This guest lecture was taken by Jane Davidson, the former minister of education. She gave a lecture on The Learning Country document and the changes in the cirriculum. Jane was a writer of the learning country and is the developer of most of the ideas. The learning country is a paving document and was a document which paved the way for the current cirriculum. Jane discussed some of the key changes which were made to the education system before the foundation phase:
1983-Margret Thatcher introduced the curriculum, SAT's introduced
1997-Labour government, National curriculum too restrictive
1999-National assembly in Wales, pre 16 and post 16 committees set up
Education policy was not different in Wales to England
Jane became minister in 2000 and felt that education is the route out of poverty
"Wales should become internationally renowned as a learning country." Learning country
One of the key ideas of the learning country is lifelong learning and it focuses a lot on post 16 education.
The learning country developed a lot of the ideas we see in the foundation phase today:
Arrangements for exchanging information between primary and secondary schools- visits
Lower class sizes- 30 or below
Breakfast clubs
The foundation phase is now coming under review as a cirriculum but it still hasn't been around very long, however the startegy has now finished testing
I found this lecture useful as I did not really know how the foundation phase was developed as a cirriculum, I also found Jane to be a good speaker without the use of a slideshow.
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