Ngātahi Aumangea Ake
return to sender
My wife (also a teacher) and I have caught up on the podcasts of the interviews on National Radio yesterday - alarm bells are ringing! Down here in the south we have some principals ready to take action. They are considering a nation wide "return to sender" when our National Standards packs arrive. They want to know that NZEI support this bold statement and that others will be willing to follow their lead . Personally, I fully support this action. We must send a united message - I believe it is critical that parents see us make a stand en mass and it needs to happen now.
Did you know that Elvis never made it into his school's glee club (his voice would ruin the sound) and that Paul McCartney was never recognised as a musical talent by his teachers? Even worse, John Cleese was never found to be funny! Not all our wonderful students have a talent for literacy and numeracy, yet our esteemed leaders have a very narrow view of intelligence overvaluing parts of the curriculum. Sir Ken Robinson states, "This stratified, one-size-fits-all approach to education marginalises all who do not take naturally to learning this way."
Let's make a stand! Do not let this stray cat in your doors and certainly do not feed it.
Did you know that Elvis never made it into his school's glee club (his voice would ruin the sound) and that Paul McCartney was never recognised as a musical talent by his teachers? Even worse, John Cleese was never found to be funny! Not all our wonderful students have a talent for literacy and numeracy, yet our esteemed leaders have a very narrow view of intelligence overvaluing parts of the curriculum. Sir Ken Robinson states, "This stratified, one-size-fits-all approach to education marginalises all who do not take naturally to learning this way."
Let's make a stand! Do not let this stray cat in your doors and certainly do not feed it.
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Erika Locke on -
Kia ora Greg, I think one of your key words is 'marginalised'. In our diverse, multi-cultural society with the appalling youth suicide estatistics that we have we need to be building inclusion, mental health well being and not increasing student marginalisation. I have always reported orally to parents clear information giving stanines and an explanation of those stanines at that show where their child sits in comparison with other students in New Zealand norms. I work in special education and I always include age related assessment information sso that parents have realistic and honesst i information. I also give information relating to specific learning progress, strengths the student has and an overview of the social relationships their child has with their peers - this relates to gifted and talented students also. I am disturbed at the pace of change being proposed, the ill conceiv sed ramifications and potential for unhealthy comparisons between students witin a class, classes within a school, between schools, between towns. There will be a narrowing of the curriculum and this will further marginalise many of our Pasifika and Maori students, ESOL students, students with special needs and it will also stifle the teaching of creativity and innovative thinking that is essential for a small island nation like ours so that we can be full participants in a global village. The proposed National Standards will create ranking systems within schools that will further alienate students who struggle to learn at the same pace as their peers. Learners should not be channelled into artificial norms and permanently recorded as averare, below average, well below average. Parents have a right to that knowledge, teachers are the right people to give that information to parents - that needs to happen. Formalised, written, reporting of that knowledge changes that knowledge from a personalised learning understanding to a dimension where ' the pen is mightier than the sword' - once formally recorded the information becomes part of a history that defines and stereotypes, that can be used as a sword to cut and to wound. Our schools will take a long time to recover from the wounds and we will be contributing to a generation of wounded students who have been publicly branded as below average and well below average. The wounds of arrogance and egoism will be no less damaging for those permanently recorded as well above average. We will have a generation of young people who's self efficacy and expectations will be branded in their formative years with written records of their 'averageness'.
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