Read on Twitter
Here’s what (I hope) is a fair-minded thread about this...
1). The ‘examification’ of humanities subjects (3-year GCSE programmes, excessive mock-mock-mocks, doing loads of lessons on ‘Question 4 AO2 practice’) is bad.
But this *isn’t* a ‘knowledge-based curriculum’... https://twitter.com/mattlodder/status/1345432727693238272
1). The ‘examification’ of humanities subjects (3-year GCSE programmes, excessive mock-mock-mocks, doing loads of lessons on ‘Question 4 AO2 practice’) is bad.
But this *isn’t* a ‘knowledge-based curriculum’... https://twitter.com/mattlodder/status/1345432727693238272
2). When history teachers in England talk about knowledge, they’re building on a 50+ year(!) tradition of thinking about many *forms* of knowledge in hist education...
The latest part to this *debate* (this isn’t just partisan dogma) is out on 7 Jan: http://www.uclpress.co.uk/products/130700
The latest part to this *debate* (this isn’t just partisan dogma) is out on 7 Jan: http://www.uclpress.co.uk/products/130700
3. The issue with ‘skills’ talk in secondary education (especially for 11-14 year olds) is that it mutates. Soon, you end up with kids doing pointless and potentially damaging things - which they don’t understand - to (not) learn how to ‘research’.
Who shot JFK, anyone...?
Who shot JFK, anyone...?
4). I recommend reading this (short) piece by @Counsell_C about the different *types* of knowledge at play in a school curriculum.
https://impact.chartered.college/article/taking-curriculum-seriously/
I think you have, rightly, identified that many young people start university with *very* limited ‘disciplinary’ knowledge.
https://impact.chartered.college/article/taking-curriculum-seriously/
I think you have, rightly, identified that many young people start university with *very* limited ‘disciplinary’ knowledge.
5). Students not understanding the key epistemological issues in their subjects - the conditions under which new claims to knowledge can be created etc - is a huge problem. This sort of thing is, generally, handled very badly in the GCSE and A Level humanities specifications.
6). In sum, it’s not a case of ‘too much knowledge’. It’s that students need to be taught much *more* knowledge about how truth-claims work in different subjects at GCSE and, especially, A Level.
@dickens_siobhan’s research on History A-Level specifications is great on this.
@dickens_siobhan’s research on History A-Level specifications is great on this.
A good example of this is the lack of cultural history on the A Level History specifications. Clearly, this is totally out-of-step with academic history (as is the lack of material culture, oral history, global history, ‘memory turn’ etc). Nazis and high-pol stills dominates.
