Literacy has stalled, says Ofsted

[Win2Win Racing]

England's chief schools inspector Sir Michael Wilshaw says progress on literacy has stalled and England is being overtaken by other leading nations.

More... (http://www.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/int/news/-/news/education-17368311)

[Win2Win]

That's because for the last 10+ years we've been teaching the kids how to pass the exams, and not what they need to know for the real world :doh1:

[barneymather]

I think new technology is now often used as a smokescreen when it comes to education. If schools aren't kitted out with endless PCs and other more sophisticated IT equipment, certain politicians would like to have you believe the pupils are deprived, which is utter nonsense.

The standard of education in the UK is far lower than it was 30 or 40 years ago when there was absolutely nothing in the way of technology available and the two might just be linked.

Certainly, grade inflation and the dumbing down of subjects is largely responsible for low standards in the classroom, but I'm pretty sure there are children leaving school in poor nations with superior literacy and numeracy skills to our teenagers and the teachers in these overseas countries often only have a blackboard and chalk to work with.

Education isn't actually (or needn't be) that expensive when you think about it. One motivated/truly professional teacher with aforesaid chalk and blackboard and textbooks is all you need. Some of the greatest minds in history and generations of those working in the professions learnt this way, therefore why schools need to be stuffed with computers and gadgets is beyond me.

Computers can be a useful educational tool, but to me they're used to keep schoolkids quiet and whether children are actually learning anything is almost by the by. Just as a parent finds it less hassle to let their child watch TV than actually talk to them, it's far easier to sit a child down at a PC and let them play with software than to have them face the teacher and actually engage them in learning a subject.

Not unless it's a way of masking the problems of lazy teachers - a small minority I hasten to add - and local councils unwilling to remove disruptive pupils. A former colleague once told me that a headteacher she knew once said to her that unruly pupils have rights too.

You despair at someone in such an important job failing to realise that these rights shouldn't take precedence or even be on a par with those of kids who behave themselves. To do otherwise is a licence for chaos in schools and a green light to little chavs to behave as badly as they choose as it's their 'right' to do so.