The Cambridge Primary Review Trust

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Below are the latest blog posts from the CPR Trust. Please read our Terms of Use and join in the conversation.

by Robin Alexander

Now we are (nearly) ten

This is CPRT’s last blog before holidays, staff changes and asbestos close its office for the month of August.  The asbestos is in the ceiling void of our 1960s building; its removal, we are assured, will be without risk to any of us. The staff change, nothing to do with asbestos, is the departure for Liverpool of our excellent administrator Greg Frame, and his replacement on 1st September by Matt Coward.

So this is a good time to take stock and flag some of our plans for 2015-16. They are nothing if not ambitious.

In the two years since its launch in 2013, the Cambridge Primary Review Trust has established itself as a substantial and distinctive educational presence. Substantial in respect of scale as well as significance; distinctive in the vast and unrivalled corpus of evidence and hard thinking in which its work is grounded.  Not just the Cambridge Primary Review of course, but also – because the quest for evidence cannot cease – research undertaken by the Trust itself. Much of this material, from both the Review and the Trust, is readily accessible via the CPRT website, which provides a formidable and essential resource for anybody involved in primary education.

Consider the scale of CPRT’s operation as it stands today. It has thirteen regional networks which, after an admittedly halting start in some cases, are forging ahead with teacher conferences, action research, reading groups and other activities. The once separate CPRT Schools Alliance  is firmly dovetailed into this regional structure so that local activities respond to local concerns. The number of such schools is growing and from September that growth will accelerate sharply. Together, the Regional Network Forum (which brings together network co-ordinators and Alliance representatives) and the Board of the Trust have identified a number of strategies for bringing the fruits of these regional activities into the national mainstream and we shall implement them during 2015-16.

So: if you are reading this blog but are not yet involved in CPRT’s regional activities, or if you lead a lively school and value a professional culture of ideas and debate rather than mere compliance, please consider joining us via one of the regional networks and/or the Schools Alliance. To find out more, and to join us, follow the links in the previous paragraph.

Schools, too, are involved in our CPD collaboration with Pearson. So far this has yielded regional curriculum conferences in conjunction with eleven of the subject associations, the much praised handbook Primary Curriculum 2014, and school-based CPD programmes on curriculum audit, children’s voice and assessment without levels. The next stage of the collaboration is now under consideration.

Meanwhile, CPRT has initiated fourteen research projects. Each seeks to address one or more of the Trust’s priorities – equity, voice, community, sustainability, aims, curriculum, pedagogy, assessment. Through specially commissioned research reviews we invite leading experts to assess published evidence bearing on these priorities and identify implications for policy and practice. Three of the resulting reports have already been published, one is in production for launch in September, and a further eight will follow before next March. (See our blog of 3 July for topics, authors and anticipated publication dates).

Then, with help from Esmée Fairbairn Foundation, the extensive paper, electronic and media archive of the Cambridge Primary Review has been lodged in the Borthwick Institute awaiting final cataloguing and indexing, at which point it will become available to researchers.

The biggest of our research ventures, the Educational  Endowment Foundation (EEF) project on dialogic teaching and social disadvantage, moves in September into its trial phase in schools in Birmingham, Bradford and Leeds after a pilot in London. Initiated by CPRT and led jointly by the Trust and the Institute for Effective Education (IEE) at the University of York, this project is developing and evaluating a professional support programme designed to ensure that classroom talk is of the character and quality which will have a measurable impact on pupils’ engagement and learning and will hence help close the attainment gap between disadvantaged children and the rest. The auspices from related  projects both here and in the United States are good, and we hope that the CPRT/IEE project’s findings will finally bury the deplorable perception – against which we campaigned vigorously during the national curriculum review and with some success, but which is still discernible in the DfE programmes of study – that spoken language is somehow incidental to the ‘real’ business of children’s education.

With that precedent in mind, CPRT engages with the policy process whenever and wherever it can, regularly submitting evidence to formal consultations and seeking discussions with policy stakeholders;  but also, where necessary – which seems to be rather too often these days – using its blog and other public platforms to expose those ministerial utterances and initiatives that seem to be particularly misguided, or which blatantly privilege ideology and prejudice over evidence and the common good.

All these strands of CPRT’s work will continue during 2015-16, and alongside the publication of a further nine research reports and briefings we anticipate continuing expansion of the regional networks and Schools Alliance. But there will be two further developments.

The first is a series of regional conferences for school leaders on ‘Making our schools research active’. The self-sustaining school system towards which England is supposed to be moving will not be viable without the high-protein sustenance afforded by evidence; evidence not only of the kind generated by large funded initiatives like the CPRT/IEE dialogic teaching project but also that which arises from the efforts of schools themselves, especially when they work in collaboration with other schools and/or with dedicated research providers. Hence, for example, CPRT’s South West Research Schools Network.

So in March 2016 our Leeds and West Yorkshire network will pilot a ‘Making our schools research active’ event which will explore models and cases for sourcing, generating and applying research in situ, making the research consciousness familiar and habitual rather than extraneous or rarefied. This will then be rolled out as a regional roadshow, hosted by each of CPRT’s other networks in turn.

The other initiative for 2015-16 takes advantage of not one anniversary but two. In April 2016 the Trust, supported by Pearson, will have been in busy existence for three years, while October 2016 marks the tenth anniversary of the launch of the Cambridge Primary Review itself. That month, therefore, we hope to hold a major national conference. It will be both retrospective and prospective, and honest as well as celebratory. It will set what CPR and CPRT aimed to achieve against what they have actually achieved, and it will examine areas where they have been less successful and ask why. It will subject national primary education policy, the inescapable and often strident accompaniment to all that we have attempted, to the same degree of critical scrutiny, perhaps testing the proposition that schools succeed in spite of policy, not because of it.

If all this sounds a tad introspective, the conference will also showcase and celebrate what by then will be a substantial body of CPRT-supported work from schools, regional networks and researchers that builds on CPR’s aims and evidence, and it will invite other individuals and organisations to swell the cornucopia with their own ideas and experience. On this basis we hope that we can recover a primary education of relevance, quality, humanity and excitement, rescuing it from the ossified politics of tests, phonics and long division.

We believe that in the coming school year the Cambridge Primary Review Trust will have a great deal to offer. We hope you agree.

www.robinalexander.org.uk

For other blogs by Robin Alexander click here and/or download CPRT’s book Primary Colours.

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Divide and Rule

A mark of a successful primary school career is, according to the Conservatives, the ability to do long division. As our privately-educated Education Secretary Nicky Morgan explained, long division is at the heart of giving ‘every child the chance to master the basics and succeed in life,’ something that is a ‘fundamental duty’ of government.

This is interesting for many reasons. Here’s one. Finland, long-time star of the education world, has clearly decided it wants its children to fail. Shockingly, it is deleting long division from its national curriculum and replacing it with coding.  The change is part of a drive, says Liisa Pohjolainen, head of education in Helsinki, to provide ‘a different kind of education’. Long division is being cast into the long grass because ‘young people now use quite advanced computers. In the past the banks had lots of clerks totting up figures but now that has totally changed’.

British technologist Conrad Wolfram makes the same point more bluntly. Long division, he says, is being used ‘as a badge of honour of what the government calls rigour when in fact it’s a prime example of mindless manual processing’. Marcus de Sautoy, professor for the public understanding of science, agrees: ‘Most people think that maths is about long division to lots of decimal places. Really, though, a mathematician is someone who looks at structure and pattern – and in a sense that’s how everyone reads the world: we’re all mathematicians at heart.’

All these comments echo the the Cambridge Primary Review final report which argued that ‘primary mathematics escapes the critical scrutiny to which other domains are subject’, and urged teachers and curriculum planners to ‘address with some rigour the question of what aspects of mathematics are truly essential and foundational in the primary phase’ (p271).  Long division is neither. It’s not what maths is about. It’s what Tory politicians believe their voters believe maths is about.  Hyping up the importance of long division in primary schools is yet another example of playing politics with education – as is labelling schools ‘coasting’ in order to create more academies. Statements of the bleeding obvious, maybe, but bleeding obvious statements clearly aren’t being made often or forcefully enough. If they were, changes that are bad for children and ultimately for all of us would not keep happening.

But back to the question of long division and the ethical issues it raises. Do I teach it knowing that I should not? Answer: a woeful yes. My profession is not trusted to decide what maths is best for young children. In that case, how do I teach it? My one year of training did not actually cover long division – or coding for that matter. My Finnish colleagues can, of course, teach both simultaneously while standing on their woolly-hatted heads. I calculate, using my mathematical skills, that this is because that they had five times more training than I did.

So, guiltily, I am relieved to discover that the way I was taught in (secondary) school is back in vogue.  However, as we know, being able to do something is a far cry from being able to teach it. The CPR final report’s chapter on pedagogy (pp 279-310) makes excellent reading on this topic – as well as underlining the need for ‘teaching to be removed from political control’. But I am under political control so I dutifully draw my bus stop and pop the numbers in. For example, 7,236 divided by 36. I start the mantra: ‘First you divide 36 into 7. Won’t go. So next try 36 into 72.’ Half the class stare at me blankly. ‘They don’t know what you mean, by “into”,’ the TA whispers helpfully.

Oh, ok. ‘Let’s try how many 36s are there in 72?’ Still blank. Hmm. ‘If I had 72 sweets to share between 36 children, how many sweets would they have each?’ Hands wave excitedly. I get excited too. ‘Write your answers on your whiteboards, please, and hold them up.’ Oops. The mathematically able children are fine, but the rest hold up a random display of answers: 3, 4 and, bizarrely, 7.6.

I catch my TA’s eye. We are thinking the same thing. Back to basics once more for those who are struggling. But I am also aware that Asian maths teaching methods, most definitely approved of by the current administration, expect all children to progress at roughly the same pace. Lessons are repetitive, short and thorough. So do I force my able mathematicians to do what they can already do, over and over again, or do I differentiate by stretching them with more interesting challenges? If only Nicky Morgan would tell me. Interestingly, if you ask Google to search ‘differentiation and Nicky Morgan’ the top hit is a reference to a 2 per cent pay rise for the ‘best’ teachers. Guess that’s not me!

Similar questions cloud times tables teaching – another ‘basic’ that holds the key to a successful life, according to Mrs (don’t ask me 7×8) Morgan. Half my class know them inside out and back to front. Another quarter know them if they are given time to think. And another quarter is as doubtful as Mrs Morgan herself. Sometimes I yearn for the hot-house pressure of Singapore, Hong Kong and Korea where parents drill their children in their times tables and demand homework. Children in my class tell me in all seriousness that they have been too busy to do one piece of homework in a week. Perhaps they are right. Hopefully they have been too busy being children to bother learning that the internal angles of every triangle in the universe add up to 180, or that 7×8 is and always will be 56, or that 7,236 divided by 36 equals 201.

Conservative politicians also complain that too many children don’t understand fractions. I have a feeling that there might be a reason for this. It goes like this. 1⁄10 of population of the UK controls 1⁄2 of the wealth. Globally 1⁄100 controls 1⁄2 of world’s wealth. Try this one, 1⁄3 of children in the UK live in poverty. Yes, I agree with the government. Fractions are important when it comes to succeeding in life.

Stephanie Northen is a teacher and journalist. She contributed to the Cambridge Primary Review final report and is a member of the Board of the Cambridge Primary Review Trust.  Read other blogs by Stephanie in CPRT’s recent downloadable collection Primary Colours .

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Musings from The Wild Wood

I’m sitting in the Spinney’s Wild Wood with a laptop balanced precariously on my knee hoping that the Muse of the wood will inspire my writing. The air is fresh, the sunlight is dappled and a female blackbird is singing enthusiastically on a branch above. I sigh. My exhalation is an expression of relief and peace. I always sigh when I come into this fresh, green space.

The Wild Wood is really a rather modest place: a copse of trees, a small lake, a clearing with a log seat circle and an imperial gazillion of nettles, and yet the Spinney children often cite it as one of their favourite locations. It’s a place to explore, to be curious, to be creative and where the natural environment awakens the imagination.

The Wild Wood was re-discovered about two years ago – like Mary Lennox finding the Secret Garden – it’s set behind a high fence, there’s a gate with a padlock, and a ditch to navigate before you can get in. The tricky ditch caused me much consternation at first. I had to consider the little ones, health and safety and risk assessment. I investigated the options including the prices for various wooden bridges, the cost of which came close to a thousand pounds. Finally after a fruitless week or two, inspiration struck and I dragged two wooden pallets into place, which have since served their purpose very well.

The Foundation Stage children were the first to go in. Their initial exploratory steps were tentative and wary, crossing the makeshift bridge on hands and knees, but as the days went by and confidence grew they soon bounded over the pallets with growing assertiveness. Once inside and following the teachers’ briefing the children were off; free to explore, to discover, to build, to climb trees, and to graze knees. The teachers had to embrace a new paradigm to facilitate the children’s learning, allowing the children to take the lead, allowing experiences and stories to grow and to expand and be without the customary limits and boundaries of time. You can find out about some of the wonderful learning that has taken place in partnership with CCI by clicking here.

Several years ago, when my daughter was about two, I had the privilege to participate in a British Council CPD visit to Sweden and experience the Swedish school system for a week. The group visited several schools and I learnt a great deal, a visit to a kindergarten in the forest being one of the most memorable. School started at 8:00 in the morning and about 30 children between 18 months and 7 years were being taught in a long beautiful chalet building. It was warm and cosy inside and there were nightlights flickering on window ledges. Other than registration, gathering to sing songs and listen to stories there was no formal instruction. The children were regulating their curriculum, choosing from a wide range of activities inside and outside of the building.

I was struck by the level of trust and the confidence that the staff had in the children’s abilities for self-directed learning and keeping themselves safe. There was the usual variety of toys, construction sets, dressing up clothes, small world play and craft activities as well as woodwork in one corner of the room. The woodwork bench was well equipped with hammers, nails and saws. Occasionally, staff would intervene if a child requested it but predominantly the children were persevering and constructing their own wooden structures, sawing, hammering, drilling and designing without any adult interference. In contrast to the provision that had been set out by the teachers, I also noticed some of the children going over to their school drawer independently at times, to pull out a smaller crafting activity such as Hama beads. This requires great hand-eye co-ordination and is a gentler, quieter activity.

At about 10:30 about 20 of the children went into the hallway to dress in their outdoor attire. Again the children were doing this by themselves, pulling on boots, shuffling into salopettes and wrapping warm scarves around themselves. Although the older ones helped the younger ones the process of getting ready took some time and this independent dressing was clearly part of the learning process as well.

The kindergarten was set at the foot of a mountain range and there was a rough stony path adjacent to the chalet that headed into the forest. Accompanied by three teachers, the children took each others’ hands and, walking in pairs, headed up the steep slope. Teeny-tinnies not much older than my daughter were confidently picking their way up the mountain. After a 15-minute steady climb we came to a clearing. The children and adults sat on the ground in a circle, and I observed as the teacher pulled out laminated cards depicting various wild birds, woodland animals, and different tree varieties for the children to identify and name.

When this activity concluded the teacher signalled for the children to go off and play. The children dispersed in an instant, heading off in every direction and vanishing into the woods! My immediate instinct was to follow, to ensure that the children were safe. One of the teachers put her hand on my arm to halt my pursuit. She smiled. ‘Let them go’, she said, ‘they will be fine.’

The Swedish and English teachers gathered and chatted for a few minutes. ‘Now’, said the teacher eventually ‘you can go and see if you wish.’  I wandered off towards the sound of giggles and happy children and saw about six of them climbing all over a huge tree trunk lying on the ground. Even on its side, the trunk was about as tall as the children and they were taking it in turns to walk along, arms outstretched and balancing the length of the beam. The children had set their own physical challenge and were delighting in every child who successfully traversed from one end to the other.

Although several years ago now, this short visit to Sweden was instrumental in shaping parts of my pedagogy and has influenced my leadership of learning at The Spinney.  I learnt that we must trust children; we must nurture their creative instinct; we must believe in their innate curiosity and their appetite to learn; we must allow for them to surprise and delight us; there must be times for concentrated endeavour as well as periods of focused calm; we must devise opportunities for them to create, collaborate, communicate, dream, imagine and problem solve. We must have confidence in children’s abilities to shape aspects of their own learning using their natural curiosity to lead the way. With thoughtful, kind and caring adults children will strive in the classroom and thrive in nature. With the right nurturing conditions children will imagine, invent, create, experiment and like the branches that surround me as I type, will grow towards the sun.

The Spinney Primary School is proud to be a member of the Cambridge Primary Review Trust Schools Alliance and to be part of this growing network of researchers and schools. The Cambridge Primary Review’s aims for primary education chime well with our school ethos and pedagogy. The Spinney has seven values. Pre-eminent of these is a child-centredness which underpins the quotidian as well as the strategic long term. Valuing children for who they are today, rather than simply what they will be in the future is also at the heart of the CPRT vision and I am excited by the opportunity to work with other colleagues and schools who recognise that childhood (and Wild Woods) are inspiring and magical places to be. 

‘Exploration is grounded in that distinctive mixture of amazement, perplexity and curiosity which constitutes childhood wonder; a commitment to discovery, invention, experiment, speculation, fantasy, play and growing linguistic agility which are the essence of childhood.’  (From Aim 9 of the Cambridge Primary Review’s Twelve Aims for Primary Education.)

Rachel Snape is Headteacher of the Spinney Primary School, Cambridge.

www.spinney.cambs.sch.uk  @RaeSnape 

Discover more about the CPRT Schools Alliance here. View or download membership criteria and procedure.

by Robin Alexander

Evidence with Vision: more CPRT research reviews

If this reads less like a blog than a promotion, so be it.

Cambridge Primary Review Trust maintains CPR’s maxim that what primary education needs is vision and evidence.  Not one or the other, but both. For, as the CPR final report noted (Children, their World, their Education, pp 16-17):

The Cambridge Primary Review is firmly grounded in evidence … But not all educational questions are empirical. Many are ethical, for education is a fundamentally moral affair, while others move forward from evidence into territory which is more speculative … This, then, is the age-old distinction between ‘is’ and ‘ought’ questions, or questions of fact and value, or what in the Review we have called matters of evidence and vision, and we readily understand that knowing what is the case may provide no guide at all to determining what ought to be. Indeed, philosophers warn us, as a condition of argument at its most elementary level, of the dangers of making this leap. They even give such errant thinking a name: the naturalistic fallacy. To take two examples, just because primary children’s school lives have been dominated since Victorian days by the 3Rs, or during the same period most children have been taught by generalist class teachers, this does not mean that such practices are inherently right or that they ought to continue indefinitely.

Existing assumptions and practices are there, then, to be questioned for what they are – habits of thought and action which are so deeply ingrained that most people don’t pause to think about them … Equally, through the diligent use of evidence we can uncover the weaknesses of a particular aspect of education, but that evidence of itself may offer no clues to how to put things right. What may be needed is some lateral, not to say visionary, thinking.

So while the fashionable mantra ‘evidence-based practice’ properly reminds us of the need for educational decisions to be grounded as securely as possible in what is known about productive learning and teaching, it tells us rather less about the educational ends to which such learning and teaching should be directed; that is, by what criteria learning should be judged ‘productive’. Hence the extensive discussion of educational aims in the CPR final report, and the eight priorities to which much of CPRT’s work is directed.  Turn that round though, and we see that aims and priorities on their own are not enough either, for grand ideas don’t morph into practical and effective teaching strategies without the application of experience and evidence.

Yet the evidence-vision relationship is complex too. Another example: education for sustainability matters because the evidence clearly shows that the current habits and practices of humankind will, if pursued unchecked, make life on much of our planet unsustainable. But for some, sustainability matters regardless of this evidence, because they believe as a moral imperative that the world we share should be respected and nourished rather than exploited for profit or convenience. And some people have held to this view for many centuries before others became alarmed by the evidence on climate change, environmental degradation and species extinction.

We hope that discussion of both dimensions – is/ought, fact/value, evidence/vision – will be provoked by the next round of research reviews that CPRT is pleased to announce today. So far we have published reports and briefings from three of these reviews. Two more from the first series are on their way, and another seven have just been agreed with their various authors. Here’s the full list.

  1. Wynne Harlen, Assessment, standards and quality of learning in primary education (published November 2014).
  2. Carol Robinson, Children, their voices and their experiences of school: what does the evidence tell us? (published December 2014)
  3. Usha Goswami, Children’s cognitive development and learning (published February 2015).
  4. Kate Pickett and Laura Vanderbloemen, Social and educational inequality: what does the evidence tell us and how can we close the gaps?
  5. David Hogan, Dennis Kwek and Peter Renshaw, Research on teaching: what do we know and how should we act?
  6. Douglas Bourn, Nicole Blum, Frances Hunt and Helen Lawson, Primary education for sustainability, global understanding and citizenship.
  7. Michael Jopling, Vulnerable children: circumstances, needs and provision in the primary phase.
  8. Carol Burnett, Digital futures:  implications for learning and teaching in the primary school.
  9. Mel Ainscow, Alan Dyson and Lise Hopwood, Demographic change, migration and cultural diversity: implications for primary schooling.
  10. Olwen McNamara and Jean Murray, How should primary teachers be trained? Policy and evidence.
  11. Warwick Mansell, The systemic reform of primary education since 2008: what does the evidence tell us?
  12. Kathy Hall and Kamil Øzerk, Autonomy, accountability and quality assurance in primary education:  England and other countries.

The first three reports above, on assessment, voice and learning, are updates of reports published by the Cambridge Primary Review. These are areas where because evidence has accumulated or policy has changed such revisiting is essential. I say ‘changed’ rather than ‘advanced’ because while evidence, properly assembled, respects and builds on what has gone before, the same can less frequently be said for policy, especially in education. To ‘advance’ implies both forward momentum and improvement, whereas all too often education policy offers neither, swinging pendulum-fashion back and forth between hackneyed value extremes or endlessly reinventing, retreading or renaming wheels that, more often than not, are not even round.

Some of the reviews not only revisit earlier CPR evidence but also invite back the same authors as in 2006-10.  Wynne Harlen, Carol Robinson, Usha Goswami, Mel Ainscow, Alan Dyson, Olwen McNamara, Kathy Hall and Kamil Øzerk are all old CPR hands. Their length of engagement with the issues in question, far exceeding that of any ‘here today gone tomorrow’ minister, will be invaluable.

Other reviews in this series tackle issues that featured in CPR but have acquired even greater prominence since then. Such issues are broadly social as well as more specifically educational. Among them are the continuing digital revolution which, alongside its benefits, provokes anxieties about the way digital media dominate young children’s lives and the nature of the material to which they have access. Demographic change and migration, pervasive in the evidence collected by CPR, are even more highly charged politically now than they were then. They raise questions ranging from identity and social cohesion to the professional practicalities of handling, within a single classroom, many languages, cultures and faiths. Education for sustainability and global understanding is prominent of course, not just because it is increasingly urgent but also because it is prioritised in the UN’s post-2015 global education agenda. Then there’s the old, old division of wealth and opportunity that in the UK, and especially England, is exacerbated by government economic and welfare policies while education ministers scurry in with rather expensive sticking plasters to ‘close the gap’. Who better to assess the evidence on this particular theme than Kate Pickett, co-author of The Spirit Level?

Kate Pickett’s review uses international evidence. The one by Kathy Hall and Kamil Øzerk, both of whom work outside the UK, does so even more explicitly, for they are comparing England’s accountability and quality assurance regimes with those in other countries in order to establish whether, as we are regularly told, there is no alternative to what many see as the tyranny of testing, Ofsted and data, not to mention those ministerial threats about ‘coasting’ and enforced change in schools’ legal status. Linked with this is Warwick Mansell’s re-assessment of the trajectory of primary education policy as a whole over the past five years; a trajectory studied closely by CPR between 2006 and 2009 – indeed much too closely for the then government, which resorted to pretty questionable tactics in its attempt to neutralise CPR’s findings and smear CPR personnel.

As with the reports so far published, the new reports will be available for viewing, downloading or printing both in full and as three-page briefings.  Between them, the twelve studies come to the heart of classroom life while exploring the wider world in which children grow up.  Children, their world their education, in fact – and  value.

www.robinalexander.org.uk

Click here for further information about the CPRT research surveys

Download publications list 

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Goodbye PGCE, Hello NQT

For the past 12 months, teaching has taken over my world. I’ve never highlighted, annotated or reflected so much in my entire life, but it’s finally over (for the summer at least). I’ve survived my PGCE year, I’m qualified and I have a job as an NQT in September.

When I started applying for the PGCE, I spent a day at university alongside fresh-faced graduates competing for a place. I seemed to be the oldest person in the room by far (I was 30 at the time) and it was at that moment that I realised I was one of the very few ‘career-changers’. Having worked in marketing and PR for the previous seven years, I’d never worked as a TA, let alone a teacher, and I only had two weeks’ experience in a primary school. It was a big change. Almost everyone else had a foundation degree in education or early childhood studies. They spoke a different language: not only were they fluent in pedagogic jargon and educational acronyms, but they also had an envious familiarity with day-to-day school life. Despite the odds, I was accepted and last September I began my perilous PGCE journey.

I can’t look back at myself during that first school placement – and all of the things I was utterly clueless about – without wincing. I suppose I spent most of my first week at school in a state of shock. Culture shock. Bombarded with information, I experienced generational language barriers, knowledge and technology gaps. Aside from a fortnight’s voluntary work, the last time I’d set foot in a primary school was during my own childhood. Back then we had blackboards. We didn’t even have whiteboards, let alone the interactive kind. We had landlines which weren’t wireless and we used encyclopedias for our homework. We learned about ‘magic e’ and Letterland, Clever Cat and Hairy Hat Man. Split digraphs and nonsense words were nowhere to be seen. Oh, how times have changed. There have been some amazing advances in the last two decades – so much so that the above description seems quite nostalgic.

The biggest challenge I faced was something I like to call ‘plate spinning’; the juggling act required to achieve everything expected of me. Academic assignments, practice-based research, planning, teaching, reflecting upon and evaluating lessons, getting to grips with formative and summative assessment, progress, evidencing teaching standards, ensuring that each and every one of the 30 children in my class felt supported, challenged and praised … not to mention finding time to enjoy some sort of work-life balance. I suppose I never really did get the hang of the latter.

Initially, planning took an eternity. I probably spent three hours preparing each hour-long lesson. At times, I would spend half an hour simply staring at a blank lesson proforma in horror – physically and mentally exhausted – with what can only be described as writers’ block. I would scour TES, Twinkl and Pinterest for hours on end in search of fun, engaging activities – none of which would ever quite fit the Learning Objective I had in mind.

I was working much harder than I had done in the world of marketing. It was all consuming: all day, every day, evenings and weekends. Every waking hour – and each restless night – was spent thinking about lesson plans and learning. Yes, there are decent holidays for teachers, but believe me they are well needed and truly deserved. By the time each half term rolled around I was begging for a break. I began to understand why so many teachers leave the profession within their first five years. Sadly, many are increasingly put off by the excessive workload, the bureaucratic hoop jumping, the pressures of inspection and the relentless pace of change. I’d only been in the profession six months and I couldn’t see myself keeping it up for much longer without it affecting my health.

It seems that the pressure on new teachers to be instantly ‘outstanding’ is huge and that those who struggle initially are all too often chewed up and spat out rather than nurtured and supported. Almost every cause of stress I’ve had in the classroom over the past 12 months seems somewhat irrelevant now. It’s all about perspective. Luckily for me, I had inspirational leadership and a wonderful mentor to remind me of this and to build me back up whenever I felt things were falling apart.

As teachers, it’s our job to navigate our way through successive fads and fashions and this is no easy task – especially when school curriculums, strategies and requirements appear to change at the impulsive whim of politicians and policy makers. I began to realise that the best teachers are those who make decisions about pedagogy and resources according to their own professional knowledge and experience and match that to the needs of the children with which they are currently working. If I’ve learned anything this year, it is that one approach does not suit all.

Discovering the Cambridge Primary Review during my first academic assignment was a real turning point. For me it brought together all of the professional knowledge and experience of teachers all over the UK. CPR and CPRT call for the abandoning of quick fixes and snap reforms, instead outlining key priorities for primary education and offering a long-term, sustainable vision for primary schools, grounded in evidence from real-life interviews, written submissions and extensive practice-based research.

CPR’s 12 inspirational aims are intended to shape curriculum, pedagogy and school life as a whole and, like many others, I have now adopted these in my own practice. I truly intend to inspire and excite imaginations, teaching children how to collaborate and advance their knowledge through dialogue with others. Not only do I want to help them foster skills in academic subjects, but also in communication, invention, problem-solving and human relationships. I hope to open their eyes to the different ways through which we can make sense of our world and how we each have the power to make a positive impact upon it. I want to create a classroom culture that celebrates diversity and community, sustainability and equality, embracing a philosophy that places the child at the heart of education, and where creativity is valued just as much as numeracy and literacy. Children appreciate creativity and challenge. Doing something different in lessons can make them much more exciting and engaging and I’ve learned that taking a small risk can go a long way.

‘Miss, that lesson was the best!’ beamed one of the 7-year-olds after our experiential introduction to the new Digital Gamers topic. Now, it may have been the significant amount of time playing Just Dance on the Wii, exploring BBC games on the desktop computers or navigating the Big Buzz Wire that I had allowed during this particular lesson, but I am still trying to persuade myself that it could have been the research, planning and careful-crafting of resources (not to mention the hours spent printing, sticking, cutting and laminating computer game characters for our exciting new wall display) which had made my last lesson so enjoyable.

Thankfully, it’s all becoming a bit easier now. I’ve had a whole year to try things out; keeping those that worked, letting go of those that didn’t. I’m starting to find my own style, my own voice. Even though each class is temporarily ‘on loan’, I’m developing increasing awareness of how children learn and what they need to progress. Maslow, Piaget and Vygotsky’s theories are finally becoming more tangible and meaningful.

When it came to writing our end of year reports, I derived so much pleasure from seeing the progress children had made that I knew, without doubt, that teaching was the job for me. I’m finally starting to feel like a real teacher and – with the responsibility of my own class looming in September – it’s a good job too. Next year promises to be a busy, challenging and stressful one, but if all goes to plan it’s going to be one of the most satisfying, varied and exciting ones too. As a primary school teacher, I am rewarded more every single day than I ever was as a marketing manager and as I navigate my way through my NQT year, I’ve promised myself I’ll remember this.

Sadie Phillips is a trainee teacher at the University of Plymouth. Follow her @SadiePhillips.

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Can data really define ‘coasting’?

For me, this is the question of the moment, with the Education and Adoption Bill, whose first section is on the charmingly-worded but as-yet-undefined term ‘coasting schools’, having started its passage through Parliament.

The bill promises to sweep a new category of these schools into the reach of the ‘intervention’ powers of the Secretary of State, which include issuing academy orders forcing schools into the arms of new sponsors.

In a blunt exchange at Education Questions in the House of Commons this week, Nicky Morgan, the Education Secretary, reminded her Labour shadow, Tristram Hunt, that the definition of coasting schools would not come until part-way through the passage of the bill, at its committee stage. But I’ve already had a steer on its likely content. The Department for Education’s press office has told me that the ‘coasting’ definition will focus on data, and specifically the school’s performance over time. The idea, I was told – these are not my words – was to home in on schools which have failed to fulfil their pupils’ potential.

If ‘coasting schools’ are to be defined entirely in terms of results data, I think this will be the first time that formal intervention powers by central government will have been triggered completely by assessment statistics. This already appears to be a departure both from a promise reportedly made by David Cameron before the election and from the contents of the Conservatives’ election manifesto.

In March, the Daily Mail warned that ‘coasting schools’ would be targeted under a new Conservative government, with the Prime Minister quoted – depressingly, though predictably given our experience of the past 20 years of education policy-making – as ‘waging all-out war on mediocrity’.

However, the definition of ‘coasting’ suggested in that piece was an Ofsted judgement. Schools falling in the inspectorate’s ‘requires improvement’ category would ‘automatically be considered’ for turning into academies. Only if they could demonstrate clear plans for improvement, as judged by the Regional Schools Commissioners – England’s new cadre of officials appointed by the Secretary of State, taking decisions in private – would they avoid a change of leadership. The manifesto backed this up, saying: ‘Any school judged by Ofsted to be requiring improvement will be taken over…unless it can demonstrate that it has a plan to improve rapidly.’

But there were indications post-election that the definition was changing. Now it appears that results statistics are going to be the key driver. And that, of course, has big implications.

First, I think it has repercussions for the very controversial language used. A little diversion might be in order here, into the perhaps simpler realm of football.

Imagine, say, a football team, without any great history of success, which gets promoted to the Premier League one season. In its first year in the top tier, it finishes, say, 12th. This is seen as a big achievement, as the club beats many longer-established, richer outfits and comfortably avoids the relegation that comes with finishing 18th or lower. The following season, results are even better, with a 10th place finish the reward. The next two seasons, consistency seems to have been achieved, with 11th and 13th places secured.

However, any outsider looking only at the club’s end of season position over the years might conclude that it has been drifting. Someone could almost call it a ‘coasting’ club in its last two seasons, based on data alone. But while the possible reaction to the club’s statistical direction of travel – sack the manager – may or may not be right, any implication that it was ‘coasting’ and therefore not trying, would be to over-interpret the results. For faced with that ‘coasting’ slur, the club’s manager and any of his coaching staff or players would be incensed. The manager arrives at his desk at 6.30 every morning, hardly has a holiday in the summer and the attention to detail on the training ground is phenomenal.

But the manager does not have total control over the performances of his players and is up against other teams who may be trying similarly hard. He argues that, in a league where he will never have the budgets of the big clubs, survival in the Premier League is success. While results, then, might suggest non-progress, this is based on anything but a sense that the manager is just taking things easy: it is a real triumph.

In contrast, there was the case of a real Premier League football club recently, again having established itself comfortably in mid-table following promotion, where the manager was said by the club’s board to be too laid-back about training. He was replaced by a former player, who has marginally improved its overall position. ‘Coasting’ might have been a more appropriate word in that case, if the characterisation of the former manager’s attitude was right.

My point is that data alone will never tell you whether a football club, or indeed a school, is ‘coasting’ or not. ‘Coasting’ suggests a lack of effort but all we have, with results data, is a statistical end product: the output numbers. Teachers could be working phenomenally hard, and yet failing to improve results as much as outsiders might wish, because schools, in reality, do not have full control over results. These are, inevitably, subject to unpredictability, from the motivation and ability of pupils to ‘perform’ on the big day to the vagaries of marking. And there may be a sense of a zero-sum game: ‘below-average’ schools will always be penalised, even if all schools are working very hard, if the indicators used are based on comparing one school’s results to others’.

Are we really happy, I wonder, to bandy around a word, with all its dismissive implications for the professionals whom our system has spent years training and paying, and with whom we entrust our children, when we are unsure of its accuracy in individual cases?

So to use the results as indicators of underlying effort is as lazy – is this ‘coasting’ policy merely following the assumptions of its accustomed comfort-zone? – as it is potentially misleading. And, in implicitly being brazenly unconcerned about who gets labelled in this way, policy-makers seem to compound the insult that the word ‘coasting’ undoubtedly provokes in many in the profession.

I have to say, surveying the school accountability regime as I do, that I find it very hard to believe that many, if any, schools can truly be said to be ‘coasting’. There are, surely, already too many penalties for those schools which fail to improve their pupils’ results, starting with the head losing his or her job following a failing Ofsted, for any of them to take it easy, I reason. And surveys of teacher workload surely make unarguable the case that most professionals are putting in very long hours in term-time – and often adding to them in the holidays – often under considerable pressure.

And yet here have we have the phrase ‘coasting schools’ backed not only by the Prime Minister and his Education Secretary, but written on the face of an education bill, in its first clause.

Individuals whom I respect, working more closely with schools than I am, have countered that there are some institutions which are not working as hard as they could to provide the best possible education for their pupils. Fair enough. But my point remains: data alone will not tell us which ones they are, because there is no straight read-across from outcome data to teacher commitment and motivation. This seems to me be to be another example of policy-makers making heroic assumptions of what can be read into results statistics alone.

We will have to wait until we have a definition in full – if, indeed during this bill’s passage, we get all the details which will be used in reality by those taking decisions on schools – in order to judge the technical reliability of the datasets being used. But with the futures of more schools poised to hinge on results statistics, this is likely to place even greater weight on, for example, marking reliability. Can it withstand the pressures being placed upon it? Again, the assumption is always that it can. But national curriculum tests and GCSEs, for example, have not been designed with the intention that institutions’ existence could rest on them.

A final implication should be obvious to anyone who is interested in the unintended consequences of assessment-driven accountability. Allowing schools to be placed as, in the language of the bill, ‘eligible for intervention’ – in other words, available for a management takeover – on the basis of results data alone will, surely, accentuate teaching to the test. With so much riding on performance on a particular set of indicators, the incentive for schools to concentrate even more narrowly on doing whatever it takes to maximise performance on those particular indicators will be underlined. If, on the other hand, the statistical definition of ‘coasting’ is not precise, teaching to particular indicators may be more tricky but then Regional Schools Commissioners stand to be accused of arbitrariness in selecting which schools count as ‘coasting’.

To ministers and those defending these plans, this is all to the good. The ‘war on mediocrity’ really will force institutions and those working in them to raise their game, with the implication that countless previous reforms in the same vein have not fully succeeded in doing so. Labelling schools, then, as ‘coasting’ – even if the label is in some cases inaccurate – is not a problem and will just reinvigorate professionals who need a bit of a push. And focusing on particular indicators is fine, as these centrally-defined metrics will just spur teachers to prioritise aspects of education which are important.

To this observer, who sees teachers for the hard-working, often stressed individuals they are, and wonders about the message being sent to this and the next generation of professionals about their efforts and about the alienation of policy-making from its implications on the ground, there is a sense of despair.

As ever, and as evidenced and articulated by the Cambridge Primary Review, the hope is that professionals can still educate pupils well in spite of policy-making, rather than because of it.

Warwick Mansell, one of CPRT’s regular bloggers, is a freelance journalist and author of ‘Education by Numbers: the tyranny of testing’ (Methuen, 2007).

For other blogs by Warwick Mansell click here and/or download CPRT’s book Primary Colours.

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C is for cancer: how do we teach primary children to protect their health?

One of the recommendations of the Cambridge Primary Review (CPR), contained in its final report, was for health education to become a mandatory component of the primary curriculum in England for the first time. Drawing on extensive, well-documented evidence, the Review concluded that there is an urgent need to introduce a domain within the curriculum focusing on physical and emotional health. It noted (page 93): ‘Health concerns which once focused on infectious diseases, malnutrition and inadequate hygiene now revolve around obesity, diet, lack of exercise, and the increased risk of heart disease, diabetes, cancer and liver disease in adulthood’.

We are constantly reminded of these modern ‘epidemics’. Dire warnings about rising childhood obesity levels, for example, continue to make headlines on an almost daily basis. A timely warning came from the Teenage Cancer Trust last week, as schools head to the summer holidays, when it reported that young people risk developing skin melanomas in later life because they believe that sun cream is unnecessary in a country which enjoys so little sunshine. If, as CPR warns, many children’s health is at risk as a result of lifestyle choices and misinformation, then it is essential that they are educated to make better informed and more sensible decisions, and they learn to recognise symptoms, psychological problems and physical changes that require medical attention or therapeutic intervention.

According to Cancer Research UK, cancer is likely to affect one in two people in the UK at some point in their lives and yet it is estimated that cancer occurrence could be reduced by up to 40 per cent by lifestyle changes. Clearly, the earlier children are encouraged to make lifestyle changes that enable them to prevent cancer developing, the greater the chance that they will avoid this health problem blighting their future lives. Similarly, early diagnosis depends on being able to recognise changes in the body that necessitate medical investigation so children and adults should be alerted to these warning signs.

But talking about such a sensitive and potentially frightening subject in the classroom is no easy task. Children may be worrying about a family member, or even a cherished pet, who is suffering from cancer or who has died of the disease, and some may even be under treatment themselves. How should teachers approach this important but challenging health topic? Should we talk about cancer in the primary classroom? Within CPRT’s Eastern Regional Network we believe the answer to this question is an emphatic ‘Yes’. Children need to learn about cancer in a sensitive, balanced and well-informed way, and given the right advice and training, schools and teachers can play a vital role in protecting children’s health and well-being.

CPRT’s Eastern Regional Network has been looking at these issues in collaboration with the Teenage Cancer Trust in a pilot scheme called Cancer Education for Children, Teachers and Students (CANECTS). CANECTS aims to equip initial teacher education students with the skills they need for talking about cancer in the primary classroom.

There are two facets to the CANECTS scheme: one focuses on developing teachers’ skills for responding to the challenges, questions and situations relating to cancer that can arise in primary schools; the other explores ways of communicating healthy messages to young children which support cancer prevention and early diagnosis. The scheme introduces ways of helping a child and family with a recent diagnosis of cancer and offers advice on responding to children who are facing bereavement: and the scheme also focuses on teaching about cancer in an age-appropriate, sensitive way as part of the CPR curriculum’s domain on physical and emotional health.

The pilot CANECTS scheme is the brainchild of former primary head, Carol Bordoli, who originally approached Teenage Cancer trust for advice and support in her own school which had a pupil with a recent diagnosis of cancer. Unsure of how to help this child and his family, or how to answer questions being asked by other children, Carol contacted Susie Rice, Head of Education and Awareness, at the Teenage Cancer Trust. Susie’s expertise proved invaluable to Carol and her staff, and providing this training and support in a primary school context led Susie to look at ways of extending the Teenage Cancer Trust’s work with younger age groups.

As a result of this experience, Carol and Susie approached CPRT’s Eastern Regional Network with the idea of sharing their expertise with initial teacher trainees as part of the Early Years and Primary PGCE programme at Cambridge University. The CANECTS scheme’s first year has been run with the support of Penny Coltman, CPRT Eastern Regional co-ordinator, and Julia Flutter. Two presentations introduced The Teenage Cancer Trust’s work and offered a basic foundation for talking about cancer with young children, and these sessions were followed by a short series of lunchtime workshops for students who were interested in developing their skills further. These workshops provided guidance on talking about grief and bereavement, modelled good practice in teaching young children about cancer and healthy lifestyle choices, and introduced educational materials and resources on cancer for use in the primary classroom.

During the CANECTS sessions, two trainees gave moving accounts of their own experiences of being diagnosed with cancer whilst they were at primary school and their stories illustrated vividly how schools and teachers struggle to respond to these challenging situations.

The evaluation carried out at the end of the pilot year has shown that students felt the CANECTS training was worthwhile, with all students reporting that the project had increased their knowledge and understanding of cancer education and enabled them to develop an effective pedagogy for talking with children about cancer. Here are some students’ thoughts on taking part in the CANECTS scheme:

  • I feel more confident in talking about cancer with pupils now. I see the importance of de-mystifying some aspects of cancer so that children are comfortable asking questions and becoming more aware. I can also see myself using the practical activity to demonstrate what cancer is with classes as a teacher. Thank you for organising a great series of workshops.
  • I will carry this knowledge with me throughout my career. Of most value is the knowledge gained of where to seek help or resources if needed.
  • It has given me really practical ways which I can use to introduce cancer to children of different ages. I feel much more confident to be able to talk about cancer, without fearing I don’t know enough about it as I did before.

What next for the CANECTS scheme?

CPRT’s Eastern Regional Network will be continuing to offer CANECTS workshops for teacher trainees next year and will be increasing the number of sessions to cope with the high demand from students interested in attending the workshops. To find out more about the CANECTS scheme for ITE students, please contact Julia Flutter and for further information on The Teenage Cancer Trust please see the Trust’s website.

We would also like to hear about any initiatives and resources which you have come across that are focusing on health education issues in the primary classroom. Please let us know about your experiences and share your thoughts on how to ensure that schools teach children how to stay physically and emotionally healthy throughout their lives – it is probably one of the most important lessons we can teach them.

Other resources (there are many resources available online and through health organisations – these are just a few examples which may be helpful and offer signposting to other educational resources and support services)

Cancer Research UK SunSmart Policy for Preschools and Nurseries, and for Primary Schools and Primary School Teachers’ Notes

Royal Marsden Hospital booklet, Pupils with Cancer: a Guide for Teachers, written by Bette Petersen Broyd, Professor Kathy Pritchard Jones, and Dr Lesley Edwards

Macmillan Cancer Support, website with information about supporting children with cancer

CLIC Sargent, booklet, No Child with Cancer Left Out: the impact of cancer on children’s primary school education

Childhood Bereavement Network offers resources for supporting children experiencing grief and bereavement

This blog was co-written with Carol Bordoli and Susie Rice.

by Robin Alexander

Flying the Primary Colours

CPRT’s weekly blog is approaching its first anniversary.  During the past year teachers, heads, students, journalists and CPRT leaders have written about a wide range of educational issues. Some have done so with joy, some with anger, some with gravity and some with wit. All have shared their belief in a primary education grounded in evidence and vision, that secures children’s skills, enriches their understanding and enlarges their imaginations and lives.

To celebrate this coming anniversary, and because we believe that the blogs are by no means as ephemeral in substance as they are in format, we have brought many of them together in a specially edited volume entitled Primary Colours: Westminster postcards from the Cambridge Primary Review Trust. The collection may be viewed online, printed out, or purchased as a bound book at modest cost.

We are sure that the puns in the title ‘Primary Colours’ will be instantly deciphered, but why ‘Westminster postcards’? Well, education policy has become so pervasive and intrusive, and so deeply controversial as to substance and process, that it would have been irresponsible as well as impossible to ignore it, especially in an election year. So with a new government in place we thought it would be salutary, and perhaps even entertaining, to reverse the flow and present this collection to ministers as both a policy commentary and a reminder of what really matters.

But even assuming that ministers read it, the collection is of at least equal interest to everyone else involved in primary education. Many of the contributions speak directly to the condition of children and teachers, and the empowerment of both groups is a recurrent theme for the Trust itself. Thus alongside the policy critiques are pieces about children’s voice, curriculum, assessment and school leadership, about life in primary schools as it really is, and about some of the moral, social and global challenges which confront, or should confront, our assumptions about what education is for.

That’s just for starters. CPRT has recently commissioned seven new research reviews to supplement the three already published and the two in the pipeline. Kate Pickett’s report on equality, equity and social disadvantage will appear later this month, and between September and next March we’ll be producing expert reports on the educational dimensions and implications of other big and burning issues: vulnerable children, sustainability and global understanding, migration and demographic change, digital futures, teacher education and training, alternative models of accountability and quality assurance, and the trajectory and impact of recent education reforms.

The CPRT reports and briefings published so far are being discussed within our regional networks, in schools and in some teacher education courses. We hope that Primary Colours and the anticipation of further CPRT publications will quicken this trend and that the wealth of new material CPRT is generating will take its place on the must-read list of every intending and practising primary teacher, school leader, teacher educator, researcher and consultant, alongside what remains our key publication: Children, their World, their Education: final report and recommendations of the Cambridge Primary Review.

www.robinalexander.org.uk

Click to download, print or order a bound copy of Primary Colours.

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Democracy and education: winners and losers

The 2015 General Election, like all the others before it, produced both winners and losers. But for a majority of the electorate, democracy and education were nowhere to be spotted in the winners’ enclosure. So, who were the winners?

On the morning of Friday 8th May, just under 11.5 million happy voters, slightly less than a quarter of the electorate, were satisfied with the outcome, having scooped first prize. It had, however, been obtained in a most bizarre fashion. While we were all expecting a protracted period of horse-trading once all the ballots were counted, to find out who would be governing us for the next five years, one man stepped out, proudly sporting a sparkling blue rosette. Against all the odds, Dave’s Conservative Party had obtained an outright majority and the bookmakers had made a killing.

Surely, apart from the surprise nature of the victory, this was more than the pundits simply getting it wrong. The electorate had delivered its verdict. The people had expressed their preference with apparent conviction. It wasn’t until all the results were painstakingly unpacked and subjected to careful analysis that the full impact was acknowledged. In addition to many of the other parties involved, politics, democracy and education all took a fall and now face an uncertain future.

On a turnout of 66.1 percent with less than a quarter of the votes cast determining the eventual winner, there is little wonder that many people are now questioning the strength and robustness of that unforeseen victory and asking some searching questions about the electoral process itself.

How just is it that so many people cast a vote that counted for nothing? How can 1.5 million votes deliver 56 seats in one part of the country when 3.8 and 1.1 million votes cast for two other parties gain just one seat each elsewhere? Something is surely wrong with a system that turns 40,000 votes into one seat for the winners while 3.8 million votes are required by one of the losers to achieve the same result.

This time, first-past-the-post has dealt a severe blow to politics and democracy. In the most dramatic fashion this system has rendered the principle of one-person one-vote utterly worthless. Doubtless, there will be those who will cling to the notion that there is no case to answer. Over time, they may argue, such idiosyncratic outcomes even out. However, I have a feeling this argument will no longer stand up to scrutiny and that double standards in politics are set to be challenged. If they are, then education might belatedly become a winner.

But first, to consider how broken politics is and as an indication of why our democracy is threatened, one of the first actions of the newly appointed Business Secretary, Sajid Javid, has been to set out the government’s intention to tackle strikes in the public sector. The plan is to make it illegal to call a strike unless 40 percent of those eligible to vote do so and unless 50 percent of those votes are cast in favour of the action. On this basis, the new government would not be legal. Yes of course, more than 40 percent of those eligible to vote did so (66.1 percent precisely), but with just 36.9 percent of these voting Conservative, they are an eye-watering 13.1 percent short of the 50 percent threshold government wishes to establish as a minimum requirement for victory in public sector strike ballots.

So what of the assertion that this government is legitimate? Have the Tories obtained a clear mandate to continue with the questionable reforms to education of the last administration? What about the changes already in the pipeline for education in this parliament?

By the standard they wish to set in public sector union activity, they do not have a mandate to press ahead with their agenda for education reforms over the next five years. Following this election, our democracy is the poorer and politics are in disarray. In my view, the election has created more of a worst-case scenario for the electorate as a whole than a coalition or minority government would have done. The impact on education threatens to be especially damaging because the government has a working majority (albeit small) and the party in opposition is in disarray, caught up in infighting over its new leadership and direction.

Just two days before the general election, Robin Alexander’s CPRT blog surveyed recent education policy and warned that ‘At this election …  those voters for whom education matters would do well to pay greater attention to each party’s record than to their manifesto promises.’ Unfortunately, that did not happen and we now have five years in which to fret and watch as Tory manifesto promises unfold. In relation to the condition of England’s education system itself, Robin declared that the ‘unity, coherence, consistency and equity’ which are a system’s basic requirements no longer apply because the ‘checks and balances vital to education in a democracy have been swept away, and without local mediation schools have little protection from ministers’ caprice, megalomania or what NAHT’s Russell Hobby calls their “crazy schemes”’.

In relation to Conservative plans for education funding, Sam Fredman explains why the PM’s pledge to maintain ‘flat-cash’ per pupil will actually amount to a 10 percent cut for the service over the next five years. The planned cuts to welfare and social care budgets will have the effect of weakening the impact of the vital Pupil Premium, thus worsening the plight of the most vulnerable children in our society. Conservative voters knew about this and may well have agreed with David Cameron. But, what of the 76 percent of the electorate that did not vote for him? Is this what they want to happen?

There are concerns about other areas of the new government’s policy. What about promising to create more free schools and the push for academies when, according to the Education Select Committee, the evidence does not show that these types of schools produce results any better than their local authority counterparts?

And what plans are there to address the shortage of teachers and their training? Are we all happy to accept the current uncoordinated system? The fractured system of provision, including School Direct, fast-tracking and employing unqualified teachers, takes place in a policy vacuum. More worrying still is the fact that there are no plans currently to bring this vital strategic element of the service back under central control.

Another area in disarray is pupil assessment, a CPRT priority and recurrent focus of its activity. Current proposals for the reform of the examination system and testing arrangements are widely opposed by professionals and parents alike. Calls for a thorough review of this area are ignored and our young people remain among the most tested in the world. Worryingly, the net result of this is to narrow both teaching and the curriculum, to de-motivate pupils and deny them access to the kind of education experiences they need in a fast-changing world requiring diverse attitudes, skills and competencies as well as the ability to access and evaluate humanity’s expanding store of knowledge.

I cannot cover all areas of education that require new thinking. My concern is that politicians are out of step with the needs and expectations of a modern society, the democratic process is severely damaged and the negative consequences for education are considerable. Yet the latest announcement from Nicky Morgan on her return to office as Secretary of State for Education shows where we are heading. Naming and shaming, it seems, is still very much the order of the day. Zero tolerance of failure, we are assured, will turn the situation around. The SoS is clear about what must be done to bring failing schools to heel: ‘Mrs Morgan told the BBC that results show that students do better in academies.’ But let us not get bogged down in the  debate about what constitutes evidence in education reform. Politicians of all shades simply know what’s best.

These are potentially dark days for education. Lies will continue to be peddled by those pulling the levers of power, supported by a largely lazy media. The voices of professionals will continue to be ignored. Parents and young people will be denied their right to equal partnership in deciding the future direction of education. Creeping privatisation will continue the slow but steady dismantling of the system most of us dearly want to see revived and valued for reasons other than profit.

But it doesn’t have to come to this. We should press for our elected representatives to reform the voting system, as increasing numbers are calling for. Our democracy can be revived. Democratic accountability would not be threatened under a different voting system.

However, it could take several more electoral cycles before politicians are willing to support such a far-reaching change. In the meantime, education is far too important to be compromised by the randomness of the electoral process and government belief that the system can survive its interminable tinkering. So while we wait for electoral reform, we should set up a National Education Commission to oversee the governance of education. The campaign at www.ordinaryvoices.org.uk calls for this to happen.

It is time to do more than urge successive governments to consider what is best for the future of the system. Through coordinated action of the kind I am calling for we can positively shape that future and ensure that state education is a winner.

John Mountford is a retired primary school headteacher and former Ofsted inspector. He has a nine year old grandson, on whose behalf he campaigns through the website Ordinary Voices for the foundation of a National Education Commission to wrest the governance of education from political control. 

As with all CPRT blogs, the views expressed above are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect the position of the Trust as a whole.

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And the octopus won

I held an election at the school recently. It happened just the day before a similar event took place nationally. The two candidates were an octopus (plastic) and a clown (wooden). This was not intended as a reflection on national politics, they were simply the toys that came to hand as I raced out of the classroom and down to the hall for assembly.

This term the theme for assemblies has been fairness. As I lined the pupils up with their voting slips in front of a cardboard ballot box, I explained that we had gone back in time 200 years. Lord Sam (Year 6) and Duke Timothy (Year 5) were to be in charge of this election and would decide who was to vote. The young aristos very much enjoyed turning away all the pupils, except their two wealthy land-owning mates (Cameron, Year 5, and Freddie, Year 4). And so we carried on, conducting elections right through till 1969 when finally everyone was allowed to vote.

The children, particularly the girls, were refreshingly indignant about the denial of their democratic rights. But what was more interesting was the way they became embroiled in the contest. Who was going to win? Was it going to be the octopus or the clown? Factions quickly developed. Arguments erupted in the corners of the hall. Some were passionate in their advocacy of a particular toy. Some came close to tears when a friend rebelled and voted for the opposition. Yet no policies had been discussed. No one knew what the octopus or the clown stood for despite this being an election to decide the leadership of the school.

You get my point, I’m sure. It was reinforced after the general election when the children told me gleefully that Sats were to be abolished. Yes, I said, but did they know that they were to be replaced with more and harder ‘exams’? They didn’t know and they were, for once, silent. I suspect they would also be silent if they read the Conservative manifesto. In a few bleak words the government outlines its priorities for primary education: ‘Every 11-year-old to know their times tables off by heart and be able to perform long division and complex multiplication. They should be able to read a book and write a short story with accurate punctuation, spelling and grammar.’ That the potential achievements of an 11-year-old should be so stale, flat and unprofitable is heart breaking.

I assume no child was involved in drawing up these priorities. What self-respecting young person would sign up to such dreary targets? A very different set of aims emerges when young people are consulted. The Cambridge Primary Review listened carefully to its many ‘prominent and thoughtful’ child witnesses. Its final report (p 489) recommended that in line with the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child ‘children should be actively engaged in decisions which affect their education’ and that schools should increasingly work to ensure pupils’ opinions are listened to in a meaningful way. Children told CPR researchers (final report, p 148) that they ‘relish a challenge,’ that they ‘enjoy succeeding’ and that they like ‘hands-on active learning’ in lessons that are full of variety. They dislike ‘mundane and repetitive’ learning, copying and ‘drill and practice’ exercises.

Children are begging for a broad, balanced and rich curriculum, as sought by CPR and CPRT. They may not express it in those words, but they do express in their actions. They triumphantly find fossils in the school garden. They catch bugs, beetles and dead butterflies and bring them in to show and discuss. They make up great stories while stirring a magic mud potion. They adore playing with electrical circuits and making bits of paper fly off motor spindles. They copy a Turner painting and say ‘Wow, Miss, I didn’t know I was good at art’. They wonder why bruises happen and why we shiver or say things like ‘I know it’s a silly question, Miss, but why did lions evolve?’ They love acting, will volunteer for anything, relish funny books (I wonder if ‘Diary of a Wimpy Kid’ is the kind of book the Tories have in mind) and, of course, some go wild for long division and complex multiplication. ‘Please can I stay in at break and do more maths, Miss?’

So once more, as Warwick Mansell pointed out last week in his CPRT blog, we are back to the ‘basics versus breadth’ debate. Except that there is no debate at government level. The only debate is at school level as heads and teachers struggle to square the circle and reinforce the basics while not losing the breadth. Despite their efforts, largely via intervention programmes run by dedicated TAs and squeezed into every nook and cranny of a school day, some children will not meet those manifesto targets. They will not pass the new Year 6 ‘exams’. Their fate is to have to retake them in Year 7 – how humiliating is that for poor souls struggling to find their feet in their first year at secondary school?

Primary schools will be blamed for failing these children, but the truth is that they have a special need. It will not gain them exemption from the exams, though it ought to. These children are victims of a disadvantaged background where for myriad reasons there is no one at home prepared to listen to times tables or to buy a book, let alone to read it. Primary schools do an awful lot for these children – not least making them feel safe and valued for 30 hours a week. But they cannot and should not run them ragged to meet flawed targets set by a government that doesn’t listen to children and doesn’t have their best interests at heart.

If children had the vote I wonder if the Tory manifesto would have been different.

By the way, the octopus (plastic) won the school election. Make of that what you will.

Stephanie Northen is a teacher and journalist. She contributed to the Cambridge Primary Review final report and is a member of the Board of the Cambridge Primary Review Trust.

Contact

Cambridge Primary Review Trust - Email: administrator@cprtrust.org.uk