Disaster Looms At School Unless We Introduce Fun Learning
Once again our educational standards are under threat. Results in SAT’s GCSE and A level show a growing gap in performance. But are the best people to resolve this situation remote theorists sitting well away from the daily grind of schools? Ideally people best able to manage the situation are those on the ground, at the sharp end of operations. Teachers are therefore eminently more able to use their operational skill and judgement to maximise performance than a remote theorist.
The National Curriculum has been played around with for all of its 20 years existence. Results published in April 2009 show we are failing badly in the educational standards at primary level, the essential bedrock that influences attainment in secondary education. Although the rate of improvement in numeracy and literacy shows a marginal improvement over last year the rate is slowing. And the numbers are massive. Can we continue to fail 160,000 11 year olds, or a quarter of the total who missed the target.
Teachers are locked into targets that see some of the brighter students abandoned in favour of addressing the needs of the struggling children. Hardly an altruistic move when the motivation is a need to move the overall numbers up.
We are in the midst of a national crisis that bears similar markers. Although the jury is still out the financial collapse was heavily influenced by government policy to get banks to invest in social markets and areas of risk to improve performance. The judgment of the banks became impaired by people in high places who knew little about the operations at the sharp end. Stressed bankers took risks in order to meet targets. Incentivised by greed the odds were too high for many individuals and banks and the system imploded.
Are we seeing the corollary of distant education policy? The fun has gone out of learning, SAT’s and GCSE milestones being the key measure of education standard. Yet success stories are around. A top performing school in Bradford broke free and introduced “brain breaks.†A combination of fun and exercise to encourage learning has been a great success. The teaching resources are there they need unfettered application. Let the profession responsible for the operation use their skill and judgement to achieve the results. The current alternative in banks and education has proved what can go wrong.
Children who see education as a fun activity thrive. Putting fun learning back into the schooling process is not taking some easy route, managing the process needs skill and energy, but the results can be extremely rewarding. There is another hidden asset. Engaging parents in the process at home is vastly easier with educational games than exercises. Homework in this form can also be seen as enjoyable and as children spend 85% of their waking time outside school could capture a huge and predominately untapped resource.
