{"id":227,"date":"2013-09-05T20:12:59","date_gmt":"2013-09-05T19:12:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.hilarymoriarty.com\/blog\/?p=227"},"modified":"2013-09-05T20:12:59","modified_gmt":"2013-09-05T19:12:59","slug":"do-you-want-grades-or-an-education","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/?p=227","title":{"rendered":"Do you want grades, or an education?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\nEveryone is demanding grades \u2013\u00a0from politicians to business leaders and of course parents \u2013 and most schools are delivering, but is this at the expense of education? Hilary Moriarty asks the question.
\n
\nI went through school hating maths with a passion.
\nThis was engendered by one maths teacher for three years who regularly threw chalk, board dusters and insults if you didn\u2019t get it first time, followed by a second \u2013 the head of maths, no less \u2013 who would write complicated formulae on the board and turn to the class with: \u201cYou girls won\u2019t get this \u2013 Peter Hughes, have you got the answer?\u201d
\nAnd Peter (name not changed) who went on, I believe, to become an actuary, always had the answer. He and the teacher shared the same lofty platform above a sea of ignorance in the rest of the class.
\nThese were the days when an O level in maths meant three separate papers \u2013 arithmetic, algebra and geometry. No small potatoes. And no university place if you did not pass. I managed it by dint of much swotting and a good memory. Several girls \u2013 unsurprisingly \u2013 headed for teacher training college instead, for a certificate of education, not a degree, because they only needed a pass in arithmetic.
\nI recently met a young head of maths. In a school-y conversation, I lamented what seemed to be a trend for even the very brightest students to study books for their GCSE which I would have taught to year 8 or 9.
\nApparently one of the most commonly taught is Of Mice and Men, a fine book, but not difficult: American, 20th century and about 90 pages long. For GCSE? My eyes are on stalks at the thought of it. What happened to Pride and Prejudice, especially for youngsters who might go on to degrees in English?
\nMystification from the young maths man: \u201cThey\u2019re too long.\u201d
\n\u201cToo long for what?\u201d
\n\u201cFor a student to be able to really understand it and keep up with all their other subjects.
\n\u201cStaffrooms,\u201d he explained, \u201care much more collegiate now \u2013 much more about how can we together make sure that this percentage of students gets the five A* to C grades they need. No subject can poach time. If they can get an A* grade with a short, easier book great \u2013 more time to spend getting their heads round the hard stuff, like maths.\u201d
\n\u201cWait a minute. So it\u2019s not about teaching the subject, any subject, it\u2019s about doing what must be done for the kid to get the grades in as many subjects as possible?\u201d
\n\u201cOf course.\u201d
\n\u201cSo is it true whole tranches of pupils are sitting GCSE maths in year 10 \u2013 and what\u2019s that all about?\u2019
\n\u201cIt\u2019s about confidence. If you take the higher-tier maths papers and get less than a B, you don\u2019t get a grade at all. Lots of our kids don\u2019t have the confidence that they are going to get a B, and are afraid even to try the higher paper.
\n\u201cSo we put them in a year early and they get their C. With a C in the bank, they will take the risk of trying for a higher grade in year 11.\u201d
\n\u201cWhich should not be hard to get, given they still have a year of teaching?\u201d
\n\u201cEr, I suppose so.\u201d
\n\u201cSo tell me, does this turn out good mathematicians?\u201d
\n\u201cGood God no, we get kids to pass the exam.\u201d
\n\u201cIs that the height of the staff\u2019s ambition?\u201d
\n\u201cOf course \u2013 because that\u2019s what we are judged on, all of us. It\u2019s not about education any more, or love of the subject or any of that crap, it\u2019s about getting the most kids the five A* to C grades that they need for a job, and that the school needs to avoid special measures.\u201d
\nOf course.
\nSo the moral (for politicians, policy-makers, the media?) is: tell schools what you want, and they will do what you ask. But be very careful what you wish for.
\nYou said you wanted grades, when (probably) what you meant was \u201ceducation\u201d. But grades, for better or worse, are exactly what you might get.\b
\nThis guest SecEd editorial has been written by Hilary Moriarty, who taught English for 25 years and is now national director of the Boarding Schools\u2019 Association.\u00a0 This post originally appeared on the SecEd website at http:\/\/www.sec-ed.co.uk\/blog\/do-you-want-grades-or-an-education#sthash.d39HGB2s.dpuf<\/a><\/em>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Everyone is demanding grades \u2013\u00a0from politicians to business leaders and of course parents \u2013 and most schools are delivering, but is this at the expense of education? Hilary Moriarty asks the question.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[8,20],"tags":[87],"class_list":["post-227","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-editorial","category-sec-ed","tag-examination-reform"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/227","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=227"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/227\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=227"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=227"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/j-moriarty.co.uk\/hilarymoriarty\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=227"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}