We need to revert to the simplicity of the three “r"s

Anne71 says:

12:52pm | 22/06/12

Can’t say I blame you, Katie. If I had been forced to listen to the drivel that passes for “Social Science” myself, instead of being taught real history by a truly wonderful teacher, I wouldn’t remember much about it either, because I simply would have tuned it out.

Katie says:

03:04pm | 21/06/12

Yes.  this is exactly what SOSE (Social Science) class was like up until about year ten.  A whole heap of ‘self-flagellation’.  I dont remember any of the content, because in these types of classes there is no such thing as critical thinking, so no opportunity to properly ‘apply’ what we learned.

AdamC says:

12:52pm | 21/06/12

Sancho, that is a nice series of snobby, patronising slogans, but it really isn’t very relevant to the actual article, is it?

Also, comments such as this make you sound tragically insecure.

xar says:

10:32pm | 21/06/12

when exactly did it become radical to suggest learners who are engaged with what they are learning and how they are learning is a good thing? There is a large amount of difference between NO fun and ALL fun, I don’t recall advocating for the later in anything I wrote. I don’t advocate a lack of challenges nor a lack of attention to the “end product”, I simply point out that the way to get that end product need not be via sucking out any hope of a love of learning. Telling teachers that children are all inately horrid and need to be cowwed into a suitable state of adult submission, or that the only way to achieve a good “end product” is via dull and overly authoritarian approaches (note: I said OVERLY, authority is good but not if unchecked) is demonstrably untrue.

St. Michael says:

02:00pm | 21/06/12

“Can you please define a “structured and formal way” because it sounds to me like code for “really un-fun learning by rote” and I can point you to a raft of studies that show engaging and creative ways of teaching actually work better and help children retain that information much longer.”

Yeah, because it’s important that children believe you must never do anything uncreative or unengaging in life.  That’s an awesome attitude to give children.

kitteh says:

01:54pm | 21/06/12

Oh please. I have taught at university The fun, fun, fun approach might engage a few seven-year -olds in the short term. In the long term, all it achieves is a large subset of young adults without the discipline to buckle down when things get haaaaaaard (ie: when it doesn’t directly relate to their little world). There’s really no fun approach (nor sufficient time for faffing about) when teaching linear algebra or musculoskeletal physics - especially when the students are lacking in basic principles in math already. Telling schoolkids that they should always be motivated by a desire to learn takes away their personal responsibility and leaves them without vital life skills - persistence and self-discipline. Your future boss won’t give an aerial act of intercourse about engaging you.

Vince says:

10:47am | 22/06/12

@Little Joe - you think what I’ve stated is “PC crap”, do you?  How in any way is that “PC”?  Just because you don’t agree?  You don’t even know what “PC” means.  NAPLAN doesn’t kick in until Grade 3, Einstein, so what are you on about?  Lol. We are talking about Prep age kids.

disco_cil says:

09:10am | 22/06/12

ittlle joe - my point was it is there to be toaught, the blog states that it is NOT covered, whichv is a lie, that was my problem with his claims.

As to whether the curriculum is covered or not, not lay all the blame on a document or teachers.  I am a teacher, I have had reception kids come to my class who have never seen a book, cannot even hold a crayon, and who have parents who have not taught any respect for authority so all you do all day is classroom manage a bunch of kids, with little time left for teaching.  This is not the governments fault, the fault lays directly on the parents!  We need to stop shifting blame, and look a little closer to home.

For those who are interested in actual facts, you can look at the curriculum at http://www.australiancurriculum.edu.au/

Little Joe says:

08:55pm | 21/06/12

@ Jade

I agree totally ..... see my comment above.

@ Vince

Stop with the PC crap.

Some children never catch up .... especially in the lower socio-economic areas where the illiterate congregate.

I know that many people do not understand this but this was the point of NAPLAN ..... to identify disadvantage in the educational system and pump more money into schools that need it. People should go though the NAPLAN Numbers and see how disadvantaged indigenous Australians are before they finish Primary School.

Unfortunately it has been transformed into a political leviathan

Bob the builder says:

03:50pm | 21/06/12

See my comments before about german schools. But with regard to learning the german system i saw assumed that kids didn’t need any help at all with homework only to check plus if it was really hard. Now this is a year 4 kid who is doing hunderds thats right hunderds of maths equations preparing for testing that will determine their whole path in life. No pressure for a 10 yo every week for a year. Now the kids who were hopeless at homework and got bad marks went to the bottom school in year 5. Now the bottom schools are a problem bid like our public schools except in rich areas. But in german poor areas have trade schools and university stresm schools so kids and parents that want to get out of the poverty trap can. All i here from my aunt who is a teacher in the public system is that poor kids are trapped. Now this is just wrong, totally wrong our teaching system should have different types, putting a trade school in every poor area for high school might do wonders to help the community and the poor. Our whole system is trying to make university students. How about schools that train kids to be miners, driving trucks and plumbers and sparkies. It could change whole vommunities. But no lets make more uni students. Just silly.

Vince says:

03:14pm | 21/06/12

@Jade - “I remember being shocked at being in a Prep classroom during the first week of term, and realising that these children could not write their own name, count to ten, or identify a book.”

That is so unfair.  In the first couple of years of school, kids start at very different levels.  By Grade 3 they have equalised.  At first, there is a huge difference between their learning levels.  Some are older by almost a year, for example.  That means a lot when you are only 6.  Others have been to pre-Prep schools while others have not.  And, yes, some have had the benefit of parents who have started them early into numbers and reading, but it doesn’t make as much difference as you think, in the long run.  Whether a kid does well academically or in life has little to do with what level they start at in Prep or Grade 1. 

Believe it or not, most parents are not lazy, irresponsible.  Most parents are decent, hard working citizens who care a lot about their kids welfare and deserve a little more respect than you’ve given them here.

jade (the other one) says:

02:32pm | 21/06/12

@Little Joe. The problem is not that the curriculum is not being taught. The problem is that the curriculum assumes that students are coming to school with basic understandings. They are not.

The Prep-Year 2 curriculum assumes that children know what a book is. It assumes that they know what a letter is. It assumes that they know what a number is.

Lazy pathetic parents are the problem. Lazy, irresponsible parents who don’t have children because they are interested in them, but because they are the hottest new social accessory.

I remember being shocked at being in a Prep classroom during the first week of term, and realising that these children could not write their own name, count to ten, or identify a book.

When I was in year one, I could already read and write the entire alphabet, and identify a whole plethora of sight and high frequency words. I was not in the minority in my day. I would be now.

Little Joe says:

01:38pm | 21/06/12

@ disco_cil

I guess that you do not realize that it doesn’t matter what is in the curriculum ….. it is quite obvious that children are not learning the curriculum. They have been allowed to casually slip through the system. Their parents don’t give a damn while the teachers’ hands are tied by BS administration and PC Garbage.

Did you not see how badly student teachers performed on a numeracy and literacy tests??? And these people want to be our next generation teachers!!!

Daz says:

01:30pm | 21/06/12

Go back to school and learn their three “r"s properly this time?

M says:

11:06am | 21/06/12

But then what would the beaurocrats do?

Bob the builder says:

11:59am | 21/06/12

Xar thats right the germans don’t have standardised testing though i knew only up to year 4 which was the year my kids went to. The testing is local school based. the tests are crafted for the local area. Sure the maths seemed pretty universal but history etc was all about the town and then how that related to the outside world. My son could tell me the history of the area back to pre romans, WW2, WW1 the thirty years war and how it related to the town. The butt kicking thing i just don’t know about. But german education system produces people who can get jobs. But also for example produces plumbers who speak english who when talking look at your bookshelf, see that you have an english translation of the germn historian schillers thirty years war, ask if he can have a look, looks at a particular page and says “thats a really good translation”. I could have died at that moment here was a 25 yo plumber ....need I say more.

With regard to finalnd you would have to have a kid in the system and see if they do these standardised tests I don’t know. The germans dont to year 4 but the kids in year 4 have school tests and they know that there marks will determine which school they go to.

The next thing is the most kids want to go the middle school which teaches trades, plumbing, insurance broking, and banking. The kids finish at 16 and get a job and build on the skills from the middle school. Most average people are reluctant to send there kids to the top school as that only leads to university and “what sort of job do you get from that” people would say to me, “doctor lawyer, well you dont need many of them”

It is not the standardised testing it teaching, testing and learning. Now the kids are pigeon holed in year 4 but at 16 they can be employed as they know stuff and can do things for their economy. Seeing our system now I know it is designed like the german top schools to produce university students. But in germany tradesmen have pride and having a trade is well thought of.

A simple story to end, a friend of mine used to let school kids come to the ici factory and look at plastic manufacturing. He did this until one year he heard the teacher who had always brought the kids say “and if you don’t work hard this is where you will end up”. He never let them in again.The teaching system has to be changed so that the delusion that university is the only pathway has to be broken.

Xar says:

10:48am | 21/06/12

and out of germany came Steiner education, one of the fastest growing forms of alternative schooling which also gets really high(often superior) results but doesn’t ignore creativity and doesn’t used standardised testing much, and has no textbooks becasue the kids create their own, and doesn’t have computers until highschool and which stars teaching reading and writing much later and has no intense competition and studies showed the kids are more socially aware than peers in other schools - when exactly will people learn that there is more than one way to achieve sound educational outcomes? Heck Finland has THE best education system and they have similarities with Steiner schooling in starting formal education later, having a real focus on play in early childhood, not being competative testing driven, having the same teacher for primary years ect. In finland no kids do standardised testing till age 18 and they are kicking germany’s butt so there you go!

Bob the builder says:

09:18am | 21/06/12

thats right they don’t bash unions is just about teaching that is focussed on learning. Now I’m here again sending them to an elite private school they don’t learn, they know how to cut and paste from the internet, that is not learning. When I was in germany they would as we drove around tell me the history of this spot or that, tell me about the spainish soldier who died in that hut in 1632 that brought the black death to area as the spanish army was going to fight the swedish. Now they know nothing they are even forgetting to spell and write.

It is the teaching, the competition between kids that is the driver and personal responisbility for the kids. Kids write well otherwise their friends cane them. They all know each others marks. You never have to ask them for notes or things to sign, as they would thrust them into your hands before school demanding you sign it otherwise they were for it when they got to school.

Were are in a very competitive world, germans know it our teaching system doesn’t. The naplan stuff etc etc is not worth it if we don’t do something we will be dumb drunk, racist and out of a job.

acotrel says:

08:45am | 21/06/12

They are not union bashers in Germany, either !

Micella says:

07:36pm | 21/06/12

TChong take it from a regular Aussie who isn’t posting as anyone else (please check our isp if that helps) you need to reflect on your inappropriate comments and apologise.

John T says:

05:51pm | 21/06/12

Is there something wrong with you?
Seriously you need psychiatric help.

The Real Jacob says:

03:01pm | 21/06/12

TChong I didn’t appreciate your comments about Israel this week, but to deny the views of others and denying their existence for your convenience is just plain disgusting. I’m a real offended person and using the concept of concentration camps in such a context in sick. The Punch should look into this, it is not acceptable.

Jeanne says:

02:01pm | 21/06/12

FFS TChong what is wrong with you? Have you lost the plot? You are making yourself look like complete knobhead.

Jim says:

11:39am | 21/06/12

You think concentration camps are an appropriate thing to talk about and used in an accusatory tone! Seriously man you have inner demons that make Mel Gibson’s look like smurfs!

Deryk the concerned says:

10:58am | 21/06/12

TChong clearly the best thing to do is ignore the statements, you are coming across as a loony and that means atm and friends have won. You are such an easy target because you keep falling into traps, I think maybe a break from this forum would be good for your health.

TChong says:

09:10am | 21/06/12

Hey
AtMickey
Which music store you boycotting today ?
The store may have Wagner in stock.
What you need to do is invent another character , a female concentration camp survivor,who can post “Gee AtM you are so right and brave, and we should get TChong banned. “
Remember your Samantha character claiming to be a “brain”? Funny!!!
Hats off to you though AtM, with you and all your characters, there is never a dull moment.

acotrel says:

08:42am | 21/06/12

Hasn’t Steinberg got something to do with pianos ?

TChong says:

08:24am | 21/06/12

Mickey
defintely AtM
Embellish your name further to Mickey or sayanna Steinburg- ( must be jims brother)
Your trolling has been called out.
Go cry elsewhere.

Mickey says:

08:09am | 21/06/12

No comment about Israel today? Am I Mickey or your paranoid AtM fantasy? The discredited Chong gives another arrogant and pig-headed statement.

acotrel says:

07:58am | 21/06/12

I don’t know about illiterate, but I found several tertiary students who couldn’t plug three words on a subject, into a search engine, take the results and write a short commentary about the subject, then talk about it to the class.  It’s an exercise any competent manager does every day in industry before attending meetings. - basic skill !

AdamC says:

11:40am | 21/06/12

Economist, I like the idea of remedial classes. A lot of educational traditionalists advocate the resurrection of holding kids back a year if they do not make the grade. That seems counterproductive to me. Merely repeating the same classes that failed to effectively teach the kid in the first place seems almost designed to fail. I prefer the ‘cram school’ approach where you are expected to keep trying until you get it right. Having special ‘flying squads’ of remedial teachers who provide extra classes to those struggling could help with that.

What we really need in our education system are fewer, better teachers who have more autonomy but are held accountable for their performance. And I do not mean held accountable by high-stakes, centrally-administered testing, but by their peers and principal in equally autonomous schools, who are themselves made accountable by unrestricted parental choice.

Unfortunately, the teachers unions and other members of, as Donelly described them, the left-of-centre educational establishment oppose almost every aspect of that approach. In order to manage mediocre teachers and mediocre schools, governments are ODing on centralised control. Meanwhile, education remains the most reactionary and change-averse area of society.

Little Joe says:

08:48am | 21/06/12

So you would teach children history before teaching them to read and write?? Interesting notion however I do not think that you fully understand the concepts involved in childhood literacy. The identification of core words that are used in language, phonics and rote learning words/sounds like ‘ight’/‘ite’ and ‘eight’/‘ate’/‘ait’/‘ete’/aight.

Imagine the following instructions :

1) When you come to the fete, walk straight to gate eight and put your bait on the crate.

2) Then walk to the right of the site and, to your delight, we will flying a kite.

If you teach children basic literacy first, you will quickly be able to expand apon the basic, as you have stated, through their own motivation.

I think teaching children biology, chemistry and physics would be wonderful ..... and finally we may have found some common ground. I remember showing children in Grade 2 how to do ‘Chlorine Testing’ on town water and showing them what algae look like under a microscope. In agreement with you notion of teaching physics, I think that it would be wonderful for children to be shown how easy it is to build a solar lighting system (panel, light, battery, controller, wires).

acotrel says:

07:49am | 21/06/12

@Little Joe
‘The reading, writing and arithmetic is core business ..... but I would add science and history as these subjects reinforce many of the skills learnt in reading, writing and arithmetic’

I suggest you have it arse about.  It is extremely difficult to learn anything when the student doesn’t know its application. I attended night classes until I was 57 years of age.  If you are motivated, learning is easy.  What motivates the most,  is having a real interest based on a perceived application for the knowledge. If I wanted to teach kids maths, I’d teach them Physics at the same time, regardless of their age.

Bob says:

09:29pm | 21/06/12

Educated: Learning the times table by rote isn’t about knowing the rudiments, it’s about being able to give a snap answer to “What is seven times six?” rather than calculating it.

Greg in Chengdu: My wife is Chinese, critical thinking was a major problem for her in university. Frankly if I had to choose, I’d take someone who was largely ignorant but had the ability to understand and analyse facts over someone who knew all the facts but didn’t understand them any day.  There’s no point in knowledge if you have no idea of how to analyse and use this knowledge.

willie says:

12:39pm | 21/06/12

Educated

The times tables are not rudiments, the rudiments would be learning how to multiply 2 numbers. I don’t need to know how to multiply a hundred or so specific combinations of numbers just 2 general numbers. I actually think that rote learning the tables is worse educationally as the kid never learns to actually multiply.
I guess it’s like the whole word reading debate. If you teach kids to recognise words they will be able to read words they know, if you teach kids to recognise letter groups they will be able to read any word.

Ten67 says:

12:07pm | 21/06/12

@ Leon,
I’m agree, at the school I work at we had a delegation from Hong Kong come to see how we do it here. I drew the short straw and had a teacher tag along for the day.
He was a wood work teacher the same as me and what he wanted to know about was how we taught creativity and innovation.  His direct quote was “we know how to rote learn. We are better than you. We don’t know how to come up with new ideas”
Sometimes in argy bargy of debate in Australia about education, we loose sight of what we do well here. The Asian system of education can not produce the Hills hoist’s , the ute or the victa lawn mower.
Look at what Asia does, it manufactures, it miniaturises and copies but it cannot innovate. We better be carful of what we wish for.

Educated says:

10:07am | 21/06/12

“Mathematics has nothing to do with memorising times tables”???  If you don’t know the rudiments, you can’t progress to the abstract.  I know Year 9 kids being tutored because they don’t know their times tables and haven’t got basic spatial concepts that are taught in years 3-5!!  Even simple things like how much change you should be getting from a tenner to buy your burger is beyond them.  I feel sorry that these kids’ futures have been limited by the schooling system.

Greg in Chengdu says:

09:38am | 21/06/12

Your right here in China Chinese teachers use the same memorization methods and the result is students that cannot think for themselves have no imagination or opinion except for that given by the heavily biased Chinese government media. Take Huanyuan Island for instance discussing this topic with my students I almost pull my hair out. They are incapable of seeing through an issue. When I explained to them that Huanyuan Island is within the Philipines territorial waters they look at me with completely uncomprehending stares. The government here made a big show of America selling the philipines a retired coast guars vessel and this ofcourse was construed as an act of provocation to war. Yet they never remember the fact that the US also sold a retired air craft carrier to China years ago. If we adopt this political correct stance in Australia we will have the same result students that cannot break down an issue and come to their opinion. no imagination, no innovation which is exactly why China Copies products from overseas

Paleoflatus says:

08:20am | 21/06/12

I like your final comment, LeonT, but I wouldn’t suggest that an aspiring pianist needn’t learn to recite set pieces as examples and for pleasure, before progressing to extemporisation or composition. Likewise, memorising great poems engraves beautiful language and the joy of inspired thoughts in the memory. I also wonder how the logical sequence of history can be taught without knowledge of dates. As for the times tables, surely they are a prerequisite to more advanced mathematical concepts that promote concepts and logical problem-solving. You have only to listen to the chatter on the ABC to see the shallow results of post-modern “education”.
There are three main problems with education - over-permissive child-rearing, the gravy train of post-modern bureaucrats and a previous generation of poorly taught teachers. I’m glad I don’t have to fix it!

Greg in Chengdu says:

09:30am | 21/06/12

Our education system is only half the problem. Teachers are now a days powerless to discipline the few students that actually attend their classes and the extremely long and fettering list of politically correct practises are ridiculous. A lot of things make no sense at all. Many schools are teaching languages the children will never use. Even more bewildering is that they will teach a language for a year then teach a different language. Learning a lan guage takes YEARS of study, learning bits and pieces of Thai and Bahasa are not only useless but frustrating

Daz says:

12:43pm | 21/06/12

And some people can’t work out why there is such a significant drift towards private schools. Parents are taking their children out of the state system in droves. All my children attend private schools.

Is it because I want them to be indoctrinated in a certain religion? No. Is it because I want to feel superior to those who can’t afford to? No. Is it because the teaching is better? Not necessarily.

It’s because there are standards and rules and values and discipline. I know they won’t have to put up with disruptive or anti-social behaviour from other students, well at least not in the class room. They can do their job which is to learn.

If someone plays up or doesn’t toe the line the Principal simply says “There’s the school gates. Don’t come back.”

shinydonkey says:

11:35am | 21/06/12

The cane never taught anybody anything other than violence as an acceptable way to impose your will.  By your logic, if I think the US is askew on rules, boundaries and expectations regarding foreign policy and international law, a single strike of a Boeing 777 on a well-padded building will set them to rights.  We all know how that turned out.

Andye says:

10:11am | 21/06/12

Queensland Observer - “not brainwash them with Leftist PC mumbo-jumbo.”

Like what? I hear this said but I am not exactly sure what is the leftist mumbo jumbo?

“Trouble is that the teachers who will be teaching the basics, don’t know the basics themselves, so they too will need to be taught before they can teach others.”

You get what you pay for. You aren’t going to get better teachers until you pay more. It is as simple as that.

“Bring back the cane - previous generations who endured the cane, managed to get through school in one piece, and come out useful, mature and law-abiding citizens at the other end - not like the current lot of semi-literate ferals currently leaving school.”

I grew up with the cane. There is nothing special about the cane, mate, apart from the fantasies some older people have of a society where young smart arses get hit more often.

Queensland Observer says:

09:55am | 21/06/12

Three posts in a row acotrel? Evidently I struck a nerve.

A question to you - when was the last time you interacted with school-aged children in a school (classroom or playground) environment?

If you can honestly answer ‘days’, then another question - Do you think it is appropriate for children to: swear worse than sailors, be disrespectful to teachers and be disobedient and unruly in class, and talk back in a disrespectful manner to adults - and all without consequence?

p.s. I’m not saying all are like this, but through first-hand experience I can state that there are a significant proportion of children who fear no consequence, possess few social skills, and who laugh with impunity at the limp-wristed discipline handed out by their schools. These will be the same children, who as teens, will be raising merry hell on our streets once they leave school.

Perhaps a single strike of the cane on a well padded rump early on in life might well have taught some of these ferals a few pointed lessons about rules, boundaries and expectations.

acotrel says:

08:40am | 21/06/12

Great psychology ! If we gave you regular beatings, would you stop writing that sort of bullshit on this forum ?

acotrel says:

08:37am | 21/06/12

If you keep the kids dumb, they’ll probably vote for the LNP !  Teach them Australian political history, and they will vote Labor forever !  Which party built all the infrastructure ?
How about that bastard Jack Lang who built that ‘white elephant’ which crosses Sydney Harbour?

acotrel says:

08:32am | 21/06/12

‘Head’s up L/NP - this is what you need to do when you win Government - reform the schools and go back to basics. Teachers need to educate children with facts and useful knowledge, not brainwash them with Leftist PC mumbo-jumbo.’

Don’t be stupid !  Which side of politics do you think started dumbing down our education system - and why ?  In Victoria it was Henry Bolte, and the VCE - got rid of the matriculation exam because it gave the expectation that all students could go to university.

Zac says:

02:54pm | 21/06/12

@ morrgo,

Did you watch the clip? you are on about some unrelated stuff? I like what Kevin does for education but the trouble is with secular ideolgists hiding in the system at taxpayers cost.

Blind Freddy says:

12:23pm | 21/06/12

@morrgo

Saved me posting the same. Hypocrite, much.

morrgo says:

09:41am | 21/06/12

Not only the kids. 

Mr Donelly is blowing hot and cold too. Just recently, his Drum piece admonished the government for Naplan testing and the lack of teaching social literacy.

James D says:

11:48pm | 21/06/12

AMEN Robert S. But the right are just as bad on eduaction. No one should be able to set the cirriculum for people who have not agreed to it. That is socialised education and the left does it to create a work force that are smart enough to run the machines and dumb enough not to question why. Marley please try thinking before writing you have made my point.. Disco_cil - i am sure humanity can come up with a better solution for education that people can afford then forcing money out of the populace at gun point and using it to turn their kids into drones that believe in the system. Besides if you give people the money they government has stolen from them BACK to them and stop subsidizing education educationwould both be cheaper, and people more ready and able to afford it. Not that hard really.

Robert S McCormick says:

12:21pm | 21/06/12

Exactly, Marley,
A BA is damn-near useless & meaningless. For some weird reason companies expect their employees to have a BA - in anything, no matter how minor & irrelevant. I have a neice, her father & mother are two of the most up-themselves, snotty-nosed gits, yet he is a truck driver, she a shop assistant, who brag about how their daughter is a uni doing a bachelor of Science Degree.What they conveniently omit to say is that the marks she got were so low that the degree level she will, if indeed she even passes & not being at all academic this is very doubtful, come out with will qualify her to be a company rep, a salesperson flogging her employer’s goodies!
Education in Australia today is a complete & utter farce.
Of course the ALP will want to “dumb it down”! They want an electorate which can neither read, write or, most importantly, Think. An electorate which will blindly accept what these thrice-accursed Socialists tell them. An electorate which has been brought up to expect the government to do everything for them, to take responsibility for everything.
Dumb-down people & just as the Jesuits used to say about children ” Give us a child until it is 7 & we have got her/him for life”. That is what the Gillard Socialists are doing to the electorate of the future.
Already many young people who have already left school & indeed Uni can barely read, their spelling is atrocious, their writing indecipherable. Just as the Gillard & other Socialists would have it.
Gillard once admitted that her only hero was a man called Aneurin (Nye) Bevan. He was almost as far left a socialist as you could get before you could call him a Communist. Gillard thinks the sun. moon & the planets shine out of old Nye’s dead arse. He, along with Clemnt Atllee damn-near destroyed the UK after the war, they were the type of Socialists, just like Julia, who thought it a good idea to raise the Income Tax for anyone earning over a certain amount to 19 shillings & 6 pence in every 20 shillings earnt. The result? The producers of the UK left in droves My father was one of those so we came here & thrived.Our young ones went to pld fashioned schools. They learnt the 3 Rs, they can read, spell, write & do the sums. Their young children today can’t & after they come home from school they start getting properly taught.

disco_cil says:

09:51am | 21/06/12

so who should fund eduction??? Not everyone can afford private education, and do we really want corporations taking the helm?

marley says:

09:03am | 21/06/12

Actually, the system is not designed to produce worker drones, it’s designed to produce BAs.  Why do you think we have to import so much labour?