Topical Teaching

Below are some New Years resolutions I suggest the Education sector should take on for 2012:

1. Schools Should Become More Involved With Cyber Bullying –  At present schools have been able to turn a blind-eye to cyberbullying.  As the offence occurs out of school hours, schools have been only too happy to handball the problem to the parents of the bully. Whilst I believe that parents are ultimately responsible for the actions of their children, I ask that schools do more to help deal with this ongoing problem.

The reason why I feel schools should involve themselves more actively with this issue is that most cyber bullying cases result from pre-existing schoolyard bullying.  Having started in the playground and classroom, the bullying then gets transferred online. Whilst the school isn’t liable for what goes on after school, the problem is often a result of what started during school hours.

To me, the best schools are the ones that work with the parents in a partnership for the wellbeing of their students.  For a school to excel it needs to show that it cares about its students beyond its working hours. That is why a teacher or staff member that is aware of cyberbullying must be able to do more than discuss the issue with the class.  They must be able to contact parents, impose sanctions and actively change the situation at hand.

2. Governments Should Stop Pretending and Start Doing – Every time the curriculum changes I think of the movie Groundhog Day. I’ve only been a teacher for a short time, yet already I have seen the curriculum change 3 times. First it was the CSF, then it became the CSF 2, followed soon after by VELS. And the curriculum is about to change yet again!

Why do they do it to us? Just when you get used to one curriculum, they change it from another.

In my view, the Government is bereft of ideas and would rather pretend to be do something than actually making the tough decisions. They know that education outcomes are underwhelming, that there isn’t much satisfaction in the quality of schools and performance indicators are not painting a rosy picture. Yet, they don’t have a clue what to do about it. They neither have the money, vision or gumption to make any real change, so they go for the obvious alternative – perceived change.

When asked to reflect on their achievements in Education, the Government will proudly point to overhauling the curriculum. In Australia’s case, they will triumphantly declare that by introducing a national curriculum, they have been able to do what previous administrations couldn’t.

But they will know the truth all along – you can’t change the fortunes of a countries academic performance by altering and renaming a curriculum. In fact, from my experience you can’t expect any change at all.

3. Schools Should Fight Problems Instead of Investing in Worthless Programs – Every week a new program is being established for schools throughout the world. If it’s not Sex-Ed it’s suicide prevention, bullying, cyber bullying, cyber safety, hygiene, traffic safety, Stranger Danger etc.  Whilst all these initiatives have good intentions and are worthy causes (with perhaps the exception of Stranger Danger), it causes a great strain on teachers already struggling with time constraints.  The more programs undertaken by schools the harder it is to cover the curriculum.

If schools have a bullying problem in particular, they ought to be doing a lot more than relying on their flimsy anti-bullying programs. Schools have got to ramp up their responses. Programs, procedures and policies is not enough. They will not work and never have. Appealing to kids to improve their communications wont work either.

4. It’s Time To Stop Blaming Teachers For Everything – Education is supposed to be a team effort.  All parts of the system are supposed to work with each other and for each other.  Yet, it always seems to be that the teachers get singled out for blame.  Poor testing results – blame the teachers, a bullying problem – blame the teachers, lack of classroom control – yep, let’s blame the teachers for that too.

The question has to be asked: At what point do we focus our attention on the administrators when handing out the blame? It seems to me that whilst there is always going to be poor teachers in the system, nowhere near enough focus is directed to policy makers as well as those in management positions and on school counsels.

5. Stop Banning Innocent Things and Let Kids Enjoy School – From banning hugging, ball sports and cartwheeling to making play equipment devoid of anything to climb or swing from, kids are becoming even more restricted at school. What measures like these do, is transform schools which are already unnatural places for children and make them even more dreary and dictatorial.