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September 2022

I have long held the belief that learning should not be carried out in order to pass an exam or get a better job. It should be there to satisfy the natural curiosity with which all children are born. Indeed a formal educational establishment can, repeat can, stifle that very curiosity. Curiosity is just the first third of any learning programme. Imagination comes next and all children possess a vivid imagination from birth too. Finally we have creativity, yet another in-built skill found in all babies. In simple terms, we question, we wonder and we solve.

I agree that there are certain skills we all need in life, numeracy and literacy being the major two. Yet by following the above process of curiosity, imagination and creativity those two skills can, with some initial guidance, be developed in an enjoyable and fun way.

If you have followed the media in the last few weeks you will know that education, time at school, call it what you want, is all about getting good exam grades. If you are truly wanting to make a difference to young people's lives, to help them progress into adulthood, you SHOULD know this is a load of nonsense. In fact, harmful nonsense and while I talk about harm I was horrified to learn, if what I read was true, that the BBC actually filmed, live, pupils opening and finding out their GCSE results. I don't mince words as some of you may know; this was, in my opinion, tantamount to abuse. Imagine opening them and finding your grades were “poor”. It's bad enough interviewing a professional sportsperson when they have lost a race, an event, but 16 year-olds should not have to suffer such an intrusion. Let's be allowed some privacy in our lives. Social media is bad but, I think, almost impossible to regulate (and I speak from the experience of having total lies written about me) but the BBC and other media organisations should know better and should be rebuked for such behaviour.

On top of such intrusive behaviour there is the ridiculous idea of comparing one year's results with another. In the broadest sense of the word there is an organisation, called Ofqual, who fix the results each year. They decide, in advance, what the grade boundaries will be. They have an expected level. In simple terms this means that if in one year the marks given are higher or lower than that expectation, the pass marks, the grade levels, will shift up or down to fit the expectation. Should you be interested they use something called a bell curve to do this. Simplified again, I am a simple person anyway, this means that all results should fit on a graph inside a shape resembling a bell. Year-on-year comparisons are useless, stupid and shouldn't even be mentioned by anyone.

But I digressed from my original point; simple people with grasshopper brains do this. Education is not all about exam results. They are there. They happen. Some people do well, some don't. None of it defines who you are nor how well you can cope with life. If you believe that exams grades are all that matter and you don't achieve the ones you want, you can get upset. Don't. For some jobs, for some courses, you do need good results but for coping with life, for achieving your goal, maybe you don't. As I said, exam results do not define who you are; your personality, your confidence, your curiosity, your imagination and your ability to be creative, to think creatively, do. You cannot accurately measure these in a formal test but we can, all of us, stimulate and provide an environment for them to develop.

Learning should be led by the learner, that's how you grab their interest, but the learner doesn't need to know they are learning. Let it happen. By making exam results the be all and end all of formal learning, every learner will feel pressure to perform and also the possibility for being labelled a failure. As I have said in earlier pieces, they are not the failures our system is.

I want to finish this firstly monthly (I'm an optimist and I will try) piece with something I, a professional old fogey, found really heartening. We have, for next year, linked up with our local forest school who will have a weekly input into our site. While looking through what they have been doing I found a piece that accompanied a little video they had uploaded. Molly, who is the leader of the school, says exactly what I have believed in for so long and, annoyingly, it hasn't take her half a life time to do something about it.

The piece read:-

A fantastic example of how Forest School stimulates an inquisitive mind, creates awe and wonder, promotes child led play and provides an abundance of learning opportunities.

A child today had noticed a hole in the ground and was very curious to find out what was inside and why it was there. He spent around 10 minutes fully focused and asking lots of questions. He ended up noticing the stones buried and tried different ways to get them out.

When children are interested and curious they learn things without even knowing. Playing and exploring is so important!

There is hope.