The politics of reviews

When the National Curriculum removed control from teachers and the education establishment and centralised it under the control of the state, we entered an inevitable never-ending cycle of curriculum reviews. A centralised curriculum reveals the truth that the curriculum, the blueprint of the future society we want to educate our young people for, is a selection of knowledge and skills and so is an inherently political construct. Curriculum reviews tend to happen early in the life of new governments and usually reflect the concerns and ideologies of that government i.e. the neo-liberal functionalism of New Labour and the neo-conservative nostalgia of the Conservative government with its insistence on traditional knowledge. The present government is mainly known for its tepid cautiousness and unwillingness to offend any powerful vested interest groups. This is mirrored in the curriculum review it commissioned which abounds with terms such as ‘evolution not revolution’, ‘refresh’ and ‘light touch attention’.

Welcome recommendations but…….

Although the review finds that the overall structure and provision of the National Curriculum are working well, it identifies a wide range of specific areas for improvement. These will be welcomed by most in the education sector and will improve the effectiveness of provision. Ending the EBacc has long been called for, as it represented a limited view of the curriculum. The emphasis on oracy will be welcomed as well as the replacement of the Spelling and Grammar test in order to assess composition and application better. The use of diagnostic assessments in Y8 will focus attention on KS3 progress which has been a concern. Rationalising content across curriculum subjects should be welcomed by all and the recommendation to reduce GCSE exam time by 10% will go some way towards alleviating the indefensibly large amount of time spent on exam assessment at KS4. Making Citizenship statutory in primary schools and including Religious Education will help to establish equality of provision. Few would dissent from the call for greater diversity in the curriculum and for more effective support in making progress and in assessment for SEND pupils.

So this is a review whose intentions and recommendations are very welcome. However, it may be prudent to raise some concerns about how easy it will be to achieve some of them. How easy will it really be to achieve consensus amongst the fractious and diverse group of RE stakeholders in producing an RE curriculum for all schools? How realistic is it to expect historians to agree on what should be the statutory content of history and what should not? Is it possible to reform the content-burdened history GCSE, and the implications of this for learning, with just minor adjustments and not a full-scale far-reaching review? How can we expect non-specialist teachers to teach about subject-specific skills in history and geography without significant support?

What the review doesn’t do

The real concern with the review is not just how achievable its recommendations are but its limited scope and ambition. This is a missed opportunity and will have real and negative implications for the way in which the curriculum is taught and how the debate about how the curriculum develops.

By adopting what it sees as a gradualist, minimalist and non-controversial approach to curriculum change, which offends as few people as possible, the review seeks to accept and absorb previous policies. Additional principles and policies are simply added to those originating under other governments with different perspectives and priorities resulting in

inevitable contradictions. The report’s curriculum principles, for example, retain the commitment to a knowledge-rich approach and to ‘powerful knowledge’. This endorsement of the primacy of disciplinary knowledge produced by communities of academics seems to stand in contradiction with other curriculum principles, such as teacher autonomy to develop the curriculum and reflect students’ lives and experiences. The review highlights the need to prepare learners for a changing world by listing five key areas which should be covered by the curriculum. These should be part of cross-curricular provision but it is hard to see how this can be achieved if, as the subject recommendations make clear, the Programmes of Study should be minimalist and specific to the concepts of that subject. How can a curriculum for the changing contemporary and future world be achieved within the structure of the traditional disciplines?

The previous administration had a clear vision for the curriculum, that of the traditional grammar or public school. For them it was self-evident that the ‘knowledge of the powerful’ should be the basis of the curriculum for all. By not explicitly addressing this and providing an alternative, but instead embedding some of these perspectives into the curriculum and its principles, the review paves the way for them to be the basis for future curriculum design and development. We are condemned to an endless debate with ‘the curriculum of the dead’.

The review does not focus on the ‘big questions’ fundamental to a discussion about the curriculum, such as what a curriculum is for, what are the key values which a curriculum should transmit and to what extent should disciplines dominate the curriculum. How do they sit alongside those values and concerns which schools and society consider essential? How can vertical cohesion of the curriculum be achieved and what are the range of effective models for curriculum organisation, what is assessment for and what does it actually tell us? If a curriculum review does not anchor itself in a response to big questions it becomes a collection of mainly small-scale atomised well-intentioned reforms. Some will be acted on; others will be sidelined in the service of expediency.

Finally it needs to be said that the review is posited on the assertion that the curriculum, despite some shortcomings, is basically sound and not in need of radical surgery. To support this we are directed towards some rather minor areas of progress in pupil achievement. What the review does not discuss are the record levels of absenteeism, the increasing number of students being educated at home and the high levels of pupil discontent with schooling. It is not an exaggeration to suggest that schooling in England has never been so unpopular. This is not acceptable for education nor for a democracy. It demands the sort of radical thinking and actions which the review has put outside of its scope. It demands more of the urgency of revolution than the slow uneven progress of evolution.

Changing the curriculum – Commentary on the final report of the Curriculum and Assessment Review

The report affirms the value of existing subjects and their value in providing for a rich and balanced curriculum. Only minor amendments are recommended at subject level to support subjects to flourish.

To prepare young people for a changing world the report states that subject specific knowledge is the best investment. It does identify certain areas of applied knowledge and skills which require more attention. These are to be delivered mainly through existing curriculum subjects.

Financial Education

This should be started in Primary school. It is already present in Maths, although not always focused on, but financial education incorporates more applied concepts. These should be taught in citizenship with relevant mathematical concepts being first introduced in Maths

Digital literacy

This encompasses knowledge and behaviours to use technologies and computer systems safely, creatively and effectively. This is taught within the computing curriculum although there is scope to refine the curriculum to better reflect skills and knowledge used for everyday life. Other subjects e.g. geography make use of digital skills.

Media literacy

This concerns understanding and engaging critically with messages conveyed through different media channels. This covered in a number of subjects e.g. history and science. The review recommends that the role of media literacy should be strengthened in English and citizenship where it has direct coverage.

Climate education and sustainability

The report recommends that climate education is bolstered in the Science and Geography curricula and that sustainability is emphasised in the D&T curriculum. It should also have an emphasis in Citizenship,

Oracy

This incorporates speaking, listening, and communication. The report recommends that English should make speaking and listening requirements more prominent including greater prominence through Drama and that it should be given greater specificity in Citizenship. The report also recommends a new oracy framework to support practice and to complement existing frameworks in Reading and Writing.

Curriculum principles

The report recommends that the following principles should be adopted in drafting new programmes of study for the refreshed curriculum.

An entitlement

The national curriculum must be aspirational, engaging and demanding reflecting high expectations for all.

Knowledge rich

The national curriculum should maintain a knowledge-rich approach. This should provide them with a deep understanding of the subject matter and so access to ‘powerful knowledge’. Skills are seen as important but are situated within and accessed through the knowledge-rich curriculum.

Curriculum depth and mastery of core concepts.

Children and young people should develop a strong knowledge base revisiting prior knowledge where necessary and be given the space to deepen and extend their foundational knowledge.

Curriculum coherence

Necessary if the curriculum is to be effective and to support progression. Coherence is vertical through sequences designed to build on content and essential concepts, although the nature of these sequences will differ according to whether subjects are hierarchical or not. Coherence is also horizontal and links should be made across subjects to highlight where content in one area relies on another. This is particularly important in the delivery of cross-curricular themes and in the delivery of cross-disciplinary content in the primary phase.

Specificity

The programmes of study for current foundation subjects lack specificity. Greater specificity should not mean more content or more limited teacher autonomy but should mean specifying the essential substantive knowledge and skills to support conceptual mastery, continuity and coherence.

Professional autonomy

The report emphasises the importance of giving teachers the space to exercise their professional judgement. This sees teachers as curriculum makers ‘interpreting and transforming the content of the national curriculum. Teachers should be able choose and adapt and how they teach the curriculum to reflect their students’ lives and experiences.

Curriculum for all

All children and young people should feel included in and represented by the curriculum. Across the curriculum subject content should reflect a broader range of perspectives and experiences of our diverse society. This is sometimes more appropriately achieved through teacher selection of content than through centralised prescription.

National curriculum as a tool for teachers

and teacher understanding of previous and future learning the report recommends the development of the national curriculum as a digital product.

To support an inclusive curriculum a programme of work should be developed of evidence led guidance on curriculum and pedagogical adaptation, including exemplification for children and young people with SEND.

Curriculum recommendations by subject

Citizenship

Citizenship education helps young people to develop the necessary knowledge and skills to play a full and active role in society. Currently citizenship is a statutory foundation subject at Key Stages 3 and 4 but is not mandatory at Key Stages 1 and 2. The report recommends that the subject should also be statutory at Key Stages 1 and 2. The following topics should be prioritised in the statutory primary curriculum – Financial literacy: including the purpose of money, how to manage, spend and save money, the difference between needs and wants  and to develop financial literacy skills. – Democracy and government: supporting democratic understanding and engagement, readiness for lowering voting age to 16. Content should be aligned with fundamental British values. – Law and rights: why laws are important, how they are made and consequences of not following them. Content should introduce fairness and equity, rights and responsibilities. – Media literacy: age-appropriate skills including research skills and evaluating information and news sources. Climate education: exploring age-appropriate issues including sustainable choices and habits and climate justice.

The secondary Programmes of Study should be aligned with the primary. All Programmes of Study should be improved by clarifying their purpose and improving their specificity and progression.

Geography

The review identified some limited areas for improvement to address findings that some Geography is overly dense and repetitive limiting opportunities for deeper understanding. The report also highlights the importance of pupils developing core geographical skills and opportunities for high quality fieldwork. Great care should be taken not to create access problems for disadvantaged in fieldwork and trips by making greater use of the locality. Gaps should also be addressed in the coverage of climate.

The report recommends – Refining content to avoid repetition, deepen understanding of concepts and making content relevant and inclusive. – Embedding disciplinary knowledge more explicitly at Key Stage 3 e.g. enquiry, spatial reasoning, human geography and the use of evidence. – Clarifying requirements for fieldwork. – Embedding climate change and sustainability more explicitly.

History

History requires more curriculum space to embed disciplinary skills such as how historians study the past and construct historical accounts and arguments and assess varying sources. Messages about what is and what is not statutory and where flexibility exists could be clearer. This should be achieved without moving away from previous reforms which were intended to reinforce chronological understanding and ensure that history teaching did not feel like a series of disjointed topics. Changes should not involve replacing existing content. History teaching covers an array of eras, contexts, including local history. and cultures but further guidance could be provided on using existing flexibility. GCSE History requires significant improvement because of content overload and the need to develop assessment objectives that better encourage the knowledge and application of disciplinary rigour and do not lead to a focus on rote learning’

The report recommends – Adjusting the Programmes of Study by – adjusting and amending disciplinary terms to improve understanding and use of disciplinary knowledge. – Clarify statutory and non-statutory content requirements to support understanding of existing optionality. – Support wider teaching of diversity including a wide range of sources and local history. – Review GCSE History – To ensure understanding of disciplinary knowledge and tackle overload. – Ensure assessment is aligned to the aims of GCSE.

Religious Education

RE provides space for pupils to learn about mutuality and reciprocity, develops their ability to understand one another and helps in the understanding of national and international events.  RE is a basic, not national curriculum subject with a diverse context of stakeholders and without a national defined content or standard. SACRE’s are responsible for content but these vary in their ability to provide effective support. The report recommends that RE should become a national curriculum subject with a centrally determined curriculum although it recognises that the subject can be controversial and contentious so that achieving this will take time.  The report considered the requirement to teach RE for 16 – 18-year-olds which is not consistent across different types of education establishments and so recommended that the requirement be removed from 6^th forms.

The report recommends that its proposals should be taken forward in stages with first the establishment of a task and finish group made up of representatives from faith and secular groups and the wider teaching and education sector which will try to agree a draft RE curriculum. The DfE will consider the legislative framework and review the existing non-statutory guidance. If a draft curriculum is agreed it will be subject to a formal consultation period.

Accountability and performance measures

Changes are needed particularly at secondary level. The EBacc has limited student choice, led to students being entered for GCSE’s they are unlikely to get, does not increase the likelihood of students attending Russell group universities and targets for pupils taking the EBacc have not been met.

The review remains committed to Progress 8 although it lacks adequate contextualisation of progress. The report notes government commitment to develop digital benchmarking to enable schools to compare themselves with similar schools’

The report recommends- Removing the EBacc. – Retaining progress 8.  – Continuing to develop initiatives related to similar schools.

Primary Assessment

Key Stage 1

The report considers that the primary assessment is broadly working well. At Key Stage 1  the Phonic Screening is effective although pre and non-verbal pupils cannot be assessed for further support. Optional end of key stage assessment is effective although research indicates take up is at 60%.

Key Stage 2

Y4 Multiplication tables Check and end of key stage assessment assessments work well for measuring progress and for accountability. However MTC is not always accessible for SEND pupils. The GPS test does not test the use of grammar in pupils own writing. The teacher assessed writing could be developed with the provision of an improved teacher assessment framework.

The report recommends – AT KS1 – Encouraging the use of optional KS1 assessments, – Support in assessing the progress of SEND pupils in the Phonics Screening Test, – At KS2 – Improve access for SEND pupils to the MTC, – Improve the teacher assessment framework for writing, – Review external moderation, – Amend GPS test to better assess composition and application of grammar and punctuation,

Secondary Assessment

Key Stage 3

KS 3 faces most challenges and the report identifies the need for diagnostic assessment in English and Maths during KS3 to identify gaps in progress.

Key Stage 4

External examinations through GCSEs is seen as a valued, trusted and fair form of assessment. The time spent on examinations is excessive. The volume and nature of the subject plays a role in the volume of assessment as does the assessment design.  The proposes to reduce the volume of GCSE by 10% by using assessment levers and the principle of the volume of exam assessment should be placed at the heart of assessment design. Two assessment components should remain for each subject. Externally marked exams are the most reliable form of assessment and there should not be any expansion of coursework. To ensure that assessments are fit for purpose a subject by subject approach should be taken. Accessibility for pupils with SEND should be built into assessment and that different organisations with responsibilities for accessibility of qualifications work together to achieve this.

The report recommends – for KS3 -Introduce diagnostic assessment for English and Maths in Y8, – for KS4 – Reduce overall exam time by at least 10% – Introduce a design principle that considers the volume of assessment as a priority – Ensure that each subject retains at least two assessment components, – Non-exam assessment to be used only when it is the only valid way of assessing an element, – Ensure that what is assessed reflects what is most important for students to learn and do, – Explore how core aspects of subject content can be assessed including non-exam assessment whilst managing risk of AI, – Explore the potential for on-screen assessment, – Ensure that relevant organisations work together to consider how accessibility can be built in to new specifications.

Future Curriculum reviews

The report differentiates between periodic holistic reviews and reviews. Holistic reviews are best suited for striking a balance between volume of content and available time. They also need to strike a balance in their frequency. Reviews are light touch and intended for areas of the curriculum which need more regular updates. Reviews should have the aims of ensuring the NC remains uptodate, addressing any specific issues and ensuring that the volume of content remains appropriate. They should avoid adding content but focus on refreshing that which is outdated.

The report recommends; – holistic reviews are limited to one a decade, – A rolling programme of light touch reviews takes place,- Ensure that future reviews have clear objectives and are evidence led and undertake public consultation.

Its been a rather torrid year for Ofsted. The suicide of headteacher Ruth Perry, which the Coroner’s report said Ofsted had contributed to, opened the floodgates of smouldering resentment It was accompanied with a flurry of reports critical of Ofsted and its work. The independent learning review said that Ofsted appeared to be defensive and complacent after Ruth Perry’s death, was critical of the Ofsted Board and governance and of the pressure on inspectors to ‘chase volume at the expense of inspection quality’. The Select Committee’s on Ofsted reported that in relation to the perception of teachers ‘Ofsted has lost trust and credibility among many in the teaching profession’.

The NEA commissioned report ‘Beyond Ofsted’ highlighted the negative view most teachers have of Ofsted with a common perception that Ofsted is an ‘interrogative, destructive process and a political tool’, designed to evaluate schools not to improve standards in education, but to fulfil a political purpose. This report was critical of Ofsted’s impact, schools in disadvantaged schools being much more likely to have a negative report, and, more fundamentally, in the assumptions which direct its practice, Ofsted identifies what it sees as effective practice and disseminates this to inspectors and schools. Schools prepare for inspections by ensuring that Ofsted sees what it wants to see even if this is not its usual practice. This does not necessarily produce improvement, does not allow for any debate and discussion as to what effective learning is but creates a context in which schools and inspectors are complicit in creating an illusion the aim of which for the school is not a dialogue aimed at school improvement but in achieving a badge of excellence to support marketing.

In an attempt to head off the growing tsunami of criticism which was threatening to destroy the last vestiges of legitimacy the inspectorate had amongst the teaching profession Ofsted, started its ‘big conversation’ with interested parties and on the back of this introduced yet another revision of its framework and practices. These have been, in general, been well received but do they provide the basis for the fundamental change in Ofsted as driver for school improvement teachers are calling for and will it enable Ofsted to regain its legitimacy amongst the teaching profession?

The much praised decision to finish the single overall grading will certainly help in reducing simplistic comparisons between schools but Ofsted will still grade the four sub-judgements and schools will continue to be put into a category of concern if any judgement is inadequate. Pausing the inspection where there are safeguarding issues giving schools time to rectify these before completing the inspection will help to end the process of automatically failing schools who fall foul of the increasingly complex safeguarding regulations. The inspection of safeguarding has always been a contentious area for Ofsted and has always run the risk of becoming a bureaucratic exercise in checking policies and procedural issues. The time constrained inspection of safeguarding requires a more extensive and detailed review. In ungraded inspections ‘deep dives’ into individual subjects will be replaced by investigations of groups of subjects which may be welcomed by many although it should be remembered that one of the more positive moves in recent Ofsted revision was a move away from an exclusive concern with literacy and numeracy and a more detailed review of other individual subjects. Any move away from this and back a narrow inspection curriculum focus is to be regretted. Schools will now receive notice of inspection on Monday which means there will be an extra 2 days a week when schools do not have to dread the phone call. This is to ‘reduce stress and anxiety’, itself a recognition of the damage Ofsted does to teacher wellbeing.

The changes in Ofsted are the latest episode in the long history of revisions and additions to the Ofsted framework. These have either been politically motivated or in response to criticism and serious concerns. What has not happened is a thorough rethink about what inspection is for, what school improvement means, how improvement comes about and how it can be measured and how the UK can align itself with most many other educational systems in giving a significant role to self-evaluation. The political forces which have forced schools to embrace a sometimes ruthless marketisation, have marginalised teacher professionalism and deformed evaluation and improvement into a system of accountability designed to support the market value of the successful and victimise those who do not conform to Ofsted and their political masters current view of what success is. We may thank Ofsted for removing some unacceptable features of inspection but unless we engage in a fundamental discussion about evaluation and improvement and the role of professionals, we will inevitably be in the future discussing Ofsted’s relapse into an unacceptable and destructive regime.

The violence which erupted on UK streets in July/August 2024 was a shocking reminder of the fragility of our society and the ever-present subcurrent of racism which remains a force threatening to engulf us. The speed by which the violence became directed towards not just immigrants but towards mosques and any citizen seen as belonging to an ethnic minority shows that, despite the nearly 60 years since legislation first banned discrimination and made the promotion of hatred on the grounds of ‘colour, race or national origins an offence, racism remains an active and pernicious disease in our society and its elimination  a priority for all of us.

For those who believed that contemporary society had embraced equality and that the disease of racism was an increasingly distant memory the events of July/August provided something of an existential crisis. The respect for equality and diversity enshrined in our school policies and value statements which we thought evidenced our progress and formed the architecture of the tolerant society was exposed as frail and tenuous. The collective shock and horror we experienced at the sight of racist riots on our streets and on our TV screens and the pictures of people of a wide variety of ages including school children not only proclaiming their racism but showing that racism could motivate them to extreme violence and potentially murderous acts demonstrated that the tolerant society was flawed and not capable of defending its citizens.

It is fortuitous that with this background the government should announce a major review of the curriculum. An essential part of that review must be, as always, what role we want the curriculum to play in providing an education which upholds and promotes values of tolerance, diversity and equality. The curriculum response to the riots must be more than providing a set of skills in how to s social media. People acted as they did in the riots not just because of misinformation on social media. That misinformation was acted on because of a disposition to believe it and the actions of many young people in the riots and the data we have of the increase in school suspensions and expulsions for racist behaviour show that we have failed to successfully eliminate or marginalise racism in our schools.

We need a debate amongst all educational professionals and participants as to how we can deliver an effective education which provides an understanding of right-wing extremist ideology, its nature and history, opposes the racism it feeds off and provides an objective and balanced view of the context of human migration. Education cannot, of course, fully compensate for the racism which may be engrained in some of our institutions and which is platformed by some politicians and their media supporters, but if we fail to embed throughout our curriculum and teaching the importance and essential need for equality and diversity we will have failed to deliver what the curriculum, in its broadest sense is, the selection of values, knowledge, skills and understandings they need for the futures they deserve.

THE NEW GOVERNMENT CURRICULUM REVIEW

There is no better way for an incoming Secretary of State for Education to demonstrate their zeal for energetic reform than to initiate a curriculum review and one of the new Labour Government first acts was to establish an independent review chaired by Professor Becky Francis to ‘breath new light into our outdated curriculum and assessment system’. It should be noted in passing that this outdated curriculum which ‘held children back’ was introduced less than 10 years ago to support higher standards and rigour in teaching. (We can only speculate that Ofsted will apologise for denigrating schools for not delivering a curriculum now seen as holding children back)

Since the National Curriculum was introduced in 1988 it has been the subject of multiple revisions and reforms. These changes reflected new concerns and educational priorities, emerging concerns with the existing curriculum and changing theoretical and political perspectives. There is a certain inevitability about this. What we teach about and what we choose not to teach about reflects the sort of society we think we have and the future we want and the emergence of school subjects themselves the result of struggle and negotiation. The National Curriculum by locating the question of what schools should teach firmly in the political and public arena. Furthermore the gap between the politically approved curriculum and how it is interpreted and taught and converted into learning experiences in classrooms ensures that ongoing debates and arguments about what a new curriculum may or may not demand are ensured.

The new curriculum review in its initial terms of reference and working principles has got off to a good start. There is a commitment to a wide consultation of all key stakeholders and the review panel seems to have a wider representation of educational experts with experience throughout the educational sector than the limited number of ideologically approved of ‘experts’ which characterised previous reviews. The review will start at key stage 5 and then work backwards across other key stages to ensure that their contribution towards the end point can be recognised and built into curriculum. The curriculum will be broad and balanced and reflect the issues and diversities of our society. It will consider assessment and curriculum together hopefully to ensure that what is taught does not become distorted by how it will be assessed, and it will pay attention to the practicalities of implementation to avoid unintended consequences.

This provides a useful starting point but stating what is needed is one thing being able to achieve a consensus in its recommendations and navigate the tensions inherent in the construction of a national Curriculum is another. Professor Francis shows that she is certainly aware of the tensions and has drawn attention to the diversity of views on the curriculum, the myriad of subjects and issues which stakeholders may wish the curriculum to cover, the common view that the curriculum is currently overladen and over-prescribed and the issue of teacher workload, recruitment and retention. The key issue may be that there has only been one attempt to create and construct a National Curriculum. Since 1988 successive Secretary of State for Education have attempted to revise, amend, prune and reshape this in response to educational crises and ideological trends producing an increasingly narrow and dysfunctional curriculum. The assumptions of the 1988 curriculum, that it should be a traditional subject centred one, centralised, linked to and shaped by assessment for accountability was never questioned.

Whatever the outcome of the current curriculum review will be it will an occasion for claims, counterclaims and argument as different stakeholders advance claims for which subjects should be in the curriculum, the priority they should have and what should or should not be included in those subjects. It will also be seen as an opportunity to reopen debates about skills or knowledge, the role of assessment, the level of proscription and cross curricular themes and values.

The Humanities Association throughout its existence acted as forum for discussion for the humanities about all aspects of humanities education. The principles, objectives and curriculum models and strategies of the association were developed through decades discussion and debate and of working with schools and teachers in the delivery of humanities subjects. It may, therefore, be worth revisiting some of these to inform thinking on a review of the curriculum.

• The humanities provide essential knowledge, concepts and skills that learners need to understand our world. As such the humanities must not be marginalised in the school curriculum in terms of available time and resources.
• A number of subjects contribute to the humanities these have their own concepts and perspectives. Across key stages pupils need to have access to a variety of these subjects and the opportunity examine how they help us understand human society in all its complexity.
• The curriculum needs to be sufficiently flexible to allow for a range of curriculum models to be developed which reflect the aims, values and context of the school.
• Curriculum design should enable connections to be made between curriculum subjects and with cross-curricular themes. Making links between subjects strengthens the coherence of the curriculum for pupils and deepens understanding of the subject matter. Making connections with cross-curricular themes helps to establish the relevance of the curriculum in preparing pupils for life in the local, national and global society.
• The curriculum should enable pupils to be involved in enquiry and to explore issues. Enquiry helps to promote independent learning and the application of subject knowledge and concepts to develop an understanding of key issues.
• The curriculum should allow scope for teachers to control, shape and develop what and how they teach. Past experience demonstrated that where humanities courses, including courses at GCSE level were teacher controlled and assessed teacher, involvement, commitment and enthusiasm was maximised.
• Assessment should not be allowed to determine the curriculum. Assessment should be primarily to support learning and learning objectives and not to distort learning and reduce it to teaching for tests.
• It is important that the curriculum builds in progression in subjects and subject areas across key stages but it is also important to recognise that the primary phase of education is distinct from the secondary phase. Learning within the primary phase takes place within a specific context and the organisation, resources and aims of primary schools need to be taken into consideration when planning the curriculum.
• In practice how the curriculum is interpreted and realised by schools and teachers is influenced by wider political forces directing educational change. Education has undergone its own form of privatisation. Schools and chains of schools spanning the public and private sectors have become semi-autonomous institutions with Ofsted providing centralised regulatory function. Locating schools within a form of market economy accelerated a discourse of management in education with an emphasis on transparent and quantifiable outputs, compliance, and accountability. In this context the curriculum and assessment became important primarily as a means of advertising and demonstrating the superiority of individual schools rather than a means of designing worthwhile learning experiences. An effective curriculum must be one which concentrates on the quality and meaningfulness of learning and frees itself from its role as an instrument of a competitive market.

It is hard to sum up Tim’s educational philosophy. It was both informed by a wide and eclectic grasp of educational theories and the pragmatic providing accessible practical advice for teachers that really did make a difference, He was an advocate of a broad curriculum for students, assessment which supported rather than dominated teaching, cooperation rather than competition, debate rather than dogma, an opponent of the over punitive organisation Ofsted had become and a staunch supporter of the professional autonomy of teachers.

At the heart of Tim Brighouse’s approach to education and what made him a great educational figure and an infectious optimist was his humanitarianism. His belief in the power of positive relationships within and across schools, of showing teachers that they were cared about and that they would be supported and that a confident, innovative, strong and dedicated workforce could and would make a difference to the quality and outcomes of education in schools, cities and across the country.

It may be tempting to see Tim Brighouse as a relic from a past golden age of strong LEAs and a teacher-controlled curriculum. Since then LEAs have all but disappeared and schools have become semi privatised and competitive units regulated by a strong central governance and imbued with a managerialist discourse of performativity and quantifiable outcomes. The work of Tim Brighouse shows that a different direction was possible one which did and will work and help us build a confident and successful educational system from the discredited wreckage of the present one.

To put all this into stark relief imagine for one impossible moment what would have happened if Tim Brighouse had become, what many of us advocated, Chief Inspector for Ofsted. Imagine what Ofsted could have been like now. Imagine how it could have supported teachers, engendered confidence not self-loathing and paranoia, supporting self-evaluation not being an instrument of central regulation and control, a means of sharing good practice and encouraging cooperation not a mechanism for competition. To begin to explore the gap between these two positions is to begin to appreciate what Tim Brighouse stood for and the principles and practice we need to build an education system we can have confidence in.

Rich encounters with the past: Ofsted history subject report July 2023

History is, perhaps, our most contentious and politically sensitive curriculum subject. When Hilary Mantel said, “the past changes a little every time we retell it”, she captured well a subject whose content is unstable, continuously changing its form when viewed through  differing perspectives and interpretations. It is also an inherently political subject whose subject matter can be a battleground for differing political values and world views and whose teaching methodology in UK schools has been a centre of controversy for over a century. We have few sources of information as to what goes on in history lessons in our schools, so when one of Ofsted’s infrequently produced subject reports on history appears it is worth our attention, especially as this is the first report since Ofsted’s ‘curriculum turn’ and the inauguration of subject ‘deep dives’.

‘Rich encounters with the past: history subject report’ (Ofsted July 2023) differs in tone from the apocalyptic ’History in the balance‘ 2007 report,  with its picture of a struggling subject with a limited place in the curriculum, and the ‘History for all’ 2011 report, whose tenuous optimism was tinged with a view of a subject in danger of marginalisation and a loss of identity. History is no longer following in the footsteps of the African forest elephant or the Yangtze finless porpoise in the path towards extinction. On the contrary, History is recovering, highly valued and receiving sufficient curriculum time. Most schools now have a broad and ambitious history curriculum, primary school teachers’ subject knowledge now impresses, pupils are developing a secure knowledge of the past and the gap in the quality of history teaching between primary and secondary schools has closed.

There remain, according to the report, significant areas for further development. There are variations in the quality of history across schools, planning for disciplinary knowledge is not always ambitious, knowledge is sources of evidence are often used by pupils who do not have secure knowledge of the historical context, some schools still focus on superficial aspects of the past, and, as usual, assessment in history remains underdeveloped. Central to developing further the teaching of history is the need to see pupils’ experience of the subject across the whole history curriculum across all years. Layers of historical knowledge interact so that pupils should develop their understanding of historical periods and of recurring terms and concepts and of broader chronological frameworks. This involves, both in curriculum planning and in classroom pedagogical decision-making, the identification of key concepts and content which will support future learning and progress in the subject.

An Ofsted subject report reflects not only the state of the subject but also the context within which evidence is gathered. Changes in the Ofsted framework and methodology mean, for example, that the report is no longer organised around categories such as achievement and teaching. The report also reflects the political context within which the curriculum is viewed. It is hard to see, for example, the warning to avoid emphasising the negative experiences of a group and ‘creating narratives of victimhood’ as not being motivated by the current government’s ‘anti-woke’ culture wars.

The dominant view that the curriculum, promoted by government and Ofsted, should reflect the ‘powerful knowledge’ of subjects has led to the reaffirmation of the importance of the traditional subject-centred curriculum. In this view the demise of history as a component of school topic teaching is seen as a significant step forward. The report has nothing to say about the relationship and contribution of history to the rest of the curriculum or about the relevance of history to the developing child. The 2007 History in the Balance report argued that history needed to focus, through the Every Child Matters agenda, on what young people needed to become successful and well equipped adults. The 2011 History For All report identified as a key issue for history teaching how it might contribute to pupils’ sense of social responsibility and recommended that the history curriculum should include opportunities to study the cultures of different communities and the roots of contemporary issues, for example, those presented by Black History Month. For the current report, planning in history is about identifying what is important in supporting future learning in the subject. We teach what we teach in history to develop the subject. Why we teach history, how it develops future adults and citizens and how it connects with the rest of the curriculum are both unanswered and seen as unimportant questions. Many teachers of history would applaud the report’s focus on the subject, its integrity and how it should be developed. Others may regret the disappearance of relevance as a criteria for planning and developing history teaching, an outwardly looking curriculum and the return to a more traditional and narrower curriculum mind.

The relationship between Ofsted and the teaching profession has always been a tortuous one. The death of the primary school headteacher, Ruth Perry, and the tensions caused by Ofsted inspections continuing while schools struggled with the chaos caused by the consequences of the pandemic have taken us close to the breakdown of this relationship with an unprecedented volume of calls for non-cooperation with Ofsted, its radical reform and the abolition of it in its present format.

Ofsted was established in 1992, alongside the National Curriculum, as part of a radical programme of education reform aimed at a form of ‘marketisation’ of the education system, which combined increased central control with increased school autonomy. This embedded organisational diversity, financial autonomy, and state regulation within the education system. Ofsted provided, through the inspection of schools, the centralised regulatory function, while schools were encouraged or compelled to leave Local Education Authority control as financially-independent, semi-autonomous institutions. Within this mixture of increased central control and a quasi-free market many schools developed through chains of academies with networks of governance spanning public and private sectors. Locating schools within a form of market economy accelerated a discourse of management in education with an emphasis on transparent and quantifiable outputs, compliance, and accountability.

In this environment the Ofsted grade of Outstanding is seen less as something which is located within a process of school improvement and more as an outcome in itself, and a term for advertising, to be placed alongside the school logo. Some schools were more able to secure a favourable Ofsted judgement because of their more privileged pupil. intake or because they were able to deploy resources to prepare for inspections through the use of consultants  When Ofsted began to change its inspection framework, for example, to inspect schools formerly graded as Outstanding, to introduce a default overall grade of inadequate for what was judged to be any significant safeguarding issue, to place less emphasis on quantifiable outcomes such as examination and test results, many schools previously judged to be outstanding found it harder to secure that judgement when reinspected. The pressure from academy chains and to achieve in the marketised education economy placed huge pressure on school headteachers/managers.

The speed with which Ruth Perry’s death ignited a simmering resentment of Ofsted suggests longer standing issues in education. It points to a growing distrust, by the teaching profession, of Ofsted and its motives, and the fragility of Ofsted’s legitimacy, (the acceptance by the education profession of Ofsted’s right and ability to make accurate judgements about the quality of education).

To be seen as legitimate, Ofsted needs to demonstrate its independence from political interference and show that it is not just the mouthpiece of the political party of government. Ofsted is a non-ministerial department of His Majesty’s government which reports to Parliament. Although it is independent from government it has to respond to ministers’ questions and concerns. This means that, in part, what and how Ofsted inspects is in response to government concerns e.g., Ofsted guidance on ‘Woke’ issues and the sudden inspection of schools which have been demonised in the right-wing press (e.g. holding a snap inspection of a school based on a TikTok video snippet of a classroom argument and the subsequent media coverage) ‘. Although its independence is not guaranteed but the product of an ongoing negotiation to a significant degree the direction Ofsted takes is in the hands of the Chief Inspector. Regular changes in the Ofsted framework reflect issues and concerns identified by previous frameworks but also the priorities and educational beliefs and practices of Chief Inspectors. In this context the appointment of a new Chief Inspector is being greeted with some apprehension. Sir Martyn Oliver, due to be appointed Chief Inspector, was the leader of a large academy trust of 41 schools which the Guardian noted was ‘renowned for high numbers of suspensions’. Concerns have been expressed that Ofsted, under his leadership will reverse the direction taken by Amanda Spielman, the last holder of the office, and return to an over-reliance on quantifiable data such as examination results and attendance data so that Ofsted grades then simply follow GCSE, benefiting schools in more prosperous areas. Many may also be concerned about some of the many positions Sir Oliver occupied in his ascent to national prominence. These include his membership of the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities. This was established in the context of the Black Lives Matter movement and essentially sought to undermine it through its somewhat overoptimistic view of racial equality in the UK. The report has been roundly condemned for its conclusions and in particular for its misrepresentation of evidence presented to it. The historian David Olusoga, in particular, accused the report’s authors of appearing to prefer “history to be swept under the carpet” and compared it to the Trump-era 1776 Commission.

We need to look for the sources of legitimacy in different educational contexts: in teachers’ subject identity and communities, in pupil age phase specific practice, in pedological theory and understanding and in the organisational goals of the school. The current wave of criticism shows that it is time to rethink Ofsted and its role for school improvement. How Ofsted is to change and what it should become need to be preceded by a full discussion by the teaching profession, which should draw on all the sources of legitimacy. An Ofsted shackled to the political whims of government or directed by the unchallenged views and prejudices of its Chief Inspector will be an inspection regime which will be increasingly challenged by teachers, increasingly condemned for its impact on schools and teachers and increasingly irrelevant to the future health of schools.

The drawn-out death agonies of the present Conservative government bring to mind, for students of the humanities, the last days of the Roman Empire. Political instability and assassinations, (the year of the three Caesars). The mounting chaos, incompetence and greed and the feeling that everything is broken and nothing works any more. An obsession with invasion from across the borders and increasingly extreme statements and policy to distract the population. The disenchantment of most of the population with their political institutions and the departure of members of the political elite from the centre of power to their home estates to ‘spend more time with their money’. All this and government political appointments which bear a similarity to Caligula’s appointment of his horse to the Senate of Rome.

As we wait, enforced witnesses to one of the e longest death-bed scenes in history, our thoughts naturally turn to the moment when we wake up and find that 13 years of Tory rule are over and we are in a different political period. As we wait, it’s natural to speculate about what a new government may mean for education and for the humanities. At present the answer to this does not exactly conjure up the sound of trumpets welcoming the triumphant entry of a new age to the crumbling ruins of education in the UK. At the moment the Labour Party’s education programme includes:

ending private school’s charitable status, (it might be a shock to some of us who can’t recall people on street corners rattling collecting cans for Eton that they were charities);

reforming Ofsted by giving it a school improvement role (some may have thought that improving schools was always the purpose of Ofsted);

replacing Ofsted’s grading system with a report card (which presumably may say, for example, requires improvement in a different way);

making the National Curriculum compulsory in all schools (most teach the National Curriculum whatever their status anyway);

practical life skills in the National Curriculum, (sounds a little like a version of the 70s life skill of calculating your unemployment benefit, but could include useful skills like estimating how many pizzas you would need to deliver to pay off your student loan;

a visit to the seaside for all children by the age of 10 (should hopefully only take place after the sewage has been cleaned up);

and the right to learn to play a musical instrument (should make it clear that schools will be able to finance instruments other than the ocarina).

Of course, many of Labour’s proposals will be welcomed, such as free breakfast clubs, a right for teachers to have professional development, the establishment of a teacher recruitment fund with retention payments, and in-school counselling for pupils will be welcomed. However, this is not the stuff to engender wild enthusiasm and to bring hope to a demoralised profession working in often substandard accommodation, picking up the pieces of a system traumatised by Covid. We need a policy agenda which will take education forward, repair the damage done to the curriculum, return teachers’ creativity and professionalism, and make all educational staff feel valued and appropriately rewarded.

The fall of a corrupt and incompetent Roman Empire was followed by the ‘Dark Ages’. A Labour victory will certainly not usher in a new Dark Age but it will probably create a ‘dimly lit age’ of a mediocre education experience to be haunted forever by the ghosts of missed opportunities.

Rich encounters with the past: Ofsted history subject report July 2023

History is, perhaps, our most contentious and politically sensitive curriculum subject. When Hilary Mantel said, “the past changes a little every time we retell it”, she captured well a subject whose content is unstable, continuously changing its form when viewed through  differing perspectives and interpretations. It is also an inherently political subject whose subject matter can be a battleground for differing political values and world views and whose teaching methodology in UK schools has been a centre of controversy for over a century. We have few sources of information as to what goes on in history lessons in our schools, so when one of Ofsted’s infrequently produced subject reports on history appears it is worth our attention, especially as this is the first report since Ofsted’s ‘curriculum turn’ and the inauguration of subject ‘deep dives’.

‘Rich encounters with the past: history subject report’ (Ofsted July 2023) differs in tone from the apocalyptic ’History in the balance‘ 2007 report,  with its picture of a struggling subject with a limited place in the curriculum, and the ‘History for all’ 2011 report, whose tenuous optimism was tinged with a view of a subject in danger of marginalisation and a loss of identity. History is no longer following in the footsteps of the African forest elephant or the Yangtze finless porpoise in the path towards extinction. On the contrary, History is recovering, highly valued and receiving sufficient curriculum time. Most schools now have a broad and ambitious history curriculum, primary school teachers’ subject knowledge now impresses, pupils are developing a secure knowledge of the past and the gap in the quality of history teaching between primary and secondary schools has closed.

There remain, according to the report, significant areas for further development. There are variations in the quality of history across schools, planning for disciplinary knowledge is not always ambitious, knowledge is sources of evidence are often used by pupils who do not have secure knowledge of the historical context, some schools still focus on superficial aspects of the past, and, as usual, assessment in history remains underdeveloped. Central to developing further the teaching of history is the need to see pupils’ experience of the subject across the whole history curriculum across all years. Layers of historical knowledge interact so that pupils should develop their understanding of historical periods and of recurring terms and concepts and of broader chronological frameworks. This involves, both in curriculum planning and in classroom pedagogical decision-making, the identification of key concepts and content which will support future learning and progress in the subject.

An Ofsted subject report reflects not only the state of the subject but also the context within which evidence is gathered. Changes in the Ofsted framework and methodology mean, for example, that the report is no longer organised around categories such as achievement and teaching. The report also reflects the political context within which the curriculum is viewed. It is hard to see, for example, the warning to avoid emphasising the negative experiences of a group and ‘creating narratives of victimhood’ as not being motivated by the current government’s ‘anti-woke’ culture wars.

The dominant view that the curriculum, promoted by government and Ofsted, should reflect the ‘powerful knowledge’ of subjects has led to the reaffirmation of the importance of the traditional subject-centred curriculum. In this view the demise of history as a component of school topic teaching is seen as a significant step forward. The report has nothing to say about the relationship and contribution of history to the rest of the curriculum or about the relevance of history to the developing child. The 2007 History in the Balance report argued that history needed to focus, through the Every Child Matters agenda, on what young people needed to become successful and well equipped adults. The 2011 History For All report identified as a key issue for history teaching how it might contribute to pupils’ sense of social responsibility and recommended that the history curriculum should include opportunities to study the cultures of different communities and the roots of contemporary issues, for example, those presented by Black History Month. For the current report, planning in history is about identifying what is important in supporting future learning in the subject. We teach what we teach in history to develop the subject. Why we teach history, how it develops future adults and citizens and how it connects with the rest of the curriculum are both unanswered and seen as unimportant questions. Many teachers of history would applaud the report’s focus on the subject, its integrity and how it should be developed. Others may regret the disappearance of relevance as a criteria for planning and developing history teaching, an outwardly looking curriculum and the return to a more traditional and narrower curriculum mind.