Jason Cannon
3/20/14
UK
http://www.bbc.com/news/education-22123931
Synopsis:
The UK Department of Education is currently in the process of changing the national curriculum for England Schools. They are in the final stages of their consultation period for the curriculum which they hope to implement very soon. Head teachers and school leaders in England think that the change is much too fast and is too challenging to implement. They feel like they are not very involved in the changes being made and they have concerns with what is happening. Brian Lightman, the general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said when speaking of the teachers and school leaders, "If their views are not taken on board, there is a real danger that implementation will be rushed, poorly implemented and could result in a drop in standards." He also said that the implementation of the curriculum relies on the school leaders. The Department for Education said that waiting to implement the curriculum would cause "a whole year of pupils [to] miss out on a more rigorous, knowledge-focused curriculum."
I don't think that this is a good idea for England Schools. It sounds like the Department for Education has independently created a new curriculum which will be very difficult to implement. They don't have the support of the teachers or school leaders who will need to be the major implementers. This shows the power of the Department for Education, which I do not think is good in this situation. I think that they new curriculum will get off to a very shaky start if it gets off at all.
Also, this situation reminds me of the Obamacare roll out that just recently occurred in the United States. The government tried to implement something that was obviously not ready to be implemented and it backfired. If England implements this new curriculum, they might find that it causes a whole year of students to miss out on a solid education.
In a small form on a much smaller scale, this is happening right now in Utah with the new curriculum. Remember Investigations?! There will always be divisions amongst large effecting things like this. But for the ACA, just like our voting systems, people can get access to all the information and learn about new things like the ACA and one of the reasons people feel its rushed is because they were not much rushed to read and understand it.
ReplyDeleteI agree that this curriculum shouldn't go through. The input from the teachers and the parents would be the most valuable input in this case and that's really disappointing that they aren't taking those people into consideration. Sure, maybe the curriculum will end up being really good and helpful, but like you said, it won't start out that way. That's great that they are trying to improve their education, but something as important as this needs to be implemented properly and this definitely isn't the way to do it.
ReplyDeleteI think that when it comes to big changes in school curriculum, the UK should have the teachers have a big part in it. They are the ones who see these kids every day and who would be able to listen to suggestions and discuss how well it would work and what things could use some change. I wish them the best of luck.
ReplyDeleteThis is Solei
ReplyDeleteYeah, I think that things like this work better as a set of smaller implementations spread out. Plus, that way, you could tell what the effects of each part of the new stuff are, because they are changing at separate times. Just like in skiing, its supposed to not be so good to try out a ton of new equipment at once, because then you don't know how it will work out, but instead you are supposed to adjust to one piece of equipment at a time. Sorry if this dosn't make sense it is so late and I am tired.
This implementation should involve the school leaders more and should not happen all at one time. I don't believe that the students are ready for a huge change and it would just overwhelm everyone who is involved. The Board of Education should be more wary of everyone that this is effecting before they put it in place.
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