Packed lunch

When the little Rigbys started school we paid for school dinners, because it seemed like a good idea. But, for several reasons, it didn't go too well and junior Rigbys ended up joining the packed lunch brigade.

Schools in Rigby Town don't have kitchens. Food is cooked elsewhere, 'centrally', then packed onto heated trolleys and delivered in a van. The young Rigbys and chums were given culinary delights such as a portion of cheese, baked beans and chips, followed by a slice of cake and custard. Sometimes there was pizza, plain sort of pizza with a smearing of tomato sauce and sprinkling of cheese - with chips of course. Sometimes there was pasta, with an indescribably bland sauce. Another time there were baked potatoes, filled with beans or bolognese, and chips. There was never a choice because, of course, only the right number of meals were ever delivered to the school, anything more would be wasteful - and because of this hungry children soon learned that being either at the front or tail end of the queue was always a bad idea because 'spoonfulls' or 'scoops' of food tended to contain less to eat than for those served out in the middle of the queue.

The other thing the little Rigbys disliked was the way they were expected to eat their food. You see, it's served on trays that are meant to double up as plates. They are hard plastic things with compartments for each 'bit' of the meal, which meant that beans spilled over into custard if the serving was either careless or hurried. And believe me, there's nothing a little Rigby likes less than custard flavoured with baked beans or tomatoes.

We Rigbys know from friends that children attending school in an adjoining county are given a mass produced 'packed lunch', comprising a sandwich, a yoghurt and a 'piece of fruit'. The sandwiches are always two slices of white 'plastic' bread with the thinnest of indescribably tasteless fillings that won't deteriorate if not kept chilled. The best flavoured yoghurts, naturally, go to those at the front of the queue, with the tailenders ending up with plain. The fruit is almost always an apple, because children won't eat green or mottled bananas and don't understand pears.

The decision to close school kitchens was made at county level, it was meant to save money because the 'old' kitchens needed upgrading to comply with the latest standards. Centralised cooking was also meant to save money, because mass purchase of ingredients is meant to be cheaper, and one large kitchen is supposed to need fewer staff than required to man many small kitchens. The authority that decided to do away with hot dinners altogether did so, apparently, on H&S grounds - because of the potential consequences of an equipment failure in a delivery van which could have led to food poisoning. So, all in all the bean counters and elves were probably happy, and the kids missed out.

The kids missed out because parents are led to believe that their children are provided with a 'proper meal' at lunch time, something similar to their meals at home. Parents imagine that their children will at the very least be allowed to choose between one or two menu options, options which cater for not only the personal likes and dislikes but also all the various 'allergies' suffered by increasing numbers of youngsters. But in many cases this simply isn't true, it doesn't matter how many 'menu plans' are sent home, because the powers that be can simply change their minds. Many children, when confronted with a school meal, are simply expected to eat what they're given, or go without. It doesn't matter a jot what dear Mr Oliver has to say about it, the penny - and baked bean - counters know what they're doing and in the end it's they who dictate policy.

Imagine, if you will, going to have your lunch and being told what you must eat. Imagine being told you can eat 'that' or go hungry - even if you (or your parents) have paid for your meal in advance.

Then imagine a regime that allows adult 'dining room assistants' who maybe only work for one or two hours a day to enforce these same rules on large groups of children, some as young as five.

We Rigbys dumped school meals quite early, and turned to packed lunches. Ours is a fairly unusual way of putting them together - to offer the children a variety of 'things' each evening with which to fill their lunch boxes, including sandwiches or rolls. Nothing, of course, is allowed to contain even the chance of a hint of essence of nut, because somebody somewhere in the school has an allergy - so no peanut butter, no sesame thins, no cashews, no peanuts and not even multi-seeded bread, just in case an unknown child suffers anaphylactic shock.

Our little scheme ensures that the little Rigbys never, ever, open up their lunch boxes to find something they don't want - it's meant to encourage them to eat a reasonable amount to keep them filled up until they get home, instead of sitting there nattering. You see, children's tastes change almost from hour to hour and like a petulant moggie they'll actually go without rather than eat something they don't want or like - or that their friends say isn't nice. They don't care in the least how much something's cost, they don't care if it's 'healthy', all they care about is whether it tastes nice - at the time.

Would we Rigbys pass the lunch box inspectors test? Probably not, but what we can do is balance a snacky fill-em-up type of lunch with a decent evening meal - and that's something the school dinnerists seem to forget.

Mrs Rigby would like to ask two simple questions of those who think it's reasonable to inspect children's lunch boxes, and who will remove anything that doesn't pass the test from the child's lunch box - meaning they could go hungry.

1) Is this really the way to treat children?

2) Would you like Mrs Rigby, or indeed anybody else, to inspect any one of your daily meals before you are allowed to eat it?

If the answer to either of those questions is negative then they should keep their noses out of what parents provide their children for the one meal a day on the 190 days that they attend school*. And, maybe, they should investigate the institutional meals provided in places like this - and see if they'd get away with their dictatorial policies there.

* Most people these days eat 3 meals a day, which is 1095 meals in a non-leap year.

....

If you have ...

Makes you think, for a moment.

Taken from here

....

Schools and 'Academies'

Mrs Rigby is finding it hard to understand why there is opposition to the proposals to allow schools to become 'Academies' - when the last government thought they were a wonderful idea.

According to the BBC former schools secretary Ed Balls

warned it would produce a two-tier system

Odd that he didn't notice this 'two tier system' when he was schools secretary.

And the Unions?

The NASUWT teachers' union claims the policy will "disenfranchise democratically-elected local councils".

Haven't either of these people noticed that the private sector, which is largely free of local council 'enfranchisement' are quite successful and get good results?

Not, of course, that any possible turnaround would happen overnight, because there's still a little problem of people like these, who are, Mrs Rigby thinks, the ones who need less power and more control and need to be able to follow rules so they become decent adults.

Maybe what's already happened at one school in Grimsby should be used as an example of what can happen, and quite quickly too. And it happened, by the way, under Labour - so Mr Balls should do his homework.

At Havelock Academy attendance has improved from 89.8 per cent to 94.8 per cent in the two years that it has been open and GCSE results of A* to C, including English and maths, have increased from 23 per cent to 41 per cent.

....

Educational conditioning?

This is a comment attached to an article in the Mail

I am writing this comment as a mum of one of the children at Blackminster and the mum who bought this to the attention of the press. It is interesting and comforting to see that other people think what happened is wrong, very wrong and that I now do not feel like I overreacted in my dismay, anger and total amazement at the unbeliebility of the incident.

The school appear to have made light and their letter of apology did nothing to soothe us parents. They seem to think the problem lies with the tme elapsed between the incident and telling the children this was a spoof.

This is not the issue, the issue is that this should never have taken place, Under no circumsytances should be put in this situation. We censor what our children watch and read we hope that they all know the difference between reality and fiction but this needs to be made clear to them. We do not expect or wish to find that they are subjected to this kind of "experiment". - Vikki Woosey

The events that led to this letter being written were very well planned :-

1. Children were told there was a "gun in the school".
2. Alarm bells rang, children were evacuated onto the playing field.
3. 300+ children then watched as a teacher was gunned down by a "crazed hoodie", who then ran into the school building.
4. Children saw LSAs attempt CPR.
(4a. Children didn't see emergency services arrive)
5. Children returned to the building.
6. Children called into an assembly where they were told it wasn't real, it was playacting, it was role play, it was a science lesson.

Blackminster Middle School teaches children aged 10+ to 13+

The headteacher's response :-

'The role play was part of a science lesson where a selection of students and teachers acted out this scenario.

'The problem with a small minority of the pupils was that there was a slight delay in getting them back into the hall to to explain what had just happened.

So it was the children's fault?

Could the 'delay' in 'getting them into the hall' have been because the children were scared or upset and they didn't want to be herded indoors, especially as they'd just seen a gunman running inside?

'Most of them already knew it was a spoof but a couple of them were upset and we have since spoken to them and their parents and apologised to them.

Tsk, it must have been the naughty children's fault for not knowing it was a spoof. See, it was only a couple of them. Most, oooh, that'd be at least 151 children wouldn't it, already knew it wasn't real - so they wouldn't have got the point of the 'exercise' either, would they?

Heck, there are some rotten kids around these days, but there are loads and loads of decent kids too. Grown ups, especially teachers and headteachers, shouldn't try to pass the blame in this way.

Or should they? We'll see why later.

'It was one of the more popular teachers who played the victim, I don't think there would have been as much concern if it was one or two of the others.'

Ah, so this headteacher believes that children as young as 10 wouldn't have minded seeing somebody killed - as long as that person was less popular?

There's so much wrong with this statement that it could easily be the subject of a PhD thesis. Mrs Rigby isn't even going to try unpicking it further.

Maybe the school got the idea for this 'experiment' from here, which was a project from Science Year 2003, and decided to jazz it up a bit, and do their own thing - without truly understanding that they're dealing with children who, no matter how bolshie they may to be, are still children - and in the school's care. These are, after all, the same children who can be killed by a single particle of cigarette smoke at 20 yards.

In 2005, following an inspection, OFSTED inspectors concluded that the overall personal development and well-being of the learners was worthy of a 2 (2 = 'good'). Perhaps they might think otherwise now?

But then, maybe not.

Blackminster Middle School doesn't seem to be alone in experimenting with the thoughts and minds of its' children, because only a couple of weeks ago children at St Kilbride Primary School were 'traumatised' when their teachers decided to play Holocaust with them - and

deputy head teacher Elizabeth McGlynn segregated nine youngsters in Gerry Blair’s P7 class and told them they were being taken away from their families.

The role play was

... designed to give the 11-year-old children an insight into the horrors of the Holocaust as part of a project they are doing about the Second World War.

It worked so well that it

left pupils crying in fear.

These children were later told it was all a game, but their parents weren't amused and wrote letters of complaint to the council - which wrote a nicely 'on target apology :-

“Schools commonly engage in drama-based exercises which encourage children to use their imagination and act out a character. These role play situations are designed to help children understand diversity and develop empathy for the victims of prejudice and are usually very well received by pupils.

“We are sorry that the lesson had this affect on some pupils.

See? Same thing.

Some pupils.

Some pupils obviously didn't have enough diverse empathy for Holocaust victims, they were too busy being scared and upset for themselves - selfish little blighters aren't they?

All this leads nicely to the little boy who climbed a tree in the grounds of Manor School, Melksham. He couldn't get down, and was left there because the school has a policy to

observe the situation from a distance so the child does not get distracted and fall.

A passer by didn't think this was a good idea, so she strolled into the school and got him out of the tree.

Was the school grateful? Were they heck, they contacted the police and accused her of trespass!

Whew.

After all that, is it any real wonder that Truancy hits record high with an increase of 44% during the term of this government.

Schools Minister Vernon Coaker said

'Parents have a clear duty to ensure that their child is in school ...

Why, Mr Coaker, why? Because you 'say so' isn't good enough any more.

What's the point in them going to school? Where's the incentive to those who aren't A* material? Compulsory sex lessons haven't been enough to pull them in through the doors, and too few are being taught to read, write or do maths, and now we learn that primary school teachers are willingly traumatising those in their care - in the name of 'equality, diversity and blimmin drama.

So, come on Mr Coaker, and Mr Balls too, please tell us.

What's the point of school?

Is the point of school these days so that kiddies can learn what it's like to be the playthings of "the authorities" when they practice their own emergency games? It very nearly worked with the swine flu panic.

Here's how this little exercise was planned :-
1) Leaflets delivered to residents outlining emergency procedures in the event of radiation leak - delivered in the evening, after dark.
2) Almost simultaneous loudhailer announcements that water supplies are being cut off.
3) Residents panic.
4) "Authorities" say all is well.
5) "Authorities" say residents over-react.

It didn't go down too well in Portland, but that nice BBC said it was the silly residents' fault, they were mistaken - just like the frightened children.

....

Advanced Science.

In a statement about Science and Maths A-level exams, Sylvia McNamara, from the QCDA, the body responsible for the development of the curriculum and qualifications in England, said

"This summer A-level students will sit the new style exams, which demand a more broader understanding ...

Sylvia McNamara is a very important person, in a high powered job. She is Executive Director for Policy Implementation at Qualifications and Curriculum Development Agency (QCDA), her background :-

... having worked at Birmingham City Council as Director of Education and prior to that as a lecturer in special educational needs at the universities of Nottingham Trent and Leicester.

She's obviously the best person the implement policy decisions across the whole curriculum, including those for bright, able, gifted and talented young people - because they too have been recognised as having special educational needs.

If your child is gifted or talented, talk to their teacher, the school's Leading Teacher for Gifted and Talented Education or the headteacher about the support available. You may also find it helpful to talk to your local authority's Gifted and Talented lead ...

Good for you Sylvia for remembering this, well done for making sure clever kids are catered for.

Let's look at the "more broader" Science Diploma Sylvia is so proud of. It should be good, because 

Schools Minister Jim Knight [...] asked the science community, employers and higher education experts to come together to ensure the new Advanced level Science diploma is of the highest possible quality.

These experts must have had lots of meetings, because they managed to produce all these documents

* Initial Scope 09-08
* Draft Themes 10-08
* Draft Themes Annex
* Draft Themes Summary
* Secondary Research Report - January 2009
* Market View Report - January 2009
* Market View Annex - February 2009
* Student Voice Report - March 2009
* Consultation Findings - March 2009
* Criteria Consultation Interim Report - May 2009
* Criteria Consultation Report - June 2009
* Employer Voice Report
* Advanced Level LoL*** - Final Draft for Consultation - February 2010

This diploma will

... be phased in over two years with the Foundation and Higher level being introduced in September 2011, and the Advanced Science diploma now being introduced in September 2012.

It's going to be so difficult that at age 16

* the Foundation level is equivalent to 5 GCSEs at grades D to G
* the Higher level is equivalent to 7 GCSEs at grades A* to C

Crikey, that sounds tough. Imagine the rigour. Imagine the challenges students will have to face to be able to complete assignments and pass tests in only one subject that is equal to all those GCSE passes - and to be able to do all that whilst also studying at least English and Maths and two other subjects to ensure 'breadth' of study. Anybody studying this syllabus must be incredibly bright, and so incredibly focused on learning that they won't mind having their noses glued to books for the two years needed to get through this syllabus.

Imagine how proudly superior these students will feel when they realise they've got a longer list of qualifications than those of their peers who have studied Biology, Chemistry and Physics as single subjects, and who are only awarded one GCSE pass for each. Imagine, too, what this amazing qualification will do to the league tables - every school will be eager to take it up.

It gets even better, because in the sixth form

* the Advanced level is equivalent to 3.5 A levels

Fantastic! It's amazing! Only the most able, the brightest will be able to stand the pace, after all, very few these days manage to do more than 3 subjects at A-level, not even Oxbridge expects that much. The students following this course will be scientific world leaders, so let's hope loads of teenagers sign up to study this diploma.

Ah, you're thinking, it isn't often Mrs Rigby is thrilled by innovative learning opportunities, so why does she sound so pleased?

Well, she's delighted to think the government, via QCDA, has at long last realised that academic rigour is, errm, de rigueur - that it's fashionable, it's common sense, it's the 'in thing' to do.

Mrs R knows that, by the time they reach (now compulsory) 6th form, every single student will have been through 12 years of full-time education and, in the state sector, every scrap of learning will have been dictated and micro-managed by the government and its agencies.

Mrs R knows that every single state school (in England) will have complied with the ruling that makes Science a key subject, a compulsory subject - so no individual student will have been able to avoid either lessons or (in England) assessment at the end of each 'Key Stage', and their results will have been written down on a list.

So it's interesting that the "Diploma in Science" site needs to ask this challenging question

"What is science?"

***
Oh, by the way, LoL in this context is not the internet acronym, it refers to "Level of Learning"

....

A* rejections.

In an article that details how some high achieving applicants are, this year, being rejected by all five of their choices it is claimed that this may be because they attend Private Schools :

In some cases, pupils predicted to get three A*s at A-level – along with a string of perfect GCSE results – are being turned down from all five of their choices.

In response ...

A spokesman for the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, denied that private school pupils faced discrimination.

“Although admissions are rightly a matter for individual institutions, the Government is committed to ensuring that entry to university is determined by aptitude, potential and merit, not where a student was educated,” ...

Maybe they hadn't read this

Universities have been given the green light to vary the A-level grades expected from applicants depending on the schools they attend.

....

We don't like rules.

Courtesy of BBC

A school in Suffolk is to ban girls from wearing skirts in a crackdown on uniform infringements.

St Albans Catholic High School in Ipswich said it would enforce the ban from September after pupils broke dress code rules.

So, although the parents might have let their daughters be a bit careless with the existing rule, they of course agreed that it was a good idea for girls to wear trousers. Trousers mean there will be no problems with excessive thigh exposure which could attract horrible paedophiles. Trousers will keep the girls' legs warmer in winter ... and so on. Good idea, don't you think, after all, some schools expect all their children/pupils/students to wear trousers because they're meant to be safer for girls than skirts. And anyhow, there are rules, as the school says :-

"Our prospectus lays down a rule that skirts must be from knee to mid-calf length, not tight and no slits are allowed."

But no, the parents didn't like the idea of their daughters obeying rules, they followed the best practices of modern Britain and :-

Parents and pupils have set up a Facebook petition opposing the ban.

Parent Claire Calver goes one step further, she's realised there's no real difference between staff and children/pupils/students because, she says :-

"I'm disgusted. I hope the female teachers won't be wearing skirts either."

Actually Claire, unless you're a school governor, it's no business of yours what the teachers wear to school, nothing whatsoever - it's your job, as a responsible parent, to help the school turn out a fresh crop of adults who are going to be of some use to the country. With an attitude like yours the rest of us might as well stop trying.

But, to be honest, it looks as if the school needs to rethink a thing or two, too :-

School manager Alison Turner

What on earth is a "School Manager", and since when did head teachers need to hide behind "managers"?

According to AskOxford 'manager' is

• noun 1 a person who manages an organization, group of staff, or sports team. 2 a person in charge of the business affairs of a sports player, actor, or performer.

Ordinary folk see a manager as somebody fairly ordinary, somebody they could be if they were in the right place at the right time -  such as an ex-footballer who becomes a football team manager (and can  mess up the team's chances); a supermarket manager who used to work the tills (and can be unreasonable by telling customers not to wear their pyjamas);  a coffee shop manager (who shows teenagers how to make expensive cups of coffee)  or even the manager of the local takeaway (who, errm, makes and sells takeaways).  Ordinary folk have heard that managers of whopping great NHS hospitals earn more than surgeons, and put patients into cupboards, and we've been told to view Bank Manager with disdain because they're responsible for the country's financial woes.

How then are parents, any parents, supposed to react to a school manager? Is this a person who should automatically generate respect? If so, why - because who, these days, can presume to be respected because of their job?

On top of all that there's the very careful newspeak the educational establishment has been forced to use - because nobody is allowed to fail, nobody is allowed to be seen to slip through the academic net, every child is a winner but if they should do badly in their GCSEs there's a brilliant excuse - as Leg-Iron points out, there's been some research which decided that 'everyone is born with the same level of intelligence and it's only their subsequent life that determines their IQ' - so anybody who fails their exams can say the rich family-up-the-road / MPs / Bankers / Lottery-Winner has stolen their brains.

It's wrong to pick on just one school, so take a look at your local school's website and see what it says for both it's "motto" and "Mission Statement" - it'll be on the front page.

The school will probably say "we aim to" and "we strive to" along with "inspire", "caring", "inclusive", "ethos", "enrichment", "celebrating".

What will be missing will be the word "teach".

It's unlikely the school will have "We will", or a "We are going to" or "the students will".

These "Mission Statements" are always couched in very careful language so that if the school messes up it hasn't actually broken a promise to either the kids or their parents. In the end it means that 'these days' nobody really knows what schools are for, they're not allowed to be excellent at anything other than football or drama, and it's open season for tearing up the rules and teacher bashing.

It didn't take long for it to be completely broken, did it?

....

Pyjamas and fluffy slippers.

Having identified All Day Pyjama Syndrome (ADPS) in 2003, and a couple of years after a school asked parents to wear day clothes when delivering their children, a Tesco store has decided to ban shoppers who are wearing pyjamas or other nightwear.

It seems unreal, but the BBC says so, and so do the Mail and Guardian, so it must be true.

The lady chosen to be spokeswoman for the nightie-wearing folk of the St Mellons area of Cardiff could, probably, have been chosen more wisely because she complains that

"I think it's stupid really not being allowed in the supermarket with pyjamas on.
"It's not as if they're going to fall down or anything like that. They should be happy because you're going to spend all that money." 

Ah, so she thinks a shop should never turn away a customer, it doesn't matter how they're dressed - it's all about taking money.

Apparently some pyjama-wearers think Tesco is waging a class war.

One mother said: ‘This is just pathetic and shows how snobbish some people can be.
‘Do they have any idea how difficult it is to get three kids off to school when you are a single parent?

Goodness me, getting three kids off to school sounds really hard, it's probably terribly tiring too - so tiring that Mum has to go back to bed afterwards.

How is it that 'snobs' don't do this?

Let's put it into perspective - schools only have to be open for teaching for 190 days a year, not at weekends. Schools tend to open at the same time each day. It's a routine that should be relatively simple to master - especially for an adult.

Tesco employees who also happen to be parents can manage to get up, sort their kids out, and still be there to provide a service to these wannabe pyjama-wearers - and many Tesco staff will also be 'single parents'.

So taking a giant leap in logic, perhaps only a few, if any, of these pyjama-wearing 'single parents' go to work. Maybe they're just taking some time out, or maybe they are stay-at-home Mums who have never needed to go to earn - so have never had to plan ahead, never had to get themselves up, have breakfast, get dressed for work as well as get child or children dressed, breakfasted and ready for school and/or before taking them to the childminder early enough to be in work before the boss complains.

Maybe these ladies were part of the group we Rigbys breakfasted with a year or so ago - a whole tribe of them, wearing fluffy slippers, short nighties, embroidered pyjamas and so on.

There really is nothing wrong with wearing your nightwear when eating breakfast - at home. But there is something wrong when you can't be bothered to put on 'day' clothes before joining a number of complete strangers in a hotel dining room.

It looks as if our opinion is borne out by the comments on BBC's HYS.

There was a time when people made sure they were dressed according to the occasion - work clothes were for, err, work, casual clothes were for evenings and weekends, or whatever free-from-work time there was. Things slackened off, possibly at about the same time as tracksuits became 'fashionable' - but it's unlikely that those tracksuits were worn in bed as well as out of doors.

There was a time when people would make sure they got washed and dressed before they went further than either the back garden or the doorstep, and they also made sure that their nightclothes were worn only in bed - to make sure they weren't dirty, to make sure that there weren't 'outdoor things' in bedding.

It does seem incredible that 'these days' there are people who will happily get out of bed and mix with other people - strangers - in what are very public places without even making sure they are clean and tidy as well as properly covered up. Especially when every man is a potential rapist or child abuser.

To go food shopping without even bothering to wash the sleep from your eyes seems a little lackadaisical and is also probably unhealthy - but they don't seem to care.

A comment from an unnamed 'mother' :-

‘I can't see what is wrong with pulling a coat over your pyjamas to drop the kids off at school then stopping in the shop for a loaf of bread.

Sorry dear, I can, and so can people on Mumsnet .

On Facebook a group of, currently 10,640, people want to ban pyjamas from the streets of Liverpool.

The unnamed mother continues :-

‘I won't be bothering with Tesco anymore, I'm off to Aldi.’

And Aldi in Cardiff will welcome the great unwashed?

Let's wait and see, shall we.

Completing a circle in education?

A trail somehow led me to a post on Fausty's blog about the "The deliberate dumbing down of the world" - it's about education and I highly recommend you take a look for yourself.

I suppose it's hardly surprising that we Rigbys have talked about the state of UK state education more than once, and not only because there are junior members of the family.

We, and the rest of our generation, went through the 'old system' where there was competition to get into the top or, perversely, the bottom, class. There was competition to get into sports teams, competition to get into the choir and so on. If you weren't good enough at something or other you were never chosen for the top team or the top club, but it didn't ever mean you were completely left out, because there were always plenty of other things to do that you were good at.

When we were at school we knew it was hard to get into a top university, and no matter how much money you'd got you still had to pass a very tough entrance exam that only two or three of the very highest performers in the school would sit each year. We were realistic, so we, and most of our friends, set our sights a bit lower down the list of possible places to study when we left school - if that was what we wanted to do. Some decided that more book learning wasn't for them and went off to do apprenticeships or vocational courses at the local college. We and our friends never really thought we were getting 'second best', because we had a fairly healthy dose of being realististic about our prospects.

When we look at what's happening now there are many things we can't understand about the system, but will look at just two in this post.

First. How, with so much money being thrown at education and with a carefully-constructed-by-experts, curriculum, can there be such a high percentage (almost 50%) of school leavers (age16) who fail to reach the standard set by government of in Maths and English. Secondly, we wonder how it's possible for 50% of school leavers to be capable of studying hard enough to be awarded a Bachelor's Degree - something that is meant to indicate a high level of both learning and ability, when there has to be an element of choice in taking up further study, and not all of the 50% who pass Maths and English GCSE will want to go to "Uni".

Education in Britain was once a fairly haphazard affair, funded by either family money or charity. Some children of industrialists, landowners, senior military officers etc were sent away to boarding school where they were not only 'educated' they were also socialised - they learned how to behave in a certain way. Children of working families were expected to earn something as soon as possible, to help make ends meet. They were incredibly lucky if they could go once a week to a Dame School or a Sunday School - where they learned the rudiments of reading, writing, arithmetic and, naturally, religion.

There were the "Grammar Schools" too, often endowed by some philanthropist or other who thought it would be a good idea to put their wealth to good use - it was a sort of payback to their hard-working employees. Children who were chosen to attend these schools (because they were clever) were often the ones who, in later life, ended up one step higher up the ladder than their peers. This opportunity didn't mean they could sit back and relax, they had to work hard to get and keep their place on that ladder because if they were slackers others would be given a nudge upwards - it was competitive, like in a running race.

One thing all children had was a form of discipline, for some it was the school of hard knocks - learn a skill, quickly, or die. For others it was a seemingly easy life - but still often quite brutal if contemporary literature is anything to go by, and one that took them away from their family when they were young.

Now, having had that badly presented mini-history lesson, let's get back to something we Rigbys think. ... We Rigbys think that if people aren't properly literate and properly numerate they can't properly challenge, or question, decisions made on their behalf - and this is how I've tenuously managed to tie this lot in with Fausty's blog piece.

Challenging and questioning decisions was something employers were worried about when Forster's Education Act was passed in 1870. They were worried that if the whole population became literate and numerate there would be nobody willing to be factory workers, road sweepers, 'night soil' collectors, crop planters and harvesters or pickers - because, you see, once you can read you can also choose what to read. Books, newspapers and magazines can be entertaining, but can also help you learn about all sorts of things, things your employer might not want you to learn.

Employers also wanted to be sure their workforce was capable of working hard, for long hours - not easy if you've had your nose buried in a book instead of going to sleep. One sop to employers was the decision to organise long school summer holidays - to make sure harvests were gathered and hops were picked. These weeks weren't ever intended to be used as an excuse to spend a fortnight burning on a beach in Benidorm.

So where's my thought pattern going? I'm trying to point out that it wasn't until 1870 that educational provision was 'organised' in this country.

The 1870 Act meant that children had to go to school, there was no choice and no excuse, and were expected to achieve a recognised level of attainment before their 13th birthday. At 13 they could leave school irrespective of achievement and join the workforce, unless a charity was able to help them out and let them study a bit longer by providing their education.

Local school boards set their own attainment targets, here's an example of what they were expected to achieve to reach the top "Standard VI". (taken from Wikipedia)

Children had to be able to do :-

Reading	To read with fluency and expression.
Writing	A short theme or letter, or an easy paraphrase.
Arithmetic	Proportion and fractions (vulgar and decimal).

Remember that children had to be able to add, subtract, multiply and divide using many different number bases all at the same time -because Britain used the old sort of LSD - pounds, shillings and pence - as well as farthings and halfpennies, florins, half crowns and guineas.

Back then things were measured in acres, miles, rods, poles, perches, chains, furlongs, yards, feet and inches - including fractions of inches, not like today's easy decimal number, and calculations were generally done either mentally or on paper because pocket calculators hadn't been invented.

In case some of you think that standard is too low then take a look at what they had to do to achieve "Standard III" :-

Reading	A short paragraph from a more advanced reading book.
Writing	A sentence slowly dictated once by a few words at a time, from the same book.
Arithmetic	Long division and compound rules (money).

These weren't 'age' standards, they were terminal qualifications - a bit like grade school in the States, but back then children could leave school at 10 provided they achieved standard VI, otherwise they had to stay there until the age of 13. If you think about it, this gave an incentive to learn, because it meant they could leave school and begin to either make their own way in the world or contribute towards the family finances - and get more to eat.

Were these terrible times, or was education a way out of poverty?

Life was hard then, much harder than many of us could imagine. At school little children were forced to learn difficult things - but you know, if the Rigby forebears are anything to go by, they were proud of their achievements, and the results of their learning are a delight to behold, because they weren't only taught to read, write and do maths. Things were terribly sexist - girls were also taught how to cook and to sew. One of Mrs R's female ancestors made, by hand, a truly astonishingly intricately detailed Christening Gown that's still in use today and one of her male ancestors made some lovely pieces of furniture, which are also in use - unlike some of the modern mass-produced flatpack tat that's only a few years old.

We know from research that at least one of the forebears left home at the tender age of 13 to work as a live-in maid, another went off to be an apprentice to a cabbie and lived in crowded accommodation that would be condemned as unfit by modern social workers - but he survived and went to fight the Boers.

Life was tough, life was hard, yet these two people were proud of what they achieved, and to the end of their lives they loved reading and wrote using the most exquisitely executed copperplate script, with never a spelling mistake - we know because we've seen it.

This, then, is the sort of education that was provided to grandparents, great-grandparents or possibly great, great-grandparents of those alive today - they were given the most basic of learning skills, those of literacy and numeracy, as well as life skills.

Prior to that, from marriage records dated as recently as 1880, few Rigby brides or grooms could sign their name. (Remember, it was the children who went to school from 1870, not the grown-ups - they were working too hard to make sure nobody starved.) These adults proudly made an X on the marriage register - two strokes to show it was a deliberate action rather than a slip of the pen, which is why it's still used on ballot forms.

Can it be that these people were more literate and numerate than their descendants? Well, no, maybe not, because there are statistics and graphs that say so - although they're international stats referring only to literacy. (At the moment Mrs R can't find one that only relates to UK so it'll have to do, otherwise this post will continue to languish in the drafts folder, and it's been there long enough!)


The graph has been drawn using data from UNESCO.

Okay, now you've relaxed by looking at a picture, let's get back to the writing. ...

It wasn't until fairly recently that a UK government decided to get itself deeply involved in education, and in 1988 drew up a prescriptive curriculum that would apply to all state schools. Government also created a national body to set and oversee terminal exams - taking this role away from universities. But they couldn't tell the private sector what to do, because it was, errm, private, not state, run.

To begin with the National Curriculum was a fairly sketchy sort of thing involving just Maths and English, but it's evolved over time to become a mighty beast, with teachers being told not only what to teach but also how to teach - and they can be subjected to intense criticism if their observed and assessed teaching fails to match the proscribed pattern specifically designed to ensure 'students' are interested. It's also designed to guarantee outcome/achievement.

So, when you take all the man hours involved in putting together this approach to both learning and teaching, it seems very odd to read a (now quite old) news item reporting that Tesco's boss, Terry Leahy, criticised school outcomes as being "woefully low".

Unfortunately for Mr Leahy and his fellow supermarket bosses it's a bit of a joke (round here at least) about the, ahem, 'required qualifications' of some checkout staff - especially the ones who get confused if a customer hands them £21.27 to pay for something costing £16.27. (Hint - you get a fiver change!) But joking aside, we Rigbys think that if Mr Leahy believes standards are low then there must indeed be something to worry about.

We thought his comments needed a bit more investigating and at the time we looked and read and talked quite a bit - but we didn't come to any serious conclusions except that "they" (whoever they may be) want too much out of schools, and are ignoring the most basic of skills in a rush to be seen to be trying to sort out the social ills of the country such as teenage pregnancies, obesity, drug abuse and those most evil things - smoking cigarettes and drinking alcohol, and all via the National Curriculum. Doing all this dilutes the time left for things like history and geography, which some children hate, but are still important to know how to relate to the rest of the world.

Here's a story.

When our little Rigbys were small we used to take them to all sorts of places, including farms and zoos. Once we were lucky enough to see a lamb being born. It led to a lot of questions. The odd thing was that when they got older they seemed to have forgotten almost everything they had learned then, couldn't even remember seeing a brand new lamb let alone how it got inside the ewe in the first place! We can't imagine that our children are particularly strange or unusual, it's just that they unconsciously filed away some of the things they saw, and some of the things they learned on our days out, because that knowledge was irrelevant to their lives at the time and more important things came along.

So we thought it was a bit strange that all the educational specialists - who should know about child psychology and child development - want little children to learn about sexuality, contraception and so on when they're only half way through primary school, when they could probably better spend their time reading and writing and getting a bit of general knowledge, so they don't have to wait until taking their GCSE Science before they learn that you can use a telescope to look at the moon. (edit : and note James Higham's piece reporting that the in UK an exam board warded C grades in one [Science] paper to pupils getting just 20 per cent of questions correct)  If the primaries concentrated on these basics then maybe, just maybe, the 'students' would do a bit of learning on their own, on the side, when they're not at school, and maybe, just maybe, they might end up with better GCSE results.

Another aside - Mrs R wonders who wrote the Wikipedia entry about Education in England, because in the box on the right hand side there's nothing about GCSEs and nothing about AS or A levels, merely "Secondary Diploma" or "post Secondary Diploma" - the former of which Mrs R had thought was a vocational qualification for the less academic rather than the 'gold standard' of achievement at age 18 - but maybe she's wrong, because things do seem to be being changed while she isn't looking!

What Mrs R isn't wrong about is something written in both Bishop Hill's and StraightShooter's blogs about charities linked with education in India. It would seem that the poorest of the poor are willing to make themselves even poorer by paying for their children's education,they do it because :-

... a survey of state schools found that "in only half was there any teaching activity at all"

And what happens next, in India? - [Oxfam] charity had then concluded that universal state provision was the correct way forward.

Hmm, it's interesting to note that as long ago as 2005 the Times was reporting that same sort of thing was going on in Africa. :-

Poor African children benefit more from independent schools than government ones for a fraction of the cost, says James Tooley. Why are aid groups and pop stars against them?

Take a little while to read the whole article, go on, I dare you!

Then compare it and the India stuff with what's happening in UK, where government seems to be using schools attended by other politicians as a political weapon - calling anybody whose parents had chosen to send them to Eton "toffs". Yet many of those name-calling politicians have themselves benefitted from private education (there's a list somewhere or other) and are ensuring their offspring do the same. (edit: The list is here)

It seems that some in government might not like to be seen to like private schools, even though they use them themselves, because the latest ploy is to give private schools a set of targets to achieve (or else be failed/closed by Ofsted) - including equality of outcome in sport and after school activities - presumably to make sure more white boys become excellent 100 metre sprinters, more short kids have a go at pole vaulting or high jump and maybe more girls get to do boxing. Who knows what it's all about, I'm just guessing because I haven't seen these targets listed anywhere.

Anyhow, I reckon it'll just mean more lists for the statisticians to moan about. Targets of that sort suggest that children can be forced into a certain role or activity to suit the grown-ups who decided the quota, but kids aren't like that. Children like to make their own choices and, irrespective of their physical or ethnic profile, will all too happily ignore what the grown-ups want them to do outside the classroom. Maybe somebody ought to tell the bean counters about horses and water.

Here in Britain we have state sector 'students' failing to meet literacy and numeracy targets at 16, but these same 'students' are to be taught about sexuality, contraceptives and parenting.

To get rid of the NEET section of the 16-18 population they're all being forced to stay in full time education until they're old enough to vote, even if they can't read and don't want to be at school or sixth form college.

At 18 50% of them are expected to go off to university and earn a degree that will saddle them with a debt of at least £21k (before interest) - a debt owed to just one state-run company, a company that sets it's own repayment terms and has first claim on a wage-earner's salary.

Add to this sorry mix a dose of dependence on government for almost everything, from advice about what to have for breakfast to what to do with your spare time, and we suddenly end up with a new population of adults that's almost incapable of independent thought and action - and they know no different because they think it's always been done that way, and they know they're right because they know more than the wrinklies.

Is this, perhaps, a worldwide phenomenon, as Fausty's blog suggests? Mrs R hopes not, even though she could, with a bit of effort, find out what's happening - because she can read, and because she wants to read.

Funny thing is that those old industrialists in 1870 might have got it right - but it wasn't they who ended up with a proportion of the British population that doesn't want to do menial things, it took over 100 years for that to happen and we now have to import workers who are willing to clean our toilets, pick our fruit and dig up our vegetables - and it doesn't seem to be because we have a well-educated population either, it might even be because some don't value education.

Maybe we're seeing the education system almost completing a circle too, with provision dependent on personal wealth or charity - but this time it's government that gives the money to the charities and dictates the terms, not well-meaning philanthropists.

.....

... and a complete aside, does anybody have any idea who invented the term sheeple?

How many police officers does it take to control a bus queue?

Precisely how many Police it takes to control a bus queue is uncertain, but it includes a PCSO who was originally supervising the queue and :-

Local safer neighbourhood teams, safer transport teams and police officers from Bromley, Lewisham and Greenwich were all drafted in to deal with the mob.

The Met’s dog unit and territorial support group were also called to the scene.

It all started when students going home after a day's hard work at Orpington College were told they couldn't get on a bus because it was full. Some of them thought it would be a good idea to :-

... force their way onto the bus, kicking the front and back doors.

Unfortunately

The violence quickly escalated and a 25-year-old PCSO sustained a cut above his left eye.

and

Two other police officers were also struck during the incident.

and then,

The high street was shut for around an hour while officers fought running battles with the teenagers.

Mrs Rigby was interested to read the comments beneath the article in the Newshopper (thanks to Ambush Predator), including this from a bus driver,

I am a regular driver of route 51, it does not surprise me at all what happened in Orpington High St. on Tuesday. We are subjected to a barrage of verbal abuse from the time we start until we finish and we would get physically assaulted if we were not protected by an assault screen. This abuse is usually because of fare disputes, but often it is because the bus is full and we can't let any more people on. As a bus driver we are legally responsible for the safety of the bus and if it were involved in an accident and found to be overloaded we would definitely be sacked, could lose our PCV licence and could be fined or even jailed.

Arguments also occur frequently about baby buggies, we can only carry 2 unfolded in the disabled bay and 1 folded in the luggage rack, why don't young mums ever walk anywhere with their babies any more? They are amongst the most foul mouthed when we refuse them entry!

We get sworn at on a daily basis because we refuse people entry who are carrying pots of paint and inflammible liquids and people seem to think we are exempt from traffic jams and swear at us for being late, usually implying that we have been sitting in the canteen.

When the buses are turned because of late running despite the blinds clearly stating the destination and the in bus information announcing the destination, we are again verbally abused.

The 51 is actually no worse than any other route in London as I sometimes drive other routes. Fortunately I don't have many years to go before I can retire and get away from what is now a stressful and un-satisfying job.

From students, who clearly have plenty of spare time after college, there is this

wer d future so wen ur old well b der...

and this

excusee mee i dnt kno where all dis story is coming from nd i dnt kno y ppl r over exagerrating nd gettin scared chattin rubbish about orpington college students. i am a student dere nd dats not even how it happened IT WAS THE POLICE CAUSING A SCENE. nd to dat fed dat got hurt good 4 him he deserved it. all u old ppl dat live in orpington y u gettin shook 4 did n e wun touch you? NO so shut up. any way freeeeeeee da ppl dat got knickd it was'nt ur fault dese feds r gettin xcited coz dere in uniform. nd ppl if ur scared STAY IN UR HOUSE. nd stop tellin stories like u woz dere frm beggining FOOLSS

In response to concerns about the quality of teaching there is this,

Orpington college have grammar exams in place when you first apply and actually go out of their way to make sure that students who have problems with their English and grammar recieve special help. Whether or not they accept this help is another story.

But it would appear that some students have their own special reason for attending college,

i had good reason to further my edercation at orpington: free gym, ema, socialising and to learn..

Mrs Rigby is delighted to know that the main reason this young person wanted to go to the college was because it has a gym, because the government Rigby Family would pay them £30 a week Educational Maintenance Allowance so they can build some nice muscles, (especially irritating because Junior Rigby is still waiting for this year's student loan to appear) so that when they spend time with their friends they don't look too puny. Then, in their spare time, they might be able to relax study learn to spell.

Mrs Rigby thinks students like these will, presumably, be the ones that nice Lord Mandelson wants to give prior right to a University place, over and above any student who has had the misfortune to have been brought up to behave decently and to have attended a school that makes them work hard.

From the Mail

Middle-class pupils face being bumped off prestigious university courses under plans to give youngsters from poor homes an A-level 'head start', it emerged yesterday.

Unveiling a ten-year blueprint for universities, Lord Mandelson declared that published or predicted A-level grades would not be enough to win places at leading universities.

and this is what Lord Mandy says,

'What we are saying is that nobody should be disadvantaged or penalised on the basis of the families they come from, of school they attended ...

It sounds to Mrs Rigby that this scheme does disadvantage and penalise students, on the basis of the families they come from and the school they attend, which of course isn't what he intends to do - or does he?

It might be a good job that he might be out of a job in a few months.