Ant,I don’t accept your thesis that spelling isan innate ability that some have andsome don’t. On the contrary,Iam quite convinced that itis learnt. My thesis isthat itis most effectively taught by teaching children to read ata much earlier age than isdone at school,infact they need tobe reading well before starting school. Teachers facean impossible task in teaching children to spell because they're starting too late and,if they are using a ‘rote-learning’ approach then they're also going about itinthe wrong way. My older sister started teaching me to read whenIwas three. She was remarkable,but that’s anotherstory. I could therefore spell quite well before I started school without ever having ‘rote-learnt’ a single spelling list and I insist that Ihave no‘innate’spelling ability other than that I learnt atthe right time when Iwas three and four yearsold. Interestingly,it took the teachers atmy school nearly two years to notice that I could spell. I suppose it wasthat long before they asked usto write anything that required spelling.You're right aboutthe extraordinary ability of children to learn. The trouble isthat our education systems are not adapted tothe spectacular rate atwhich children really learn. Our classrooms actually givethe distinct impression ofa deliberate attempt to slow down children’s learning presumably due to limitations in the teaching paradigms used in schools.

I personally think itis abominable that children arebeing labeled as having ‘learning difficulties’ just because our education system fails toaddress theirneeds atthe appropriate time. This is just another version of ‘blaming the victim’. The increasing ‘diagnosis’ of learning difficulties in children isa symptom ofthe failure of our education system which is NOT the fault of classroom teachers. There isa far deeper problem with the system inthat it dictates a teaching system thatis wrong-headed, hopelessly inefficient and absolutely inappropriate for teaching children.

Dale is right about using technology in teaching but he does not go far enough. The potential exists inthe ‘virtual-school’ concept to address many ofthe inherent problems in our ‘out-of-date’,‘old technology’ teaching paradigms so let’s bring it on. The children will adapt to it much more quickly than the teachers. Why am I NOT surprised about that?

Fair enough Chris C- I can't argue what I don't know. I was repeating what a school principal here in NSW said to me, however, when I commented on the budget of high schools, and I don't suppose, now, that they thought they'd be taken literally.
My point remains that years 7-10(coinciding with puberty) are perhaps the years where students need the most individual teaching and attention; yet these are the school years when they get the least. If it can be done, and is done well, in Primary years and in years 11 &12 why not 7-10?
'Teaching the curriculum and not the student' can obviously be detrimental to the student who misses out; and also gives us the truly bizarre notion of the 50% pass. One of the first things I have had to disabuse my apprentices of is this 'half right' idea. "No' I tell them, "this wall must stand up everyday, not just half the time; this roof has to be watertight and not just keep half the rain out".
100% knowledge of 50% of a course has gotta be better than 50% understanding of the whole course; and leaves open the possibility of further education, where the latter is more likely to cruel a students interest in that subject.
Public education needs to be championed, and add me to the numbers. But that should not blind us to critical analysis either.

A life lomg education model needs to the continuing learner from pedagogy to andragogy [adult learning]. A complementary model in practice takes one from replicative to analytic to spectulative leaning outcome over the our life cycles. This is not to say that children should not be spectulative nor does argue that replication is not relevant to adults. Rather, the cognitive domain [Bloom] needs to examined from the perspective of situation specificity and developmental capacity [Piaget].

In overviewing the centuries, the Great Divergence is significant, as leveraging rediscovered Greek philosophies Western society became to apply Episte to Techne. Else put, theory to practice.

Herein, as one moves through the education system eventually one confronts the effective application of the abstarcts on practic application; while, replication remains important [and must not be dispensed with], theory's guiding hand must provide direction. Thus, the process involves complementary entities, which the education must support. In this frame, Why and How are paramount to unstanding.

Teachers and students need to manage both Epeste and Techne. Which means not ditching one for the other. Here incremental phased learning plans needs address both and recognise the change in emphasis as we progress through the Education system.

In regards to the above what has become problematic is the poor quality of education ministers we have had over recent decades. Dawkins and Nelson come to mind in the Commonealth. Also, by selecting teachers, who have been through the barstardised system, and,with relevatively low university entrance scores; we have set ourselves up for failure. That is, the teachers are not fully literate themselves.

Thus, championing education requires we address failures in approach from Prep. to MBAs, where there has been a major softening standards. I recall that about two-three years back, as an experiment, the States's "top" NSW HSC student took a 1966 HSC paper and scored 52%. Of course, this might reflect some structural anomalies: But, we cannot dismis outcomes like this, either

A life lomg education model needs to the continuing learner from pedagogy to andragogy [adult learning]. A complementary model in practice takes one from replicative to analytic to spectulative leaning outcome over the our life cycles. This is not to say that children should not be spectulative nor does argue that replication is not relevant to adults. Rather, the cognitive domain [Bloom] needs to examined from the perspective of situation specificity and developmental capacity [Piaget].

In overviewing the centuries, the Great Divergence is significant, as leveraging rediscovered Greek philosophies Western society became to apply Episte to Techne. Else put, theory to practice.

Herein, as one moves through the education system eventually one confronts the effective application of the abstarcts on practic application; while, replication remains important [and must not be dispensed with], theory's guiding hand must provide direction. Thus, the process involves complementary entities, which the education must support. In this frame, Why and How are paramount to unstanding.

Teachers and students need to manage both Epeste and Techne. Which means not ditching one for the other. Here incremental phased learning plans needs address both and recognise the change in emphasis as we progress through the Education system.

In regards to the above what has become problematic is the poor quality of education ministers we have had over recent decades. Dawkins and Nelson come to mind in the Commonealth. Also, by selecting teachers, who have been through the barstardised system, and,with relevatively low university entrance scores; we have set ourselves up for failure. That is, the teachers are not fully literate themselves.

Thus, championing education requires we address failures in approach from Prep. to MBAs, where there has been a major softening standards. I recall that about two-three years back, as an experiment, the States's "top" NSW HSC student took a 1966 HSC paper and scored 52%. Of course, this might reflect some structural anomalies: But, we cannot dismis outcomes like this, either.

I thought maybe you had realized the harm you had done to a generation of Australians, and decided to lie low....no such luck.
You and the late Garth Boomer wrote a toxic little book in the 70s, called ‘the Spitting Image, which was an assault on parents’ and their children’s apirations for real literacy and numeracy, your book replete with Marxist claptrap about schools as 'sites of political struggle'....children not being expected to 'jump through middle class hoops'..... 'rebellious illiteracy....and much more.
You politicised education, and called for comprehensive teaching of English grammar to be abolished in Australia....before long it was.
You made names for yourselves at the expense of the life chances of a generation of children, who reached Year 10, and found that, despite previous glowing reports, they did not have the fundamental knowledge to be able to study higher maths, physics and chemistry to Year 12, and further.
Many private tutors have had to clean up your mess....I was one of them.
Australia is now very short of science students due to you, Boomer and others on the Left.
Your Shakespeare/pop lyrics analogy betrays your shallowness.
Shakespeare has much to teach about everything , and always will...acknowledged by most cultures....pop has very little.
Real literacy and the study of Shakespeare enriches the study of everything , technology included....it never precludes it.
In your sneering ageist remarks.....’these oldies’….’nostalgics’ you merely out yourself as a sad eternal teenager.
You are the same age as Howard....maybe older....but pretend otherwise to look hip....doesn’t work....he's infinitely more with it than you.
Your whole piece proves nothing but your own culpability...you’re still at it.....damaging Australia.
You probably see your chance at getting a grip on the education of young Australians again, with the rise of Rudd, but hopefully Australians will come to their senses and reject both of you.
It’s you who lives in the past…go back to ‘flower power and feminism’.
Your business is show business, and education and Australia can’t afford any more damage from your subversive old hat ‘ideas’.

Oliver, the fact that top students scored only 52% on an exam paper which was set 30-40 years earlier does not indicate a drop in standards.
That you should offer this in demonstration that our standards are slipping strikes me that something may have been very lacking in the very education that led you to this conclusion. Sorry, but your pedantic quotes and references irked me.
I have faint memories of Uni exams that I did some 40-50 years ago, and in which I often scored distinctions and high distinctions. I would certainly fail them miserably today. This does not mean that I am less smart, less wise, less educated.