Education, Education, Edu-oh, I'm such a feckless youth, I can't even be bothered to finish the word.

Good afternoon comrades,


Hope you're all well. I'm going for a meal tonight, so all good:). Really I should be doing some homework, or revision before then. But this is more interesting, so feel privileged whilst you read this.


So Fred, I hear you ask, what are you going to rant about today? Well, readers, education, that's what. I read a seemingly innocuous article on the Graun's site; it raised some interesting points about the state/private divide, the reasons for it and ways to tackle it. That's a pressing issue in itself, but not the reason I'm writing today.


No, what spurred me to take up my typewriter, was the comment section. If you ever frequent the enormous cesspit that is Comment is Free, you'll know that it is utterly dominated, not by lovely, enlightened, muesli eating types, but by horrible right wing trolls who I actually believe may have been transported here from the 1950s, equipped only with a terrible rage and a desire to spoil everything.


Obviously, on an article about schooling, in particular private schooling, there's going to be the standard cries of "dumbing down" and so on. I can handle those, I really can. They might be true - I've never seen an exam paper from before about 2005 - the point is moot.


What gets me, is the sheer, bloody minded, ignorance that the commentists show. Ignorance of what being in a modern school is like, ignorance of how young people feel and think, ignorance of teaching practise. One mindless, fleshy pawn, came out with a real cracker. (S)He, although I'm presuming he from the belligerent tone, attacked the "feminisation" of the classroom, whatever that means, pointing out teaching small groups of pupils at a time as an example of it. As opposed to just standing at the front and dictating to the willing class of young drones. Because obviously, the best way to get kids to learn is to talk at them.


Readership, please do tell me, if you learn better when the teacher stands in front of a board and drones, or when in a smaller, more intimate group. You may, astute as you all are, have already picked up my personal opinion on this little gem of a statement. 


It's so damned indicative of the attitudes around education at the moment. Yes, the schooling system has huge, huge flaws. The curriculum is angled towards exams, not learning, there's too much pressure and not enough time, classes are too big, schools are badly designed. I could go on, and so could any other young person in the English state education system. However, more personalised teaching, socially orientated subjects and letting poor people learn to read and write, are not issues that currently beset schools.


Blaming schools for everything, though, misses the point. The education system is increasingly left to pick up the pieces of fucked up family lives, child poverty and private education institutes that are half full of the best students, and half full of the privileged minority (why is often the same thing is a topic for another blog...)


Maybe, one day, an educational reform board will ask, you know, young people, what they find helpful in a classroom. Until then, I suppose the angry, uninformed comments on places like CiF will have to do...


I should probably stop now, and go do that history homework...*sigh*. Hope you enjoyed reading that - as usual it was interesting and calming to write, hahaa.


Solidarity all
Red-Fred