Curriculum

Is there anything anybody believes should be compulsory on the curriculum?

My bent is history so I have issues with how it is taught. Was just saying with friends then, it is badly taught at the moment. For example, during one term you'll learn about say the Russian Revolution and Mao's China and then be expected to have an exam on them. But that to me doesn't make sense unless you're teaching to a group of people who know the *general* sweep of history of those regions and countries. And that can't be done in one term. How can you try to explain say Chinese foreign policy under Mao to people who don't even know the historical background to Asia? (ie that China was recovering from imperial collapse, colonialism had just ended, Qing stagnation etc).

I'd re-structure so like 50% would be British history (the more in-depth topics) and the other 50% each term would be more general world history rather than one specific topic. So for example for GCSE...

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Originally Posted by GCSE

Term One

- History of the British Constitution
- The Age of Discovery

Term Two

- History of the British Empire
- The Dark Ages

Term Three

- Key Wars and Battles of the British Isles
- Age of Enlightenment and The Renaissance

Term Four

- Modern Elizabethan Britain (1952 onwards)
- Ancient Empires (Roman, Greek, Mongolian, Persia)

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Then at A-Level you could go more specific on the topics and build on the general sweep, so...

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Originally Posted by A Level

British in-depth topics

- Constitutional relationship between the Crown and Parliament
- Union of Scotland and England
- British America
- British India


World in-depth topics

- Decline of Qing China
- Unification of Germany
- Fall of the Roman Empire
- Spain as a world power

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That way i've built some foundations in the earlier years which people need to know as general knowledge anyway but also so that when it reaches A Level we're not scratching around in the dark trying to learn topics that we've been thrown into w/o background.

what do people think?

or have you got comments on other parts of the curriculum that you'd change?

This isn't so much a change to an existing subject however,
I've always believed first-aid should be taught in schools. It's a shame it's not a subject that is worthy of a GCSE level but I do understand it's not a subject that can uphold a huge amount of time learning as well as not easily tested like maths and English. I am happy St John ambulance, Red cross and other first-aid organisations are raising awareness and providing lessons and cadet groups for young people and adults. What do you all think? Is first-aid just as important as the compulsory or optional GCSE subjects? Should it be kept as an outside academic hours subject or should it be introduced into schools

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Originally Posted by ThomasLaws

This isn't so much a change to an existing subject however,
I've always believed first-aid should be taught in schools.

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That's actually a really good idea, and one that wouldn't even be that hard to implement. It would only require a handful of sessions and so wouldn't cut into much other teaching time (and could be done as part of "humanities" if need be) to be refreshed every let's say 3 years of a student's school career, and then we'd have a nation of people not only aware of care remedies but able to implement many themselves

Quote:

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Originally Posted by ThomasLaws

This isn't so much a change to an existing subject however,
I've always believed first-aid should be taught in schools. It's a shame it's not a subject that is worthy of a GCSE level but I do understand it's not a subject that can uphold a huge amount of time learning as well as not easily tested like maths and English. I am happy St John ambulance, Red cross and other first-aid organisations are raising awareness and providing lessons and cadet groups for young people and adults. What do you all think? Is first-aid just as important as the compulsory or optional GCSE subjects? Should it be kept as an outside academic hours subject or should it be introduced into schools

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That first aid idea is one of the most brilliant idea I've ever heard. Me, being a medical graduate myself aren't so familiar and well equipped with it (that's bad, I know XD). I strongly second your idea because learning is about exposure and repetitions. If children are being exposed with first aids (and emergency management) all throughout school's life, just imagine how well prepared they will be when facing the emergency situation sooner or later in life. Can you imagine how many life could be saved just by that? For example in Malaysia, we still have stupid myths on putting spoon on a person's mouth during seizure attack. This is all because of hearing from someone says rather than actually being taught how to manage in a correct way.

This is something practical in life. This is something that should be compulsory to everyone. Which I guess, it's also a safe bet to put life skills curriculum or some sort to be compulsory too. Like how to do your taxes, how to make sure anything you read and listen have authoritative and authentic source, how to tolerate and respect others religions/colors/politics/race (as a matter of fact, any differences at all) and all the other true life basics to build a more functional working and humane society.

Idk how much school has changed since I was there, but I'd focus more on computing and admin (our admin classes covered word/excel/etc) as the amount of people who don't know basic excel/word/outlook usage is ridiculous, especially when so many jobs require the use of computers (or the fact any uni degree will require computer use to some extent).

I'd get rid of religious studies (I don't think a single person in my school was interested in religion, might be quite different in a catholic school though..).

I'd like to see PE be a bit more meaningful, in my school PE was always dodgeball, rounders, football etc which is fine when you're in school, but I'd like to see them do running (short sprints, long distance, etc), cycling (idk how feasible that would be), tennis, badminton, etc... stuff you're likely to do after school as I can honestly say since I left high school I've never played either of the 3 things I done for 98% of PE classes.

+1 on first aid though.

also get rid of history

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Originally Posted by scottish

also get rid of history

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I know how much people hate history, but I do not think getting rid of them is a good idea. Focusing them into certain histories is better instead of abolishing them. Certain histories are required for us to learn for patriotism value and to appreciate the world we currently live in. But some are just way off the track and have nothing to do with us in a way or another. But still, history, remains as a must subject in my belief.

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it"

(sunglasses)