Timetable is Torn to Pieces ; Slave Trade and Global Warming to Overshadow the Three Rs

By LAURA CLARK

SCHOOLS are to ditch basic facts and figures from lessons in favour of discussions on global warming and slavery in the biggest curriculum shake-up for 20 years.

In a radical overhaul unveiled yesterday, the traditional timetable of eight lessons a day is to be torn up.

It will be replaced with a variety of classes ranging from a few minutes to an entire week as different subjects are combined.

For example, language and music could be taught jointly so the pupils could learn a song in French. Or PE and science teachers could present joint lessons on anatomy.

Core subjects such as history and geography will be cut back to give teachers more ‘freedom’ over the content of their lessons.

New topics will be added, including climate change, the slave trade, Mandarin, Urdu, personal finance and practical cookery.

The shake-up, endorsed by Education Secretary Alan Johnson yesterday, marks the biggest upheaval in secondary education since the national curriculum was introduced in 1988.

The Qualifications and Curriculum Authority, which drew up the proposals, said they were needed to help pupils aged from 11-14 adapt to a ‘changing society’.

But critics claimed they put too much emphasis on ‘issues’ and ‘life skills’ at the expense of basics such as fractions, decimals and key historical periods.

They said the reforms harked back to the discredited teaching methods prevalent in the Sixties and Seventies, when traditional subjects were scrapped and merged to create ‘integrated’ lessons.

This approach was blamed for leaving children with glaring gaps in their knowledge and blighting the prospects of a generation. In further reforms, pupils will be given the chance to mark their friends’ work or even their own in a shift towards ‘peer assessment’ and ‘self-assessment’.

Pupils will also have to complete 12 key ‘life skills’, which include making a 50-mile unaccompanied journey by bus or train.

Mr Johnson’s predecessor, Ruth Kelly, ordered the shakeup in the hope of giving teachers time to ensure students were mastering the three Rs.

Ministers had been warned results in English and maths GCSEs would nosedive unless pupils had a stronger grounding in the basics. But just as teachers were promised greater flexibility to make room for catchup classes, Mr Johnson personally intervened to make additional topics compulsory.

As well as requiring certain ‘untouchables’ such as the two world wars to remain at the heart of the syllabus, he also demanded a focus on global warming, the effects of the slave trade, financial literacy and languages from emerging global economies.

However large swathes of detail in the existing curriculum have been relegated to optional status in a draft replacement, which is out for consultation with a view to being implemented in September 2008.

In the meantime, schools are being urged to adopt a new approach to timetabling by scrapping conventional lessons and merging subjects.

The aim is to encourage more pupils to stay on in education after 16 and reinvigorate the ‘backwater’ first three years of secondary schooling.

Mick Waters, QCA’s curriculum director, insisted the ‘basics’ would remain, declaring: ‘Anne Boleyn will still be beheaded, the Battle of Trafalgar will still have taken place in 1805, the Pennines will remain the backbone of England and Romeo will still fall in love with Juliet.’ But he said the review aimed to ‘move away from an overconcern with content’.

Prep school headmaster Chris McGovern, an education adviser to the former Tory government, said Mr Waters’s claims ‘disguised a revolution’ in education which was undermining core subjects.

‘The curriculum is moving away from subject content and knowledge towards issues such as climate change and various life skills,’ he said. ‘For example, history is now defined in

terms of skills and concepts, and how you can improve the mental health of children through studying history.

‘There is going to be a free-for-all, and with the emphasis on personal development and political correctness, content is going to be even more downgraded.

‘Subject knowledge is thin already and this will make it thinner.

‘This seems to be going back to a lot of what was called the ” integrated” curriculum in the Seventies.’ He claimed the switch from rigid timetables would be unworkable, adding: ‘In many schools you simply can’t play around with the timetable in the way they’re suggesting. They’re just not that flexible-Mr Johnson insisted: ‘The curriculum should evolve to meet a rapidly changing world, and enable teachers to teach in a way that will continue to interest and enthuse their pupils.

‘The new draft curriculum is designed to create greater flexibility for schools so they can ensure pupils master the basics as well as offer more stretching opportunities for those who excel.’

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FED UP WITH FRENCH? THEN TRY MANDARIN

PUPILS are to be allowed to drop French and German in favour of languages such as Mandarin.

With 867 million native speakers, Mandarin certainly qualifies as a ‘world language’.

But just how easy is it to learn?

With no alphabet, 50,000 different characters and ten different types of pronunciation, it is a slog.

But first, a little history. The earliest characters were written in 2,500 BC on the backs of animal bones.

The inscriptions were always basic questions such as: ‘Should the ruler hunt today?’, or ‘Will it rain soon?’ The bones were then thrown onto the fire and when the heat cracked them, priests would interpret the way they broke as a ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ answer.

These early characters were more like tiny pictures than the characters we see today.

Over time, the pictures began to resemble the linear characters of today comprised of anything from 8-25 strokes each.

Every one of the 50,000 characters is as word. One would have to learn at least 5,000 even to read a newspaper.

Without an alphabet, it is impossible to make an intelligent guess at words or phrases if they have not been learned and memorised.

This, as many tourists will know, makes understanding road and shop signs or directions an impossible task.

Thankfully, grammar is a little simpler.

Like English, it follows the basic format of subject, verb, object: ‘I eat the rice’.

There are no plurals, no tenses and no conjugated verbs. Pronunciation is tricky, however. In Mandarin, the meaning of a word changes dramatically depending on the tone of voice used.

The word ‘ma’ is a good example. When one says ‘maaaa’, in a straight tone, the word means ‘mother’.

However, if the speaker slightly raises his voice at the end of the word, the meaning becomes ‘hemp’.

The same word said in a more interrogative way changes the meaning to ‘horse’.

And when exclaimed in a short, sharp fashion, it becomes a swear word.

Of course in the written language, all four words have different characters.

But to western ears, they all sound very alike.

For those who do persevere the rewards are considerable. The Chinese are thrilled when foreigners attempt their language and will happily play along with your halting efforts rather than answer in their (often perfect) English.

Perhaps the most useful piece of social chitchat is the Mandarin equivalent of ‘how are you?’, and the answer ‘fine’.

In Mandarin, people greet each other saying ‘Wo chi fan?’ This literally means ‘have you eaten rice?’ The required answer whether or not you have eaten is ‘chi fan’ which means ‘I have eaten rice.’

WHAT’S IN AND WHAT’S OUT

TOPICS such as the slave trade, the impact of immigration and legacy of the British Empire will be added to history lessons.

Six compulsory periods of British and world history have been dropped, to be replaced with an emphasis on ‘constant themes’ through time.

New authors for English classes include the Rastafarian poet Benjamin Zephaniah, the travel writer Bill Bryson and children’s author Philip Pullman.

There is no mention in the maths curriculum of fractions and square roots, and only a passing reference to decimals. Instead pupils will be encouraged to measure their body mass index and analyse data presented in newspapers.

Science will include discussion of topical issues such as IVF, stem cells, vivisection and nuclear energy. Traditional themes such as photosynthesis and electricity are no longer laid down.

Environmental change will become a key theme, especially in geography, and personal finance management will be taught. Schools will also be encouraged to offer a wider range of sports in PE lessons, such as archery and golf.

LIFE SKILLS AND EXPERIENCES

PUPILS will be sent outside the school on a range of ‘real- world’ experiences to help them develop life skills.

One of the 11 tasks proposed is a 50-mile unaccompanied journey with one change in transport, to be taken by pupils before the age of 14.

Others are visits to the theatre including one to see Shakespeare and a practical challenge such as building a lookout for bird-watching.

The list also suggests that youngsters ‘prepare, host, serve and manage a healthy meal for diners in the local community’.

To encourage citizenship they will go to a council meeting, and also be taken to a police station, fire station or hospital and have ‘active and extended contact’ with youngsters from abroad.

Margaret Morrissey, of the National Confederation of Parent Teacher Associations, said: ‘It should be up to parents to decide at what age their children are ready to make that sort of unaccompanied journey.

‘A group of three or four girls may think they are safe, but are they?’

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