Teachers between a rock and a hard place! |
A year or so ago I wrote an article for the Education Todaymagazine headed ‘Teachers in No Man’s Land’. My theme was that primary teachers are caught between implementing a
student centred education and an education influenced by ‘best practice’s
adapted from the business world.
Teachers, like the
soldiers caught in no man’s area in World War One, were doomed no matter what
direction they chose. Today teachers seem just as confused not knowing whichagenda to follow and, worse still, oblivious to the agendas being imposed – all
too often exhausted just trying to implement what they are being asked to do.
To extend the theme teachers are all too often ‘led’ by principals, who like
World War One generals, have no idea what they are asking their teachers to do.
A s a consequence wrong decisions,
influenced by Ministry compliance requirements (National Standards – and the
inevitability of League Tables) and the surveillance culture created by the
Education Review Office, being made
Easier it seems to do
the wrong things well.
Forty year waves of change! |
I read many years ago
that big world-wide trends come in 40 year waves influences all in their way. After the failure of capitalism resulting in
the Great Depression and also the waste of lives in World War Two Western societies developed welfare
societies in a democratic attempt to develop the potential of all citizens not
just the elite power holders. In New Zealand the first Labour Government
develop a range of state organisations and, as part of this, new liberal ideas
about education were promulgated. Every student was too receive an education
best suited to their needs.
The sixties were seen
as the high point of these world-wide changes. After the austerity and need
for security following World War Two the sixties, reflecting growing
prosperity, was a period of great
creativity challenging traditional ideas
in all areas of life. Education was no exception. Child centred educationwas encouraged by the then Director of Education, Dr Beeby, In England child centred education was officially
recognised by the then government’s Plowden
Report (1967). In New Zealand
experimentation was also in the air. In 1964 pioneer creative teacher ElwynRichardson published his inspirational book ‘In the Early World’. Another
creative teacher Sylvia Ashton Warner also published her book ‘Teacher’. The
then Department of Education encouraged such developments. Junior teachers introduced developmental education, family
grouping, integrated programmes and in particular the language experience
/reading/writing approaches that were highly regarded worldwide. Another important influence was the work of
the art and craft advisers (led by the late National Director for Art and
Craft Gordon Tovey) which tapped into the creativity of teachers throughout New
Zealand.
Exciting times to be
a teacher.
By the 1980s economic
conditions had changed for the worse and new worldwide trend arose that was to change the direction of all
aspects of society and, once again education was not to be excluded.
This Neo-Liberal
‘wave’, based on ‘market forces’, individual responsibility, choice and the
centrality of a privatisation agenda
influenced all aspects of life. The
changes hit education with the introduction of Tomorrows Schools in 1986.
The Education Department, regional Education Boards school inspectors and
advisers were disbanded; proponents of the changes believed such bureaucracies
stultified individual school creativity. The baby was to be thrown out with the
bathwater! Schools were to be governed by Board of Trustees.
The market forces society! |
This return to a
learner centred education was to be short lived. A new conservative government
set about imposing a return to a neo –liberal agenda based on business ‘bestpractices’. When ‘best practices’ are taken too seriously, as they are by
far too many schools (once again reflecting a lack of real educational
philosophy), creativity is crushed. As a result ‘communities of best practices may well be achieved resulting in conformity rather than
creativity. Formulaic ‘best practices’ becomes the norm. Examples to be seen are an emphasis on
teacher predetermined ‘learning intentions’, WALTs (we are learning that...);
success criteria and an obsession with recording achievement in literacy and numeracy.
Such ‘best practices’ do have value need
to account for creative individuals otherwise sameness is reflected in
classrooms. National Standards,
national testing and comparative ‘league tables’ are natural extensions of such
ideas as are value added assessment leading to teacher appraisals and
comparative school performance measurement.
So this brings us to
the future.
Each forty year wave
seems to sow the seeds for its own destruction. The freedom and creativity
of the sixties finally resulted in individual selfishness the basis of neo
liberal thinking. Welfare security led to a bureaucratic nightmare and middle
class capture. Neo liberal thinking in education creates conformity and narrowness
of thinking (teaching to the tests) requiring a new sense of creativity.
The future requireskeeping what is good from the past - reviving what has been lost and creatingconditions for new ideas to emerge. Emergence seems a key word. Someone has
said ‘we need to return to the sixties but do it right this time’. Certainly in
education the ideas developed by the creative teachers of earlier times such as
Elwyn Richardson need revisiting.
Two educators that
provide inspiration for future orientated teachers are Sir Ken Robinson and GuyClaxton – but they are only two of many innovative thinkers who are callingfor an educational transformation. Sir
Ken says the ‘creativity is as important as literacy and numeracy’ and believes
a future education system ought to focus on developing the gifts and talents of
all students. Guy Claxton has written that ‘learnacy is as important as
literacy and numeracy’. These ideas
are reinforced by the 2007 New Zealand Curriculum’s (currently side-lined) phrase for teachers to see students as ‘seekers,
users and creators of their own knowledge’.
Creativity as important as literacy |
Currently, as one
commentator has written about primary schools, ‘it is as if the evil twins of
literacy and numeracy have all but gobbled up the entire curriculum’! ‘Best
practice’ becomes ‘fixed practice’. As for secondary schools they are still
locked in a traditional shape, with their timetables, subject compartmenting,
streaming, bells and uniforms, determined by the factory metaphor of an
industrial age.
The future requiresschools to move from the industrial aged vision of achieving mass education
(with a focus on the ‘three Rs’) to a personalised education system to tailor,
or customise, education to the needs ofeach learner.
Rather than
developing schools as conformist ‘communities of best practices’ we need todevelop schools as ‘learning organisations’ – centres of ‘next practice’.
A new world wide
theme is gaining strength. A world of connections. A world that needs to evolve
so as to be sustainable. A new fluid organic emerging world, continually recreating itself.
The importance of ecology in both natural and human communities. The
destructive ideology of market forces and individual greed is coming to an end.
A constantly evolving universe |
World-wide there afew schools that are leading the way in this new educational development but,
to my knowledge, few schools as yet in New Zealand.
I would love to be proved wrong.
1 comment:
Fajna strona, zobacz moją!
Post a Comment