By Anne Southern
SOMEONE in charge of traffic management in Jersey once told me that there were as many schemes suggested as there were inhabitants of the Island. It appears to be a subject on which everyone has an opinion. Similarly with education. We’ve all been to school, haven’t we? So we all know what schools should be doing. This is a harmless debating topic, but when a Member of the legislature with a hobby horse gets involved, the results can be serious.
Most teachers of a certain vintage curse Michael Gove and what he did to education in the UK. It seems to me that he basically thought education should be more like it was in his day, though doubtless his experience was limited to his selective school.
It’s all very well thinking that studying Shakespeare is valuable, but try telling that to the teacher who is trying to engage a lower set of 15-year-olds last lesson on a Thursday afternoon. The Conservatives are trying to crow about how their insistence on a phonics-based approach to reading and a “knowledge based” approach to learning have improved standards – but how is that measured?
Teaching to the test will improve test results, but will it result in genuine learning?
Phonics (decoding words through their sounds) is useful as part of a holistic approach to teaching reading, and nothing new (we were doing it here in the 1970s). But, if it comes at the expense of reading for meaning and enjoyment, it is rather hollow.
I once advised a despairing parent whose child hated their evening reading practice to stop getting her to sound out words, but to look at the pictures, try to predict what was going to happen and talk about the story. The results were transformative.
And making experienced teachers follow schemes, not deviating if a learning opportunity occurs to them, is de-skilling and demotivating them, doubtless contributing to teacher shortages. So please let educationalists take charge of the curriculum. Which brings me to Sir Philip Bailhache’s misguided plan, based on sentimental notions of heritage, to introduce bilingual schools in Jersey.
Teachers and headteachers are against it. That should be the end of it.
I’m proud of my ability to speak reasonably fluent French, rusty German, rudimentary Italian and the beginnings of Spanish. It’s important to learn a second language in order to see how it presents different ways of thinking, and it helps with an understanding of grammar.
I know that the ability to learn a language deteriorates with age. But Sir Philip is not a teacher and has not thought through the practicalities.
There is a question of staffing. Is it proposed that all the teachers and headteachers in the selected schools are to be sacked and replaced with bilingual ones? Or would we have some English teachers teaching entirely in English and French ones teaching entirely in French?
But the primary curriculum is delivered primarily by a single teacher. Research has shown that children growing up in bilingual households do best if each parent sticks to their own language. And where are the teachers, not only fluent in French, but also familiar with the primary curriculum, to be found?
Maths teachers have talked about how difficult it would be to introduce concepts in a second language, but what about reading and writing? Could the children be taught our very complicated spelling system alongside a similarly complicated and very different French one? And don’t forget that we are feeding into an English exam system that would not be able to make allowances for any confusion.
How immersive would the experience be? Surely the children would revert to English in the playground and at home.
And why French? Wouldn’t Portuguese stand a better chance, when it is the language of the home for many children and very useful for many occupations in Jersey?
Our children tend to perceive Portuguese as low status, but my sixth formers were surprised to find that it came in at number seven in the rankings of world languages, when French doesn’t even make it into the top ten. Or why not Spanish? It is arguably the second most widely spoken language, and much easier when it comes to reading, writing and grammar.
Yes, it is nice to be able to talk to our neighbours across the water in their own language, but I and many people I know can do that without being bilingual. And increasingly, I find that the French want to practise their English, an undisputed world language. So while I believe in good quality language learning, I accept that it’s not for everyone and there are many calls on what should form part of a modern curriculum.
Sir Philip should pay attention to the Education Minister, an ex-teacher who knows what he is talking about, and not interfere in matters which are beyond his experience.
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Anne Southern has taught all ages and stages before retiring as head of English at Hautlieu School. She was president of the Jersey Teacher’s Association for eight years and a founding member of Reform Jersey. She is chair of the Jersey U3A and an unrepentant morris dancer.
