THE ASSOCIATION FOR QUALITY EDUCATION

QUALITY EDUCATION FOR ALL

Reflections on the current state of education in Northern Ireland and suggestions for the future.

December 2011

INTRODUCTION

The Association for Quality Education exists to seek to improve the lot of all children in Northern Ireland, not just those with academic gifts. Its whole raison d’être is the promotion and provision of quality education for all. In this brief paper we shall address a range of concerns which, we believe, impinge disadvantageously on the lives of many children in Northern Ireland.

At a time when the high academic standards of Northern Ireland were seen to be placed in serious jeopardy through the abolition of selection for post-primary education, it fell to AQE to honour the wishes of the majority of parents consulted in the Province by providing an alternative in place of the abolished 11+ examination. In order to preserve the academic standards in Northern Ireland, we have established the company AQE Ltd, and, on a very tight budget, it has successfully run two Common Entrance Assessments for 2009/10 and 2010/11 (the CEA), which have been an improvement on the old 11 plus in a number of ways, including:

* the three assessment structure with the best two to count

* the Access arrangements

* the removal of a grading system with its potential to mark children as failures and its capacity to conceal information,and

* the development of age-standardised scores.

AQE Ltd hastried to be flexible, transparent and supportive of both parentsand schools and believes that it has demonstrated that it has developed assessment arrangements which have high standards of reliability and validity: the CEA meetsinternational standards, and hasreliability values in the high 90s as measured by the Cronbach Alpha.

Northern Ireland’s pupils continue to perform significantly better at GCSE and at Advanced Level than those in other parts of the United Kingdom; in addition figures consistently show that educational outcomes of children of working class or disadvantaged parents in Northern Ireland are significantly better than those achieved by the largely comprehensive systems elsewhere. Yet in spite of such high achievements, much remains to be done in the educational sphere, given the continuing rates of illiteracy and innumeracy throughout Northern Ireland. These rates need to be reduced so that a much larger percentage of our young people may achieve their potential; however the solution to raising our lower levels of educational achievement cannot be found in the introduction of changes that would reduce the achievement at the top end of the scale.

In our view the attacks on academic education over the last ten years and the allied attempts to make a direct link between it and underachievement have missed the point and have wasted time and resources in failing to address the real reasons for lack of motivation among some of our young people. This document focuses on wider educational, social and family issues which, we believe, do have direct links with underachievement. We strongly advocate the need for an immediate, in-depth and unbiased study of this important area and a positive, cohesive approach.

Difficult economic times lie ahead. With Northern Ireland situated on the edge of Europe with no natural resources and having lost the heavy industries that once were its source of prosperity, a highly trained and educated workforce is essential for economic survival. We believe that education in Northern Ireland must focus on building on our strengths and on addressing effectively those areas which need improvement. We make a number of suggestions in this paper which, we believe, have the potential to raise standards further. In all our suggestions, we have tried to be realistic and to have regard to the fact that there will not be the finance available for wholesale change.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

The Association for Quality Education (AQE) has always recognized, appreciated and supported the excellent standards of academic achievement gained by all types of schools year in year out, which are the envy of other parts of the United Kingdom, but we also believe that there are elements in our system where a fresh approach is needed. The following areas are discussed in this paper:

  1. Social Mobility and Achievement

Northern Ireland’s education system caters much better for those in the lowest socio-economic groups than anywhere else in the United Kingdom. There are areas of the Northern Ireland, however,where children are the victims of lack of ambition and hope, due to the social conditions in which they live. In the first section of our paper we investigate possible causes and offer suggestions and possible solutions in Appendix A, always recognizing that reasons for underachievement can be varied and complex. Much progress has been made in some disadvantaged areas, and we see a case for a thorough investigation of this success. We also see the sharing of good practice as a very important element in any drive to raise educational standards further and so a considerable part of this discussion paper is spent on this topic with an outline of the Seven Step Framework for direct instruction being included in Appendix B.

  1. The curriculum in the Primary Schools and teaching methods

This section considers academic studies which show that traditional teaching methods are best for children in challenging areas and that the use of the Revised Curriculum and an over-emphasis on skills with fewer teacher-led lessons may be leading to lower standards, particularly for those children in the medium and lower bands. It is also noted that there are proposals in England to turn back to more traditional methods of teaching in order to raise academic standards. Again there is in this section an in-depth look at the lessons which need to be learned and changes which need to be made, to prevent standards from falling further to the level of those in other parts of these islands.

  1. Subjects taken at secondary level

These subjects, and how they are taught, are fundamental to maintaining and improving educational standards in schools, colleges and universities, and to sustaining our economy and our place in the wider world. AQE has always encouraged the support of academic gifts, but also believes that there has to be increased support for science and technology, for languages and for traditional subjects, and suggests ways of achieving this goal. We are also aware of the financial restraints and look at areas where savings might be made through, for example, a more considered and practical approach to the Entitlement Framework.

  1. The Entitlement Framework

This section looks at the value of the Entitlement Framework for our young people.

  1. The Education and Skills Authority

The Association for Quality Education welcomes the indication that the proposals for the establishment of the Education and Skills Authority and outlines some principles which it considers to be essential to ensure the success of this new body.

  1. Nursery Education

Fundamental to the well-being of our children is the start which they get on the educational ladder. Families need the assurance that places will be available for their children at this stage of their development.

  1. Special Educational Needs.

AQE points out that often the special needs of children with high academic gifts are forgotten;however in this section AQE looks at the problem of the number of children who are identified as having special needs because of a specific disability, but who are not being assessed and are not receiving the external help which they need and deserve. We consider that this is another area of concern which requires urgent attention.

  1. Time, Space and Money

We are concerned about bureaucracy and about money spent on unnecessary brochures and policies, which so often do not deliver what they claim.

  1. The Education Budget

This section looks at the shortcomings of the procedures for the proper scrutiny of proposals and our concerns for the future of education because of the restriction on the amount of money available for front-line services.

Conclusion

AQE acknowledges that solutions are not easy or straightforward and that the challenges may vary from place to place. We also know that this document only touches the surface of so many issues, but we are very concerned that there are policies and practices in place, basedmore on ideology than research, which will lead in time, if unchecked or unchanged, to a general lowering of educational standards and to the lessening of the life-chances of many children, particularly those in disadvantaged areas.We are aware that problems of underachievement are deeply rooted and touch upon issues much wider than the educational: social, political and economic.We recognize that this discussion document offers only a partial glimpse of the problems and possible solutions, but our hope is that it will be read in depth and with an open mind, and that the recommendations will be accepted in the spirit in which they are given: to provide a better educational experience for all our young people. We commend a number of recommendations of the Research Report by PricewaterhouseCoopers on Literacy and Numeracy. In two appendices we offer in point-form various means by which the problems presented in this paper might be addressed

CONTENTS

Introduction 2-3

Executive Summary 4- 7

Contents 8

  1. Social mobility and achievement 9- 11
  1. The Curriculum, PISA and Successful Teaching Methods12-21
  • The Revised Curriculum12-15
  • The Programme for International Student

Assessment (PISA)16-18

  • Teaching Methods For Better Learning19-21
  1. Subjects taken at Secondary Level22-24
  • Technical Education 22
  • Science 23
  • Languages 23
  • Specialist teachers for academic Courses 24
  1. The Entitlement Framework25=26
  1. The Education and Skills Authority27-28
  1. Nursery Education 28
  1. Special Educational Needs (Additional Needs)28-30
  1. Time, Space and Money 30
  1. The Education Budget31-34

CONCLUSION35-39

APPENDIX A: The Search for Solutions 140-43

-Addressing the Problem of Low Pupil Motivation

APPENDIX B: The Search for Solutions 1144-45

-Raising Standards for Disadvantaged Children through

Direct Instruction: The Seven-Step Framework

SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY46-49

1, SOCIAL MOBILITY AND ACHIEVEMENT

Since 1947 children in Northern Ireland, irrespective of their socio-economic category or residential location, have been able to avail themselves of an opportunity to maximise their achievements according to their ability. Tens of thousands from socially deprived backgrounds have been the first in their families to benefit from a university education, having gained the entry requirements in secondary schools, comprehensive schools, grammar schools and further education colleges. Every year a much higher proportion of students accepted into higher education in Northern Ireland wasdrawn from the four lowest socio-economic groups than in the United Kingdom as a whole. The success of the system is also reflected in the fact that higher percentages of young people in Northern Ireland enter higher education than in Great Britain,and there is also a significant difference in the percentage of 16 and 17 year olds in Education in Northern Ireland compared with other parts of these islands. This is due to strong standards not just in grammar schools but also in the secondary schools.

AQE, however, believes that we should aim for even higher standards across the board; we are, at present, with our member schools, looking at measures capable of raising expectations further in deprived or disadvantaged areas.

1.1.Reasons for lack of aspiration and social mobility.

Many of the Northern Ireland studies carried out in this area are small in scale, are often based on a small amount ofdata and offer opinions and reflections from interviews. There is a need for a larger- scale investigation of this issue, in the rural, as well as the urban setting.

The reasons for this lack of aspiration are varied and complex, tend to include some of the items given below and cover a range of age groups.

1.1.1The Primary Years

  • Dysfunctional families
  • Parents with learning difficulties
  • Parents with no interest in education
  • Large class sizes in Primary Schools
  • No reading support at home
  • Areaswith little or no hope in which education is not valued
  • Lack of church or other unifying influences
  • Parents who do not know how to support their children
  • Parents with their own pressing needs
  • Children with behavioural problems
  • Special Educational Needs (SEN) not tackled satisfactorily
  • The lack of use of baseline data/inconsistency of approach
  • Some schools have a large percentage of children for whom English is not their first language with insufficient support

1.1.2The years of compulsory Secondary Education

  • Some of the above
  • Lack of appropriate role models
  • Early motherhood
  • Lack of appropriate home tuition for GCSEs
  • Lack of affordable child care for young mothers hoping to return to education
  • Social demands of areas
  • Peer influence/group influence

1.1.3 Post-Primary non-compulsory years

  • Some from 1.1.1. and 1.1.2
  • Large families (less support for moving to University)
  • Unemployed parents (less support for moving to University)

1.1.4Male underachievement

  • Literacy viewed as a feminine pursuit
  • Morevulnerableto poor teaching
  • Lack of appropriate male role models
  • Less mature about learning
  • More behavioural problems
  • Not as good attention spans

1.1.5 Within communities

As has been said, the reasons for educational underachievement are varied and complex, but certainly two main contributory causes would be the family life and the pull of the local area, and again there may be different issues between an urban area and a rural area, but AQE believes that a study of the wider problem is needed urgently. If a family has its own problems and if a young person is pulled away from a chosen course by the lure of his/her peers, it is very difficult to deal with cases like this; however while no perfect solution can be found,AQE suggests somepossibleapproaches. It also has to be remembered that some urban areas are coping better than others. Best practice should be investigated.

What can be done to address poor motivation in pupils?

Please see Appendix A.

  1. THE CURRICULUM, PISA AND IMPROVING TEACHING METHODS.

Key to the development of children is the curriculum. In Northern Ireland the Revised Curriculum is used, which encourages the use of less traditional methods of teaching. The Department of Education makes much use of data from PISA, the programme for International Student Assessment.

2.1 The Revised Curriculum.

2.1.1. Primary

It is important that all evidence is considered regarding how successful the teaching of the Revised Curriculum has been in our schools. AQE feels that much more attention should have been paid to Project Follow Through –a study which was carried out in the United States of America over a period of almost thirty years.In addition, attention should have been paid to the local Evaluation Project of the Early Years Enriched Curriculum: EYECEP.

Project Follow Through studied the scores of 75,000 low income children (across 170 communities) in the USA. The study lasted for almost 30 years, cost 1 billion dollars, and monitored the children from kindergarten to grade 3 in reading, spelling, language development and mathematics. The only study of the efficacy of CCEA’s curriculum model was the Queen’s University of Belfast’s School of Psychology study of the Early Years Enriched Curriculum in the Greater Shankill. This study confirmed the findings of Project Follow Through, finding that, for children with low or moderate IQs, the children following the Enriched Curriculum produced lower profile scores than the control group in both mathematics and English. A memorable quote from the School of Psychology’s evaluation was that the “rich were getting richer and the poor were getting poorer”.

The findings of Project Follow Through can be summarised as follows:

  • Schools which teach by “direct instruction” offer their pupils the best route out of poverty;
  • Child-centred curricula have a tendency towards damaging the basic skills and self-esteem of disadvantaged children;
  • Children following curricula founded on constructivist child-centred principles score much lower than they would have, had they been taught by direct instruction.

We feel that there is an urgent need to examine all the issues related to the Revised Curriculum as well as the recommended modes through which it is delivered. The copy of the table which is shown below and which was taken from the Evaluation Project on the Early Years Enriched Curriculum (EYECEP), referred to above, shows a worrying trend downwards after the end of year 5. It seems to us that immediate steps need to be taken to consider if the pendulum has swung too far towards a fully skills-based and discovery educational experience. In terms of underachievement in more deprived areas, surely there is a need to pause, reflect and consider the evidence which seems to suggest that children in these areas need a more direct form of instruction?