Education - The bigger picture

Home educators are quite rightly up in arms over the recent review carried out by Graham Badman and used by Ed Balls to justify imposition of draconian measures for monitoring and control over how parents will be permitted to educate their children.

However, I've had a nagging feeling that this is part of a divide and conquer strategy that seeks to ensure that ALL children are indoctrinated according to the policies of the state regardless of the culture and beliefs of the family.

I now read about the 'apprenticeships, skills, children and learning bill' which gives 153 instances of new powers to Ed Balls and John Denham as the two secretaries of state in the bill's sponsoring departments.

Whilst politicians are paying lipservice to voters by promising devolution of power from the centre to the people, this bill gives central government more control than ever before over what and how our children are allowed to learn.

The bill gives the secretary of state the right to define, for example:-

the content of certificates for apprenticeships

to stipulate which courses, other than maths, English and ICT, students aged 16 to 19 should be entitled to study

to direct a local authority to "provide information about accountable resources held, received or expended" by its schools

to specify the maximum amount of compensation that an employee is entitled to should his or her employer be found by an employment tribunal to have illegally denied him or her the right to training

to stipulate, for qualifications for young people aged 19 or over, the minimum level of attainment in literacy and numeracy needed "to operate effectively in day-to-day life".

the power to set "minimum requirements" for qualifications including, potentially, the ability to specify which textbooks pupils study.

It gives 22 powers to the secretary of state in relation to a new quango, the Young People's Learning Agency for England, including the right to direct its actions, and 32 similar ones relating to the Qualifications and Curriculum Development Agency, which is to replace the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority.

Ofqual supervision

Even Ofqual, which is being set up to be independent of ministers and will report to parliament, will have to be aware of 15 powers given to Balls and his successors in relation to its work. These include the ability of the secretary of state "to direct areas of government policy to which Ofqual must have regard in performing its functions" and to appoint the first chief executive.

Ed Balls will be able to direct local authorities to issue "warning notices" if he believes standards are unacceptably low, to replace governing bodies and even to intervene when local authorities are deemed unlikely to be effective in improving schools "which may in the future be low-performing" (not necessarily low performaing now but may do so in the future!).

Never before have politicians had so much power, not only to deal with current issues but increasingly to determine that there may be a FUTURE problem and wade in to deal with it as they see fit. Sounds increasingly like Orwells concept of 'mind crime' with big brother overseeing everything we do, say or even think!

We have to oppose these efforts to micro manage our lives and take away our freedom to live our lives or even to think 'wrong thoughts'.


READ MORE at:-

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2009/jun/02/education-bill-ed-balls
http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2008/feb/25/schools.edballs
http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/mortarboard/2009/mar/13/lords-balls-red-tape

Health and Safety Madness

A poll by Teacher's TV has revealed some of the insane rules imposed in schools in the interest on "Health & Safety".

One of the craziest is one school requiring its pupils to wear safety goggles before handling Blue Tack, others include:-

Teachers barred from sending troublesome pupils to standin the corridor as this is a fire risk.
The three legged race is banned as "too dangerous"
No footballs in the playground
Shaving foam is not allowed to be used in art projects in case pupils drown in it.
Egg boxes cannot be used for art projects in case children catch salmonella.

Is there no common sense left in this country?

Read more at:-

http://www.teachers.tv/node/35404

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1194055/Pupils-wear-goggles-handle-Blu-Tack-health-safety-reaches-ridiculous-new-heights.html

Is this Britain or Stalinist Russia?

If you read this quote:-

"If a family wishes to cremate their loved one in anything other than a shroud, the funeral director should contact bereavement services so this can be discussed to clarify what type of garments the family wish to use."

You might be forgiven for thinking that it applies to some communist dictatorship and is not something you need be concerned by.

In fact, the quote comes from Kirklees council who claim to be concerned about emissions from the cremation of the deceased, thus, if you wish to see your father or son cremated wearing his favourite football strip or your child taking her favourite teddybear on their last journey you are likely to be 'refused permission'.

How dare these jumped up little Hitlers interfere in our most personal and private matters in this way, how much pollution do they really think clothes or a soft toy are going to create especially when compared to thematerials used to make the coffin in the first place. This is gross intrusion to deal with a tiny problem with emissions, how sad that our council employees are taking this opportunity to bully families at their most vulnerable.

Read:-

Ken Frost's comments at http://nannyknowsbest.blogspot.com/2009/06/nanny-bans-clothes.html

The Daily Mail at http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1193306/I-wouldnt-seen-dead-Council-forces-relatives-cremate-loved-ones-anti-pollution-eco-shrouds.html

State Snoopers

Following along my recent theme of State infringement on our privacy and freedom, I was passed this Link which neatly sums up the dangers waiting for us if our dear "caring" government continue thinking that we can't be trusted to run our own lives. As an adult living in what is supposed to be a free country I reserve the freedom to be responsible for my own actions, provided of course that I do not have an unreasonable adverse effect on others.

The government should only step in to ensure that my actions do not cause harm or loss to other people, other than that, they should stay out of my life. My privacy, my identity is precisely that - PRIVATE and MINE.

Well that is my rant for today, I just get really annoyed at nanny state telling my that they are controlling my life, for my own good, of course.

Would you trust the government?

Breaking news today is the story of 2 discs going missing in the Inland Revenue's internal mail, read about it at The BBC. The fact that these 2 disc just happen to contain the details of EVERY child benefit claimant in the country (details on every parent and their children such as name, address, date of birth, national insurance number, bank details etc) is just mind boggling beyond belief!

Shadow Chancellor George Osborne said: "Let us be clear about the scale of this catastrophic mistake - the names, the addresses and the dates of birth of every child in the country are sitting on two computer discs that are apparently lost in the post, and the bank account details and National Insurance numbers of 10 million parents, guardians and carers have gone missing.

The government are busy putting out reassurances that peoples bank accounts are safe (though they tell you to check your statements just in case), but are keeping very quiet on what I believe to be much more worrying issues such as paedophiles or identity theft.

The kind of information that could now be available to who knows what sort of criminal minds is plenty to steal somebody's identity or if a paedophile got hold of it they would know when a child's birthday is, how old they are, where they live, their parents names - I can't think of anything scarier than this sort of information getting into the wrong hands!

This all happened because a "junior official" don't follow the correct procedures.

Now stop and think what would happen if the government manage to get their way and this happened to the contents of the proposed National Identity Database which would hold details of every person living in the UK, possibly including biometric data such as fingerprints, iris scans, or DNA details.

Visit NO2ID to read more about this scary prospect and register your support.

All children to read by age 6 according to Tories

I just looked at this article in the Observer. and my heart sank - politicians meddling in things they don't understand again!

As I see it, very few teachers actually understand how to teach (as opposed to delivering lessons) and even fewer politicians understand how children learn.

The government are constantly trying to find a single measurable solution that will teach all children most effectively and have introduced countless reviews / guidance / tests etc etc in pursuit of this ideal.

What they are missing is the fact that there is no single "best" method, each person (child or adult) is an individual and learns different things in different ways. This is what the best of the old fashioned teachers understood, they didn't blindly follow a curriculum or lesson plans, they followed the course but tried to tailor the lessons to suit the children in their class, following the lead of the pupils to determine the pace and detail of the lessons. Obviously there have always been good and bad teachers, but instead of seeking to encourage the good and weed out the bad, the gov't treat teaching just like any job and seek to impose top down uniformity thinking that everyone with a particular qualification is equal and needs only to follow the approved lesson plans in order to deliver the approved lesson which will result in the required level of education being received by the child - What a fantasy!

Our children have learned to read in different ways at different ages:-

My eldest was schooled all the way through, I remember pushing and prodding, the frustration (for both of us) and pressure because he "needed" to to keep up. It took him quite a long time to learn to read and I'm sure it turned him off reading for pleasure.

Our second struggled through the first few years in school and when we took him out he was at the struggling to read sentences stage, we took the pressure off and simply read to him and helped when he wanted - within 3 months he was happily reading Harry Potter :-) He was regarded as "backward" in school and not expected to achieve much, now at the age of 12 he has played in the Junior World chess championships, programmes his PC using visual basic, happily discusses physics with us and his mental arithmetic is way faster than mine.

Our third came out of school totally unable to read, she got by in class by memorising entire books when the teacher read them out and then reciting them from memory (using the pictures on each page as a trigger). The teacher was convinced she could read but was simply being uncooperative when faced with a new book! Again we stopped pushing and simply followed her lead, it took a while but when she was ready, she came to us for help and learned to read fluently within a few days.

No way will I let any teacher come in and interfere with my child's learning!

Using the kids :-(

Why is it that when a couple break up, they so often us the kids as weapons to battle each other?

I see this so often where the parents continue their fighting by tearing the kids in two instead of co-operating as much as is necessary for the children to feel safe, loved and without guilt.

A common battleground is over home education, where the absent parent (usually the dad) now decides that he doesn't want the kids taught by his ex (their mother) any more and uses the family courts to force the kids back into school. I guess he gets his kicks from being in control I suppose but I just wish he would think about the kids and what they want.

John Taylor Gatto clip

As you may have guessed, I've been trolling through You tube and stumbled upon the following film of John Taylor Gatto talking about the state education system, lots of reasons to not want your children ever to go into a state school.

History of compulsory schooling film

Been trolling through some of the other blogs out there and came across this film on http://ahed.pbwiki.com :-

Home Education

When I talk to people about Home Education I get a variety of responses:-

There are some who didn't know it was legal ("Can you do that! - Don't you have to be a teacher?")

There are some who think it is wonderful but not for them ("I couldn't cope with the kids being home all the time").

There are some who think that it is a terrible thing to do ("Don't you think you are messing with their future? But how will they make friends?" etc)

There are a few who perk up with interest and want to know all about it and say what a wonderful thing we are doing.

It is a great deal of work to home educate and I know that it doesn't suit all families (a few have tried HE and then gone back to school), I take my hat off (if I wore one) to those with the confidence to try it and then admit that it didn't work for them.

I was schooled conventionally as a child, I know that many of my teachers really should have chosen a different career, some were bad, some were awful, some were plain damaging to the kids in their care! (there were also a few real gems and I want to say thank you here to those few).

I remember the bullying that went on, the teasing and taunting that some children were subjected to, the constant pressure to not stand out from the crowd (who amongst you would have admitted to your school friends that you enjoyed learning a subject?).

I can remember countless lessons doing nothing but copying from the blackboard or reading set chapters while the teacher went off to do his admin (or have a quick fag).

Most of my learning I have achieved since leaving school and usually in response to a problem I have to solve or some topic that fires my imagination.

Home education (for us) is all about this latter way of learning, we allow the children to choose their topics and we do our best to facilitate their interest, often learning a great deal along the way ourselves!!

There are as many methods of home education as there are home educators, the main thing that they have in common is the freedom to choose the methods that work best for them in their own individual circumstances.

The government would love to strangle that individuality as there is nothing more frightening to those in power as the danger posed by a thinking population who may dare to question decisions and laws (should we really go to war in Iraq and Afghanistan, is it really democratic to propose locking people up for up to 90 days without evidence of guilt or even without a crime being committed - just the belief that the person MAY commit an act).

There are many who quote "well if you haven't done anything wrong then you have nothing to fear", try telling that to the Birmingham six or the many other victims of miscarriages of justice, some of whome never ever get their lives back.