Academic curriculum may worsen discipline problems say MPs
Select committee calls on Gove to think again about encouraging all pupils to study traditional subjects
A curriculum that is skewed towards academic subjects could encourage bad behaviour in the classroom, an influential committee of MPs warns today.
A report by the Commons education select committee says it has heard evidence of an increase in the number of pupils in classrooms with "complex behavioural needs".
Education psychologists told the committee that teachers say they are now expected to teach children who "would not have been in school five to 10 years ago".
School staff have suffered over 2,000 reported injuries over the past decade, the MPs' report says, with assaults rising from 171 in 2001 to 251 in the last school year.
The select committee calls on the government to think again about the status of vocational learning, to ensure a balanced approach to the curriculum.
Education secretary Michael Gove announced a review of the national curriculum last month, arguing for an emphasis on essential knowledge and stressing the value of traditional subjects.
Gove has also introduced a new qualification, the English baccalaureate, for good GCSE performance in a range of traditional subjects. The English bac, awarded to students with good passes in English, maths, science, a language, and history or geography, has been criticised as elitist by some teaching unions.
Graham Stuart MP, chairman of the select committee, said, "If the curriculum doesn't stimulate children, they will switch off, and the chances are that they will disrupt other children's learning. The onus is now on the government to draw up a national curriculum which engages all children and meets their aspirations. Then let teachers decide how to apply it."
The MPs say it is hard to get a clear picture of behaviour in schools because there is a lack of data relating to low-level disruption.
The report urges the Department for Education to gather data from a repr! esentati ve sample of schools on the number of serious incidents.
The MPs also say that children with basic skills in literacy and comprehension are less likely to misbehave, and call on the government to the speaking and listening ability of six-year-olds as well as their reading ability.
New powers allowing schools to put a child in detention without giving parents 24 hours' notice should be used sensibly, the MPs say, with sensitivity to the needs of young carers and pupils with travel difficulties.
The MPs heard from witnesses who questioned Ofsted's ability to give an accurate picture of behaviour in schools.
Tom Trust, a former member of the teaching profession's watchdog, the General Teaching Council, said headteachers sometimes suspended the worst behaved pupils when Ofsted inspectors came.
Katharine Birbalsingh, a former deputy headteacher, questioned Ofsted's standards, saying that "when Ofsted says something is good, it's not very good".
The MPs welcome government proposals that Ofsted inspections should focus more on pupils' behaviour.
"There are risks in reducing the frequency of inspections for good and outstanding schools, but we support moves to release schools from unnecessary central inspection," the report says.
Andy Burnham MP, Labour's education spokesman, said: "The education select committee echoes the views of parents and teachers who are calling on Michael Gove to rethink his backward-looking curriculum policy.
"Alongside solid academic study, young people need technical and social skills to succeed in the workplace and to stay engaged with learning."
The government has launched a review of vocational education which is due to report later this month.
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