IF there is one industry that should be excited by the return of grammar to the basic educational curriculum, it’s the media.
We’ve basically lost a generation of writers to the concept that your grammar is my gramma, is our grandmother. Now write a story about how you feel about your grandmother.
Our children have been taught how to feel but not the mechanics of how to get their feelings in place through words.
Indeed, a lengthy article about this very education initiative in a national newspaper had this to say: “Macintyre says years 7 and 8 will study ancient and medieval history, as is common now, but the curriculum mandates a depth study of Asia.”
Will students be heading over there on excursions with long pieces of rope working out the depth of Asia?
Just yesterday I read a serious piece of economic analysis in a prominent newspaper that passed my ‘international soccer player test’: could I reasonably accept that someone whose first language was not English would speak like this.
This commentary on the Federal Government passed with flying colours: “... there’s plenty of things that been stuffed up or simply shouldn’t have been attempted in the first place.
There a few areas where the jury is out...”
Basic, agreed standards in English, maths, science and history is in the interests of all Australian children.
Parents will have reasonable grounds for understanding the concepts their children are tackling each year, wherever they go.
At the moment they could change suburbs and be left in the dark.
It will help parents of children in public education to have access to something private school parents have come to expect: the right to ask their teachers exactly what their children are up to and to have measures in place to reinforce and attain the necessary standards.
Western suburbs children in public education already appear to have access to high-quality tuition.
Churchlands has just produced the State’s top student and Shenton College features high among the best TEE results.
Perhaps other public schools other than the few outstanding successes will start to come to the fore.
A common complaint against national standards is that we need texts that reflect regional differences.
Supposedly a Tim Winton might not translate as well to a Victorian context as to his home state.
For better or worse, our children already have a national curriculum. It’s called the United States of America and it’s taught on most television shows, films and much of the music they are exposed to.
It only seems fair that we’re fighting back with a curriculum of our own.