Scottish Union for Education - Newsletter No25
Newsletter Themes: When kids were kids, and the vital importance of defending the subject in education.
This week Julie Sandilands takes a quasi-comic jaunt into the disruptive classroom of yesteryear, and teacher Stuart Baird explains exactly what it is that schools should be all about.
The ‘joyful’ disruption of the classroom before things turned so serious
Julie Sandilands is an English/business teacher who worked in several secondary schools in Fife until 2017. Now based in Cumbria, she works as a private tutor teaching children both in and out of mainstream provision.
‘Remember the days of the old school yard? We used to laugh a lot’, sang Cat Stevens in 1977, perhaps reminiscing about his own schooldays. Well, I remember the days in the not-too-distant past, when conversations about being ‘born in the wrong body’, or accusations of ‘dead naming’ someone, hadn’t yet bulldozed their way into the classroom, and the teenage woes of yesteryear now seem almost like ... good, wholesome fun. Ah yes, I remember...
Arthur Conan Who?
Part 1
A high-school English department. Lesson 1 – Tuesday, 09:00. Pupils file in and noisily take their seats. The idle chatter fizzles out as Miss Greenwood stands perfectly still at the front and waits for silence.
Miss Greenwood: Morning everyone!
Whole class: (Barely audible murmur) Morning, Miss Greenwood.
Miss Greenwood: (Handing out worksheets) Today we’re going to...
Door opens and in walks Colin, yawning, squint tie. Can of Irn Bru in one hand, cheeseburger in the other.
Miss Greenwood: Colin, this the second time this week you’ve been late, and it’s only Tuesday! And NO food in the classroom.
Colin (gulping down the last mouthful) dawdles to his desk, slumps on to his seat, puts his head down and closes his eyes.
Miss Greenwood: Right, we’ll start again, shall we? Today we’re going to...
A hand shoots into the air.
Miss Greenwood: (Impatiently) Yes, Connor, what is it?
Connor: I need the toilet, miss.
Miss Greenwood: But you’ve only just got here!
Connor: Sorry, miss, but I really need it. Honest!
Miss Greenwood nods, her brow furrowed.
Connor: (Turns back at the door) I might be a while. I’ll have to go to the other building.
Miss Greenwood: Oh?
Connor: Yes, miss: All the U-bends ’ave been smashed again.
Door bangs shut.
Miss Greenwood: (At the front again) This... (holding up the worksheet in her right hand) ... is an extract from a short story by Arthur Conan Doyle. Who can tell me which famous character he created?
Silence.
Miss Greenwood: Come on, folks. Think about it!
More silence, then a hand slowly quivers into the air.
Miss Greenwood: Yes, Hannah?
Hannah: Harry Potter?
Miss Greenwood: Harry Pot... Oh, for goodness’ sake. Look, who is this?
Miss Greenwood holds up another worksheet showing the silhouette profile of a man wearing a deerstalker and smoking a curved pipe. Another hand makes its way into the open space.
Miss Greenwood: Yes, Arianna?
Arianna: (Sheepishly) Is it ... is it the BFG?
Miss Greenwood: (Deflated) This ... is Sherlock Holmes, the famous detective!
Another hand shoots up.
Miss Greenwood: Yes, Luke?
Luke: Don’t mean ter doubt yer, miss. But Sherlock Holmes was written by some feller at the BBC. I know cos I saw it on the telly last week and it said it were written by Mark summat. Not that Arthur bloke!
The high-pitched whine of the fire alarm gatecrashes the moment.
Miss Greenwood: (Dismayed) Oh, not again!
Luke: That’ll be Connor smoking in the bogs, miss!
Pupils run out – very disorderly, knocking over chairs as they go.
…..
Part 2
Fire alarm over: pupils file back in and noisily take their seats. Colin puts his head down and closes his eyes again.
Miss Greenwood: Right, let’s get back to Arthur Conan Doyle, shall we?
A hand shoots up.
Miss Greenwood: (Snaps) No, Connor. Absolutely not.
Connor: But I don’t need the toilet, miss!
Miss Greenwood: (Suspiciously) Oh? What is it then?
Connor: I can’t write, miss. I’ve been up all night. Honest!
Miss Greenwood: Really! Are you sick?
Connor: No, miss, not sick exactly – it’s called ... sexual exhaustion!
Sniggering can be heard. Connor is looking around, wearing an inane grin.
Luke: Best use yer left hand to write with then, yer perv.
Spontaneous laughter from other pupils. Connor gives Luke the V sign. Pupils’ laughter is interrupted by the sound of heaving great sobs.
Miss Greenwood: Mercedes, why are you crying?
Chelsey-Lee: She thinks she’s preggers, miss.
Miss Greenwood: I think, Chelsey-Lee, Mercedes can speak for herself.... Mercedes, whatever the matter is, I’m sure it can wait till break time. Let’s concentrate on Sherlock Holmes for now, shall we?
Colin: (Lifts his head off the desk) Yer don’t need ter be Sherlock friggin Holmes ter know whose bairn it is! (Puts his head back down and closes his eyes)
Sniggers around the room – Connor is on his feet.
Miss Greenwood: Look, enough of this nonsense; we’re over forty minutes into the lesson and we haven’t even started reading yet!
Connor sits down – another huge sob from Mercedes.
Chelsey-Lee: (Putting her arm around Mercedes) All right there, Merc. It aint your fault he don’t care. He’s just a pig, he is. (Stares at Connor)
Luke: (Pointing at Connor) Yeah, go on. Admit it, Flattery: it’s yours.
Connor runs at Luke – a scuffle breaks out – the two boys roll around the floor.
Rest of class now on their feet chanting: ‘FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT!’. Mr Bruce, deputy head, walks in – scuffle ceases. Everyone returns to their seat in silence.
Mr Bruce: Everything alright, Miss Greenwood?
Miss Greenwood: Er, yes, thank you, Mr Bruce. We were just re-enacting a scene from The Sign of Four by Conan Doyle. You know, sort of an English–drama lesson.
Miss Greenwood laughs nervously and holds up the silhouette of Sherlock Holmes to show him. Mr Bruce nods and closes the door.
Miss Greenwood: Right, Luke, will you start us off please. Read the first...
The end-of-lesson bell rings. Pupils leave the room, chatting noisily. Connor and Mercedes leave together, smiling, arms linked. Miss Greenwood is sat on her chair, cradling her head in her hands, elbows resting on the desk. She looks up. A pupil is stood in front of her.
Miss Greenwood: (Totally deflated) Yes, Declan? What is it?
Declan: (Very serious) That were a great lesson, miss. I love Sherlock Holmes. Can we do ’im again tomorrow?
Miss Greenwood: I don’t actually remember doing him today, Declan. But, yes, we’ll see.
Declan: Cool. Thanks, miss.
The door bangs shut. Total silence. Miss Greenwood stares into space.
End
The subject is the heart and soul of education
Stuart Baird is a secondary school teacher in Scotland.
Teaching is a fantastic profession. Education, as the aim of what goes on in a classroom, is a noble goal. Teachers are in a privileged position of responsibility for the pupils they work with and the community they serve.
Within schools, teachers are an authority, each one a representative of the adult world and an expert in the subject he or she teaches. Those subjects act to introduce our young people to our adult world.
Beyond the classroom, the pupil and the subject, schools have always had some contemporary instrumental purpose – from the development of individual virtue in the Greek city-states to the basic skills needed for an industrial workforce in modern times.
A key focus for Scotland’s Curriculum for Excellence has been the employability of young people, from ‘skills for work’ to ‘developing the young workforce’, aiming to ensure they are ready for work. Indeed, there is a renewed focus on using schools to support the skills that, it is believed, ‘support economic growth’.
More recently, since 2015, schools have been tasked with closing the attainment gap ‘completely’, overcoming the effects of poverty. This was a goal that the government was to be ‘judged on’. A new funding source was provided, standardised assessment was created, and evaluation reports were produced.
Economic success and negating the impact of poverty are not, though, the only two issues that schools are being tasked with today. Since the inception of the Curriculum for Excellence, schools have become an increasing focus for initiatives tackling a range of issues. And the Scottish government has a network of actors, supporting one another as they push these agendas into schools, often with little public support.
An early Curriculum for Excellence example is ‘Learning for Sustainability’, described as ‘a cross-curricular approach which enables learners, educators, schools and their wider communities to build a socially-just, sustainable and equitable society.’ Identified as an entitlement for all learners, it supports ‘Scotland’s climate change targets and commitment to become a Net Zero Nation’.
More recently, controversial so-called ‘anti-racism’ theories that frame ‘whiteness’ as problematic and explicitly reject colour-blind approaches to countering racial prejudice have been established in Scotland. An example of this initiative was seen this month with the Scottish Council of Deans of Education producing a framework for initial teacher education that seeks to ‘understand the impact of whiteness’ and recognises that ‘Racial identity is an important way for students to define themselves, connect with one another, and organise on behalf of shared interests.’
And the list of initiatives and agendas goes on, produced by an education system controlled from the centre and supported by local acolytes. Schools are therefore moving from being places to learn how to think to being places where you are told what to think. This is an issue that has been raised before regarding Curriculum for Excellence.
Missing from the discussion around schools today are the subjects. In the recent interim report on qualifications and assessment, the role of the subjects was given an uninspiring entry; indeed, it could be read as a barrier to the more novel or exciting challenges of interdisciplinary learning or personal experiences. A similar sense can be found in the final report on the National Discussion on Education. The word ‘subject’ is mentioned only 17 times across its 24,000 words, and you would be hard pressed to describe its use as positive.
The place of subjects is being usurped by a model of education that puts competencies, skills and outlooks to the fore.
Subjects have not been the organising principle of schools by chance, a leftover from an embarrassing age. Through them we, as adults, offer to our young people ‘the best that has been thought and said in the world’, as educationalist Matthew Arnold said. They build towers of the imagination to allow our young people to see beyond their immediate community.
The subjects represent a social bond between our pupils and the adult world, an intergenerational discussion between past and future. Through them we allow our young people to critically understand the world that we live in.
We are, though, faced with a system that debases education, seeing it as an arena for policies and agendas that have not been tested or democratically agreed in the realm of adults, as politics, and which disconnects pupils from their social inheritance, the subjects.
The Scottish Union for Education stands up for subjects, the knowledge and social connection they provide, and challenges those who want to use schools for their own political ends.
For parents, that means supporting teachers in delivering those subjects. Today, though, it also means questioning the initiatives and agendas that look to indoctrinate not educate.
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