Examination of Witnesses (Questions 400-404)
PROFESSOR DEREK
BELL, CLIVE
BUSH, DR
RITA GARDNER
AND PROFESSOR
GORDON STOBART
3 NOVEMBER 2008
Q400 Mr Heppell: I want to talk
about the secondary national strategy. You were talking before
about when things became very prescriptive, and there was a narrowed-down
prescription in terms of the curriculum. Is the national strategy
something that is not really necessary? Why do we need it? Why
cannot the Royal Geographical Society or the Association for Science
Education be the people who support teachers? Would it not be
better left to professional associations, rather than having another
thing alongside the curriculum?
Chairman: Clive, and Rita of course—but
brief answers if you could.
Clive Bush: The national strategy
essentially grew out of the primary literacy and numeracy strategies.
They were developed from the perception that our young people
were not reaching expected levels at the age of 11. There is considerable
evidence that the application of the strategies led to significant
improvements in literacy and numeracy. It was therefore deemed
sensible that those improvements should be carried through into
the secondary phase, and a process of identifying what might be
needed to deliver that through the secondary phase took place.
The Key Stage 3 strategy evolved from that.
It looked at pedagogy skills, the application of learning, teacher
learning, helping teachers to cope with the ever-demanding and
complex environment in which they worked, and the particular needs
of under-achieving groups of young people, for example. In other
words, it sought to provide teachers with a set of tools that
they could take or leave—it is not compulsory—that
would help them to continue their professional development to
meet the shifting and changing needs of the young people in front
of them. Arguably, any organisation at the cutting edge of development
needs a continuous, ongoing professional development programme.
That is essentially what the Secondary Strategy is—a programme
of continuing professional development to encourage and help teachers
to deal with the challenges in front of them.
Dr Gardner: The national strategies
really apply only to science, English, mathematics and ICT. By
and large, they do not apply to or support teachers in the foundation
subjects: geography, history, design technology, modern foreign
languages and religious education. Therefore, de facto
with the changes that have taken place within the QCA, we have
seen subject-specific support for geography drop from 1.5 subject
specialists who give support in the QCA, to 0.1 of one person's
time—I quote geography as that is the example I know. Combined
with the demise of local authority advisers, what in effect has
happened is that subject associations have had to bear that load.
They do that willingly; they know the community, they are used
to supporting their teachers, they have strong and close links
with the community and often—as in our case—they can
link the higher education community and research with the schools
community. That is an added benefit. Subject associations are
happy to fill the gap but often feel under-resourced to do so.
None has core funding from the Government, and probably none would
want it as they like their independence. Perhaps the Government
are relying on subject associations to fill the gap of supporting
teachers in their subjects. That is largely the position that
we are in at the moment—the CfBT's support for the introduction
of the new curriculum lasts for two years. We must give serious
thought as to how subject associations will work together and
what happens where there is more than one subject association
for a subject. Together with the Geographical Association, we
have been leaders in coming together to support our subjects.
That is the first point—how can such associations work collaboratively,
and how can there be systematic support for subject associations
that work with their communities? Otherwise, there will simply
be nothing out there for the foundation subjects.
Q401 Chairman: That is very interesting.
Do you agree with that Derek?
Professor Bell: I agree with a
lot of it. We have looked at the issue from a different side.
When the strategy comes in and we look at how much money has been
spent on supporting science, for example, and how much money we
have, there is a big difference. That has created other problems
for us, as we find that some of our members who want to be innovative
and take on new projects, feel that they cannot because of demands
made on them elsewhere. It is a tricky balance to get right. There
is an issue about subject associations and membership of them.
At one time, teachers were encouraged by their local advisers
and so on to become members of the associations. They joined them
largely because there was nowhere else for support. Nowadays,
life is different, and people feel that because something is a
Government thing, they must do that first and other matters come
second.
Professor Stobart: I think we
could live without a strategy. We have a curriculum. It is coming
down, so it may be that the minimalist strategy is the next step
and perhaps we can then move on to living without one. The original
strategy for maths had a 285-page framework detailing what teachers
had to do. English teachers had 72 pages.
Q402 Chairman: When was this?
Professor Stobart: That was the
strategy that came in in 2001. We can see the progression. We
are now down to four or five pages, which is good news. Teachers
will have used what they wanted from the other one and can return
to it if they are stuck.
Q403 Mr Heppell: I hear what you
are saying. I am still a little concerned, because you are effectively
saying that you think it is best left to the professional associations,
but that we do not have the resources and, as a result, we have
to have the national strategy.
Dr Gardner: No. The national strategies
were set up to support those four subjects, because of their essential
links with numeracy, literacy and so on. The other subjects have
never had that level of support. At the moment, science gets something
like £25 million from the DCSF, and another £25 million
from Wellcome.
Professor Bell: That is just for
science learning centres.
Dr Gardner: That is just for the
science learning centres—there is more on top. Geography—we
have the action plan, so we get more than many foundation subjects—gets
something like £750,000 a year at the moment, to support
teachers in the teaching and learning of geography nationally.
Q404 Mr Heppell: How should teachers
use the secondary strategy to support the curriculum? Earlier
on, Clive was saying that it had definitely brought improvements,
and I think there is general acceptance of that—bringing
in the strategy definitely brought in improvements—but you
seem to be saying that it was at the expense of other subjects.
How should teachers use the secondary strategy? On the other side
of the coin, we hear that what is now happening is that people
are actually using the strategy as their basis for teaching, and
ignoring the curriculum, because the strategy is, as you say,
something that the Government have put their stamp on.
Clive Bush: I am slightly perplexed
by that, because the National Strategy is not a body of knowledge.
It is not a thing that you can then put into the classroom. It
is a methodology, an approach, a pedagogy, a way of doing things.
I have said several times that it is the tool for delivering the
national curriculum. At the core, there is a thing called the
framework—there are frameworks for English, maths, science
and ICT—which are web-based. What the frameworks are is
a way in which teachers can draw down information to enable them
to plan for the progression of every single individual child in
their class, if they choose to do so. Those frameworks, which
went live last May, include support and guidance on planning,
they provide consistency for expectations and they run straight
into an effective assessment system, and teachers are telling
us that they are hugely successful. They want the frameworks;
they use them and the website has had over quarter of a million
hits since it started in September. I shall stop there, but, perhaps
crucially, head teachers—who I meet across the country every
week—tell me exactly the same thing. For them as leaders
and managers of learning, the framework is crucial in providing
consistency in planning expectation delivery in classrooms.
Chairman: I am sorry, but I am drawing
this session to an end. I mentally noted that, if there was a
Division in the House before 17.35, I would call people back,
but at 17.37 I am not going to get them back. It has been a really
lively and good session for us. I am sorry it has been mucked
up by a couple of votes. Can we continue to have a dialogue? You
know the sort of thing that we are interested in. A couple of
people did not get their favourite questions in, but can we continue
the dialogue and will you continue to help us with this inquiry?
Thank you very much for the material we garnered today. Thank
you, colleagues.
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