11 Plus Exams Forum

Education Secretary Michael Gove believes changes should be made making the school summer holidays shorter and extending the school day to 4:30pm.

I guess it would suit working parents, but what about the teachers and pupils?

Good Grief!!
Able children need a 2 day week to reach the required standard by 16 not more time being bored at school.

I love the long summer holidays.

I don't suppose independent schools will be forced to cut their (long) holidays!

What would be the impact on the price of holidays taken during shortened school holiday time?

They're already doing something similar in the new University Technology Colleges - longer days but no homework as it's all done in the longer school day, so overall not an absolute increase.

Note the rhetoric used by Gove to justify this latest initiative:

The UK is losing ground against its international competitors because its children spend too little time at school..We are actually running in this global race in a way that ensures we start with a significant handicap,

This is now the driving force behind all education reform here - to 'win' a global 'race'. Policy makers now are very interested in international league tables. That the country at the top of most of them, Finland, has the lowest teaching time of any country in the world, will not be mentioned, because, as a respected professor points out: British governments voice admiration for high-performing Finland but then, finding Finnish education policies politically unpalatable..*.they look elsewhere where the messages 'fit' politically - in this case the Far East. That these countries are rooted in a history of Confucian values underpinning their very traditional schooling style will not be mentioned either, because that won't help the 'quick fix' politics so appealing to ministers.

Either way, do not be fooled into thinking this has anything at all to do with the welfare of children, who already attend school for more years and longer hours than anyone else in the world; nor indeed with the needs of working parents, or teachers. It is nasty but very clever rhetoric aimed at justifying a worsening of conditions for teachers and the opening up of the 'schools market' in a bid to further reduce public expenditure on education. The state as regulator not provider, which is the way we are heading - a tight regulatory grip characterised by a prescriptive curriculum and punitive inspection regime, to ensure 'standards' are maintained; and a free-for-all in a market with few rights for employees (teachers) and children used as pawns.

*Robin Alexander, "Neither National nor a Curriculum"

Aside from winter months and 'travel in the dark' type issues for some..I think it also depends on the child. My eldest starts at 8.30 and finishes at 4, which is a reasonable length of day. However, when it comes to homework, she is not easily motivated at home and there are too many distractions. And unless homework club was mandatory, she wouldn't do it in a million years! So an hour longer wouldn't be a bad thing for her, as she is quite mature for her age and would probably cope with the longer day. I do find, and I'm sure she and her friends do too, that the holidays can be a little too long. Summer particularly. Unless you have many homes abroad to visit, it does start to drag a little towards the end. And the first half term back is 2 weeks, which seems the norm for independents, which I can never understand. Perhaps someone here knows why?!

I suggest anyone who has a ratty and tired child in the lead up to weekends / holidays arrange for said child to stay with Mr Gove. I might also send my big suitcase of workbooks for that extra boost ...Mr Gove won't mind I'm sure.

The holidays could be better spread but don't want more total hours. Maybe it could be optional for those who need it or want it, and the extra hours could create more teaching jobs rather than longer hours for current teachers.

Ugh!