Layer 235 . . . End of an Era

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Flames

I'll see her no more

That small figure framed

In her favourite armchair

Faint through the net curtain

On many a tired arrival.

She became too weary

To rise up and greet me

At the door of her small world

Where she insistently and rightly

Lived to the very end . . .

Letting myself in, just like

The home help and the lunch delivery

"Hello, hello - how are you today?

Oh you forgot I was coming?

Never mind; it's only memory . . . "

How she hated getting old -

Losing memories, becoming feeble -

But it somehow became her

As soft smiles of acceptance

Replaced her feisty challenges.

All gone now, though the Christmas bouquet

Still blooms with snow-white lillies -

The last I'll ever buy her -

A cyclamen still flames and glows

And hyacinths struggle into fragrant flower.

The Christmas cards still stand

Red, gold, silver and shiny

Testimonials to her from friends and family,

Mingled with framed photos of loved ones -

Not a single one of her, of course:

Too little ego, or too much?

She saw herself still as a flame-haired girl

And disowned the tottering grey person

On unsteady legs, with wrinkled skin,

Smoking another cigarette.

"I'll live here till I die", she proclaimed

And so she did, though she had

Little appetite for food or life

And sometimes secretly wished to end

The struggle and the fight.

She lived on her pride and determination

Appreciating the affection of those

Who knew she was a Good Person

No matter her want of diplomatic grace,

Or inability to say "I love you".

Actions spoke louder, much louder than words,

And now the silent empty kitchen,

The half-empty packets of biscuits and cigarettes

The brand-new lighter she still struggled to enflame

Speak only of loss, and sorrow, and pain.

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Layer 234 . . . . The New Learning Revolution . . . and The Aims of Education

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To tie the ideas together from the previous two blogs on the subject of transforming schools, learning and education - I'm going to reiterate what I've written previously about Dryden & Vos's seminal book – The New Learning Revolution.

(See Layer 147 - http://oxzen.blogspot.com/2009/04/layer-147-academia-technology-desert.html)

Read large sections of it here on Google Books -

http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=y7LxRLxQQ_oC&pg=PA23&lpg=PA23&dq=new+learning+revolution+%2B+vos&source=bl&ots=wEu8IuChPh&sig=zYMd3T-1o7pSTaUEbvSPz_tnf0Y&hl=en&ei=y9IVS6qMO9aL4gbe7aXXBg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CAoQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=&f=false

The subject matter of this book is new ways to learn, teach, think, create and communicate.

It is now the world’s biggest-selling non-fiction book.

10 million copies of this book have been sold in China alone.

The Chinese government has completely retrained its teaching force in order for them to teach on the basis of these progressive ideas about learning and teaching. This was a massive project, and represents a radical and progressive break with their traditional methods of teaching.

Why do this? Because the Chinese government has understood that learning has to be a dynamic process, driven by the needs and wishes of learners to be responsible for their own learning and to become equipped with creative thinking and communication skills.

This stands in contrast to traditional models of education which are based on the acquisition of a specified body of knowledge and the ability to pass tests on one’s memory of that curriculum.

In a world where information is available day and night from a laptop computer or even a telephone connected to the Internet, why should hundreds of millions of pupils and students be sitting in rows of desks facing their teachers in classrooms designed for a different age?

Very soon it will be possible for all advanced countries to provide every pupil with a cheap laptop computer. In eight or ten years time it will be possible for every pupil to own a pocket computer. Those who don’t possess this technology will be severely disadvantaged.

Traditional schooling is breaking down. In Britain record numbers of pupils are being excluded from school because of their undisciplined behaviour. Frankly, many of them are bored and cannot see the point in doing what schools are asking them to do.

Not only are many teachers and schools offering no intellectual stimulation, they are also failing to provide learning in social, emotional and spiritual intelligence.

In the foreword of this book Christopher Ball, the chairman of Britain’s ‘Campaign for Learning’, says, ‘This book explains what is going on in the gradual collapse of the old model of education, and the advent of the revolutionary new models of learning’.

He goes on to say, “The old school model is as dead as the industrial revolution that spawned it. The flight of both pupils and teachers from traditional schooling will soon become an embarrassment for governments in developed countries. Neither the curriculum (what is taught) nor the pedagogy (how it is taught) is any longer sustainable.”

“What lies at the heart of this book is a shift of focus from teaching to learning, and a recognition that a new philosophy of learning must lead the curriculum.”

In the 21st Century “the rewards of the good life will go to those who are most adaptable - who learn best. They will also go to those who learn to use and share the new world of interactive technology, instant communication, collaborative innovation and multimedia creativity.”

To that list I would add that the rewards will also go to those who learn to become emotionally, socially, instinctually, intellectually, physically and spiritually intelligent.

These are the clear goals of progressive education - an education that is needed for the 21st Century.

These are the goals we must reach if we are to become “a more creative, cooperative, sharing world society”. These are the true aims of education.

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Here's another page worth checking out -

Pupils under too much pressure to go to university say teachers

http://www.edge.co.uk/news/pupils-under-too-much-pressure-to-go-to-university-say-teachers

There is too much pressure placed on young pupils to head for university, teachers believe, and conversely, too little connection between schools and local businesses.

According to a new study from independent education foundation, Edge, two thirds of teachers think there is too much emphasis on pupils getting a degree at a traditional university while over a third (39%) of teachers feel their institutions still offer too little practical and vocational learning. Involvement with local businesses is seen as widely insufficient with fifty-nine per cent stating that their school or college does not offer enough opportunity for students to learn with local companies.

The study was conducted among over 1,000 teachers and FE lecturers in the state and independent sectors. Exploring their views on the current education system, it shows widespread teacher support for a greater emphasis on practical and vocational pathways – and broad agreement that these routes help pupils to succeed.

Andy Powell, Chief Executive of Edge said: “Teachers know large parts of the system are too academically biased, they recognise a balanced approach is better and they are tellingly concerned that local businesses have insufficient involvement in pupils’ learning in schools.

“We support the teachers’ views. There are many paths to success and we need a richer education with more real-world learning opportunities for young people. Change is beginning to happen, but things are moving too slowly. This generation will be working in a global economy and will have to deal with extraordinary challenges – we have to ensure they are properly equipped.”

The majority of teachers (59%) believe practical and vocational learning often leads to a good career, but they also recognise their knowledge of the qualifications available falls short when compared to their understanding of academic routes.

Edge is inviting the public at large and teachers to have their say on the education system and will feedback findings to politicians of the three main parties prior to the general election. Teachers can join the debate at edge.co.uk/revolution.

The research was conducted online by YouGov between 2nd-8th October 2009. Respondents were drawn from state secondary schools (712), independent schools (105) and sixth form/FE/tertiary education environments (131), making a total sample of 1,034.

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 How would you change the education system? 

http://www.edge.co.uk/revolution

Help revolutionise education now.
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Venice hit by high water

Flood waters engulfed the lagoon city of Venice leaving close to 45% of the historical centre under water

 Saw this on the Guardian website – amazing pictures of Venice under water.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/video/2009/nov/30/venice-flooding-under-water

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Disturbing reports about the national health service -

The worst NHS wards ... where safety is a lottery

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2009/nov/29/nhs-safety-hospitals-deaths

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Desert Island Discs – Morrisey

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006qnmr

For those who didn't know that DID is now available on iPlayer and podcast – wake up!

This piece from the Guardian about the Morrisey programme is less interesting than the comments afterwards on CiF -

http://www.guardian.co.uk/tv-and-radio/2009/nov/30/morrissey-desert-island-discs-kirsty

Morrissey: This charming Man Friday

http://www.guardian.co.uk/theobserver/2009/nov/29/observer-profile-morrissey

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Layer 233 . . . We Are The People . . . and All Our Futures

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And so to the movie – We Are The People We've Been Waiting For

Trailer - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VRi8_fXz1D8

A very impressive piece of work. Respect to Caroline Rowland who directed and co-produced.

A quick summary of its points of view?

We currently have a system of education that was shaped by 19th Century ideas that are now bankrupt as ideas suitable for the 21st century.

We still see a teacher as the person who 'knows it all'. Schools are full of 'static knowledge'. We should be preparing pupils for the emerging issues of our time. We live in a rapidly changing environment. Education should be the key to solving all our problems. Does our current schooling help? Does our education prepare children for the rest of their lives?

What is the best education? A love of learning for its own sake? How are children supposed to choose the right path for them to follow? What should they pursue? What experience and knowledge do they have of the world? Should they just stay safely in the mainstream?

Children are the planet's best natural resource. They need to be able to question what they see in the world around them – not just do as they're told. Our system programmes children to be compliant and to conform. We don't develop their creativity. We let their talents go to waste, remain undiscovered.

Thoughtful children believe they should be able to choose their own pathways. They should be able to find success in life in spite of academic failure. We fail to focus on children's strengths because of our obsession with the academic. We concern ourselves principally on their weaknesses, and try to address those academic weaknesses to the exclusion of all else. We are obsessed with standardised tests. Do we really want to turn out kids who have 10 'A' stars who are in many other respects complete 'toe-rags'?

We teach kids how to take tests -  we don't educate them. (Ken Robinson says our whole purpose in education seems to be to produce university professors.) The system is geared towards selecting small elites at the cost of the failure to properly educate all the others. We should be drawing out what is within our children, not stuffing inappropriate things into them.

No wonder so many of our children, both the able and the less able, lack engagement with their own learning and are sometimes physically and often mentally truant.

30,000 British kids leave school each year with NO GCSE passes. 140,000 leave with no grades higher than a D. They've effectively wasted their time in school.

In the USA each year there is $8 billion of crime related costs. 7,000 kids a day drop out of high school. Kids burn down schools  - resentful of their lack of opportunities and their wasted childhood. But they KNOW they have talents. We should be helping them to find the things they're good at, whilst helping them to overcome their weaknesses. They need to engage with more relevant and exciting forms of learning.

The head of education at Unicef says that education is merely used as a political football in unenlightened countries. We need to do something radically different. We need to reinvent our approach to education.

We need confident and creative thinkers. We need holistic education and learning. It's what affluent parents are already choosing for their children.

Too many children have family histories of total academic failure. We need to 'bring children back to life'. (Ken Robinson) We need 0% drop-out rates. We need intrinsic motivation to learn, and choice in our pathways to learning. We need 'mind and hand' learning together. The practical and the theoretical. This is how children learn best. Learning through doing.

We need to design new systems. We need to capture and channel children's instinctive spirit of risk-taking, and help them to become more independent and entrepreneurial. In our culture most children think only of 'getting a job'. This is even true for the most able. We need innovative and pro-active thinkers who know how to harness their own talents. Practical learning should have equal esteem with the theoretical and the academic. Why should practical skills have less respectability and esteem than essay-writing? Law and medicine, after all, are vocational qualifications. Children need theoretical AND applied knowledge.

We need to work with industry and businesses of every sort to show children the opportunities that are available to them, and to help them realise that  through lifelong learning they don't have to stick to one trade or craft or profession throughout life. Not if they are flexible, curious and eager to learn. Not if they are able to USE knowledge and have the ability to make good choices.

Why do we have hierarchies of subjects we study? Why are music and dance regarded as irrelevant and marginal? Why is maths so revered? Why can't young people choose studies that reflect their interests?

We need teachers who can communicate their passion and love of knowledge and learning, not subjects. We need teachers who are skilled in creative thinking and can pass on those skills.

We need a different pedagogic model. Are our teachers ever excited about what they do? We need teaching to be a highly respected profession, as it is in places like Finland.

The headteacher of Summerhill school believes schools should be helping children to grow into real people who are confident , self-assured and realistic. They also need to learn to take responsibility for themselves and their actions, their decisions. They need the confidence to research and to experiment.

As one pupil said, “It's nice being creative.” Having discovered the joy of creativity in one area, children begin to realise they can be creative in many areas, not 'stuck down one path forever'. Hairdressers can also be poets. Textile designers can also be singers and dancers and entrepreneurs.

We need to build a more suitable model of education. We need to consider the role of technology in unlocking potential. Technology can also empower teachers. School is no longer the source of information – it's a portal. We have to help pupils to find their own ways to learn. We need to provide different ways for pupils to reach their own goals. We need to make schools pupil-centric. We need mass customisation and the ability to tailor learning experiences.

Key skills and attitudes must include pride in oneself, ambition, self-direction, persistence, resilience and determination.

We need more than change. We need transformation. We need attention to human and spiritual needs.

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Congratulations to Caroline Rowland – the film's director and co-producer, and head of Moongate Films.

Having explained to Brother B in Nigeria my enthusiasm for the film, and having run through its key messages, he said, “So what? We knew all that already didn't we?” Indeed we did. But the film did a brilliant job in images and sound of bringing to life important ideas that can seem difficult and abstruse to non-specialists, to non-insiders. I just wonder what impact the film might have on the thousands of Guardian-reading professionals who take the time to sit down and watch it. Most young teachers, hothoused through their PGCEs, will never have encountered such a powerful evocation of what proper education can be like, and will never have been exposed to such a powerful challenge to re-imagine how schools might operate. Will they now demand change?

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Of course Oxzen has blogged about these ideas many times, and commended to readers Ken Robinson's arguments in favour of a transformation in the way we run schools and the curriculum. See also All Our Futures, especially Sir Ken's personal introduction.

Layer 171 – Education: A Whole Lot To Answer For.
http://oxzen.blogspot.com/2009/06/layer-171-education-whole-lot-to-answer.html

Layer 169 - . . . The Nuffield Review . . . (How Children Became Customers)
http://oxzen.blogspot.com/2009/06/layer-169-drummers-biddles-blears-and.html

All Our Futures – note – this has now been taken off the government website for education!  (http://www.dfes.gov.uk/naccce/index1.shtml)

Look here instead - 
http://www.cypni.org.uk/downloads/alloutfutures.pdf
http://www.culture.gov.uk/PDF/naccce.PDF

The Purpose of this Report

 In 1997, the Government published its White Paper Excellence in Schools. It described education as a vital investment in 'human capital' for the twenty-first century. It argued that one
of the problems in education is the low expectations of young people's abilities and that it is essential to raise morale, motivation and self esteem in schools. The main focus of the White Paper was on raising standards in literacy and numeracy.

But this will not be enough to meet the challenges that face education, and the White Paper recognised this. It also said:

If we are to prepare successfully for the twenty-first century we will have to do more than just improve literacy and numeracy skills. We need a broad, flexible and motivating education that recognises the different talents of all children and delivers excellence for everyone.

It emphasised the urgent need to unlock the potential of every young person and argued that Britain's economic prosperity and social cohesion depend on this.

By creative education we mean forms of education that develop young people's capacities for original ideas and action: by cultural education we mean forms of education that enable them to engage positively with the growing complexity and diversity of social values and ways of life. We argue that there are important relationships between creative and cultural education, and significant implications for methods of teaching and assessment, the balance of the school curriculum and for partnerships between schools and the wider world.

Our aim is to urge the need for a national strategy which engages the energies of all of these to provide the kind of education, in substance and in style, that all young people need now, and to enable them to face an uncertain and demanding future.

The business community wants education to give a much higher priority to promoting young people's creative abilities; to developing teamwork, social skills and powers of communication.

New technologies are providing unprecedented access to ideas, information, people and organisations throughout the world, as well as to new modes of creativity, personal expression, cultural exchange and understanding. The opportunities are considerable: and so are the difficulties.

Issues of creativity and of cultural development concern the whole of education. They are influenced by much more than the shape and content of the formal school curriculum. These
influences include methods of teaching; the ethos of schools, including the relationships between teachers and learners; and the national priorities that underpin the education service.
Our consultations suggest some tensions in current provision.

The key message of this report is the need for a new balance in education: in setting national priorities; in the structure and organisation of the school curriculum; in methods of teaching and assessment; in relationships between schools and other agencies. Over a number of years, the balance of education, in our view, has been lost. There has been a tendency for the national debate on education to be expressed as a series of exclusive alternatives, even dichotomies: for example, as a choice between the arts or the sciences; the core curriculum or the broad curriculum; between academic standards or creativity; freedom or authority in teaching methods. We argue that these dichotomies are unhelpful. Realising the potential of young people, and raising standards of achievement and motivation includes all of these elements.
Creating the right synergy and achieving the right balance in education is an urgent and complex task, from national policy making to classroom teaching.

Education throughout the world faces unprecedented challenges: economic, technological, social, and personal. Policy-makers everywhere emphasise the urgent need to develop 'human resources', and in particular to promote creativity, adaptability and better powers of communication.
We argue that this means reviewing some of the basic assumptions of our education system. New approaches are needed based on broader conceptions of young people's abilities, of how to promote their motivation and self-esteem, and of the skills and aptitudes they need. Creative and cultural education are fundamental to meeting these objectives.

There are many misconceptions about creativity. Some people associate creative teaching with a lack of discipline in education. Others see creative ability as the preserve of a gifted few, rather than of the many; others associate it only with the arts. In our view, creativity is possible in all areas of human activity and all young people and adults have creative capacities. Developing these capacities involves a balance between teaching skills and understanding, and promoting the
freedom to innovate, and take risks.

Creativity can be 'taught'. Teachers can be creative in their own teaching; they can also promote the creative abilities of their pupils. The roles of teachers are to recognise young
people's creative capacities; and to provide the particular conditions in which they can be realised. Developing creativity involves, amongst other things, deepening young people's cultural knowledge and understanding. This is essential both in itself and to promote forms of education which are inclusive and sensitive to cultural diversity and change.

Assessment and inspection have vital roles in raising standards of achievement in schools. But they must support and not inhibit creative and cultural education. There is a need for a new balance between different types of attainment target in the National Curriculum, and between the different forms and criteria of assessment and inspection. Raising standards should not mean standardisation, or the objectives of creative and cultural education will be frustrated.

We are not advocating creative and cultural education as alternatives to literacy and numeracy, but as equally relevant to the needs of this and of future generations. We support the need for high standards of literacy and numeracy. These are important in themselves. They can also enhance creative abilities: equally creative teaching and learning can enhance literacy and numeracy. These are complementary abilities, not opposing objectives.

Ability comes in many forms and should not be defined only by traditional academic criteria. Academic ability alone will no longer guarantee success or personal achievement.

Children with high academic ability may have other strengths that are often neglected. Children who struggle with academic work can have outstanding abilities in other areas. Equally, creative and cultural education of the sort we propose can also help to raise academic standards. The key is to find what children are good at. Self confidence and self esteem then tend to rise and overall performance improve. High standards in creative achievement require just as much rigour as traditional academic work.

We live in a fast moving world. While employers continue to demand high academic standards, they also now want more. They want people who can adapt, see connections, innovate,
communicate and work with others. This is true in many areas of work. The new knowledge-based economies in particular will increasingly depend on these abilities. Many
businesses are paying for courses to promote creative abilities, to teach the skills and attitudes that are now essential for economic success but which our education system is not designed to promote.

We are advocating a new balance between learning knowledge and skills and having the freedom to innovate and experiment - a system of education that fosters and channels the diverse abilities of young people and which gives everyone the opportunity to achieve on their own merits.

In publishing this report we believe with even more strength than we did at the outset, that the tasks we identify are urgent and the arguments compelling; that the benefits of success are enormous and the costs of inaction profound.

The foundations of the present education system were laid at the end of the nineteenth century. They were designed to meet the needs of a world that was being transformed by industrialisation. We are publishing this report at the dawn of a new century. The challenges we face now are of the same magnitude, but they are of a different character. The task is not to do better now what we set out to do then: it is to rethink the purposes, methods and scale of  education in our new circumstances. This report argues that no education system can be world-class without valuing and integrating creativity in teaching and learning, in the curriculum, in
management and leadership and without linking this to promoting knowledge and understanding of cultural change and diversity. The arguments and proposals that follow are to help set a course for the next century while addressing the urgent demands of the present.

It makes you wonder what the impact of this report would have been had someone bothered to make a film like this when All Our Futures was first published.
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Pycnopodia – the seastar – the star of this week's edition of 'Life' on BBC. A truly horrendous creature.

http://images.google.co.uk/images?hl=en&safe=off&client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla:en-GB:official&hs=6Wx&resnum=0&q=pycnopodia&um=1&ie=UTF-8&ei=D3QUS4u9ApKv4QaMzvzgBg&sa=X&oi=image_result_group&ct=title&resnum=4&ved=0CBkQsAQwAw

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The Art of Spain – Andrew Graham-Dixon

It seems incredible now to think that Franco kept Spain locked in a fascist dictatorship for the best part of 40 years, and the very first time I went to Spain he was still in power.

Last night's film about Spanish art highlighted the fact that Picasso lived and worked for most of his life in France because of Franco's dictatorship.

The film claimed that both Gaudi and Picasso produced work that focused on the tension between spirituality and sexuality, or carnality. Well it seems to me that's a whole blog in itself – does there have to be 'tension' between those two life forces, or can each of them be a direct pathway to the other? Aren't we all designed to be spiritual, sexual and 'intellectual'? Isn't the very interplay between those forces and faculties at the root of creativity? Isn't creativity itself an attempt to celebrate both spirituality and sexuality? And can't the warped and distorted expressions of each of them often inhibit and prevent the proper expression of the others?

I prefer 'interplay' to 'tension'.
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Layer 232 . . . Welcome To The Real World

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The Guardian had a curious "Advertisement Promotion" in it yesterday, a four-page spread called "Welcome to the Real World", wrapped around the Family section of the newspaper - for want of a better place.

It's there in the paper to draw attention to a DVD that was given away yesterday, and the front page of this 'promotion' says, "The world is changing, but our education system is not keeping pace. A new hard-hitting film calls for a fresh approach to learning."

As you probably know, Oxzen is very keen on fresh approaches to learning. Haven't had time to watch the DVD as yet, but will get round to it today. Be assured the next blog will reveal all.

In the meantime, here's a bit more blurb for you:

"The world is changing rapidly, but our education system is not keeping pace with these changes . . .

Young people need an education rich with opportunities for practical and vocational training, alongside traditional academic study. As Dr Cream Wright, (Cream?) global chief of education for Unicef says in a new film, "Schools fail to prepare young people for contemporary society, for the realities of the world we live in and, more significantly, for the emerging issues of our time".

The film We Are The People We've Been Waiting For, inspired and guided by Oscar-winning producer Lord Puttnam, looks at where the education system is going wrong and how we can address the issues that are of vital importance to everyone."

David Puttnam is definitely one of the good guys, so the film is probably well worth watching.

Have a look at this 'advertorial' -

http://www.guardian.co.uk/we-are-the-people/welcome-to-the-real-world
http://www.guardian.co.uk/we-are-the-people 

And it's on the Internet!

http://www.wearethepeoplemovie.com/....................................................

So what else has been happening in The Real World?

Simon Jenkins wrote another superb column that gets to the real heart of the matter as far as the banking disaster is concerned. Everyone needs to get their heads round this piece of reality.

Name, shame, blame the bankers, if you like. But they're the wrong target

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/nov/26/name-shame-bankers-wrong-target

Who said bankers "just don't get it"? They get it absolutely. Bankers are doing what they pay themselves to do, make money. They are performing what economists from Adam Smith to Karl Marx regarded as capitalism's sacred ritual, profiting by rigging markets and shedding risk. Like all professions, their first responsibility is to their peer group and their second to their shareholders. It is not their job to run the country, only sometimes to ruin it.

The banking community came a cropper last year but manoeuvred itself out of trouble by deploying the oldest trick in the book: claiming that the government needed them even more than they needed it. They were "too big to fail".

Ministers and regulators bought the gambit hook, line and sinker. They all hollered that bonuses were "ludicrous" (Darling), that banks had "lost sight of basic British values" (Brown) and were "antisocial" (Lord Turner). But it was all mouth. For them to accuse the banks of behaving obscenely might be a brief buzz, but what are a few insults to a banker on a roll?

It was not the banks that do not get it, but those on whom the public relies to guard its interests: Brown, Darling, Myners, King, Turner, the Treasury and the Financial Services Authority. The bankers this past year have played a blinder. Next month they will give themselves large bonuses while the nation troops to the dole office. They merit the order of the golden fleece, first class.

Then came today's report from the latest Hercules sent by Alistair Darling to clean the City's Augean stables, Sir David Walker of Goldman Sachs. He predictably concluded that nothing more than a feather duster was needed. He seemed to think that his fellow bankers would decamp en masse to Monaco if so much as rapped over the knuckles. So what?

As if that were not galling enough for the taxpayer, the supreme court – asked to adjudicate on the racketeering of banks towards overdraft customers – stepped forward to pat them on the head. The judges said it seemed fine to them and went off to make daisy chains in Parliament Square.

Nobody but a fool believes that a free market in anything, left to its own devices, will tend to perfect competition. Economic history attests that it tends to monopoly. That is why it must be regulated. Such regulation, in every sphere of economic life, is democracy's most onerous but essential responsibility. In the case of British banking in 2008, the government's clear duty was to ensure that marketplace discipline curbed the emergence of a debt bubble and that no residual liability, let alone one for some £1.3 trillion, should fall on the state.

Last year was a tragic failure of that responsibility and not one person in authority has accepted blame. The best-told stories might be of millionaire salaries, fancy derivatives, subprimes and sports cars; but what mattered was the denouement, saddling every man, woman and child in Britain with unprecedented levels of lifetime debt. This will be paid for in unemployment and higher taxation in the short term, and in a lower standard of living for the foreseeable future. The bank crash was a national disaster, the economic equivalent of Munich and appeasement.

Ministers have spent the past year propping up toxic debt, but not the British economy, which lurched deep into recession. They did nothing to help it, apart from brief and bizarre assistance to the car market. This was at a time when governments across the world were racing to prop up consumer demand, successfully speeding recovery. It was as if Britain was a one-industry town, that of banking.

Darling and his colleagues were clearly out of their depth. Public money was being spent on an unprecedented scale, with no one in charge knowing where it was going. Where were the public auditors? Still no one has explained the meaning of the much-parroted phrase, too big to fail. A failed bank may be a terrible thing, but then so is an economy crippled by long-term debt service. Which is worse? Why did nobody ever ask?

I find it simply incredible that a chancellor can take over a trillion pounds of public money, some of it in secret, without giving a remotely plausible account of why it was risked as it was, rather than in boosting consumer demand. At present the Chilcot inquiry is asking past ministers and officials why they went to war in Iraq. The reason is that war kills people. What happened to the banks last year did not kill people, but in every other sense it was a seismic event in the history of Britain's political economy. It was a true collapse in political authority. I wonder when someone will stop abusing bankers and fix on those really to blame.

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The other Big Event of last week to catch up with is the start of the Chilcot Inquiry - the Iraq Inquiry. Simon Jenkins, again, injects a dose of reality:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/nov/24/blair-chilcot-inquiry-parliament-iraq

We want Blair's head. But Chilcot won't give it to us

Britain's political community, bored at having to wait six months for an election, is baying for blood. The nation may lack bread, but at least it can have a circus.

It even has a star Christian, Tony Blair, who got us into the mess. The cry is for him to die, and die horribly. The camera must toy with his face in the dock, zooming in on the dripping brow, the writhing body language, the phoney meekness and the mendacity. Damned as a war criminal, Blair must be hung, drawn and quartered and his head impaled on a spike at Temple Bar. He must be Chamberlain after Munich, Eden after Suez. There must be nothing left of him but a puddle of sweat.

The same goes for the rest of them, Gordon Brown, the cabinet, John Scarlett, Alastair Campbell, civil servants, generals, bag carriers and tea ladies. Kill them all. The amphitheatre is packed with MPs and journalists, salivating as the gore runs into the sand. Not Nero in all his pomp staged a show like this one.

What else is Chilcot about? We know the truth. The report can be written in a sentence. Tony Blair went to war in Iraq because he lacked the guts to stand up to George Bush, say the invasion was not justified by facts or law, and refuse to join him in Baghdad. Despite being told to his face by Hans Blix that there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, he deceived the cabinet and parliament and took his nation to war.

................................................................

Morrisey and Zen

Morrisey was on Desert Island Discs today, and he was reasonably interesting - though most of what he said we already knew. His choice of music was less than inspirational.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00p068y

For his luxury he chose a bed, which was original. He reckons he prefers to be on his own for most of the time, and says that going to bed is the highlight of everyone's day.

Kirsty was obviously a fan in her youth.


Commenting on his manner and his attitude, she said, "I don't want to use the word Zen . . . but at 50 you seem less spikey, more reflective and thoughtful, and at ease with yourself."

Which is an interesting, inaccurate and very common interpretation of what Zen is about.

Zen is really concerned with helping us to see through to the reality of things, and having seen reality we may well be motivated to become more energised, more challenging , and less 'laid back' if we feel moved to try to do something about the condition of the world.

See also:

http://oxzen.blogspot.com/2008/04/layer-14-zen-buddhism-breaking-chain.html
http://oxzen.blogspot.com/2008/04/layer-18-nature-of-reality-redefining.html
http://oxzen.blogspot.com/2008/04/layer-20-fully-evolved-humans.html
http://oxzen.blogspot.com/2008/04/layer-12-spiritual-intelligence.html
http://oxzen.blogspot.com/2008/04/layer-23-zen-abd-art-of-everything.html
http://oxzen.blogspot.com/2008/04/layer-24-chopping-wood-carrying-water.html
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Layer 231 . . . Ofsted is Failing . . . Comment is Free

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We're nearing the end of Let's Kick Ofsted week, so here's another selection of colourful and concise comments from the Guardian's Comment Is Free pages.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2009/nov/23/flawed-ofsted-fails-inspections?

HappyBirthday
23 Nov 2009, 1:38PM
It's about time this ridiculous regime was seen for what it is. It's anecdotal evidence, but I bet it's easily repeated all over the country. Ofsted go into schools having already decided which schools have failed.

 My friend was deemed inadequate because two 10 year old boys decided they wanted the same ruler for a few seconds (bickering politely in whispers so the class was not disturbed!). They sorted it out amongst themselves (one decided to use another ruler) and did not interrupt the lesson. In fact, they finished all their work as directed and worked hard. The teacher was at the other end of the classroom and hadn't noticed as all equipment had been provided to groups before the lesson. The Inspector focused on this as the only incident of the teacher not having control of the class. She was failed despite the whole class working hard and there being no other incident in the lesson. Ofsted are just unaccountable bullies.

scodman
23 Nov 2009, 1:43PM
What more can one expect from a government obsessed with spin, news management and tomorrow's headlines.
Almost every time I sit down to my boiled egg and open the newspaper, I read of a new education initiative. Perhaps this Government now thinks that it is part of the media and, like newspapers, needs to come up with a new headline every day.
Isn't it time that the whole quangocracy was booted out and a system devised that leaves education to teachers and parents? It must be freed once and for all from the pernicious machinations of Labour's Ministry of Social Engineering.

bitzadog 
23 Nov 2009, 1:50PM
HMI was once a serious and respected organisation. The process of politicising its replacement OFSTED began with the Tories and the pompous idiot Woodenhead, but its now made worse by the ludicrous stretch of its role to include social work with children. Yet another self inflicted bullet in the foot of a government of which teachers and social workers once had some hope. Tragic.
 
dukeofmarlborough
23 Nov 2009, 1:55PM
So our benevolent bully government have invented yet another bloated, centralised bullying check box system which has actually turned out to be a total waste of money, a demoralising episode for workers who are already underpaid and overworked...........well there's a surprise.

mawbags
23 Nov 2009, 2:11PM
Measuring, Targets, Performance
Have destroyed every facet of public service with this ridiculous obsession with measuring the unmeasurable. They reward cheating and exploitation and force people not to see fit what to do with what is presented in front of them, but are forced to act in ways to achieve imaginary points.

asheroy
23 Nov 2009, 2:49PM
This appalling organisation should have been scrapped long ago. The voice used for propagating so called "best practice" as devised by the morons in government and relayed down the line by fools who cannot stand up in a class without falling over their monopoly flags of truth.
For too many tears we have lived with these talentless meglomaniacs inspiring an education system based on targets, form filling, one size fits all pedagogy and a wealth of exams which measure nothing.

socialistMike
23 Nov 2009, 3:19PM
Sickening, but all too bloody predictable, seeing tories blame Labour for Ofsted. It was a tory creation, developed to get rid of local democratic accountability that we used to have under the Local Education Authorities. It has always been weilded as a politcal tool to hammer the education system. The whole idea was corrupted from the start. Like league tables there was always a dual aim behind the policy - to rank schools and to allocate funding on that basis. We need to seperate these two things since, quite obviously, in any rational world not dominated by the interests of the richest, funding should go to the schools that need help most, not take money away because a school happens to have a greater than average number of poor students, and thus a greater than average need in educational terms.

Instead of abolishing this unfair, arbitrary and undemocratic setup New Labour not only continued it but retained that elitist Chris Woodhead - a man who hates public eduction as a concept, it seems - as its head. Another pathetic Blairite triangulation that lost them support in one of their real heartlands - the teaching profession and won 0 tory voters to new labour (tories don't care about education, only making it more class biased).
Let's go back to local democratic control of education again and have a good school in every neighbourhood as our aim, and end the poisonous involvement of rich and fundamentalist zealots in education.

FishKid
23 Nov 2009, 3:29PM
I am a Secondary school teacher in London.
I lost my faith in Ofsted, finally, the day it came in and awarded the school in which I work an "excellent curriculum" - this is a school where the curriculum has narrowed so much that pupils can drop Art/History/Languages at the age of thirteen and where Work-Related Learning/ and various BTEC courses rule all. I've spoken with kids who cannot even recall conducting an actual experiment in a Science lesson - to give you some idea - they just watch video recordings of them.
Ofsted is guilty of many things, but it is the watering down of subject choices in pursuit of League Table glory which is destroying meaningful education. Just as long as kids get GCSE grade Cs in English and Maths - that's all that matters.

People would weep if they knew what was going on. Happily for those who
perpetuate this culture, the average parent is quite easy to hoodwink.

dunmaglass
23 Nov 2009, 4:53PM
I know a school in Solihull that has been wrecked by a Headteacher who's only concern was passing OFSTEDs. The kids are out of control, the best teachers have deserted her mad regime, and all that matters in this school is pulling the wool over the eyes of the OFSTED inspectors which she has managed to do three times.
I suspect there are many schools just like this one.
Many new Heads have been selected by Authorities because on interview they convince Local Authority inspectors, and the ignorant mass of school governors, that they have the wherewithall to get the school through OFSTEDs.
Now wonder education is in such a bloody mess!

Downing
23 Nov 2009, 5:01PM
1 Ofsted was created by Ken Clarke
2 They used to be led by highly trained Registered Inspectors with a long history of successful teaching 3 Inspections used to comprise a team of 4-16 in a school for 3-5 full days
4 All aspects, subjects and teachers were inspected.
5 A Parents' summary and value for money statement was given in the report.
Now
1 1/2 inspectors are in for 1/2 days
2 Inspectors have very little experience in inspecting all aspects of the school
3 Few lessons are observed and only a small sample of teachers, thus their experience is diminished and thus their expertise
4 No value for money statement is provided in the report which is about two pages long.
I personally challenged the judgements of an Ofsted inspection in 2007 (350 children inspected by 1 inspector in 1 day). It took over a year to prove my case through the use of Freedom of Information Act (I was a Registered inspector for 15 years and retired in 2004 disgusted at the new regime). Finally, the Adjudicator agreed with me that the inspection was poor and the school should be reinspected. I am still waiting for the re-inspection and parents have been duped now for two years.

deborahlewis
23 Nov 2009, 5:04PM
I have been a primary school teacher in various roles for 17 years. The curriculum is geared towards passing SATS and OFSTED. The children are suffering, the curriculum is not child centred. We are not educating chilren, we are schooling them. It is an educational abuse of childrens minds.

Fozzie
23 Nov 2009, 8:33PM
I know a primary school that came very near the top of its local LEA league table--in terms of value added--this year that has been put into special measures. The head, advisors and other heads in the borough were astounded. And even the inspectors were embarrassed saying that the new regime leaves them with no option.
The new inspection regime brought in by Balls is grossly unjust because the weighting given to value added has been vastly reduced. And as the article states, schools cannot be rated good if they have low exam results--no matter how much valued they have added.
Schools in sink estate areas where exam results tend to be low are now in an impossible situation. No matter much they succeed in pushing up value added, they can, and are, being put into special measures if test results are low. This has created an immense morale crisis.

AniBrooker
23 Nov 2009, 8:59PM
OFSTED inspectors are draconian torture for teachers, students and any kind of residual ethos of free-thinking within education.
I have a tendency to waffle but where these people are concerned, after watching them maul my school and its mostly wonderful staff to pieces, it is very simple:
Go away - and never, ever return.

Devongooner
23 Nov 2009, 8:59PM
I have been a teacher for 26 years. I have been through many HMI and Ofsted inspections. My main gripe with Ofsted is the lack of constructive feedback to individuals. I have never had any useful or helpful comment from an inspector. So the exercise is NOT about making teachers better.

It does not help schools identify weaknesses, any decent school will know this already.
The new style inspections are even worse. Ofsted visit the school for TWO days (inspections ARE expensive, so lets cut the number of days and get the school to do loads of the paperwork in advance!), how can they possibly get an accurate impression in that time? Some comments above about how schools can 'put on a show' for the inspectors, papering over the cracks are spot on.

Ajay100
23 Nov 2009, 11:23PM
The greatest disservice to education was the removal of HMI through the introduction of Ofsted.
HMI had credibility and above all a sense of wisdom that left schools feeling valued. School improvement was presented within a positive framework. Schools were encouraged to develop and were supported.
Professionally if there were enough bravery amongst out leadership teams in our schools we could bring this system to its knees . . .

AdamTut
24 Nov 2009, 9:03AM
"I'm sorry if this is going to upset some people but as a parent I'm glad Ofsted is out there inspecting, because there's no one else doing it."
With respect, Realistic, you've missed the point of most of the comments above. It's not that teachers or parents don't want inspections - it's that they want inspections that are helpful, evidence-based, and conducted by experts, not driven by box-ticking and hoop jumping, and that actually contribute in a meaningful way to children's welfare. As did HMI in its day.
I'm a parent too, as well as a school governor, and I can assure you that Ofsted inspections for the most part have precisely the opposite effect to what is intended - not because teachers and schools don't want to be inspected, but because inspections are ludicrously bureaucratic, look at the wrong things, and are clearly driven by political expediency rather than by any real desire to improve children's education and safety.

petecrockett
24 Nov 2009, 1:10PM
In response to Realistic Parent . . .  Finland disproves your argument. One of the best education systems in the world without an overbearing inspectorate, league tables or testing.

BlueH
25 Nov 2009, 10:32AM
I have a wife and daughter both teachers and both being made painfully aware by their LAs that their looming Ofsted inspections are likely to downgrade them from their ratings at previous inspections, or worse, put them in special measures purely on the basis of "failing to safeguard children" . Stories abound of schools being put straight into special measures on day 1 of inspections, regardless of how good they are educationally. This purely on one persons subjective view on one aspect of the school's performance. I know of another school where a manager at a meeting of the management team said they had never known such a tense depressed atmosphere pervading the whole team, purely because of this issue. For teachers striving to do their utmost in difficult schools often with very challenging children, this is one more piece of stress they don't need.

Now of course no-one is suggesting children should be anything but safe, but have our schools suddenly become such dark and dangerous places? Of course not. So why is this witch hunt happening? Well this is the organisation who gave Haringey childcare dept a favourable report just after Baby P died and for which they were roundly criticised. Ofsted are just symptomatic of our blame culture society and are now ensuring they cover their own backsides, but at what cost? Demoralised and stressed heads and teachers distracted from their real job of educating our children, with Schools reluctant to do anything that smacks of risk or innovation.
Recruitment of Primary Heads is already in crisis, soon it will be a job nobody wants with consequent impact on standards.

wildskel
I agree with pretty much all I read above- I'm a primary teacher in a school in a very deprived area. we got ofsteded in June under the old system and had some character who probably hadn't been in front of a class come in and "observe" me for 20 minutes before making his judgement. I declined his offer for feedback, much to his surprise but what did he really know either about me and my teaching, the children, or in fact about teaching per se?

So the new system takes no account of local deprivation etc etc etc this being seen by the bloated irrelevance as "excuses" or a slacker's charter.. well, we may as well give up now- I know that for most of the children in my school "learning" and "personalised learning" and "excellence and enjoyment" and all the other little aphorisms churned out by ed balls and his chums are way down the hierarchy of needs- a good square meal, a wash and not getting verbally abused at home (or worse) come way before that.
It's high time professionals in education grew a pair and just refused to co-operate with the irrelevant, punitive self serving industry of "inspection". C'mon the revolution starts here!
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Layer 230 . . . Accountability, Ofsted, ResPublica, Trust, The Boat Race and the Human Race.

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In the news today, the big question – have the water companies been handing out enormous profits to shareholders, when they should have been re-investing them in service improvements, and indeed cutting charges to consumers? Hello? Do bears shit in the woods?

The new Tory guru, one Phillip Blond, is today launching his very own think tank – ResPublica. Mr Blond (sounds like a character from Reservoir Dogs) has had a big thunk about the “Trust Economy”, and says that we need to reconsider how we approach 'public accountability'  - replacing oppressive bureaucracy with 'trust' and the presumption of efficiency and effectiveness unless clear evidence becomes available through 'normal' scrutiny by clients and the public.

Interesting idea. Especially in an era where bankers and financiers, and water companies, as well as politicians and senior civil servants, have shown themselves to be completely untrustworthy. Still – it's clear we need to become a more trusting society, and for that the happen there needs to be a revolution in the consciousness of those who have completely fallen down in this respect.

On the other hand, the vast majority of public service professions can certainly be trusted to manage their own affairs, through peer-review, etc, and ought not to suffer oppressive management and scrutiny by layers of highly paid bureaucrats and ignorant politicians.

http://www.respublica.org.uk/
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/6636282/David-Cameron-and-Red-Torys-promise-to-heal-Britain-through-community-values.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Res_publica
http://therespublica.org/

….....................................

Guardian letters

Time to exclude Ofsted from schools

Ofsted is a creature of New Labour's obsession with raising standards by central micromanagement enforced by ruthless inspection: it fails to accept that social deprivation can mean that, however hard-working and committed the teachers and social workers are, the "expected" standards cannot be reached overnight (Flawed Ofsted fails barrage of inspections, 23 November). Ofsted provides an ineffective form of accountability. Its £70m could be better spent.

Eight objections to Ofsted are set out at www.free-school-from-government-control.com/Ofsted.html. These show how it acts as a ruthless enforcer of inept government policies with a narrow vision which totally fails to take account of local circumstances, that it is fear-inducing in a way alien to most teachers and social workers, that it undermines their professional status, fails to provide support to those needing it, and there is a dearth of firm evidence that it has succeeded in raising educational standards.

A spokesman says that current criticisms are not in accord with what frontline workers are telling them. Who tells a dragon that its breath is too hot?

Michael Bassey
Emeritus professor of education, Nottingham Trent University

It is to be hoped that the MPs' report on Ofsted will be a firm nail in this laughable watchdog's coffin. Having experienced several inspections, I was appalled at the subjective and occasionally inane comments used to grade my teaching and that of the schools I have taught in.

Christine Gilbert confirmed my worst suspicions when she said Ofsted might ask students if they are bored as a means of analysing a school. Any educationist, parent or indeed student knows that if you catch a pupil on a bad day or if they have lingering resentments against a teacher, they will give any response necessary to denigrate him or her.

Those of us concerned about good education must never lose a chance to remind people that Ofsted is a political creation whose purpose is to remove accountability from elected officials.

We need to return to a sane and fair way of providing environments where teachers teach and children learn.

Michael Ayers

Ofsted's inspection methodology is flawed not only for its imbalanced reliance on paper, form-filling and abstracted data (ie without adequate context) but because its judgments are never moderated. The five private companies that carry out the inspections are never asked to look at the same institution independently of each other as a most basic check on their reliability.

The result is an unaccountable quango, highly susceptible to government pressure, the individual prejudices of its inspectors and the need of the inspection companies to conform to government expectations in order to get their contracts renewed. Ofsted's recent volte-face with Haringey council after the Baby Peter tragedy is a case in point.

Keith Lichman
Campaign for State Education

…..........................................

www.free-school-from-government-control.com/Ofsted.html

Why Ofsted Inspection Of Schools Should Be Abolished

It is clear from the evidence that there is tremendous and grave concern about SATs, Ofsted and, to a lesser extent, the national curriculum - across the teaching profession and the research community. Each has served its purpose in the past, but now, for the sake of effective education of the children in our schools, should be taken off the statute book. This section sets out the main arguments against inspection of schools by the Office for Standards in Education.

Ofsted has contributed to a culture of compliance under which schools and teachers prepare for evaluation out of fear rather than commitment and enthusiasm. National Union of Teachers (2004)
What school leaders need is not more pressure and constantly moving goalposts, but an environment that trusts them as professionals to do the job they were employed to do. … Ofsted is part of the problem, not the solution. John Dunford, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders (2006)

…..............................................

Campaign for State Education

http://www.campaignforstateeducation.org.uk/
….................................................

Kate Humble spoke very eloquently on R4 today about how much she disliked her own schooldays, and hated having to go through a system that cared only about processing children through tests, due to the obsession with league tables.

“One of life’s great joys is dancing naked in the sun. It makes me feel so good. Even now, there are all sorts of places in the world where you can take your clothes off and not be seen”. -- Kate Humble

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kate_Humble

….................................................

The Boat Race and the Human Race

I really like my multicultural neighbourhood, where you can see in my local newsagent copies of the Wall Street Journal sandwiched between copies of the Morning Star and the Socialist Worker; where the Guardians lie slightly to the right of them, but to the left of the Times, the Sun and the Sport. For some unknown reason - which now that I come to think about it I'll have to look into - the Mails sit on the counter, alongside the local rag and the evening sub-standard.

So – back to the papers.

Richard Williams had his usual excellent column on the back page of the sport section yesterday, which isn't his usual slot. He was writing about the Boat Race.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/blog/2009/nov/24/boat-race-sponsorship-oxford-cambridge

You may be as surprised as I was to discover the existence of something called the Boat Race Company. This week its chairman emerged to announce that, after 180 years of being identified by a simplest possible title, the annual Putney-to-Mortlake eight‑oared rowing contest between Oxford and Cambridge will be known from this day forward as the Xchanging Boat Race.

Bizarrely, or so it must seem to today's legions of marketing executives, for the vast majority of its history the race managed to get along quite nicely without the benefit of a sponsor or even a limited company dedicated to its upkeep.

Personally, I could never see the excuse for taking any sponsorship money at all for this event. The crews are composed of undergraduate and post-graduate students, whom the universities should be able to supply with the necessary boats, boathouses and coaches. Not much else should be required, you might think.

It was patiently explained to me yesterday that the annual costs include paying top coaches to create crews of "world-class standard", buying a new boat every couple of years at £30K a pop, subsidising the cost of morning and afternoon training six days a week from September to April, paying the Port of London Authority to clear the river of debris on training and race days, and hiring giant screens for the spectators.

But why do Boat Race crews, who exist only to race against each other, with no need of external yardsticks, have to be of "world-class standard"? Why can't they make their boats last longer? Why do we expect students to behave like professional sportsmen when they ought to be attending their lectures and tutorials? Why can't the river authorities bear the cost of preparing the Tideway for an event that enhances London's standing as a tourist destination? Rather than training on the course, wouldn't it be more fun to get the oarsmen to treat it like a French unseen? And why should the spectators be given additional viewing facilities that deprive them of the ancient thrill of watching the two distant specks grow larger until their identities can be distinguished?

Of course I know the fundamental answer, which is that the universities have grown to depend on the tuition fees paid by post-graduate students from abroad, who are mostly 6ft 7in, 220lb giants in their mid-30s, with Olympic medals already in their possession, plenty of time on their hands and very little interest in, say, deciphering the Oxyrhynchus Papyri.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxyrhynchus

Looking back from the future, decades from now (?), people in more moral societies will feel a deep sense of digust that so much money was squandered on futile and inane nonsense like boat races and spectator conveniences when the planet was in such dire straits with millions struggling to survive, and indeed millions dying from hunger, disease and starvation.

We live in a global village, we know full well what happens in every part of the village, and yet we behave as though the people at the other end of our village don't even exist as they cry out for help and support, whilst we get on with our ludicrous and outrageous over-consumption of things that take us away from developing and fulfilling ourselves as human beings.


By all means let's have boat races if we must, but let's boycott everything that reeks of the commercialisation of a thing that ought to be cheap, cheerful and joyful, as opposed to expensive, grim and dull.
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Layer 229 . . . Domestic Violence, Government Nonsense, Born Free, Human Rights, Olympic Stories and Hackney Wick

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Domestic Violence and Education

Our bloody bogus government is at it again. This week's education initiative is to announce that every child in England and Wales is to be taught that domestic violence is not acceptable. What! This is a scheme that a psychopath would dream up . . . for dealing with other psychopaths. And even then it wouldn't work. It wouldn't make a jot of difference.

Even psychopaths KNOW that hurting other people isn't acceptable. Neither is manipulating, threatening or deceiving. However, it doesn't stop them hurting other people, because they have an inability and an unwillingness to empathise with others, and a total lack of concern about anyone except themselves. Besides, many of them actively enjoy hurting other people - especially people who annoy them, or refuse to bow down to their demands, or fight back.

We all KNOW that domestic violence isn't bloody acceptable. We all KNOW that bullying isn't acceptable. Neither is unkindness, or rudeness, or unfairness. KNOWING these things, however, isn't the issue.

The problem is that our school system doesn't even set out to seriously address social, emotional and spiritual intelligence. Teachers are not trained in how to help children develop these key intelligences, though many teachers do their best to persuade children to be kind and thoughtful and reasonable - for instance during token 'circle times' and assemblies slotted in between literacy hours, numeracy hours and PE.

The government's initiative won't do anything to help matters either, and may make things worse if more and more pupils become pissed off with having to sit and listen to platitudes and statements of the bleeding obvious and decide that giving someone a good slap would be an act of rebellion and therefore 'cool' - in the same way that they deliberately go out and use drugs after a tedious session of anti-drugs 'education'.

The government's announcement is pathetic and bogus and totally worthless. As if teachers don't already make clear to kids that ANY kind of violence is unacceptable in a civilised society. The point is, what kind of schooling is required in order that from the very beginning of their time in school children learn not only that violence is unacceptable but also have opportunities every day to develop the skills and attitudes required to become non-violent and emotionally, socially and spiritually intelligent?

Don't bother asking Ed Balls that question. He wouldn't have a clue. And in any case he's far too busy pursuing the only educational agenda that New Labour has ever really had: attainment, attainment, attainment.

----------------------------------------------------

We Are All Born Free

Julian Rhind-Tutt and an all-star cast narrate an animated film about the Universal Declaration of Human Rights

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/video/2008/oct/31/amnesty-human-rights-film

....................................................

Olympic Stories – Hackney Wick

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/davehillblog/video/2009/nov/19/2012-olympics-hackney-wick

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Layer 228 . . . Life Begins At . . .

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Remember when people used to talk about life beginning at 40? Channel 4 are currently running a series of programmes called Life Begins at 60.

I guess the meaning of this expression used to be that after passing the age of 40 people usually had more confidence, more money, more opportunities for self-expression and enjoyment, etc. Child rearing used to be pretty much over by that age, and more freedom and autonomy were potentially on offer. Even if you were still responsible for kids, they were normally past the stage of needing constant attention and supervision by the time you reached 40.

Of course life could still be wonderful before the age of 40, but as a young(ish) adult you were still in many ways a work in progress, and not fully formed. Becoming a mature human being, and possibly at one with yourself and the world - self-actualised as it were - was something to look forward to, and a thing to appreciate when you got there.

With the passing of the decades and the Americanisation of our society, people tend to work harder, commute further, work longer hours and become more exhausted. These days many people no longer feel in control of their lives, as they career ever-onward with their careers and their busy, busy existences, getting and spending money, trying to keep their heads above water.

For many people these days a new life can begin at 60(ish), in the sense that post-retirement they can finally get out of the rat race and start to fully enjoy their lives. Not having to spend time doing zillions of things you'd much rather not be doing, you can finally focus on the things that really matter, whatever they may be. Even for those who love their work, their profession and their careers, there can be a huge benefit in starting to live differently, away from a lifetime of duties and responsibilities.

I mentioned in Layer 226 Jeff Koons's remark, “We should follow our interests and focus on them. There's nothing else you can do in life.” Which is all very well, but being a committed professional, or just someone who's trying earn money so that their family can live well, may well mean that many other interests have to fall by the wayside. Post-retirement, people really can follow their true interests, whether or not they're able to make money from them.

http://oxzen.blogspot.com/2009/11/layer-226-thick-of-it-game-of-politics.html

…............................................

How much money is enough?
By Robert Skidelsky

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/nov/22/maynard-keynes-wealth-economics

In 1930, Keynes predicted that by 2030, we'd be working a 15-hour week. But he underestimated our appetite for wealth

The economic downturn has produced an explosion of popular anger against bankers' "greed" and their "obscene" bonuses. This has accompanied a wider critique of "growthmanship" – the pursuit of economic growth or the accumulation of wealth at all costs, regardless of the damage it may do to the earth's environment or to shared values.

John Maynard Keynes addressed this issue in 1930, in his little essay "Economic Possibilities for our Grandchildren". Keynes predicted that in 100 years – that is, by 2030 – growth in the developed world would, in effect, have stopped, because people would "have enough" to lead the "good life." Hours of paid work would fall to three a day – a 15-hour week. Human beings would be more like the "lilies of the field, who toil not, neither do they spin."

Keynes's prediction rested on the assumption that, with a 2% annual increase in capital, a 1% increase in productivity, and a stable population, average standards of living would rise eight times on average. This enables us to work out how much Keynes thought was "enough." GDP per head in the United Kingdom in the late 1920s (before the 1929 crash) was roughly £5,200 ($8,700) in today's value. Accordingly, he estimated that a GDP per capita of roughly £40,000 ($66,000) would be "enough" for humans to turn their attention to more agreeable things.

It is not clear why Keynes thought eight times the average British national income per head would be "enough." Most likely he took as his standard of sufficiency the bourgeois rentier income of his day, which was about 10 times that of the average worker.

Eighty years on, the developed world has approached Keynes's goal. In 2007 (ie, pre-crash), the IMF reported that average GDP per head in the United States stood at $47,000, and at $46,000 in the UK. In other words, the UK has had a five-fold increase in living standards since 1930.

It is likely that Keynes's "target" of $66,000 will be achieved for most western countries by 2030.

But it is equally unlikely that this achievement will end the insatiable hunt for more money. Let's assume, cautiously, that we are two-thirds of the way towards Keynes's target. We might therefore have expected hours of work to have fallen by about two-thirds. In fact they have fallen by only one-third – and have stopped falling since the 1980s.

This makes it highly improbable that we will reach the three-hour working day by 2030. It is also unlikely that growth will stop – unless nature itself calls a halt. People will continue to trade leisure for higher incomes.
Keynes underestimated the weight of “relative” needs, especially as societies got richer, and, of course, the power of advertising to create new wants, and thus induce people to work in order to earn the money to satisfy them. As long as consumption is conspicuous and competitive, there will continue to be fresh reasons to work.

Keynes did not entirely ignore the social character of work. "It will remain reasonable," he wrote, "to be economically purposive for others after it has ceased to be reasonable for oneself." The wealthy had a duty to help the poor.

Keynes did not really confront the problem of what most people would do when they no longer needed to work. He writes: "It is a fearful problem for the ordinary person, with no special talents, to occupy himself, especially if he no longer has roots in the soil or in custom or in the beloved conventions of a traditional economy." But, since most of the rich – "those who have an independent income but no associations or duties or ties" have "failed disastrously" to live the "good life," why should those who are currently poor do any better?

Here I think Keynes comes closest to answering the question of why his "enough" will not, in fact, be enough. The accumulation of wealth, which should be a means to the "good life," becomes an end in itself because it destroys many of the things that make life worth living. Beyond a certain point – which most of the world is still far from having reached – the accumulation of wealth offers only substitute pleasures for the real losses to human relations that it exacts.

Finding the means to nourish the fading "associations or duties or ties" that are so essential for individuals to flourish is the unsolved problem of the developed world, and it is looming for the billions who have just stepped on to the growth ladder. George Orwell put it well: "All progress is seen to be a frantic struggle towards an objective which you hope and pray will never be reached."

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There are several interesting responses to this on the Guardian's CiF, including,

gloriana

I would love an explanation from Dr Skidelsky -- or anyone else -- of the apparently insatiable need of the rich to acquire more and more wealth. What human being, what family even, needs billions of dollars or pounds to live a good, comfortable, secure, even luxurious life? There seems to be something which impels millionaires and billionaires to go on adding to their fortunes ad infinitum -- or perhaps I should say ad nauseam -- regardless of how much actual use it can be to them.
This does not arise from envy on my part -- at nearly 80 I have enough money for my needs and don't want any more. I am just intensely curious and desirous of understanding this strange phenomenon.

princesschipchops

I know quite a few people earning what I consider large amounts of money. None of them are particularly happy but they are all considerably happier than the people I know who are living on paltry benefits and being treated like criminals by the DWP.

The happiest I know (not a scientific survey obviously) are those who have medium or even low - but not appallingly low - incomes and time to spend on family and friends.

As someone who has been forced out of the rat race by illness I know when I re join it it will be on a part time basis and hopefully doing something that I enjoy.

We only have one life. Unfortunately those struggling to earn more and more and more and voting to keep more and more of that wealth all to themselves are not only ruining their own lives - they are messing it up for the rest of us.

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Layer 227 . . . Flawed Ofsted Fails Inspections

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Today's post is going to consist solely of a reprint of an article in today's Guardian, by Polly Curtis, the paper's excellent education editor.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2009/nov/23/flawed-ofsted-fails-inspections


Ofsted fails barrage of inspections

Schools watchdog mauled as critics bite back at 'wasteful' bureaucracy

Ofsted is facing a crisis in public confidence as it comes under a series of attacks on its authority this week, with the watchdog accused of being "flawed, wasteful and failing".

The children's services inspectorate will be criticised today by service heads in every local authority in the country, headteachers' leaders and in a damning forthcoming report by MPs on the government's school accountability system.

Its new inspection regime is accused of forcing social work departments to focus on passing inspections instead of looking after children, giving good schools mediocre ratings on routine technical matters – such as fences not being high enough – and more claims that sub-contracted inspectors are not fit for the job.

Pressure further intensifies on the watchdog as a former chief inspector of Ofsted, Sir Mike Tomlinson, today suggests it is struggling after a major expansion two years ago to include responsibility for inspecting children's services as well as schools and childcare.

The attacks come as Christine Gilbert, the chief inspector at Ofsted, prepares to publish the watchdog's own annual report tomorrow after arguably the most difficult year in its history, during which it has been battered by accusations of failings in the Baby Peter case and struggled with its controversial new inspection regimes.

Tomlinson, a respected government adviser who led Ofsted between 2000 and 2002, today raises new questions about Ofsted's ability to fulfil its role. "The question needs to be asked and answered as to whether Ofsted has the appropriate skills and experience to carry out its agenda," he told the Guardian. "Inspection systems that rely too heavily on data and tick-box systems is not what we need. I worry we are heading that way."

The 2007 expansion of Ofsted made it the biggest regulator in England and since then it has introduced new inspection methods for schools and local authorities.

A document drawn up by the Association of Directors of Children's Services, which represents the head of children's departments in English local authorities, claims that new annual performance profiles being developed by Ofsted are "not fit for purpose". Separately schools have expressed concerns about the new school inspection regime under which they cannot be rated good if their exam results are low – regardless of their social context. They can also be marked down on routine matters of safety.

Lawnswood school in Leeds, a rapidly improving school with a good reputation, was penalised after a survey suggested that 1.3% of parents reported their child did not "feel safe" there. A second school was judged to be inadequate because inspectors said the fence around the playground was low enough for children to be abducted and another failed because inspectors were offered coffee before they were asked for identification.

John Dunford, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said schools felt they were being "caught out" in inspections. "It's brought in a climate of great anxiety because you don't know whether the inspector will trick you on safeguarding."

A report from a powerful committee of MPs, to be published shortly, also criticises Ofsted for having insufficiently trained inspectors and for relying too much on exam data in their inspection of schools.

Barry Sheerman, chair of the children, schools and families select committee, said schools in challenging areas felt "aggrieved" that even when they were doing well against the odds, they could be failed for low GCSE results.

A spokesman for Ofsted said: "We are disappointed to hear the ADCS criticisms but have to say that their views just don't accord with what we are being told by directors and frontline social workers who have actually experienced our children's services inspections. The feedback we are getting is much more positive."

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Oxzen commented on CiF -

Excellent article, Polly. This sums it all up very well  - incompetent contractors, inadequately trained inspectors, training that forces inspectors to focus on data and 'technical' issues rather than actual schools and their teachers & pupils, a ridiculous grading system, and a climate of fear and loathing.

Add to that an inspections culture that turns the school's attention away from legitimate operational matters and forces them to spend huge amounts of time preparing themselves and their staff for inspections, including a heavy year-round focus on preparations for tests, rather than on real education and learning how to learn, and you have what we have - an unfair, impoverished and illegitimate system that often has very little to offer either the most able pupils or the less able, beyond preparation for tests.

Thank goodness the highly respected Mike Tomlinson is prepared to speak up against our abysmal system - "Inspection systems that rely too heavily on data and tick-box systems is not what we need" - but some of his comments are a little 'light touch'. "I worry we are heading that way", says Mr T, whereas in fact he probably knows we're already well up shit creek.

It'll be a huge and long-term effort to change our system of accountability towards the professional Finland/Denmark model, and the current leadership of Ofsted doesn't seem to have either the inclination or the capacity to do that job. It's all a very far cry from the days when HMI was led by and consisted largely of respected professionals with a vast amount of experience and understanding of schools, pedagogy, the curriculum, management, leadership, teachers and children.

I've lost count of the number of people I know who did Ofsted training but gave up on the work because of the way in which they were expected to carry out inspections, leaving the system to be operated mainly by those of a lesser calibre who are blatantly only doing it for the salary.

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Other comments:

@feline1973

Well I imagine this lambasting will produce a "no sh*t, Sherlock!" response in most of us.
It's from the same Nu-Labour stable-of-spin and bureaucratic lunacy that tried to tackle NHS waiting lists, and now means that you can't book an appointment with your GP more than 2 days in advance because otherwise it makes their waiting-times statistics look bad.
The government response will probably be to set up an new Inspectorate of Inspectorates Watchdog Watching Department, a quango of ex-public school Knights of the Realm who all earn £174k a year for turning up for a 2 hour committee meeting once a month (which features a one hour luncheon costing more than my annual salary).


@takeastepback

Ofsted is one of those ideas that sounds great in theory (inspect, assess, praise good, point out areas for improvement, drive up standards) but in practice drives all the wrong behaviours.

Many of my family are teachers (though not myself) and the stories of inspection times are comical. Inspectors failing teachers/schools without often visiting classrooms and spending time on seeing what is happening. Being in the wrong area is enough for them to fail and if the inspector doesn't like the school mangement then you are failed. One relative then moved from a failed school to a nice school in a middle class area and suddenly she was assessed as outstanding - and still had never actually seen an inspector - boxes were ticked though. Another had her school failed even for RE (which is difficult apparently) because a candle wasn't lit ffs!! We asked other kids do they light a candle in your assembly? No was the answer but it didn't matter, they wanted to fail the school because the headmistress had pissed them off - teaching was good in a deprived area but no matter.


@Tehillim

Labour's obsession with simple quantifiable targets has badly skewed the provision of basic services such as health and education, as the providers inevitably ask themselves how best to meet the targets, rather than how to meet the requirements of those under their care. Tick boxes don't won't for anyone other than administrators.


@Kerrygold

The Audit Commission could equally be in the dock. Organisations spend thousands preparing for inspection, and even more on mock inspections. The whole inspection and auditing regime is one big con, designed to provide a nice cushy job for people who can't compete in the real world. And isn't Christine Gilbert married to one of the MPs caught fiddling his expenses?Hardly a ringing endorsement of her judgement.

@Ranong

I enjoyed two Ofsted inspections as a Secondary Head.

The first was led by a failed middle-manager from a neighbouring school who'd become an inspector after realising no Head would appoint him to a Deputy Headship.

The second was lead by a pompous rural Catholic who had never been in a muti-ethnic school before. The poor guy was out of his depth.

If OFSTED can only attract the failed and the second-rate middle-managers as lead inspectors, no one should be surprised if they can't cope.

On the other hand, incompetence does not account fully for the smug pomposity that my colleagues endured.

@ Laplante

Ofsted was flawed from the very beginning. A failed teacher, Chris "Bonehead" Woodhead was its first head and he gleefully set about alienating the teaching profession at the behest of his tory masters. His inspectorate did not consist of experts in the field of education, but often people from business: the teaching profession sighed in vain for the days of Her Majesty's Inspectors of School. These were wise old birds who had had successful careers in teaching and could offer sound judgements tempered with good advice.

Ofsted has too great a remit these days and has been far too political from the start. It was set up so that governments could exercise greater political control over education and the ways in which teachers worked. It really has been a poor effort as is reflected by present low standards in education and the poverty of the modern curriculum. This is no reflection on schools, pupils or their teachers. Everybody in education deserves better. Educators simply have to work in a poorly thought out system and are always aware of the need to watch their backs as non-expert Ofsted people descend upon them. Schools find inspections scary simply because they are often quite arbitrary and with a low level of competence.


@ juliusmalema

As a foreigner who has come to work in uk schools i have to say that the things schools in this country have to do to please ofsted amount to a joke. you can only laugh or cry. the schools that do well say, "do this x, y and z please, we know it makes no sense but it has to be done to please ofsted. then we can get on with what we really need to do." i have worked at schools with good ofsted results that were truly terrible, because everything is done to please ofsed and not benefit the children. and vice versa. it's like orwell's grim prophecies have come in through the back door.

@ redbigbill

Readers should be reminded that Ofsted and it's first boss, the obnoxious right wing Woodhead (who given his way would have privatised every education establishment in the country) are both inventions of Tory Governments.
It was useless then and Labour have just turned it into a massive, money wasting quango with jobs for the boys and bureaucracy run riot.

@ IKnowSomethingcThis

I too have first-hand experience of Ofsted inspection in a childcare setting, and of an extended complaints process. Some (not all) of Ofsted's inspectors are incompetent and they react extremely vindictively to criticism, which, I suspect, is why so many people give Ofsted itself only positive feedback: it's called self-preservation !

@ stucathome

Like many other NuLab ideas Ofsted is a joke.

I was fortunate enough to go to a fee-paying school where teachers were employed exactly to do that, i.e. teach

A box-ticking culture will deter the most gifted from joining the education system, turning schools into education factories, rather than a place which encourages ideas as much as book learning.

@ feline1973

-     @ Juleusmalema -  you can only laugh or cry. the schools that do well say, "do this x, y and z please, we know it makes no sense but it has to be done to please oftsted. then we can get on with whatt we really need to do."

Well this is the thing - you can not ONLY laugh or cry, you can tell people to get stuffed, refuse to be numbered, stamped, filed, indexed, brief, debriefed, or have you trousers removed.

The problem is that a large proportion of "teachers" are bureacratic busy bodies themselves, who enjoy bullying children and bossing them about and making them "conform",
and behave like spineless fools when asked to conform themsleves.

What they SHOULD so when an Ofsted nitwit tries to get them to do something ridiculous is tell them to get stuffed, and make sure there's a camera crew there to film it so that it can be shown on Panorama and thus not only achieve something for the education system, but also entertain and enrage the chattering classes.

WHAT'S DIFFICULT?

@ surferboy

As a teacher I have been through 2 OFSTED inspections, including one of the new ones. I teach in a relatively successful secondary that is the 2nd choice in a reasonable catchment area, once the brightest students have been creamed off by 3 Grammers and 2 Roman Catholic schools. As a staff we work very hard to provide for all of our students (we're above average in numbers for free school meals; SEN etc) and have a successful G&T; Extra curricular and Social Development provision. Under the old criteria we were a good school with outstanding features - stuff we knew that we should do. However, under the new standards we are now 'satisfactory'. Morale has plummeted due to us being unable to achieve the standards that they expect with the type of students we attract. We work very hard so that they achieve (for them) good results but this is not good enough apparantly. How someone who has not taught for the past 16 years can observe lessons within my department and after 20 mins say how 'good' they were annoys me.

@ yonsoc

Managers in my social work department plan in advance how to hoodwink inspection. They cook the books, lie and try everything to throw the inspectors off the scent. I know that my local authority told my partner to CHANGE her report on the state of children's homes to something more positive. She refused.

@ Ajay100

"There is not enough money in the world to make me want to be a headteacher." said a senior Ofsted inspector in an interview during a primary school inspection under the new framework.

"Bad luck," said a second senior inspector, "If we had come in July , before the new framework was introduced in September, the issues facing your school would not have been highlighted."

Both of these comments, intended to make me feel better, were not helpful. One can understand the weighting attached to aspects of inspection following the criticism directed at Ofsted over safeguarding. This next comment is not an attempt to pass any blame, but should it not be Social Services that are scrutinised rather than increase the pressure on schools and the inspection framework?

The Ofsted framework has always been flawed by the mechanical way in which limiting judgements automatically downgrade outcomes in other aspects of the inspection process. The new framework is offered as a partnership approach between inspectors and schools. In theory this is a positive change to inspection however, in practice it remains dependent upon the lead inspector, their guide to senior inspectors, and the interpretation of the new Ofsted schedule. Ofsted themselves are subject to proof readers and have to write within a range of vocabulary that supports their outcomes.

There needs to be an immediate revision of the present Inspection schedule and there needs to be a way to minimise any inconsistencies amongst the teams.

"I was damned if an attractive blond bimbo in a difficult London Primary school was going to be judged as outstanding. That would mean she would have been better than me when I was a head. So I gave her a good." said a lead inspector. I am pleased to say this was reported and the lead inspector, is no longer working for Ofsted.

Inspection needs to move away from a weighting on pupil results. School data is complex. Just because pupil outcomes are below national outcomes it does not mean that the school is inadequate.

"The data suggests that this school can be no better than average. It would make it very difficult for me to write my report if any of you judge lessons to be good or outstanding." said a lead inspector to the rest of the team. This lead inspector no longer works for Ofsted.

Inspecting teams need to work together with schools and its leaders within a supportive framework. Finland has no inspection framework and they are seen to be leading the way in educational provision. Education in this country needs to look at the best of excellent practice and provision in the rest of Europe and look at ways to improve. Ofsted . . . . try harder to be better at understanding schools and the pressures they face.

@ ljrushton

Isn't it amazing how Mr Tomlinson and Mr Woodhead both failed to point out the errors of Ofsted while they where still collecting their fat pay checks. I wonder if the Ofsted spokesperson quoted in the article will come clean and speak out after he has finished receiving his pieces of silver. It would be nice for all three to be in an enclosed room with all the teachers whose hard work and careers they have damaged and caused untold unnecessary stress to and all the parents of children whose education they have wrecked while carrying out their sordid dirty work.

@ Ghostworld

Ofsted may well have been a Tory idea.... But it has mutated under Labour ( sorry, New Labour ) into something far more inept

@ rubberneck

OFSTED- Squeezing the joy, fun and humanity out of education and replacing it with DATA !
New Labour in a nutshell. Stalinist control freaks.


@ solocontrotutti

The tick box culture is a real problem. It corrupts education with the BTEC non examined qualifications being a primary example. Almost no external verification and the teacher sets the assignment, marks it and then selects which one goes for what external verification there is and with a management breathing on your necks for results - integrity becomes the first victim of the process.

The Oftsed session guide lines are imbecilic with so many criterion that it becomes a nit picking pedant's charter. Anyone going through the observation process almost by default endures a litany of minor faults (the clock was wrong , the whiteboard wasn't clean enough etc etc)

The result is a slow corrupting of the education process and innovation and flexibility is the second victim of the process.

Management become obsessed with stats and funding is thrown at achieving those stats. So if you are a borderline pass you will get all the funding whilst if you are almst certain non pass you will get a vocational qual' whilst the good pass will get ignored. Personalisation is the third victim of the tick box culture.

Organisations are also reluctant to enforce discipline because (particularly in the FE sector) retention is a funded component. Good behaviour and a positive environment is the fourth victim of the tick box culture.

The whole sector becomes more conservative with teachers wanting to steer clear of problem groups because there is very little room for making allowances for the level of learner being observed and tick boxed. Why get a three with a large challenging group when you could get a 1 with a smaller more middle class group. Diversity and differentiation is the fifth victim of the Ofsted culture.

The simple fact is - you can't tick box complexity!
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