Re: Prevent The Church Hijacking Our Schools : Mon Jan 09, 2012 1:29 pm  

Neil wrote: Other loons are waiting in the wings to have their agendas promoted in our schools. The ridiculously named Truth in science for example. There was a brief series on TV a couple of years ago with Richard Dawkins looking at evolution. If I remember the details correctly, he went into schools (obviously with permission) to talk to pupils, but found a substantial reluctance among pupils to 'believe' evolution over ideas of divine creation, even after he'd done things like take them on field trips to hunt for fossils. Now I cannot recall whether the school in question was a faith school or not, or whether this was simply a case of a group of young people whose home unbringing had created that situation, but it raises the issue of just how easy or likely it is for children to simply 'throw off' such beliefs because they decide/want to. And if, as we already know has been the case, the lines between science and religious studies are quite deliberately blurred, then do people really simply think that youngsters will be able to sort the one from the other? I mentioned earlier, the case of the Orthodox Jewish girls' school in Hackney, where 50% of the pupils' time is spent on religious studies. How is the conducive to anything other than continued ghettoisation? But it also comes down to the contentious issues of selection. Faith schools can – and do – select. So it's not difficult to see that the state schools that cannot operate selection will end up, for want of a better description, with the less desirable pupils – those with learning difficulties, those who are more disruptive, those from homes where the parents don't give a toss etc. Is the answer selection in all circumstances, then? I don't think so – on the basis that, having seen the education that my sister received in a state secondary school and later, in a CofE secondary, having not passed her 11 plus. Part of the problem, it seems to me, is in treating those at one end of the educational pile as not worth investing in – so you get a generally substandard level of education. To start with, we need more vocational education and training – not less. We need streaming at some level or other for those with a more academic bent – but not treating those who don't have such leanings as inferior. Personally, I think that insisting that all youngsters stay at school until 18 is ridiculous and counter-productive in many cases. It's just as flawed an approach to demand that someone who wants to go on a course to learn plastering has two GCSEs in order to get on that course.

Neil wrote: Other loons are waiting in the wings to have their agendas promoted in our schools. The ridiculously named Truth in science for example. There was a brief series on TV a couple of years ago with Richard Dawkins looking at evolution. If I remember the details correctly, he went into schools (obviously with permission) to talk to pupils, but found a substantial reluctance among pupils to 'believe' evolution over ideas of divine creation, even after he'd done things like take them on field trips to hunt for fossils. Now I cannot recall whether the school in question was a faith school or not, or whether this was simply a case of a group of young people whose home unbringing had created that situation, but it raises the issue of just how easy or likely it is for children to simply 'throw off' such beliefs because they decide/want to. And if, as we already know has been the case, the lines between science and religious studies are quite deliberately blurred, then do people really simply think that youngsters will be able to sort the one from the other? I mentioned earlier, the case of the Orthodox Jewish girls' school in Hackney, where 50% of the pupils' time is spent on religious studies. How is the conducive to anything other than continued ghettoisation? But it also comes down to the contentious issues of selection. Faith schools can – and do – select. So it's not difficult to see that the state schools that cannot operate selection will end up, for want of a better description, with the less desirable pupils – those with learning difficulties, those who are more disruptive, those from homes where the parents don't give a toss etc. Is the answer selection in all circumstances, then? I don't think so – on the basis that, having seen the education that my sister received in a state secondary school and later, in a CofE secondary, having not passed her 11 plus. Part of the problem, it seems to me, is in treating those at one end of the educational pile as not worth investing in – so you get a generally substandard level of education. To start with, we need more vocational education and training – not less. We need streaming at some level or other for those with a more academic bent – but not treating those who don't have such leanings as inferior. Personally, I think that insisting that all youngsters stay at school until 18 is ridiculous and counter-productive in many cases. It's just as flawed an approach to demand that someone who wants to go on a course to learn plastering has two GCSEs in order to get on that course.

Re: Prevent The Church Hijacking Our Schools : Mon Jan 09, 2012 2:55 pm  

Continuing the themes I touched on above, this raises some interesting points.

Continuing the themes I touched on above, this raises some interesting points.

Re: Prevent The Church Hijacking Our Schools : Mon Jan 09, 2012 3:00 pm  

Mintball wrote:

someone who wants to go on a course to learn plastering has two GCSEs in order to get on that course.

but the counter argument is that the acquisition of 2 GCSE's shows some form of personal investment/comittment on the behalf of the individual?

The whole education system is screwed, I know people with degrees and no common sense, and I know people without degrees that are way more intelligent than their peers.

The question is, what can be done to realign things?

Re: Prevent The Church Hijacking Our Schools : Mon Jan 09, 2012 3:07 pm  

McLaren_Field wrote:

Well I'll hold my hand up then, both of my kids went to CofE primary and secondary schools and you know my attitude on organised religion of any kind ...

Nice one, I got the LOL.
First time I've seen "CofE" and "Organised" in the same sentence.

My view is simple.
Education is education, not indoctrination.
Attempts at indoctrination, regardless of their efficacy or lack of it, should not happen in the same curriculum as education.

Re: Prevent The Church Hijacking Our Schools : Mon Jan 09, 2012 3:56 pm  

Mintball wrote:

There was a brief series on TV a couple of years ago with Richard Dawkins looking at evolution.

If I remember the details correctly, he went into schools (obviously with permission) to talk to pupils, but found a substantial reluctance among pupils to 'believe' evolution over ideas of divine creation, even after he'd done things like take them on field trips to hunt for fossils.

Now I cannot recall whether the school in question was a faith school or not, or whether this was simply a case of a group of young people whose home unbringing had created that situation, but it raises the issue of just how easy or likely it is for children to simply 'throw off' such beliefs because they decide/want to.

And if, as we already know has been the case, the lines between science and religious studies are quite deliberately blurred, then do people really simply think that youngsters will be able to sort the one from the other?


.

Both my boys attend a RC primary school, my husband is Athiest & I'm CofE on paper. As I said earlier the boys attend the best available school in my area.

A few weeks ago my oldest Son, 6 asked, "Where did all the people come from?"
Bearing in mind his age and his school I told him how some people like Father Dominic believe that God created the Earth & everything in it, but other people like Scientists believe that we evolved from Monkeys. He thought about it for a while and asked which theory I believed, (Evolution, of course). Then declared that my belief was silly and how of course God made everyone & everything!
Given his age I'm not overly worried, but I do get your point.

Re: Prevent The Church Hijacking Our Schools : Mon Jan 09, 2012 4:01 pm  

Little Robin Redhead wrote:

Both my boys attend a RC primary school, my husband is Athiest & I'm CofE on paper. As I said earlier the boys attend the best available school in my area.

A few weeks ago my oldest Son, 6 asked, "Where did all the people come from?"
Bearing in mind his age and his school I told him how some people like Father Dominic believe that God created the Earth & everything in it, but other people like Scientists believe that we evolved from Monkeys. He thought about it for a while and asked which theory I believed, (Evolution, of course). Then declared that my belief was silly and how of course God made everyone & everything!
Given his age I'm not overly worried, but I do get your point.

Given his age, that's exactly the time to worry.
What was it the Jesuits said "Give me a boy until he's seven and he'll be mine for the rest of his life"
Something like that.

Re: Prevent The Church Hijacking Our Schools : Mon Jan 09, 2012 4:34 pm  

Little Robin Redhead wrote:

Both my boys attend a RC primary school, my husband is Athiest & I'm CofE on paper. As I said earlier the boys attend the best available school in my area.

And that, in two sentences describes how f**ked up the English school system is.

Re: Prevent The Church Hijacking Our Schools : Mon Jan 09, 2012 5:23 pm  

Little Robin Redhead wrote:

Both my boys attend a RC primary school, my husband is Athiest & I'm CofE on paper. As I said earlier the boys attend the best available school in my area.

A few weeks ago my oldest Son, 6 asked, "Where did all the people come from?"
Bearing in mind his age and his school I told him how some people like Father Dominic believe that God created the Earth & everything in it, but other people like Scientists believe that we evolved from Monkeys. He thought about it for a while and asked which theory I believed, (Evolution, of course). Then declared that my belief was silly and how of course God made everyone & everything!
Given his age I'm not overly worried, but I do get your point.

To be honest I'm not surprised and I was going to make the point after I read Mintballs post but before I read yours - as a society conversing with pre-school children what is the most common story that we feed them ?

Its christmas and easter, two of the three biggest dates in a young childs calendar, and we tell them even in very brief terms about the birth and death of a person who we might not even believe in ourselves, we do it to "educate" them and probably partly because we don't want them starting school believing that christmas is just about santa and easter is about a bunny.

Its hardly surprising then that the idea of a god making a world and everything in it is a passable reason for being here when a six year old hears it, after all it ties in with what its parents told it about xmas and easter.

Re: Prevent The Church Hijacking Our Schools : Mon Jan 09, 2012 5:52 pm  

McLaren_Field wrote:

To be honest I'm not surprised and I was going to make the point after I read Mintballs post but before I read yours - as a society conversing with pre-school children what is the most common story that we feed them ?

Its christmas and easter, two of the three biggest dates in a young childs calendar, and we tell them even in very brief terms about the birth and death of a person who we might not even believe in ourselves, we do it to "educate" them and probably partly because we don't want them starting school believing that christmas is just about santa and easter is about a bunny.

Its hardly surprising then that the idea of a god making a world and everything in it is a passable reason for being here when a six year old hears it, after all it ties in with what its parents told it about xmas and easter.

Your right.
I had a similar conversation with a Muslim friend of mine, just before Christmas. He asked why if I don't believe in God, do I celebrate Christmas? I didn't really have a reasonable answer other than, for the Children.
I ended up telling him I celebrate the winter solstice rather than the birth of Christ and some other rubbish, but it did make me think.

Re: Prevent The Church Hijacking Our Schools : Mon Jan 09, 2012 7:19 pm  

Little Robin Redhead wrote:

iven his age, that's exactly the time to worry.
What was it the Jesuits said "Give me a boy until he's seven and he'll be mine for the rest of his life"
Something like that.

Actually this "quote" has appeared in several guises; usually the version used has been selected to support whatever point the user wishes to make. The generally accepted version is "Give me the boy until he is seven, and I will show you the man."

I guess any parent or dedicated teacher could say the same thing.