The curriculum and assessment review is dealing with “dilemmas” over the volume of GCSE assessment and concerns over “overburdening”, its chair has told MPs.
Professor Becky Francis, the chief executive of the Education Endowment Foundation, appeared in front of the education committee this morning.
Here’s what we learned…
1. ‘Dilemmas’ about assessment volume
The review’s interim report stated its next phase would “consider carefully whether there are opportunities to reduce the overall volume of assessment at key stage 4 without compromising the reliability of results”.
Francis told MPs the review was “really mindful of…the more volume, the higher the reliability…and that there is obviously a risk that if you cut too far, you might damage reliability, and that’s something that obviously we’re not going to do”.
She added that, given the “sudden death” nature of GCSEs, reducing papers to one per subject could reduce it to “a kind of one-shot for such an important exam”.
“So two papers and beyond diminishes that risk. But equally, the more papers, the longer the total and so those are the kind of dilemmas and trades that we’re looking at and the approach that we’re taking to it. We’re taking it very seriously.”
2. Adding qualifications ‘not always the solution’
The exam board OCR has proposed a short-course GCSE in maths sat by pupils in year 10, with the option for those who wanted to study the full course continuing into year 11.
Francis said the review was considering “all of these ideas in the round”, but that she would not “speculate on that particular idea”.
“There’s a lot of suggestion for additional assessment through the education system, and often sort of driving license equivalent kind of qualifications to be introduced.
“There’s a real challenge, I think, between if you benchmark those two low, they become pointless, because everyone can get it and it doesn’t really mean anything.
“If you benchmark them high, same problem with significant groups of young people that don’t pass them. So adding qualifications isn’t always the solution, in my view, but definitely also has a role.”
3. Many reasons for ‘overburdening’
Francis said the evidence received showed there were “many different causes for this experience of an overburdened curriculum”.
This “sometimes” comes from programmes of study – the statutory documents that make up the curriculum – “struggling to manage breadth and depth in proper balance”.
But “other times, it’s very puzzling, because if you look at the programmes of study, they’re very, very thin, and yet the experience on the ground is that you have this over stuffing.
“And what we’ve heard is that often teachers feel that they have to teach everything because they’re not sure what might come through in an exam spec, or what Ofsted might be looking for and so forth.
“So actually, in some areas, we think that better specification might actually help teachers to make sense of that.”
4. Languages a ‘profound’ problem at secondary transition
The review is looking at how to secure “better teaching and learning, particularly in primary” in languages, Francis said.
She said Britain did not have a “natural second language, which means that there are very severe problems across transition”.
Secondaries take pupils from primary schools which teach an “array” of languages.
This means “that either some kids are starting from scratch in secondary or they’re having to rehearse a rather boring lesson where they’re re-taught things that they already know.
“So this is quite a profound problem. It’s not one that is easy to fix, and we’ve thought a lot about the different ways that you could address this.
“They’re pretty radical and unpalatable for the main, so the discussions that we’ve been having is really how we can secure better teaching and learning, particularly in primary.”
5. Some subjects ‘severely’ squeezed by exams
Pressed on whether her review would recommend that two hours of PE per week should become mandatory, Francis said the review was “looking at PE and we’re continuing to deliberate on it.
“We’re, I think, very mindful of both the issues around…the squeeze on curriculum and time and particularly in secondary schools, examined subjects, sometimes squeezing subjects that are meant to be held dear in the basic curriculum, but sometimes aren’t”.
She said she had been “very interested to see how severe that can sometimes be, not just for PE, but also for other subjects in the basic curriculum, despite the fact that these are expected subjects, and so we are looking at that”.
6. Trusts using freedoms to avoid ‘expensive’ DT equipment
MPs also grilled Francis on the government’s move to force academies to follow the national curriculum.
She said it had been “heartening to me to hear that, for example, 70 per cent of headteachers feel that this application to their academy won’t change their practice”. The review has been consulting with heads and CEOs, “to check how big a change will this be”.
But she added that the “main area that we’ve heard talked about is design and technology, where some multi-academy trusts have used their freedoms not to provide often expensive equipment and so forth.
“And so that is one area that we’re again considering as we make our recommendations.”
However, she said that “broadly”, there is “going to be continuity rather than change”.
7. Review won’t create programmes of study
Francis said it had been an “enormously intense and challenging task to review all the way through from key stage 1 right through to post 16 in just over a year”.
“So I’m very glad to say that we won’t be creating programmes of study and so forth for the national curriculum.”
The review also won’t draft exam content, but “we will be making recommendations about how those things should be approached”.
It will be for government to respond to the review and set out its next steps for implementation.
But Francis said the review had heard an “array of evidence, which often includes matters of implementation, it’s very important, I think, that we share it”.
8. ‘Range of timelines’ for implementation
Francis’s panel is due to present its final report to government in the autumn.
Asked when schools could expect to see changes as a result, she told MPs “I think there will be a range of different timelines for change”. For example, some recommendations, if accepted, would require consultation.
The review has already recommended a rolling programme of change because of capacity in the system.
“I haven’t worked backwards, but I imagine it would be at least a year [before any changes are seen] because of the government stipulation about landing zones, and then again, it has to work with academic years and so forth.
“I imagine also that…our recommendations will include everything from quite sort of more pithy fundamental change to very in the weeds, easier things to address.”
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