GCSE results prove traditional teaching methods do work

Low grade boundaries for A level exams result in students who answer almost half their papers incorrectly being awarded with the (supposedly) highly coveted A grade.

Last week, low grade boundaries for certain A level exams resulted in students who had answered almost half their paper incorrectly being awarded with the (supposedly) highly coveted A grade.

Yesterday, younger students received their GCSE results. ‘Pass rates up and top grades edge upwards’, the media hailed; combined with the fact this year’s GCSE exams were supposedly much tougher than in previous years, this represented a great boost in educational attainment. Except it didn’t.

Again, one who scrolled to the very bottom of these reports could find that the boundaries set by the exam boards were shockingly low. To pass a (Pearson/Edexcel) chemistry paper, a student needed to answer only slightly more than one fifth of the questions correctly. Likewise, one could answer a fifth of the questions incorrectly and still be awarded with grade 9, this being the most difficult grade to achieve.

In physics, a similarly low amount of correct answers was required for a pass, and sixty-two percent was required for a 7 (what was formerly an A).

I could go on, but you get the idea.

The devaluation of British exams is not new. A study conducted by the Engineering Council, which I discussed in my previous article on education, displays this fact:

‘In 2000, the Engineering Council released the results of their ten-year study of university undergraduates beginning courses in maths, science and engineering. These students were all given an identical test. Their study found that, as the entrants’ grades at A level had risen, their mathematical understanding had declined.’

This is a direct result of Britain’s education system having long ago abandoned its traditionalist ethos. This ethos championed rigour and discipline and was characterised by a teacher standing at the front of the (forward-facing) class and transmitting a structured body of knowledge, which had been passed on from previous generations.

In typical modern schools, the authority of the teacher has been almost completely decimated and creativity is placed above knowledge, despite the fact creativity can only flourish when within certain defined boundaries. Learning largely takes place within group, or in individual work, rather than as a result of teacher instruction. As Melanie Philips explains in her immensely important book All Must Have Prizes (1996), ‘the prevailing philosophy [in education] is the child-centered, individualised approach in which learning has to be fun, no child must feel a failure and no rules must be taught’.

One school which has refused to bow down to this current educational mood is Michaela, the free school in Wembley run by the so-called ‘strictest head in Britain’, Katharine Birbalsingh.

Ms. Birbalsingh has recently expressed the fact her school is ‘committed to explicit teaching, with the teacher standing at the front of the classroom and students listening’.

‘We instil a respect for authority and unashamedly champion a knowledge-based curriculum’, she told the Telegraph. ‘Some characterise this as mere rote-learning which strips pupils of their ingenuity – but on the contrary, it involves analysis and exploration and promotes creativity, memory and independent thinking. Only by having knowledge at their fingertips can children write, speak and learn with confidence’.

The educational establishment has lambasted this school for its traditional approach, but yesterday’s results day showed the ethos described above has seriously paid off.

Over half (54 per cent) of the results achieved by students at the school were 7s, 8s or 9s (A or A* under the old system). Further, 18 per cent of exams carried out were graded with a 9, a whopping four times higher than the national average (4.5 per cent).

Clearly, the structure and clarity produced in the minds of students at Michaela by formal, knowledge-based teaching has boosted said students (from normal, or even deprived backgrounds, it must be said) to reaching their full educational potentials. That this is denied to other students across the country is a national disgrace.

Turn your nose all you like to traditional teaching methods; the simple fact is, they work.