Perhaps I am in the midst of a mid life crisis but I cant help but feel that lately I have found myself questioning what it is that I am doing !

Firstly, if you are a follower of my blog posts you will know that I have strong opinions on several aspects of education and partcularly strong opinions on where education is headed (or should be headed).

My opinions have been formed through the years from my own experiences of going through an education system that no longer exists to working within the fairly infantile Curriculum for Excellence and latterly as a learner within that same curriculum and I have to admit … I don’t like it.

I have far too many questions that are unanswered.

What is it for ? I mean this as a learner and as a mother of children. Are we doing enough for the learners, myself being one of them ? Is it still all too vague? Are we just shying away from the real issues that need addressed? What are these issues ? What do we want from our education system? Do we want the highest performing children and young people or do we want happy learners that are actively engaged and willing to risk take for the benefit of autonomy? OR do we want both?

Is it true then that you can have your cake and eat it ?

CfE on the surface and in theory can deliver  but not whilst we are hung up on QIs and E’s and O’s and the constant need to assess (and record) the performance of the learners. A recent article in TESS addressed  issues of too much emphasis on assessment , marking and planning causing teachers to leave the profession. Now if its too much for the teachers , how do the children feel?  Previous posts have touched on a few of the above!

A fairly recent publication on CFE that serves to better define what we should and shouldn’t be doing in the deliverance of it but on a fairly cynical note… I know from experience how heavily we relied on the Developing , consolidating and secure aspects of each level in terms of tracking children’s progress, yet now we are no longer to use these internal “stages” .

That being said I would be happy to accept this decision if an alternative had been offered.

Paying lip service to a curriculum that is in essence and in my opinion failing at what it set out to do is simply not good enough. Its not good enough for those trying to deliver it and it is certainly not good enough for the students learning within it !

We have a system that could work and work very well to the advantage of our children yet we are not utilising this to its full capacity. No amount of policy documents or papers or conferences will change that. Words do not make change happen. Action and a willingness to embrace new possibilities are the drivers for making these changes.