do it simply to survive and others to make it into that next lane across. Whether it is fiddling expenses claims or taking copper wire from railway tracks, within the community of your lane, if you can get away with it there is advantage to be taken.

Children continue to grow up in this range of different circumstances. Those born into that outside ‘gutter’ lane grow up as part of an ‘underclass’ where traditional social norms disappear and a new set of norms take over. Few take the time to care. Camila Batmanghelidjh of Kidscape, for example, speaks out for the children who live off the scraps of society and castigates the blind eyes that have been turned to the children who need us most. Louise Casey, the coalition government’s ‘tsar’ for troubled families, has spelled out the challenges that these dysfunctional families cause to society, not least in terms of cost. She talks of the need to break the grim cycle that continues from one generation to the next. Successive government initiatives have passed by these families; Neighbourhood Renewal, City Challenge and the like were targeted at local authority areas, with pressure put upon them to achieve results. Those nearest to the target became the focus of attention and action, the so-called ‘low-hanging fruit’ or ‘quick wins’, and those furthest away carried on as before, wreaking havoc on all they touch in society. Louise Casey’s drive to understand the circumstances, and then address every aspect of family need at the most basic of levels, is long overdue.

As long ago as 1990, there was a focus on the new ‘underclass’ and a television programme focused on a big estate in Sunderland. At the time, I was working with a primary school on the estate and knew of the social conditions from which these children came. These were feckless households in terms of normative behaviours but resourceful ones in terms of survival against the odds. Many people pilfered as a matter of course; stole as a job of work; did business with fences as a natural course of events; treated their children as little more than pets and their pitbulls as trophies; wives were traded and sampled; drugs were used as and when available; and some individuals were falling increasingly under the control of the pushers and runners. Yet most of them sent their children to school. It became an oasis of calm for these children in a desert of neglect.

In our society, at the beginning of the twenty-first century, we have significant numbers of children who fit a category that puts them in those outside lanes. Think of the words and consider the implications for learning and schools: groomed, abused, addicted, neglected, raped, targeted, frightened, hungry. Social workers and youth workers can provide graphic descriptions of how this underworld operates, how some children are deceived into gangs and weaponry, how some are drawn into sexual abuse, how some look for excitement and get out of their depth. A number of schools will recount examples of children who don’t eat between their school dinner and the following morning’s breakfast club. What do these children eat in August?

These families, and their children in turn, become a problem for society, which typically applies ‘inside lane’ thinking to ‘outside lane’ people. The Labour government introduced anti-social behaviour orders (ASBOs) without realising that there would be a competition in some quarters to see who could acquire the most. Another ‘tsar’, this one responsible for looking at behaviour in schools, has proposed fining families £60 for their child’s non-attendance. The thinking is that deducting the money from benefits will ensure payment. How will that keep children fed?

The official report into the riots of summer 2011 refers to the 500,000 ‘forgotten families’. The chairman of the Riots Communities and Victims Panel, Darra Singh, said: ‘We must give everyone a stake in society. There are people “bumping along the bottom”, unable to change their lives. When people don’t feel they have a reason to stay out of trouble, the consequences for communities can be devastating.’ The government is trying to come up with strategies to reintegrate these individuals into society. It is a bit late but anything would help.

The anecdotal evidence of pupils arriving at primary school unprepared for learning is growing. Teachers talk of children who aren’t toilet trained, don’t know how to dress themselves and, more worrying, can’t talk and don’t know even their names. These are children who are treated as little more than pets or toys to enjoy when it is convenient.

These are examples of early childhood at its worst. The proportion is not high, but 500,000 ‘forgotten families’ probably yields twice that many children of school age, about 8% of the school population in England. On the nearby inside lanes from these groups are the families trying hard but who are unaware of what to do, the ones with aspirations but little idea of how to achieve them.

Jean Gross, the Communication Champion until the government decided to close her office, reflected in her final report in 2011 that ‘Many practitioners have told me that parents want the facts. Speech and language therapists in one local area, for example, told me how when they provided information about the impact of indiscriminate television-watching under the age of two, and the prolonged use of dummies, the reaction from parents was “No one told us this before”. Once given the facts, parents were all too happy to make changes to their interactions with their child.’

The coalition government is trying to address these matters through a range of activities. Alan Milburn’s work on social mobility continues to highlight the dominance of independent school pupils in future success and to find ways to overcome it. He suggests that families with children in failing schools should be given a voucher to use in any school, public or state. His argument is that families do not lack aspiration; they do not know how to achieve it and schooling holds the key. Graham Allen’s 2011 report on ‘Early Intervention’ warns that ‘If we continue to fail, we will only perpetuate the cycle of wasted potential, low achievement, drink and drug misuse, unintended teenage pregnancy, low work aspirations, anti-social behaviour and lifetimes on benefits, which now typifies millions of lives and is repeated through succeeding generations.’ Frank Field, the long-time parliamentary campaigner for action on poverty, and at one time another of the government’s ‘tsars’, this time on parenting, talks of parents ‘falling out of love with parenting’.