Report on competency-based education

This is from the Kyle Academy website:

"Teachers and practitioners will share information to plan a child’s ‘learning journey’ from 3-18, helping their progression from nursery to primary, primary to secondary and beyond, ensuring the change is smooth."

It is difficult to understand why children now require the assistance of teachers and practitioners in order to make the transition from nursery to primary school, for example. They used to manage that fine before. It looks like it is the sharing of information about children which is the important aspect of the change.

From Kyle Academy again:

"The term ‘curriculum’ has traditionally been associated with the subjects available within the school. With the introduction of Curriculum for Excellence, the term ‘curriculum’ applies now to "the totality of all that is planned for children and young people throughout their education..."

So it is information about the totality of all that is planned for children which is being shared. This is the data driven whole child approach. It would be foolish not to see that the curriculum has been changed in order to achieve this outcome.

http://www.kyle.sayr.sch.uk/thecurriculum.html

Tom Hamilton of the General Teaching Council for Scotland was one of several people consulted in the recent International Study in Competency Education in which Curriculum for Excellence is reported on, a number of times.

The USA report explains: "(C)ompetency-based education takes a holistic approach to the "whole child," embracing the idea that to bring a student to true proficiency, it is important to have more than a simple record of previously demonstrated academic abilities. The social and emotional aspects of a student’s learning must be considered for an understanding of his or her motivation for, engagement with and ownership of learning."

It might be more accurate to say that the report attempts to `explain away` the need to gather personal information about students. They do this by pointing out that on the international scene educational systems are converging. "National governments have come to incorporate family and physical data into the academic goal-setting process where possible, working from the assumption that a child`s academic performance is inseparable from his or her state of mind and physical well-being."

Referring to Kyle Academy in particular they mention that a local school from a deprived area closed and merged with the academy which caused a certain amount of disruption. "With no guidance available, the school implemented its own innovative approach to personalisation to keep students on pace and improve equity in performance...Staff found what they needed in a rigorous data tracking system - one they built themselves, with the aid of a retired head teacher, to meet their needs."

Here it gets even more interesting: "Teachers first met and pored over every resource available, getting to know each student based on personal data, past transcripts, and current achievement levels. Staff also used a nationally available database on poverty and single-family homes to develop a full portrait of each child." Those 9 and 10 year-olds, identified as at-risk, had a campus police officer and community partners to monitor their behaviour during the day and at night.
 
This is as far away from teaching as it is possible to get.

http://www.competencyworks.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/CW-An-International-Study-in-Competency-Education-Postcards-from-Abroad-October-2014.pdf

We have recently been informed by Michael Russell MSP that Scotland could become a global pioneer by making its curriculum the first to be continually updated. While the children are being tracked - and some of that is quite alarming - it is going to be more difficult to monitor what the system as a whole is doing.

http://www.tes.co.uk/article.aspx?storycode=6444929