Ofsted has been rubbish! Who says? The Head of Ofsted. Er... The recently appointed Amanda Spielman, Chief Inspector of schools in England. Er... What seems to be the problem?
Schools have become mere “exam factories”.
We know. It’s what Ofsted prescribed! Well, no more. It’s all change. Another one: “We should be ashamed that we have let such behaviour persist for so long,” says Spielman. Well, yes – for so very long.
Summer has seen many unprincipled U-turns, but none more vertiginous than this one. We spent nigh-on 30 years peddling this guff at gunpoint, ranting and raving that it shrank the soul – and now Amanda seems to agree. “To reduce education down to this kind of functionalist level is rather wretched.”
Rather. But it’s all a bit late.
For sheer cheek, it takes the biscuit. Teachers were getting pretty adept at peddling the requisite, criminally atrocious pedagogy. Well, no more, apparently. Ofsted will henceforth come down like a ton of bricks on schools that chase mere league table success. We must now teach the “whole child”.
Inspections will henceforth look “underneath the bonnet” (eh?) for “a good quality education”, where pupils can “play the great works of classical musicians or learn about the intricacies of ancient civilisations”. Blimey! Go Amanda!
For years we bit the bullet and “taught to the test”. We were tested to test that our testing was testing enough so that our pupils passed their tests and we passed ours. We had to be seen to deliver lessons full of aims, intentions, Starters, Plenaries, Learning Outcomes, Assessment Objectives and Synoptic Phonics – or else. The Full Ofsted.
And to meet a million targets. I once failed 15 of them in one week, according to my line manager. I must have been doing something right.
Still, I got better at being bad, and bad teaching yields good results – dictating parrot essays, finessing quotes, filling in tick boxes, and boring the class senseless. They all passed, C/D pupils got As, and I kept my job.
But this U-turn has come too late for many of my ex-teacher chums. Ofsted drove them bonkers, barmy, insane or into deep melancholy. Creative and brilliant, they were disappeared or just left. Fledgling teachers are now jacking it in after three years.
Perhaps another new dawn beckons. Out goes fuddy duddy functionalism. In comes whizzo creativity. At last! We are finally free. This New Year you better teach the whole, holistic, rounded child or you’ll be toast. Who knows? Education may be making a come back.
- Ian Whitwham is a former inner city London teacher