just saying, is all – III

Tags

2012, 2014, accountability, achievement, assessment for learning, career, CPD, dialogue, education, funding, GCSE, inclusion, intervention, love, measure, National Curriculum, nurture, outcome-led education, planning, politics, process, professionalism, public service cuts, pupils, results-led education, school, slogans, statistics, subjects, targets, teachers, teaching, vocation

 

 

 

                                                                                    just saying, is all – III

                                              I watched the first generation of pupils sit their GCSEs

                                              then I watched the National Curriculum
                                find a gear
                and crunch-jerk launch the level system of attainment
                                across all the subjects
                                              then I watched the whole dialogue –
                political and educational
                                and the funding that went with it –
                                              shift from process and nurture
                to outcomes and statistics

                                and then I felt the reform of teaching professionalism
                and watched the proliferation
of endless sheets of planning, four – part lessons, Assessment for Learning, Ready for Learning, Every Child Matters, Inclusion, Continuing Professional Development, targetting, intervention, Boulders into Pebbles, Investors in People, accountability, Achieving Together, Be a Part of It, G₂O                      
                                the unforgettable 2 As & 2 Bs
                the Freedom to All Think Along the Same Lines (glorious times)
(and I’m really looking forward to the innovative work to be launched soon by Professor Cobbly from the prestigious University of Fisc’ut, Corporateshire, (not least of all because he happens to be my uncle))

                                              and all the while
                                those who work hard achieve well
                                              in the wash
                those who don’t don’t whether they are intelligent or not
                                if they are going to be angry or lazy
                they will find a way to be so
                                              whether you teach them to their very marrow
                                or just let them alone

                                              most teachers
                                just get through their career
                all of them measured to within an inch of their vocation
                                some keep their love
                                some make a difference
                                              sometimes
                                when no one is … measuring

                                              all kids
                                just get through school
                                most kids do OK
                                some kids thrive

 

 

 

^{————w}(O)rmholes_________________________________|—–

career wormhole: tag cloud poem IV – C
education & results-led education wormhole: poessay VIII: / educational behaviourism
love wormhole: plethora: the Dark Knight Strikes Again (2002)
politics wormhole: my life is not your market
professionalism wormhole: the Lamp
teaching wormhole: which is worse

 

poessay VIII: / educational behaviourism

Tags

2012, behaviourism, communication, compromise, consultation, consumerism, creativity, dialogue, education, educational behaviourism, giving, Have, identity, learning, management, managerialism, measure, mechanism, opening, poessay, results-led education, teaching, vocation

 

 

 

                                poessay VIII:
                                educational behaviourism

                     teaching is a
                                conversation
                                          between teacher and pupil between school and teacher

                     management of education
                                has shifted from collegiate sharing to hierarchical interview
                                          without consultation
                     a velvet coup deep into the Heartland of Vocation – the desire to give
                                Opening of Mind –
                                          which has nullified teacher creativity and reduced learning to
                                                      controlled behaviour which you can Have

                                dialogue is dissipated
                                communication devolves to
                                demand and consumption
                                there is no interaction
                                there is no communication
                                only mechanism
                                because mechanism is easily switched
                                and mechanism is easily measured

                     the more that communication is systemic and systematic
                                the more it provides springboard for pupils to define themselves
                                          against
          defining the inverse norm of behaviour in which individuals site themselves
                     and against which education must then try to
                                work

 

 

 

^{————w}(O)rmholes_________________________________|—–

communication wormhole: sunny day
compromise wormhole: tag cloud poem IV – C
creativity wormhole: I don’t think I could do it anymore
education wormhole: Put service back into people rather than productivity
giving & Have wormhole: multifarious: the Dark Knight Returns (1986)
identity & teaching wormhole: “I think I’ll have a nice sandwich”
learning wormhole: Assessment for Learning: the Lamp
management & results-led education wormhole: … just saying is all I
managerialism wormhole: that’s me / in the corner that’s me in the spot light / losing my religion*
poessay wormhole: poessay VI: // truth

 

Assessment for Learning: the Prologue

Tags

assessment for learning, communication, giving, identity, learning horizon, learning objective, managerialism, National Curriculum, performance, performance management, professionalism, teaching craft, vocation

Assessment for Learning is not simply another government accretion brought-in-to-check-that-we-are-working-properly-and-measure-us-accountable-to-a-‘professionalism’-which-is-defined-despite-educational-values-and-teacher’s-morality … (breathe, breathe).   It has come from the government, it is true, and it has been administered, so far, as yet another measure with which to beat the ever-disinterested donkey that is the modern teacher – blinkered, pulling a large cart, uphill, when it doesn’t think it should go uphill and would rather take the long way round and enjoy life a little.   Nevertheless – quite by accident – AfL could be exercised as both a rationale and a practice which is at the very heart of teaching, something which might be hijacked by teachers to claim back the autonomy, the self-respect, the self-confidence, the prestige, the necessity, the indispensability that is the reality of a teacher nurturing her pupils in the million ways that he does.*

* The most damaging aspect of the ever-rolling-out Reform of Education was the seizure and exploitation of what constitutes teacher professionalism by Managerialism.   It became increasingly apparent that those defining, measuring and administering accountability of teaching were not … teachers.

There is nothing new under the sun.   And likewise in the classroom – no matter how much you try to mechanise the service by making it run to business models in the pursuit of economic prudence – you cannot escape the fact that teaching requires communication, communication requires flexibility and autonomy, flexibility and autonomy requires a workforce of people who have the vocation to GIVE and the vocation to Give needs a clear structure through which it can be exercised clearly, fairly and nurturing-ly.   Teaching with ‘aims and objectives’ – even with just a title – has always been the means by which teachers train, and exercise, their skills and qualification.   It is only recently, since the National Curriculum really bit down, that these means have been used to measure the teacher’s performance rather than to nurture h/er craft; to control rather than to enable.

Assessment for Learning is yet the latest way to tighten down the ‘business’ of teaching – to ‘tune’ the engine to reach maximum efficiency – but it has stumbled, in doing so, upon the very dynamic which makes the educative interplay between pupil and teacher possible.   Assessment for Learning is nothing new – it is the means of getting ‘to’ the ‘aim’, of getting from the ‘aim’ to the ‘objective’; it is the controlled burning of fuel which turns the engine, it is the valve which circulates blood around the body to work.   It is NOT a means to measure if the teacher is working hard- and responsibly-enough, it is the mechanism of teaching through which a teacher can wrest back the management of their own teaching and regain the honour which becomes anyone who chooses to grow knowledge in another.

^{————w}(O)rmholes_________________________________|—–

managerialism & professionalism wormhole: Apologia
performance & teaching craft wormhole: a bit painful this