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Posted Monday 18th February 2013 at 12.27pm
Under the radar
The following letter seems to have snuck under the radar of the debate on the proposed new curriculum. There are plenty of arguments for and against Mr Gove's changes, as will always be the case on such an overarching plan. My opinion is that he hasn't got the slightest clue what he's doing and there isn't a shred of evidence in favour of the revolution, whereas there is plenty against it; but why listen to me? Here are some people who even the Government (via Ofsted) says know what they're talking about.
I've taken this straight from the Independent.
Elizabeth Truss defends the history National Curriculum proposals on the grounds that they include diverse groups and encourage critical reflection (Voices, 14 February). We applaud each of these. What neither the minister nor her boss understands, however, is the impact of the new proposals in the classroom.
We’re not sure that parents have yet realised that their six-year-olds may soon be learning about the concept of Parliament and the meaning of “nation”. Meanwhile, their eight-year-old siblings will be tackling the sensitive complexities of the Crusades, all in the hands of teachers without history degrees, teachers without knowledge of history or its scholarship.
Nine-year-olds will wrestle with the differences between Catholics and Protestants and the causes of the English Civil War, never to return to these at secondary school, never to be taught them by specialist history teachers. To label the proposals “age inappropriate” is just the start of it.
Mr Gove wants pupils to have knowledge. We agree: knowledge is central and plenty of it should be British, too. But these proposals will not achieve what Mr Gove wants. At best, children will emerge with superficial, vague and ill-formed notions of a narrative that has taken a tortuous seven years or more to wade through, with scant specialist teaching. Their understanding will be practically nil and their love of history destroyed. What is more, do we really want to be the only leading educational jurisdiction in the world not to have a proper, mandatory world history course?
We represent the history departments of three large comprehensive schools in south London, all rated “outstanding” by Ofsted and all with an excellent track record of engaging and challenging many thousands of young people in history. We would like to know on what experience the Secretary of State and his ministers are basing their decisions, given that this is the first national curriculum written in this country with no transparent authorship. We know it will fail and what is more, we know it will fail to deliver what Mr Gove and Ms Truss want. It is a catastrophe.
Tom Greenwood
Haberdashers’ Aske’s Hatcham College
Sean O’Neill
Langley Park School for Boys
David Stevenson
Norbury Manor Business and Enterprise College
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