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Teachers oppose 'narrow' curriculum | Teachers oppose 'narrow' curriculum |
(about 13 hours later) | |
The revised national curriculum for schools in England is so narrow it will deter young people from learning, according to the National Union of Teachers' conference. | |
Delegates attacked it as "Gove's pub quiz curriculum", a reference to the Education Secretary, Michael Gove. | |
The NUT's general secretary Christine Blower said the curriculum was "desperately ill thought out". | |
The Department for Education said it "embodies high expectations". | |
The NUT, holding its annual conference in Liverpool, heard strong criticism of the planned new curriculum. | |
'Kings and queens' | |
Delegates claimed that its emphasis on core knowledge was a throw-back to rote learning and uncreative lists of facts. | |
Alex Kenny from the union's executive said it was a curriculum based on pub-quiz style chunks of information. | |
"It's a curriculum in which the learner is completely absent, or just a passive consumer of information or knowledge," he said. | |
The conference backed a motion attacking the curriculum for presenting a simplistic, culturally narrow, "kings and queens" version of subjects such as history. | |
It says that the curriculum for maths is over-prescriptive with too narrow a focus and that geography is reduced to a list of "capes, bays, rivers and mountain ranges". | |
For English, it says there is an "obsession with particular literary texts". | |
There were particular concerns that it would fail to engage with children who spoke English as a second language and pupils with special needs. | |
Martin Allen, a delegate from Ealing, described it as a "know your place curriculum", based on rote learning and "social control". | |
"Teachers are genuinely fearful that pupils will be forced to learn in a way that is inappropriate," said Ms Blower. | |
"Rote learning is the antithesis of experiential learning, learning through doing. It doesn't promote the critical thinking and problem-solving skills that are essential for good quality learning." | |
'Challenging and ambitious' | |
But the debate also heard support for the idea of teaching a core of knowledge. | |
Quentin Deakin from Bradford warned that in history pupils could be left "rudderless without some chronology". | |
The NUT published a survey of more than 2,000 members of the union showing widespread opposition to the curriculum. | |
It found that two-thirds of teachers believed there was "too much emphasis on 'facts' rather than skills". Fewer than one in 10 believed the changes would give teachers more freedom. | |
A Department for Education spokesman rejected the criticisms of the planned curriculum: "This could not be further from the truth. | |
"The draft national curriculum is challenging and ambitious and will give every child the broad and balanced education they need to fulfil their potential. | "The draft national curriculum is challenging and ambitious and will give every child the broad and balanced education they need to fulfil their potential. |
"We engaged with academics and experts and carefully analysed the world's most successful school systems before building a curriculum which embodies high expectations. | "We engaged with academics and experts and carefully analysed the world's most successful school systems before building a curriculum which embodies high expectations. |
"Furthermore we are giving every school more freedom and trusting teachers to use their creativity to shape the curriculum to the needs of their pupils." | "Furthermore we are giving every school more freedom and trusting teachers to use their creativity to shape the curriculum to the needs of their pupils." |