Sir Jim Rose has caused quite a stir this morning with his report – highlighted as the splash in this morning’s Times – calling for sweeping reforms to the curriculum in primary schools.
According to the Times’ report, he is proposing that:
"Traditional subjects such as history, geography and religious studies will be
removed from the primary school curriculum and merged into a “human, social
and environmental” learning programme as part of a series of radical
education reforms."
Michael Gove, the shadow schools secretary, has just issued the following statement condemning the proposals:
“The Government’s changes to the primary curriculum will lead to children learning less not more. The move away from traditional subject areas will lead to a further erosion of standards.
“Schools in the top-performing countries in the world and the top independent schools in this country teach children hard subject knowledge not soft “topics”. In adopting this throwback to the 1960s, the Government is denying the highest quality of education to children in the state sector.
“The experiment with this kind of ideology – moving away from facts, knowledge and rigour – failed forty years ago and will fail again. This is not a step forward, it is a blast from the past."