Changes in Education

New technology is in danger of swamping education in Scotland. There is no shortage of imaginative ideas for using this technology. Where are the people discussing and planning the strategy of its use across education?

Unless the pedagogy or methodology changes the new technology will become as boring as the old chalk and talk. And to change the pedagogy we must re-examine the goals. Our present system is based on the goals our Victorian forefathers saw as useful outcomes for educating the nineteenth century worker. We need to be certain that we have goals fit for purpose in the twenty first century.

Unfortunately unlike our predecessors we have a massive educational bureaucracy which is as difficult to shift as a supertanker and probably with about the same vision and imagination as the supertanker.

ID Cards are creating more heat than light at the moment.

However, there was a throwaway mention on Radio 4 that when Napoleon III was exiled to the UK he was amazed at how easily people moved around the country. In France at that time you needed permission to visit a neigbouring town

A national database of the people could lead to electronic surveillance and hence to restrictions on the movement of non-convicted persons.

Or am I being paranoid?

I have always believed that a government should test any law by imagining the powers conferred to be used by their political opponents or political extremists. This government has never even thought about doing this for the last eight years.

A question has been posed elsewhere. What will education in Scotland be like in the short, medium and long terms?

It's easy to be flippant or pessimistic or optimistic, but not to be serious and realistic. Time frames are difficult in education. Looking back five, ten or twenty years may give some clue. But the fundamentals in those time frames have not changed greatly. Syllabuses have changed; some exams have changed or been introduced; technology has changed. Methods have not changed. The classroom is based on the teacher imparting knowledge and teaching skills. Pupils absorb the information for exams and use some of the skills to do it.

The model of universal literacy and numeracy is based on a nineteenth century requirement and vision. Can we agree on a new vision based on the requirements of modern twenty first century life or should it be the same as the past, because life for the majority has not changed?

Too many questions!