Education at the Crossroads

Education at the Crossroads

© 1996 The Christian Institute

John Burn and Nigel McQuoid

Contents

Introduction

Causes for Concern

Emmanuel College

References

Introduction

"There is much that is praiseworthy in education today. The introduction of the National Curriculum, Standard National Tests, the publication of school examination performances and the introduction through the Office for Standards in Education (OfSTED) of systematic inspection have very properly helped teachers, parents and young people focus on standards and the need to be accountable to the public for the delivery of high quality education. Very often these reforms have had to be carried through in the teeth of opposition from the educational intelligentsia, sometimes in alliance with civil servants who were opposed to the so-called 'right wing' agenda.

However, there remains much to concern and many issues to address. The authors of this booklet are committed Christians whose motivation to serve young people in publicly funded schools is underpinned by the Biblical view that man is made in the image of God and that, though fallen and in need of salvation, all human beings are of equal value to God and thus are to be treated as being of equal value in our schools.

It was John Milton who wrote, "The End, then, of learning is to repair the ruins of our first parents by regaining to know God aright, and out of that knowledge to love him, to be like him, as we may the nearest, by possessing our souls of true virtue, which, being united to the heavenly grace of faith, makes up the highest perfection."

Milton is stating in his own context what is always true. There must be a spiritual and moral base to learning. The prevailing mind set of the intelligentsia today is one of relativism, hedonism and a counter spirituality all of which is contrary to the morality and spirituality of Biblical Christianity.

The moral fabric of society is in tatters because we think, plan and legislate as if there were no spiritual and moral absolutes. Those of us who work at the sharp end encounter daily the consequences of the collapse of moral values as it manifests itself in our schools.

Top

Causes for Concern

This collapse manifests itself in many ways. We wish to highlight some matters which we believe are a cause of concern to many parents.

1. School discipline is a major issue. Whilst it is true that the Chief Inspector of Schools indicates that many schools are harmonious places this is not the reality in large numbers of others. Nor do we believe that the problems are confined to certain urban and inner city areas. The tolerance level of poor behaviour by teachers has had to be raised. The cases of expulsion of unruly children, some of them quite young, are but a tip of an iceberg for although they hit the news headlines, there are children in many schools whose aggressive behaviour spoils the learning of others and deflects teachers from their task of teaching.

Increasingly, with the demise of properly regulated corporal punishment and the refusal of many LEAs and Appeals Tribunals to support Governing Bodies' expulsions of violent disrupters, teachers have had to tolerate unacceptable levels of defiance, ill-discipline, vulgarity and threat.

2. There is much teacher and parental concern about standards of reading, writing and arithmetic. It is certainly our experience that for many eleven year olds these standards remain at too low a level. We note confirmation of this from the 1996 Key Stage 2 SATs results and from a recent study showing that the average pupil aged 11 is 18 months behind their expected level of attainment in English and 24 months in Mathematics and that in both areas girls outperform boys. (1)

It is also depressing that those commentators who wish to undermine such research frequently resort to the somewhat meaningless phrase "right wing author" as if this somehow contributes to the argument.

3. The Chief Inspector of Schools, Chris Woodhead, has consistently and courageously voiced the concern of many about the unfocussed emphasis on projects, themes and group activities in primary schools at the expense of class teaching and teacher input. This is by no means confined to primary schools. In many ways he is much more in tune with the ordinary concerned parent than the educational intelligentsia. There is still too much emotional attachment to mixed ability teaching throughout the system and a lack of specialist input. This leads to the disadvantaging of many children. There remains a hostility amongst some teacher trainers to setting arrangements on a subject basis as a means of stretching children of all abilities. Large numbers of parents remain concerned as to whether their children's potential is being fulfilled. They are right to be so. The sensitive academic speaks of protecting the young from "failure" but consigns them to that very fate by limiting their ability to soar. The teacher on the ground knows the reality of differing abilities and must work children openly towards the achievement of their actual potential.

4. There is widespread concern about whether young children are being exposed to drug pushing and drug taking. Stories appear through the media of school playgrounds being places where drugs are available and of drug pushers encountering youngsters on the way to and from school. In addition to this, recent tragic events in which children have been killed and maimed by armed and violent intruders have highlighted the issue of the physical safety of children and young people in our schools.

5. Then there is the drift into moral relativism. Whilst it is probably true that there has been a reaction against this amongst the general public there are many in the education establishment who still talk of moving away from terms such as "marriage" and "the family" and towards such terms as "centres of intimacy".

There has been a systematic attack on the idea of the family based on a marriage between a man and woman in which children are nurtured and developed as an essential and fundamental building block of society. Those who have ready access to the media have been systematically attacking the concept of the family as restrictive and suffocating and contemporary soap operas peddle their cheap wares in front of millions as part of their agenda to remove absolute values and replace them with self-indulgent DIY morality.

The family was recently defined by the United Nations in its Year of the Family as being "any domestic arrangement whatsoever of any single adult, or of any number of consenting adults, living together and taking some responsibility for children". There are some who would see this as a sufficient arrangement to present to children in our schools.

We have drawn much encouragement from the comments of Dr. Nick Tate, Chief Executive of the School Curriculum and Assessment Authority (SCAA), in his advocacy of the needs for schools to give clear moral teaching and a deep insight into our cultural heritage.

SCAA recently set up a National Forum for Values in Education and the Community. Indications are that the report, which will form the basis of advice to schools, will fail to stress the importance of family life and marriage. It seems equally unlikely that the report will warn against the dangers of sexual immorality, drink and drug abuse, the occult, gambling and pornography. There seems to be a total confusion at the heart of government on this matter. The Family Law Act of 1996 has restated the significance of marriage for the nation's well being and yet it is reported that SCAA sources have made it clear that the Forum had stopped short of promoting heterosexual life long marriage because it felt it could not be prescriptive about family structures. (2) It is one thing to long for a moral code but to build up such a concept without a foundation of absolute truth leaves one chasing shadows.

We see here evidence of a moral slide of enormous proportions. Thirty years ago a Government Commission was clear that heterosexual marriage built upon sexual abstinence outside of it and sexual fidelity within it were values to be promoted in secondary schools. (3) They added that they believed it to be wrong to leave the young to fend for themselves without guidance.

The 1986 Education Act, which remains in force, requires sex education to have due regard to family life. (4) The Department of Education Circular to schools directs them to assist pupils to appreciate the value of stable family life, marriage and the responsibilities of parenthood. (5)

SCAA set up a forum of some 150 people, nominated by national organisations with a concern for young people in education, to produce this report. Once again it seems that the wishes of most parents will be set on one side as an official report carries us further along the road to secularism and relativism. To avoid offending some we are apparently prepared to set on one side the wishes of many who would require schools to uphold traditional morality. This leads us directly into a related matter.

6. This is the issue of the drift into multi-faith relativism within school religious education and school worship. Poll after poll of parental and public opinion reveals that the vast majority of the public wish to continue to describe themselves as Christian. The majority of parents want their children to be taught right from wrong, know what the Bible teaches and have an opportunity to be present when worship is offered.

It remains true that Britain is a Christian country with a secondary pluralism. It is impossible to understand our culture without understanding Biblical content and the way in which Biblical Christianity has shaped our art, literature, architecture, science, institutions and way of life.

The decision of SCAA to offer guidelines and advice on religious education to assist in the drawing up of locally agreed syllabuses for religious education has had unfortunate results. (6)

These models suggested that normally Christianity and three other non-Christian faiths should be studied by the time a child reached the age of eleven. The Government Circular (7) which is still in force states that there should be a predominance of Christian content at each Key Stage of religious education. The loading of primary school religious education with too many other faiths was done in the cause of tolerance. It is educational nonsense. It is, from reports reaching us, recognised by many primary teachers as such but they often feel under pressure from inspectors who quote at them the SCAA guidelines.

The educationally unsound thinking behind the guidelines is leading to the trivialisation of all faiths in the name of a superficial politically correct multi-culturalism.

In effect we have the growth of a relativistic multi-faith mish-mash which is a counter spirituality. This counter spirituality is promoted by some advisers and teacher trainers and is totally opposed to orthodox historical Christianity. We would argue that orthodox Christianity is not well treated by decision makers in the media. We want to see a substantial place for Christianity in the curriculum of all children and young people.

There are those who would also seek to replace religious education as we know it with the atheistic world view of scientism. Scientism believes that only questions that can be answered by science are worth asking in the first place. There is a clear need to help young people in schools to distinguish between the process of science and the philosophy of scientism. Clearly the latter is a major challenge to Biblical Christianity. One of the most articulate and accessible popularisers of scientism in general and evolutionism in particular is Richard Dawkins. He and others like him are able to gain ready access to television to promote their atheistic evolutionary world view. The believers in historical orthodox Christianity seem not to have the same facility afforded to them. Dawkins' most recent book, Climbing Mount Improbable, grew out of the Royal Institution Christmas Lectures televised by the BBC under the general title "Growing Up in the Universe". In this highly readable book Dawkins finds it necessary to describe how he corrected his six year old daughter who told him that she believed the wayside flowers were there to make the world pretty and to help the bees make honey for men and women. (8)

His book is an attack on the Christian view of a creating and designing God. He acknowledges that the world around us looks designed but he argues that the almost perfect illusion of design is shaped by a magnificently non-random process. (9)

He argues strongly that Darwinism is wrongly thought to be a theory of pure chance. He acknowledges that one stage in the Darwinian process is a chance process, namely mutation, but proceeds to state categorically that selection is non-random. (10)

We have no truck with those who would wish to ban the teaching of evolution from schools. We wish to see young people gain the ability in schools to distinguish between science and scientism and to examine the assumptions underpinning evolutionary theory, creation theory and the many competing world views and religions.

What we do urge is that substantial time be given for children to understand the assumptions and truth claims of that faith we call Biblical Christianity which has done so much for so long to influence our culture. The multi-faith mish-mash which is so often the diet of many in schools is no substitute for the kind of religious education we advocate. Nor, interestingly, does it satisfy the genuine followers of other faiths.

7. Finally we consider the issue of what we call special ethos schools. These are generally Church schools with a Christian ethos. They frequently achieve well in the performance tables. Their attitude to discipline, uniform, values and belief are popular with parents. Parents wish for choice and in exercising that choice look for a clarity from the school with regard to its underlying ethos. The average parent, irrespective of voting intent, applauds the right of public figures to choose schools for their children in what they perceive to be their children's best interests. They do, however, look for the creation of a system which makes that right clearly possible for all. Grant-Maintained Schools and City Technology Colleges are also popular. We are perplexed as to why it is proposed by the major opposition party to fund these schools through the local authorities who would be able to withdraw up to ten per cent of their funding to provide local services. This would have a significant impact on such schools and would seriously decrease their ability to deliver first class education. The gains of local management and the devolution of finance to schools have been very significant. We believe there is now a need for complete devolution.

Top

Emmanuel College

Emmanuel College is an inner city comprehensive school with a defined catchment area on Tyneside. It is a new institution with a normal curve of distribution of pupil ability. The majority of its pupils are, therefore, of average ability. Emmanuel College operates a strict uniform policy; firm discipline; teaches right from wrong; has an act of Christian worship each day; presents marriage, sexual abstinence outside of marriage and fidelity within it and in religious education examines the truth claims and assumptions of Christianity as well as other major world views. It has virtually no truancy. It obtains excellent examination results and has a high staying-on rate post 16. It promotes the work ethic and is well respected by the business world. It is heavily over-subscribed. Such has been its success that an expansion of its numbers was recently agreed.

The College's life is underpinned by a view of human beings which derives from historical Biblical Christianity. We believe that all human beings are made in the image of God and are all of equal value to Him. It follows from this that all young people must be regarded equally by those who teach them. It is therefore incumbent upon us that within a disciplined environment our young people be stretched to fulfil their potential to the very limit. We see the truth about human beings as being a triangular relationship of body, mind and spirit. Remove one side and the whole collapses. Without spiritual and moral roots, schooling is built on shifting sand.

In our view schools are about developing children and young children to the full - physically, academically, morally and spiritually. What we believe to be true about a human being will determine what and how we teach. We repeat here what we have written elsewhere. (11)

(a)Biblical Christianity has a doctrine for the whole person and thus a deep concern for education. It declares that man is a worshipping creature because God has placed Eternity in his heart (Ecclesiastes 3:11). It is categorical in its conviction that man is made in God's image and thus reflects His Creator. It follows from this that human beings have the capacity to know right from wrong; to create in word, music and a variety of media; to communicate with clarity and meaning; to experience awe and wonder and ascribe meaning to existence; to seek meaningful and sustaining relationships.

(b)Biblical Christianity asserts that God created everything out of nothing, that He created human history, intervenes in human history and will bring human history to an end in judgement and the creation of a new earth and new heaven from which all that is evil will be excluded.

(c)Biblical Christianity also points to the essential flaw in all human beings, namely that they have an inherent tendency to sin and thus God's image in them is marred. This flawedness cannot be dealt with by human effort or good works. It can only be dealt with by God's intervention in history through the birth, life, death, resurrection and exaltation of Jesus Christ and in the personal faith and new birth of the believer.

(d)Education alone cannot deal with the disastrous result of man's first fall from his original and perfect creation. It has a part to play in the restraint of evil and the affirmation of good and it has a major role in affirming what is true about human beings and devising a curriculum which reflects that truth. However, it can help draw a person out further in their understanding of God and his or her position before Him. From what we have already said many subjects are important contributors to this whole view of the person. These clearly include science, geography, history, mathematics, english and languages, technology and design, art, music, drama, religious and moral education and opportunities for worship. Herein lies the crux of how Christian Truth permeates all knowledge.

(e)Science and Geography may speak of the glory and wonder of God's creative activities. History can be seen not as a cycle of meaningless events but as a story in which God speaks and acts. Mathematics provides opportunities to appreciate pattern, symmetry, order and the excitement of relationships as well as developing a sense of accurate communication through number. Design Technology, literature, poetry, Art, pottery, Music, Drama and Physical Education give opportunities to develop the creative potential of young people. Religious education gives opportunity to understand the basic nature of human beings and their need for significance and salvation. Worship, at the heart of human nature, gives opportunities for young people to be present as worship is offered to the true and living God.

If the spiritual, moral and social roots are secure then young people will develop even beyond our high expectations. It is no surprise to us, therefore, that the outside world comments on the good behaviour, motivation, confidence and excellent academic performance of our pupils.

Our academic performance is satisfying. We are a new institution and our first pupils took GCSE in the Summer of 1995. As a typical comprehensive with a normal curve of distribution of ability we should be expected to perform at GCSE in line with the national norm. In fact we have substantially exceeded this in the two years we have entered students. Nationally the percentage of young people gaining 5 or more higher GCSE grades was 43% in 1995 and is expected to be marginally higher in 1996. The Emmanuel figure in 1995 was 75% and in 1996 was 79%. Indeed the percentages of children gaining ten or more higher GCSE grades were 48% and 55% respectively. In the 1996 GCSE examinations for Emmanuel students the students exceeded the national average of higher grade passes in English, Mathematics, Science, Technology and Information Systems by at least 20% in each listed subject. We should also make it clear that the majority of our children are 'ordinary' urban children few of whom attend church. Their parents, however, very clearly recognise the value and fruits of a schooling which is based on Biblical truth. We believe that much of what has been achieved is replicable throughout the system.

How do we see the way forward?
In the light of what we have outlined as causes for concern we put forward a number of points for action.

1. We advocate a change in the law which allows absolute rights for parents to choose schools. We believe that parents of very unruly children should lose this right. We do not believe that schools are overacting in expelling unruly pupils. Physical and mental bullying is a reality. Teachers too frequently have to spend time arguing with pupils about their need to conform.

Clearly the proper procedures must be followed and the right of appeal by parents to governors must be retained. We believe, however, that the present ability of the authorities to reimpose disruptive and deviant pupils on schools against the wish of the headteacher and governors must be ended. Clearly the number of centres for such unruly pupils will need to be expanded. The right of schools to detain pupils for reasons of behaviour, attitude or failure to comply is also in need of strengthening and clarification.

2. We believe that the National Curriculum in English and Mathematics should be further adjusted. The position of Phonics in the early years needs further strengthening. Research has clearly shown that the most effective way to teach children to read is to teach them to use the Phonic Method in the early years of schooling. One of the authors of this booklet was several years ago a member of the Council for the Accreditation of Teacher Education (CATE). He can well remember the opposition from the teacher training establishment at the time who were adamant in their view that teachers were properly trained to teach children Phonics. Events have shown this not to be the case. We believe that outside agencies, such as the Dyslexia Institute, should be brought in to correct the bias which exists against Phonics in some Initial Teacher Training Centres.

There needs to be a greater emphasis on Arithmetic in Key Stage 2 of the National Curriculum. The requirement for children to use calculators in primary schools should be ended. The National Curriculum tests in Mathematics should focus very strongly on mental and written Arithmetic.

3. We believe that all attempts, however worthily motivated, to legalise cannabis must be resisted. Those attempts may come from the liberal centre or the libertarian right or left. If successful the results in schools would be devastating. Schools must be encouraged to take a positive stand against drugs in their curriculum and against pupils found to be pushing and possessing drugs on school premises.

4. Schools should be encouraged to adopt subject setting and homogenous teaching groups wherever possible. Whilst not wishing to rule out project work and group work we would like to see a further move to teacher led class teaching. Too often teachers have been at the receiving end of impractical and ill-conceived theories of how children learn, behave and progress, often from people who left the classroom behind long ago. Although there are resource and practical issues to be resolved we wish to see an acceleration of the move from University and College based Initial Teacher Training (ITT) to School Centred Initial Teacher Training (SCITT). School-Centred Initial Teacher Training will allow the greater possibility of good teachers from well-proven schools sharing with trainees good practice based on a combination of orthodox teaching methods which both impart knowledge and also allow the flowering of creativity.

The absolute pre-eminence that came to be given to a child's innate creativity in educational thinking, of which Melanie Phillips has written, still holds sway in much of today's training of teachers and is a cause of low attainment. (12)

5. We believe we should attempt to retain the moral and spiritual base of education derived from traditional Christianity for publicly funded schools. This means resisting those outside and inside political parties who wish to remove the statutory requirement for a daily act of worship which is broadly Christian and/or a religious programme which has real Christian content.

In respect of religious education we wish to see retained the statutory requirement that religious education in Schools should reflect the fact that the religious traditions are in the main Christian whilst taking account of the teaching and practices of the other principal religions represented in Great Britain.

We wish to see retained the DfE Circular to which we have already referred with its emphasis on the need to ensure that the Christian faith predominates at every Key Stage of statutory schooling. We have reluctantly come to the conclusion that locally determined religious education through the locally agreed syllabuses should be ended. Many of these syllabuses, heavily influenced by the SCAA advice on the number of faiths to be studied by children by the age of 11, are not consistent with the intentions of the Act or the Circular and have tended towards the presentation of faith as little more than 'folk myths' from across the world.

We, therefore, believe that schools should draw up their own schemes for religious education consistent with the spirit of the 1988 Act and the 1994 Circular and that their schools should be inspected by OfSTED against these criteria. The training of OfSTED Inspectors must attempt to wean some of them away from their attachment to politically correct multi-faith, multi-cultural superficiality and schools must feel more confident about challenging these attitudes when they encounter them at inspection time. The politically correct notions relating to race, religion, class and gender continue to be in need of serious challenge.

6. We have drawn attention to our concern about the drift into cultural and moral relativism. It is undoubtedly true that there has been a decline in public morality. Divorce, co-habitation, births outside of wedlock and crimes of violence perpetrated especially by young males have all dramatically increased. Educationalists have tended to reflect this and say that we cannot positively present marriage, sexual abstinence and fidelity to young people in today's changed society. This is related to the prevailing view among the 'educational establishment' that teachers should be facilitators rather than instructors, that didactic teaching is opposed to learning and that knowledge must be drawn out of rather than put into children. We believe that children need to be given wisdom, knowledge and guidance in moral matters and that this is a proper role for schools. We must strengthen the commitment in statute that all schools should teach right from wrong and present positively the ideal of marriage as a life commitment between a man and a woman with sexual abstinence outside of it and sexual fidelity within it. Such strength demands reference to an absolute, and not to the shifting base of contemporary moral revisionism.

We should not be afraid of presenting to young people the Ten Commandments as the basis for private and public morality. We must seek to persuade SCAA of the desirability of presenting these as positive advice to schools as they seek to do what they are legally required to do - promote the social, cultural, moral and spiritual development of all young people.

7. We certainly do not wish to give the impression that Emmanuel College has all to give and nothing to learn in these matters. We believe that many schools - county, church, grant-maintained, city technology and technology schools - have a similar ethos and exhibit similar success. We believe it important that all schools should have their own flavour and should make it absolutely clear to parents the moral and spiritual basis on which they operate. Parents are entitled to know. We believe that the system should allow the development of schools similar to Emmanuel.

In order to maximise educational standards and to enhance parental choice we believe that all schools should be totally self-governing; that all funding should be delegated to them without any retention by the local authority and that we should move to a system of schools which are publicly funded independent trusts working within an agreed national framework and to a standard blue print for ethos and practice. To achieve a higher degree of accountability and to raise standards in numeracy, literacy and in other areas we advocate a structure whereby the Principal of the Secondary School also becomes responsible and accountable for the standards and development of educational achievement in its satellite Primary Schools. This would allow a degree of specialist teaching in the key areas of language and numeracy and afford a continuity of learning experience currently lacking as children transfer schools at 11 and 13. Now is the time to be bold and develop institutions which take responsibility for high quality continuous education from 5 to 18.
Top

References

(1) Social Market Foundation Memorandum No. 24, August 1996. Standards of English and Mathematics in Primary Schools for 1995: Dr. John Marks.
(2) Report in The Sunday Telegraph, 8th September 1996.
(3) The Newsom Report - Half our Future: HMSO 1963.
(4) 1986 Education (No. 2) Act, Section 46.
(5) The Department for Education (DfE), The Education Act 1993: Sex Education in Schools: Circular 5/94, Paragraph 8.
(6) National Model Syllabuses were published in July 1994 by the School Curriculum and Assessment Authority.
(7) Department for Education, (DfE), Circular 1/94: Religious Education and Collective Worship.
(8) Climbing Mount Improbable: Richard Dawkins: Viking 1996: page 236.
(9) Op. Cit.: page 4.
(10) Op. Cit.: page 70.
(11) Christianity and the Curriculum: What is Possible? John Burn and Nigel J. McQuoid: The Christian Institute 1996.
(12) All Must Have Prizes: Melanie Phillips: As reported in the Observer, 8th September 1996.

Top