Best ever A-level and GCSE results yet another year running. The Opposition points to grade devaluation, the Government to ever-brighter pupils and improved teaching. Meanwhile in schools, indignant heads assure us that pupils and teachers simply ‘worked really hard’. So what’s the real score?
Thinking back to the last preoccupation in education, classroom behaviour, its not then surprising when independent research tells us that standards haven’t in fact improved. Yet independent research also indicates that exam papers haven’t actually got much easier either. Strictly speaking therefore, something has improved: pupils are considerably better at exam performance, and their teachers better at exam preparation. It’s little wonder then that schools feel indignant - pupils and teachers have worked hard, doing exactly what the DfES told them to.
The trouble is, statistical progress of this sort doesn’t constitute educational progress. In a system where teaching and learning are driven by test outcomes, educational aims have become distorted. The rot first set in when so-called ‘norm’ referencing was replaced with ‘criterion’ referencing as GCSEs replaced O-levels. The new system meant that the top grade was no longer reserved for those pupils in the nation’s top percentile. In the criterion marking scheme, you now needed only to satisfy the set criteria. For a Government fixated on proving itself through the achievement of education targets, criterion testing can be heavily exploited. The Government sets the DfES test targets which are then passed onto schools to be artificially achieved through spoon-feeding. Teaching is now about advising pupils how to best navigate through exam papers in order to pick up maximum points. And with league tables the markers of success, everyone involved is motivated to play the game.
Thus all-importantly, the greater number of A-grades does not amount to the same as an exceptional generation of better scientists and mathematicians. Rather, higher results signify the sapping of pupil and teacher creativity, and most likely lower standards of education. The bottom line is that schools are failing pupils in order to make them achieve the necessary grades. Our children are losing out on real learning, and our teachers are becoming robotic. Now we know just how good both parties are at following instructions, let’s give them some that are educationally worthwhile.
Anastasia de Waal