Education, education, education...

I've just been reading about and listening to (on the radio and TV) information on the legislation on booster seats for children. Now I'm in favour of safety, but it looks as if this has been brought in on the thoughts that more and more children are die-ing in road traffic accidents and therefore the children must be strapped in safely so that if the vehicle they are in does happen to have an accident, the child would be safe. A fair assumption. But, when there is a traffic accident, surely there is more to protect than the child. What about the adult sitting next to child, the pedestrian walking beside the speeding traffic, the white van driver making deliveries and therefore not required to ware a seat belt, and driver of said vehicle... I could go on. Will those in charge of making legislation be looking in to these areas as well and coming up with more 'restrictive' measures. Wouldn't it be better if we were all strapped in with 5 point harnesses and a roll cage to boot, at least then we'd be as safe as the Formula 1 boys.

A few weeks ago there were articles in various newspapers and on the television and radio about the quality of the exams and whether they were hard enough or not because it seemed that too many students were getting higher and higher grades. I don't blame the students for being up in arms about this as they aren't the ones who decided on the characture of the exams or the content of their courses. The examing boards where saying that the exams weren't becoming easier, but the students were working harder and passing well. The results speak for themselves.

And just now at the Labour Party Conference it was announced that course work would now be done in school under supervision to stop cheating, (as if any student would dare to!) and that it was found that internet web sites where 'geared-up' to help students. You can look at this in two ways, one, well done to the student for their initiative and finding out how to get a task done well and for the minimum work, or, you could tear them off a strip for not entering into the course work in a manner that would benefit them in the long term, eg, do it right now and then take the short cuts later if it works. By using their initiative the student have undermined there own education because there will come a point where short cuts will not do and the long way is the only way and then the student would not know what to do.

This has made me think that maybe, just maybe, we've been heading down the wrong road. I always thought that tests, like the road test and exams like the ones we've all take at school, were there to check what we have learnt and whether we can use it effectively. I get the impression that now that everything seems to be heading for league tables and 'a competitive market' (whatever that means?) that students are being taught how to pass the exam rather than letting the exam be a check on what they have been learnt and to a lesser degree how well the teachers taught. I do believe that this is a dangerous path to tread. Without the necessary skills to use the knowledge gained in education we will have a generation who can excel at passing exams but nothing else. Taking this to the road, wouldn't it be better to teach and educate drivers-to-be how to drive and use a half ton metallic projectile rather than pass an exam. A recent survey has suggested that fewer and fewer drivers know the meaning of various road signs shown them, and various rules in the HIghway Code. Is it any wonder then that there are more accedents on our roads?

My point is that I don't think exams are doing now what their intention was a decade or 2 ago. I consider myself to be fortunate in that when I was at school I was taught how to learn, which then made teaching easier for the teachers and the exams checked how we could use this new information. There always seems to be something useful from the pass. There is the old adage of 'If it ain't broke, don't fix it'. Beware of the improvement for the sake of improvement.