School Or Exam Factory? How Are We Preparing Our Children For The Real World

The 4th Industrial Revolution is dawning and our children need to be prepared for it.

It is best described by Klaus Schwab, founder and executive chairman of the World Economic Forum, as

a fusion of technologies that is blurring the lines between the physical, digital, and biological spears I left the teaching profession over 18 months ago now with just shy of 17 years experience, in various managerial, training and teaching roles, in the UK and International schools. I have, recently, dipped back in, as supply, in order to keep myself abreast of new educational changes and techniques for whatever my new career will be I know it will be within the realms of education. I was excited to see how UK schools were preparing students for jobs in the 4th Industrial Revolution, compared to those schools I had worked in internationally. Unfortunately, I was disappointed.The reason I feel I can comment on this topic is that I was an outstanding teacher. I can say this with confidence for a few reasons I received that judgement many times from inspectors and school management, my students consistently achieved outstanding results at the end of Y11 Y13, I developed professional yet nurturing relationships with my students, they loved my lessons because I made sure they were fun, included Blended Learning, that my students developed as independent, inquisitive learners and yet still made progress! So what do I feel is wrong with UK education then? Well from what I have seen recently, it seems to have gone backward and below are the reasons I believe this may have happened.Class books. What? When are our children going to be writing on paper in the workplace? E-Learning and Blended Learning is NOWHERE to be seen, the focus is solely on work conducted in their class books! Why? Well, it may have a lot to do with the fact that you can t always mark work completed using blended technologies in a coloured pen, and then have the pupils respond to your comments in a Purple Pen of Progress (I kid you not, that is what they are calling purple pens!). And of course, if an OFSTED inspector cannot see progress in their books then you are an inadequate teacher and/or school. So to ensure the inspectors can see progress, work in class books and multicoloured pens, are must it would seem. Quite frankly, multicoloured pens and paper WILL NOT prepare our children for their future! The evidence proves that such comments, even in different coloured pens, have little impact on pupil progress. What such practices do prove, is continual progress , for the purpose of inspection. Tests. Students are being tested to death! I ve witnessed students being given tests when the teacher hasn t yet managed to cover all of the content yet! Over testing is not preparing the students for sitting exams, what it is doing is desensitizing them to their importance. Many schools have even cut sports, the arts, clubs, and trips, replacing them with extra English and Maths classes this is limiting our children s education and so their potential, for the benefit of the test! What is being created is a whole generation of young adults who can pass exams but are not prepared for the world they are expected to work in and live inNo time. Teachers have no time to establish those important professional and nurturing relationships with their students because they are too busy comment marking and giving out tests. As adults, we feel good when we feel valued and secure in our place of work, well guess what, children are the same! When students know and feel that they are valued, they feel happy, they feel safe and secure in school, they want to learn, and they make progress! So time to develop positive relationships in the classroom is vital. The fact there is no time to formulate these relationships is turning students off education. It is turning teachers off the profession too. According to the Guardian newspaper, a quarter of those who qualified to teach since 2011, have already left the profession. They enter it thinking they will be making a difference to students lives what they find is they are being forced to turn children into data and they are drowning in a mountain of unnecessary paperwork.Funding. Government cuts have affected not only teachers pay but school resources which enhance our children s learning and make it relevant. Maybe this is another reason why class books are once again as important as they were in the 1950 s and e-learning and blended learning, which both involve bringing currently technologies into the classroom, have been phased out?Something needs to change. Blended Learning needs to be an everyday feature in our children s classrooms. Many teachers have been calling on government, to make changes for years now but their voices have fallen on deaf ears. Perhaps they should listen to the leaders of industry? When speaking to key business influencers, they have been shocked to learn about the direction education has taken in government-funded schools and academies. They voiced concerns, that those students currently enrolled in UK schools, were not being prepared for the blended technology jobs of the 4th Industrial Revolution and consequently, our children are being left behind the rest of the world.

Other countries governments, many private and international schools are acting. They are giving teachers more autonomy, investing in technologies, training and incorporating Blended Learning throughout their curriculums they are making sure their children have the skills to obtain jobs and become leaders in the 4th Industrial Revolution. The fact the UK Government is not doing this will most likely have a detrimental effect on our children s future. But hey, these are only my thoughts, and I`m only a teacher, what would I know? :(