The authors of the B.C. Ministry of Education’s draft curriculum have a penchant for lofty gerunds — transforming, rethinking, redesigning — to describe their work. Yet the draft re-peddles Maria Montessori’s program of personalized learning in 1930s fascist Italy. It also dumbs down the curriculum, admitting to a “reduction of learning standards” and “less detailed and prescriptive content.”
Moreover, there is repeated attention to “self- and peer-assessment.” The problem with self-assessment is that it rewards students with an inflated opinion of self, or a weak conscience. It is equivalent to figure skaters at the Olympics making up their own scores. The problem with peer assessment is that it is often arbitrary and subjective, and engenders hostility toward classmates.
The move away from teacher marking puts the responsibility in the hands of hormone-addled high school social Darwinists. This is because the new “personalized learning” is about giving students “more of a say in what and how they learn.” The jury is out as to whether it will produce more Encyclopedia Browns or more couch potatoes.
The new curriculum proclaims that “assessment is tied to learning, not behaviours.” This conjures up the case of the Edmonton teacher fired last year for assigning zeros for work not done. In order to get as many students as possible through to the Dogwood, teachers can be disciplined for giving zeros or late marks because students cannot be marked on behaviour. Yet anyone who has travelled beyond high school knows that success in life comes largely from hard work. As Thomas Edison famously said: “Genius is one per cent inspiration and 99 per cent perspiration.”
One can understand why private schools are outpacing public schools on external exit exams. A study posted on the Council of Ministers of Education Canada website found that “in more than 150 statistical comparisons covering eight different educational outcomes, the private sector outperforms the public sector in the overwhelming majority of cases.”
The Fraser Institute’s annual report card, which is based on publicly administered tests, never has a public school even near the top of the pack. The highest-rated public secondary school last year was Lord Byng in 22nd place.
The draft curriculum states there will be an emphasis on “big ideas” without delineation of these big ideas or acknowledgment that teachers have more than just small ideas. The draft promotes “learning which is holistic, reflective and relational,” as though teachers have only ever pushed ideas that are specific, flippant and unconnected.
What the draft does is present a view of educational history that is false, reminding us that the word “history” has the word “story” in it.
In a nod to political correctness, the draft asserts that “those whose understandings have traditionally been privileged may be more likely to encounter conflicting perspectives that force them to question their beliefs.” The goal of education should be to question one’s beliefs, from Latin word educare, meaning “to lead out.” Yet to suggest that children of European background are more likely to be wrong in their beliefs is racist in nature.
Downplayed in the draft are stock educational terms from the past, such as excellence, standards, competition, rigour, discipline and home support. Somehow these have all become passé. After a few years of the new curriculum, there will be a rush to retrieve the old one.
Jim McMurtry, PhD, is a Surrey high school teacher, a textbook contributor with Pearson Canada and a B.C. provincial exam reviewer.
