In the UK: Major Report Condemns Test-Driven Curriculum
This news arrived this morning from across the Atlantic. The biggest report on education in the United Kingdom from the last forty years has reached a startling conclusion. The Sats test, currently given to eleven-year-old students, has had disastrous effects and should be abolished. The Sats test for 14-year olds was scrapped a year ago after a scoring fiasco in which results were delayed by months.
However the Labour-led government left in place the Sats for eleven-year-olds, on the grounds that this was essential to make primary schools accountable for results. However, an upcoming report is raising concerns that echo the debate here in the US over the effects on NCLB.
From the UK's Daily Telegraph:
The conclusions - by the Cambridge Primary Review - will represent a damning indictment of Labour's education reforms.
It will say that a "narrow" focus on English and maths has been at the expense of a more rounded education, leaving many children ill-prepared for secondary school.
The four-year review, led by Professor Robin Alexander, based at Cambridge University, will say that art, music, drama, history and geography need to be "vigorously re-asserted" in primary schools.
It is also expected to claim that science has been neglected following the implementation of Labour's "national strategies" in 1998 designed to improve standards in the three-Rs
But it is feared the Government will largely shun the report, which is being produced following submissions from 900 academics and teachers around the world.
Sound familiar?
The authors of the report, which has not yet been released, are expected to recommend that the tests be replaced with a system of teacher assessment.
What do you think? Should educators in the United Kingdom change course? What will it take to get our elected leaders and policymakers to respond to these concerns?
