A primary function of art and thought is to liberate the individual from the tyranny of his culture ...and to permit him to stand beyond it in an autonomy of perception and judgment.” Lionel Trilling. Beyond Culture, 1966.

Bright teenagers are a disappearing breed (November 2008)

Bright teenagers are a disappearing breed, an alarming new study has revealed. The intellectual ability of the country's cleverest youngsters has declined radically, almost certainly due to the rise of TV and computer games and over-testing in schools. The 'high-level thinking' skills of 14-year-olds are now on a par with those of 12-year-olds in 1976. The findings contradict national results which have shown a growth in top grades in SATs at 14, GCSEs and A-levels.

Michael Shayer’s team of researchers at London's King's College tested 800 13 and 14-year-olds and compared the results with a similar exercise in 1976. The tests were intended to measure understanding of abstract scientific concepts such as volume, density, quantity and weight, which set pupils up for success not only in maths and science but also in English and history. One test asked pupils to study a pendulum swinging on a string and investigate the factors that cause it to change speed. A second involved weights on a beam. In the pendulum test, average achievement was much the same as in 1976.

But the proportion of teenagers reaching top grades, demanding a 'higher level of thinking', slumped dramatically. Just over one in ten were at that level, down from one in four in 1976. In the second test, assessing mathematical thinking skills, just one in 20 pupils were achieving the high grades - down from one in five in 1976.

Professor Shayer said: 'The pendulum test does not require any knowledge of science at all. 'It looks at how people can deal with complex information and sort it out for themselves.' He believes most of the downturn has occurred over the last ten to 15 years. It may have been hastened by the introduction of national curriculum testing and accompanying targets, which have cut the time available for teaching which develops more advanced skills.

Critics say schools concentrate instead on drilling children for the tests. 'The moment you introduce targets, people will find the most economical strategies to achieve them,' said Professor Shayer. Professor Shayer believes the decline in brainpower is also linked to changes in children's leisure activities. The advent of multi-channel TV has encouraged passive viewing while computer games, particularly for boys, are feared to have supplanted time spent playing with tools, gadgets and other mechanisms.

Previous research by Professor Shayer has shown that 11-year-olds' grasp of concepts such as volume, density, quantity and weight appears to have declined over the last 30 years. Their mental abilities were up to three years behind youngsters tested in in 1975. His latest findings, due to appear in the British Journal of Educational Psychology, come in the wake of a report by Dr Aric Sigman which linked the decline in intellectual ability to a shift away from art and craft skills in both schools and the home. Dr Sigman said practical activities such as building models and sandcastles, making dens, using tools, playing with building blocks, knitting, sewing and woodwork were being neglected. Yet they helped develop vital skills such as understanding dimension, volume and density.

Last month an Ofsted report said millions of teenagers were finishing compulsory education with a weak grasp of maths because half of the country's schools fail to teach the subject as well as they could. Inspectors said teachers were increasingly drilling pupils to pass exams instead of encouraging them to understand crucial concepts.

Britain nosedives in education league tables (December 2007)

A host of respected international studies have contradicted the official message from the Government that educational standards and attainments are continually rising. Critics say that year-on-year improvements in school-based examinations including SATs tests, GCSEs and A-levels may be because of "dumbing down" as tests become easier to pass. The Government has denied the claims.

A major report from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) published this month is just the latest study confirming the same findings. This study produced new rankings comparing reading, mathematics and science standards in 57 nations - accounting for 90 per cent of the world's economy.  It shows that British pupils have a poorer grasp of literacy and numeracy than most other children across the developed world. It reveals that in the past six years, the United Kingdom has fallen from eighth to 24th place in the international league table for maths, with British 15-year olds said to be "below average" in comparison with their peers elsewhere.

And the news is just as bad on reading standards, where the UK has plummeted from seventh to 17th place. In science, there has been an equally disturbing fall, from fourth to 14th place since 2001.

It comes just a week after the UK sank in another international league table comparing the reading standards of primary school children. The performance tables - part of the OECD's Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) - were based on independent tests taken by 400,000 secondary school pupils worldwide.

In reading and maths tests administered in 2000, the UK was ranked above average compared to other nations, but in today's table they tumbled into the OECD's second division. In reading, the UK has now been overtaken by countries including Poland, Sweden, the Netherlands and Japan. This year, South Korea came top followed by Finland and Hong Kong. In maths, the UK actually scored below the international average for the first time, as it was overtaken by a number of other nations including Slovenia, Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark and Austria. Taiwan was the top-ranked country followed by Finland and Hong Kong.

In a further conclusion, the report said the advantage of being educated at an independent school was greater in the UK than in almost any other country.

Four in 10 pupils 'failing basics' (August 2007)

Results published by the Government show that fewer 14-year-olds reached a decent standard in maths tests this summer compared to last year. Standards increased slightly in English but were no better than those achieved in 2005.

Forty per cent of pupils failed to achieve the required levels in the three Rs combined - despite millions being spent on secondary school reforms. It also emerged that the Government missed its targets for the number of pupils in England passing Key Stage 3 national in maths, English and science.

There was also a claim that English tests were now easier to pass than they were in the mid-90s. The Bow Group said pupils had to score between 41 and 62 in tests to reach the required level in English in 1995 but this year pupils had to achieve only between 30 and 52. Chris Skidmore, the Bow Group chairman, said: "Pupils are reaching the accepted level in English with far fewer marks. This must seriously call into question the Government's claim that standards are rising."

White working-class boys are the worst performers in school (June 2007)

White boys are being turned into an unemployable underclass - as they fall behind children from other racial groups at school, new research shows. Almost half of all children leaving school without any good GCSEs are white British males, according to figures published today. They outnumber white girls by two to one and have vastly inferior reading and writing skills at the age of 11.

The Joseph Rowntree Foundation says that failure to improve literacy at primary school is fuelling an "anti-education culture" among boys, turning many towards a life of crime. White British pupils make up more than three quarters of low achievers in English schools and do worse than children from other ethnic groups with similar economic backgrounds, according to the study. 62 per cent of white British boys on free school meals are in the bottom 10 per cent of performers compared with 43 per cent of Afro- Caribbeans - the next lowest ethnic group. The large majority of under-performers are boys. They are said to suffer because their parents fail to talk to them at home and they have a culture in their communities that it is "uncool" to learn.

"A key factor is the 'home learning environment'," the report says. "The amount parents read to their children, the number of books in the home, the degree to which parents support their children in and out of school. "Language development is a further factor: a young child in a professional class home will hear every day more than three times the number of words heard by a child in a home where the parents are of low socio-economic status."

British children: poorer, at greater risk and more insecure. (February, 2007)

Children growing up in the United Kingdom suffer greater deprivation, worse relationships with their parents and are exposed to more risks from alcohol, drugs and unsafe sex than those in any other wealthy country in the world, according to a study from the United Nations.

The UK is bottom of the league of 21 economically advanced countries according to a "report card"' put together by Unicef on the wellbeing of children and adolescents, trailing the United States which comes second to last. The Unicef team assessed the treatment of children in six different areas - material wellbeing; health and safety; educational wellbeing, family and peer relationships, behaviours and risks; and the young people's own perceptions of their wellbeing.

The Netherlands tops the league, followed by Sweden, Denmark, Finland and Spain. The bottom five are Portugal, Austria, Hungary, the US and the UK.

Nine countries, all of them in northern Europe, have brought child poverty down below 10%, the report shows. But it remains at 15% in the three southern European countries - Portugal, Spain and Italy - and in the UK, Ireland and the US. Child poverty is a relative measure that shows how far their standard of living has fallen below the national average.

Some of the most shocking findings concern the relationships children and adolescents have with their family and peers. The UK is bottom of the 21 countries. The report presents a sad picture of relationships with friends, which are so important to children. Not much more than 40% of the UK's 11, 13 and 15-year-olds find their peers "kind and helpful", which is the worst score of all the developed countries.

The UK takes bottom place "by a considerable distance" for the number of young people who smoke, abuse drink and drugs, engage in risky sex and become pregnant at too early an age. For 16 out of 17 OECD countries with the data, between 15% and 28% of young people have had sex by the age of 15. For the UK, the figure is 40%.

On education, the UK comes 17th out of 21 and more than 30% of 15- to 19-year-olds are not in education or training and are not looking beyond low-skilled work.

How Conservertoires Select Students (2003)

Richard Morrison reports, in the May 2003 edition of Gramophone, that England’s music conservatoires are increasingly being pushed towards fudging their standards in order to broaden their social mix, in a musical reminder of the recent accusations that Bristol University has admission procedures that are models of “positive class discrimination”. Curtis Price, the Royal Academy of Music’s principal, says that the idea is absurd: “What sort of kids would you take into a football academy? Those that are the best at football, of course.”

Apparently, all music colleges are now given a target quota of students who must be recruited from “low participation neighbourhoods”. The home postcodes of each new student is scrutinised by the Education Department, and if too many are found to come from more advantaged areas the college loses part of its grant. “We are being hurt because our mission does not correspond with what the government wants,” Price says. “And our mission is excellence.”

Apart from anything else the quota system is arbitrary because different institutions have different target figures that seem to correspond to no logical reality. But then there is the more destructive claim by the powerful Higher Education Funding Council for England that the conservatoires are attracting too few inner-city teenagers because they offer courses in the “wrong” sort of instruments. According to this institution the conservatoires teach too many stuffy violin lessons and too few zappy classes in rock guitar.

Richard Morrison reveals the absurdity of these policies, stating that the real problem is the inadequacy and failure of musical education in state schools. He points out that by the age of 17 or 18 when students are auditioning for college, it is far too late to remedy the glaring defects in the way that music is taught, or more often, not taught, in state schools. It is often too late by the age of 11, and the reality is that if young instrumentalists are to reach the standards demanded by the college they must receive serious tuition by the age of seven or earlier.

It seems entirely likely that the above policies will lead to a decline in standards in music conservatoires, leading to a loss of opportunity for young people rather than the reverse, and a seriously reduced ability to compete in the highly competitive world of international music making.

Britons' ignorance of classical music exposed (December 2005)

More than half of Britons polled do not realise that Elgar was English or that Beethoven was born in Germany, according to a survey for the digital arts and culture channel Artsworld. In a poll of nearly 1,200 people, Artsworld discovered that more than 85% of those surveyed described their knowledge of classical music as "average" or "worse than average". In fact, those describing their knowledge as “average” were discovered to be appallingly ignorant. Nearly two-thirds of the full sample were unable to identify Mozart as composer of The Marriage of Figaro. The poll found that only 46.7% identified Sir Edward Elgar as English, with the remainder plumping for German or Austrian.

As a country we produced such greats as Dickens, Elgar and Constable. Yet our knowledge of the arts is plumbing new depths of ignorance. Britons do not know the basic facts about our history, monarchy, national landmarks, or artistic heritage.

The Prince of Wales has lamented the failure to teach the classics of English literature in schools. Now, it appears, in a country boasting concert halls in every major city and countless music festivals, most Britons are also shockingly ignorant about classical music.

"It is all to do with this extraordinary forcefield of inverted snobbery in this country," said Peter York, the social commentator. "On the one hand you have the attitude that high culture is not for the likes of us. On the other hand, you had for a long time this philistine attitude among the upper classes that it was better to go out and kill an animal or get drunk than listen to classical music. This set in motion the attitude that an intensive interest in the arts was probably a little suspect."

The latest example of Britons' ignorance of the arts is revealed in a survey in which most admit they did not know that Sir Edward Elgar was English. Respondents wondered, instead, if he was German or Austrian. Few were aware that Mozart composed The Marriage of Figaro or that Beethoven's first name was Ludwig. Nearly 90 per cent had been to an opera or classical music concert only once in their lives.

"It all goes back to the fact that music is neglected in secondary schools. Pupils lack the basic grounding in classical music," said Geoffrey Norris, chief music critic of The Daily Telegraph. "You only have to watch something like The Weakest Link, and wait for a question to come up on classical music. They always get it wrong. It is terribly sad. When I went to school, which was a million years ago now, we had music lessons, music appreciation and we went to concerts because it was encouraged as part of the curriculum. For a long time music was completely neglected and a whole generation has grown up without a basic knowledge of the classical repertoire."

Guardian Culture Survey 2000

Results

Do these results matter?

18 to 24: the dumber generation

TV Standards (2005)

According to a recent survey more than half of the British public believe standards of taste and decency on television are getting worse.

There has been a significant increase in the number of people who regard television as their main source of world news: 79% in 2002, compared with 66% in 2001. By contrast, 9% of respondents named newspapers, down from 16% in 2001.
Concerns about television standards in general, however, remain high – on a level with those observed in 2001, with 47% of respondents thinking standards had got worse (compared with 28% in 2000).
A new cause for concern among respondents was the perception of intrusion into people’s lives: 61% thought there was too much, making it a greater concern than too much sexual content (44%), swearing (56%) or violence (58%).
Viewers continue to be concerned about quality and standards in general on television, with 47% of respondents thinking that programmes had got worse.
Eighty per cent of the parents believed that soaps did not promote positive images of the family, highlighting too many scenes of sex and violence, a high level of infidelity, alcohol abuse and an overall feeling of negativity as areas of concern.
British, Australian or American child will be exposed to 20,000-40,000 ads a year; American children spend 60 per cent more time in front of the TV screen each year than they do at school.
Just under a fifth of adults said that they had been personally offended by advertising they had seen in the past 12 months.
 

Music Plus (2003)

For the last 10 years Aylestone High School, Hereford, has run a “Music Plus” course, selecting 10% of pupils by aptitude. Any child in the county who has the aptitude and is prepared to make the extra committment could benefit from the course. However, the Lea of Herefordshire has decided that selection by aptitude is against their policy of across-the-board education and the course is now only open to those in the catchment areas of the school. This policy is clearly restricting opportunities for the most gifted and able, and is likely to lead to a deterioration in the quality of the course since the needs of the less able will limit the potential for meeting the needs of those who have most aptitude and potential. A common enough story in education?

 

View From the States: Cultural knowledge down over 5 decades (The Washington Times, December 20th 2002)

College seniors of 2002 are barely more knowledgeable in culture and history than high school graduates of the 1950s, and they rank far below their counterparts of the same decade, according to a new survey released by the National Association of Scholars.

The average of correct responses for today's college seniors on a series of questions assessing "general cultural knowledge" was 53.5 percent, compared with 54.5 percent of high school graduates and 77 percent for college graduates in 1955, the poll showed.

"The average amount of knowledge that current college seniors had was just about the same as the amount of knowledge high school graduates had in 1955," said Stephen Balch, the association's president. "The results are hardly reassuring."

Mr. Balch attributed the results to a decreased emphasis on general knowledge in high school, which places the burden on colleges and universities. He also said that colleges are placing less emphasis on liberal arts education in favor of more specialized education geared toward specific career goals.

"These results just show us that we have done an awful lot of dumbing down of the curriculum, both at the high school and college levels," he said. "What we need to do is to have high schools and colleges reinvigorate general education. The education scene has been too much about having the students feel good about themselves, and that has been too often at the real expense of teaching good content."

Others argue the problem is with the teachers and professors.

Winfield Myers, an education analyst with the Democracy Project, an educational-assessment and outreach organization in Wilmington, Del., said colleges of education churn out schoolteachers who are "too often trained in politicized methodologies" rather than educated in the liberal arts and sciences. As a result, many students today enter college possessing less knowledge about key subject areas than did their 1950s peers, he said.

"With such role models, it's not surprising that college seniors are no more interested in the best works of music, art or literature than were high schoolers in the 1940s and '50s," Mr. Myers said.

The questions asked in April were almost identical to the ones asked in 1955 by the Gallup Organization, with a few questions slightly modified to reflect contemporary times. The results of the survey can be found at www.nas.org.

Mr. Balch said the survey was done primarily to see whether the extra expenditures on higher education has led to a commensurate increase in knowledge.

Between 1947 and 1995, the number of high school graduates entering college rose from 2.3 million to 14.2 million. Spending on campuses and faculties expanded even faster, with overall public and private outlays for higher education going from $12.6 billion in 1947-48 to $190 billion in 1995-96, according to the Digest of Education Statistics.

"America has poured enormous amounts of tax dollars into expanding access to higher learning," Mr. Balch said. "Students spend, and pay for, many more years in the classroom than was formerly the case. Our evidence suggests that this time and treasure may not have substantially raised student cultural knowledge above the high school levels of a half-century ago."

 

More From the States (2004)

Information from Fat, Dumb and Ugly, Simon and Schuster 2004:

Percentage of Americans who believe that the theory of human evolution is "probably" or "definitely" not true: 47
Average number of words in the written vocabulary of a six- to 14-year-old American child in 1945: 25,000
Average number of words in the written vocabulary of a six- to 14-year-old American child today: 10,000
Percentage of American adults who understand that the earth orbits the sun yearly: 48
Percentage of Americans in favour of censoring news reports about antiwar protests: 40
Time spent by an average American watching television commercials during his lifetime: one year
 

Yet More From the States (July 2004)

A recent US report, from the National Endowment for the Arts, concludes that “literary reading” - defined as the reading of novels, short stories, poetry or plays - is in “dramatic decline”, being enjoyed by less than half the population. That represents a 10% fall since 1982. Even before 1982 there had been a progressive decline over the previous 30 years. Reading is declining among all groups of all ages and the rate of decline has accelerated especially among the young. Over the past 20 years the proportion of Americans aged 18-34 who read literature has fallen by 28%.

Among the study's key findings, extrapolated from 2002 census data, is that the "percentage of adult Americans reading literature has dropped dramatically over the past 20 years," from 56.9 percent in 1982 to 46.7 percent in 2002. Similar findings contribute to what poet, essayist, and NEA Chairman Dana Gioia describes in a thoughtful preface as a "bleak assessment of the decline of reading's role in the nation's culture."

The number of American adults who read any book, as opposed to literature alone, has declined by seven per cent. Literary reading -- the reading of fiction, poetry, or plays -- fell off among all specified ethnic groups, at all educational levels, among all age groups, and among both women and men. The "steepest decline in literary reading is in the youngest age groups": for example, from 59.8 percent in 1982's 18-to-24 group to 42.8 percent in 2002. And the report warns that the decline in literary reading, "which correlates with increased participation in a variety of electronic media," also "foreshadows an erosion in cultural and civic participation" because literary readers participate more actively than nonreaders in volunteer and charity work, and more frequently patronise performing-arts events, sports events, and museums.

Resonant quotes from the study include: "Literature reading is fading as a meaningful activity"; "an imminent cultural crisis"; "a cultural legacy is disappearing"; "the declining importance of literature to our populace"; "a culture at risk."; “at this rate, literary reading as a leisure activity will virtually disappear in a half a century."

The study suggests that the higher the education level, the higher the reading rate of individuals. Those with a college degree are about 75% more likely to read literature than the rest of the public. Given the greater - and rising- level of participation in higher education in the US, one would expect an increase in the rate of book reading. However, this is not the case. This is because there has been a decline in reading among university graduates during the past two decades of 15.4%.

Surveys have shown similar trends in the UK. It is a reasonable hypothesis that a large proportion of this decline is due to the death of the older population and its replacement by an increasingly un-literate young. It is well known in University circles that today’s students are reading far less than was the case 30, 20, or even 10 years ago and they are therefore in possession of a less substantial body of cultural knowledge. Students often expect to be “spoon-fed” with papers or excerpts from books and never develop the habit of reading complete works in the way the author intended. Reading the odd chapter or a sequence of pages throughout a university career does not constitute a rounded education or necessarily develop the skills to enjoy, appreciate, or follow a complex, structured debate that needs to be developed over the course of a complete volume.

Britain the most violent country in western Europe (October 2003).

Britain has the worst record in western Europe for killings, violence and burglary and its citizens face one of the highest risks in the industrialised world of becoming victims of crime, a study has shown.

Offences of violence in the UK have been running at three times the level of the next worst country in western Europe, and burglaries at nearly twice the rate.

Britain has the highest level of homicides in western Europe and the totals for robberies and thefts of motor vehicles have also been close to the highest in the European Union, outstripped only by France, the Home Office figures show. The research has been compiled by International Comparisons of Criminal Justice Statistics 2001, with data collected by the Home Office and the Council of Europe.

The "victimisation risk" - showing the risk of suffering a crime - in England and Wales is higher for overall crime than anywhere else in Europe, and higher than in America. The same is true of falling victim to "contact" - violent - crime.

Britain had 1,050 homicides in 2001, three ahead of France, the next worst in western Europe.

In 2001, UK police recorded nearly 870,000 violent crimes, a figure hugely above the next highest total - 279,000 in France. Germany recorded 188,000 violent offences.

There were around 470,000 domestic burglary offences in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. Spain recorded 247,000 offences, France 210,000 and Germany 133,000.

The figures for robbery, which surged in Britain around the turn of the Millennium, showed about 127,000 offences in 2001.

GCSE pupils who don't know the alphabet. June 2005.

A growing number of students leaving British high schools are so poor in English and mathematics they cannot write a letter nor do simple sums, says a report. The report by the Skills in the City for the Corporation of London says these students include those who score high in their General Certificate of Secondary Education examination.

Pupils who score top GCSE grades are often still so poor at English and maths that they need to be tested again by potential employers, it has emerged.
Growing numbers of school-leavers haven't mastered basics such as writing a letter or calculating simple sums, despite good exam results. It means that employers often have to set their own tests at job interviews, or offer extra literacy and numeracy training. Some are even testing applicants on the alphabet just to be sure they can hold down a job which involves a simple task such as filing.

The findings, based on a survey of 32 employers, will intensify concerns over the alleged 'dumbing down' of GCSE standards.

Some employers, who favour only applicants with five good passes at GCSE, voiced similar fears to researchers. The report states: "Some recruitment consultancies, working on the employers' behalf, test for literacy and numeracy - or offer further training in these areas - even where candidates hold the relevant GCSEs.

A-levels are getting easier (August 2005)

The Government was embroiled in a row over A-level standards yesterday as a report claimed that some candidates getting an A-grade this week would only have been awarded a C or D in 1988. The report by Reform looks at attempts by academics to determine whether the A-level standard has been maintained over the years. It concludes that evidence clearly suggests that the exam has become easier, even when the content has remained similar.

It compares the A-level pass rate, which has gone up from 81 per cent in l993 to 96 per cent last year, with that of the International Baccalaureate, which has hovered between 81 and 84 per cent.

"Students' abilities have improved but by far less than that implied by the official statistics," the report concludes. It traces the start of the decline in standards to 1988 when the Department for Education took over responsibility for regulating exams. "In addition, since the early 1990s the department has taken responsibility for increasing the number of students passing public examinations. The result is a clear conflict of interest and a structure in which the department has a clear incentive to allow standards to fall," it says.

Among the studies it cites are monitoring reports from the Curriculum Evaluation and Management Centre of Durham University, which found that pupils of the same ability achieved between one and a half and three grades higher in 2004 than they would have done in l988. "A student achieving a grade E in mathematics in l988 would achieve a grade B now," said the Reform study.

Head teachers insisted yesterday that their pupils were reaching as high a standard as in previous years but admitted that the Government's changes to the exam format - which includes the opportunity to resit papers - had made it easier to do well.

The furore over the results, which will be announced on Thursday, took the exam boards by surprise. They had hoped to head off any criticism of the expected increase in pass rates and A- grades by delaying publication of the statistics until after students had collected their results. Sources confirmed over the weekend, however, that the results will show a 16th successive increase in the proportion of subject entries awarded an A-grade. It is expected to hit 23 per cent, or nearly one in four. The pass rate is also predicted to show an increase on last year's 96 per cent.

A third of new nurses fail simple English and maths test (August 2006)

A third of nurses expecting to graduate next month have failed a basic English and maths test set by a hospital as part of a new selection process. As nurses must be able to calculate drug doses and keep accurate notes, this high failure rate has alarmed the hospital and the Nursing and Midwifery Council.

The questions involve simple arithmetic and everyday comprehension. They will be given to all nurses, physiotherapists, radiographers and clerical and other workers seeking jobs with the East Kent NHS Hospitals Trust, in Canterbury.

Thirteen of 40 nurses completing training at Canterbury Christ Church University -the first to take the 20-minute test - failed to achieve the 60 per cent pass rate. One question is: if a night shift starts at 8pm, is it the same as 18.00, 19.00, 20.00 or 21.00 hours? Another asks: how many minutes are there in half an hour?

The nurses are understood to be products of the British schools system. Traditionally the hospital trust has drawn nurses from the university and most have been training on the wards. The Nursing and Midwifery Council, which runs the nursing register, has become worried about falling standards in education. It announced yesterday that it had appointed HLSP, an independent organisation, to run a new system to monitor educational standards at nursing schools. The monitoring will start in the new academic year in October to "support public safety".

Sarah Thewlis, the chief executive and registrar of the Nursing and Midwifery Council, said: "It is essential that all nurses and midwives are able to demonstrate that they have basic English and numeracy skills. "The council has received anecdotal evidence from colleges and universities suggesting that there is a worrying number of nursing students who lack such basic skills.”

Schools system letting us down, says CBI (August 2006)

A report by the Confederation of British Industry claims that firms are having to recruit from abroad because of the poor literacy and numeracy skills of school leavers and the shortage of graduates with a solid training in maths, science and engineering.

But while employers complain of having to spend money on remedial lessons, examiners say the year on year rise in A-level and GCSE pass rates and the proportion gaining the top grades reflect higher achievement and not a lowering of standards. But the CBI, which launches a campaign this month highlighting the shortage of science graduates, says rising pass rates mask skill shortages which are threatening the economy. Alan Wood, the chief executive of Siemens, said: "We have embarrassingly large numbers of people coming out of secondary education who can't even read or write properly."

Employers, say the CBI, complain of having to undertake the "remedial education" of their recruits, of having to teach science graduates basic laboratory skills, and confess to being forced to look abroad for applicants with qualifications that mean something.

New science A-levels (April 2007)

New science A-levels are being "dumbed down" to such an extent that some courses will demand no prior knowledge of the subject. Draft syllabuses for chemistry and biology published by one exam board state that the first part of the qualification, the AS-level, can be tackled without the candidate having studied the subject before. The changes, part of a general redesign of A-levels to reduce the number of external examinations per subject from six to four, have been condemned by science teachers.

David Perks, a science teacher for 20 years and head of physics at Graveney School, Tooting, south London, said that the redesign was further evidence of the "dumbing down" of science to create "critically aware" consumers, rather than future scientists. "The Qualifications and Curriculum Authority (QCA) is looking for ways to make science more 'relevant' because it is told that kids are not interested and they find knowledge too hard. So, steadily but surely, science teaching is becoming about current controversies - covering science at the level of media analysis. So, for instance, there is hardly any maths in physics. You are being asked to teach about forces by applying it to car safety."

The chemistry flops: Pupils baffled by O-level exams from the Sixties (July 2008)

Chemistry pupils have flunked O-level questions from 50 years ago, deepening fears that the subject is being dumbed down. The teenagers were unable to answer questions from the 1960s and 1970s set by the Royal Society of Chemistry. The average mark for the 1960s questions was just 16 per cent.

The society warned that pupils are no longer tested in rigourous problem-solving and are instead guided to the right answers. It said that modern exams use questions that require only one or two lines of working. Even bright pupils were baffled by many of the old questions, said the RSC chief executive, Richard Pike. He added: 'There is no doubt that the clever pupils are as sharp as they ever were, but most are being stifled by an educational system that does not encourage more detailed problem-solving and rigorous thinking.'

Two thousand 16-year-olds from 450 schools entered the online competition, which involved sitting a two-hour paper made up of chemistry O-levels and GCSEs from the past five decades.

Eight questions were selected from each of the 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s and 2000s and mixed up so pupils could not identify the source decade. Questions from the first three decades came from O level papers and for the latter two from GCSE papers  -  and most required numerical calculations. Overall, the students scored just 25 per cent. But while the average mark for questions from 2000 onwards was 35 per cent, for the 1960s it was just 16 per cent. Pupils did better as the decades rolled on, with a big leap between the 1980s and 1990s, when GCSEs replaced O-levels. The average mark on the 1980s questions was 22 per cent  -  against 35 per cent for the 1990s and 2000s.

One pupil wrote about a ' radioactive leek' while another said a handful of baking soda weighs almost 10,000 times the weight of Earth.

About a quarter of pupils incorrectly suggested that nuclear power was a sustainable fuel. Last year in GCSE chemistry, 46.9 per cent of candidates achieved an A or A* and 90.9 per cent achieved at least a C.

Mr Pike said the RSC's test results would be analysed and a report presented to the education and science communities. A RSC spokesman said the apparent lack of problem-solving skills among pupils is 'a major issue for universities and employers', who needed students with these abilities so they could stay internationally competitive.

The truth about GCSE languages (August 2007) GCSEs are 'dumbed down' says examiner

A languages examiner broke ranks last night to reveal how GCSEs are being "dumbed down" as results are expected to show fewer than half of state school pupils are now studying a foreign language.

The teacher - with more than 30 years' experience - told how some tests in French were often being reduced to little more than an exercise in memorising four words. In other sections, students regurgitate the same essay using "writing frames" created by their teacher - inserting key words such as a holiday destination to personalise their work.

“Let me give you an example from the 2007 speaking test I have just marked. The test is split into three sections - a role play, a presentation by the student and series of questions asked by the teacher/examiner. The first role play - for the foundation level - is often a very simple scenario, in which the examiner plays the part of a shopkeeper and the student a customer. This “test” simply requires the knowledge of four words that every 11-year-old should know, such as “pommes”, “deux”, “limonade” and “combien”. No verbs, no prepositions necessary. Et voilà! You’re on your way to a grade C.

The second “more demanding” role play does contain a few surprise questions. But, “quelle surprise”, they can be answered using a simple phrase. In one such role play from this year’s exam, the teacher plays the part of a hotel receptionist and the pupil a guest. Typical questions include “how long are you staying?” (“pour une semaine” - for a week) and “what time do you expect to arrive? (“à neuf heures” - at nine o’clock). Did someone mention the subjunctive? The third role play, attempted by higher candidates only, used to be a difficult task: a photo to be described in detail with no helpful vocabulary included.

This will horrify anyone who happened to sit the 1959 University of London O-Level French paper. In this exam, they would have been confronted with the following question: “Vous avez trouvé une bague dans la rue. Inventez une histoire intitulée: 'La Bague Perdue’. (“You have found a ring in the street. Make up a story entitled: 'The Lost ring’.”) I doubt if many of today’s A-level candidates could tackle such an essay with confidence”.

Bedtime stories a problem for many parents (July 2007)

One in 10 parents struggle to understand the bedtime stories they read to their children, a survey by adult learning organisation Learndirect has found. Almost a quarter (23%) skip passages they cannot read or invent words to get to the end of a sentence, the poll found. A third of parents also admit to difficulties in helping their children with their maths homework.

The poll of 1,000 parents with children aged five to 10 found that a third of parents had problems helping their children with maths, particularly fractions and percentages. One in five had difficulties with English homework and 12% of parents said they struggled to understand books they read to their children. Learndirect estimates there are 26 million adults who struggle with English or maths.

Gen Y's ego trip (March 2007)

All the effort to boost children's self-esteem may have backfired and produced a generation of college students who are more narcissistic than their Gen X predecessors, according to a new study led by a San Diego State University psychologist. In the study being released this month, researchers warn that a rising ego rush could cause personal and social problems for the Millennial Generation, also called Gen Y. People with an inflated sense of self tend to have less interest in emotionally intimate bonds and can lash out when rejected or insulted. "That makes me very, very worried," said Jean Twenge, a San Diego State associate professor and lead author of the report. "I'm concerned we are heading to a society where people are going to treat each other badly, either on the street or in relationships."

She and four other researchers from the University of Michigan, University of Georgia and University of South Alabama looked at the results of psychological surveys taken by more than 16,000 college students across the country over more than 25 years. The Narcissistic Personality Inventory asks students to react to such statements as: "If I ruled the world, it would be a better place," "I think I am a special person" and "I like to be the center of attention."

The study found that almost two-thirds of recent college students had narcissism scores that were above the average 1982 score. Thirty percent more college students showed elevated narcissism in 2006 than in 1982. Twenge said she and her coauthors are not suggesting that more students today have a pathological narcissistic personality disorder that needs psychiatric treatment. Still, traits of narcissism have increased by moderate but significant amounts, said Twenge, who last year published a book titled "Generation Me: Why Today's Young Americans Are More Confident, Assertive, Entitled — and More Miserable Than Ever Before."

Some of the increase in narcissistic attitudes was probably caused by the self-esteem programs that many elementary schools adopted 20 years ago, the study suggests. It notes that nursery schools began to have children sing songs that proclaim: "I am special, I am special. Look at me." Those youngsters are now adolescents obsessed with websites, such as MySpace and YouTube, that "permit self-promotion far beyond that allowed by traditional media," the report says. Other trends in American culture, including permissive parenting, increased materialism and the fascination with celebrities and reality TV shows, may also heighten self-regard, said study coauthor W. Keith Campbell, psychology professor at the University of Georgia. "It's part of a whole cultural system," he said.

The researchers seek to counter theories that current college students are more civic-minded and involved in volunteer activities than their predecessors. Because many high schools require community work, increases in volunteering "may not indicate a return to civic orientation but may instead be the means toward the more self-focused goal of educational attainment," the report says. Students and teachers said they often see examples of inflated egos on campus: students who converse in the computer centre while others are trying to concentrate, preen in front of the reflecting windows of the economics building or expect good grades simply for showing up at class.

Marc Flacks, an assistant professor of sociology summed up the attitudes he often encounters in students, who expect a tangible payoff from their education: "The old model was a collegial one in which students and professors alike sought knowledge for knowledge's sake. The new model is 'I paid my money, give me my grade and degree.' It makes me want to ask [students], ' Do you want fries with that order?'

Current Affairs (The Guardian, Monday November 3, 2003)

Britain was condemned yesterday for its obsession with television and celebrity culture, and its ignorance of current affairs. The attack came from Whitaker's Almanack, after a survey for the 136-year-old reference book found 47% of respondents could not name the deputy prime minister. This ignorance rose to 73% among the 16-to-24 age group.

The book's editor in chief, Lauren Simpson, was alarmed by the finding that eight out of 10 people were "worried and deeply embarrassed" at their lack of knowledge in current affairs and politics. "They are quite right to feel this," Ms Simpson said. "We are a nation obsessed with celebrity culture. Although we all need to escape from real life once in a while, I would like to see more people putting down their celebrity gossip magazines... to keep abreast of current affairs and the world around us."

The survey follows others by Whitaker's, a standard reference book in Whitehall, libraries, and among Trivial Pursuits players.

Last year, a survey during the build-up to the Iraq war found only a quarter of people could correctly identify Saddam Hussein, and 16% Vladimir Putin. The poll concluded that the average Briton found politicians much less absorbing than the Big Brother champion Kate Lawler, or Phil Mitchell from EastEnders. Gordon Brown was among the highest-scoring political performers, with recognition by 24%. By contrast 30% could name at least one Big Brother winner from the last three series. The reference book said at the time: "We can only conclude from this report that Britain is dumbing down."

Earlier Encyclopaedia Britannica, the world's most respected reference work, dismissed British youth as "historical philistines" after a survey found most unaware of what happened on D-Day, how long Queen Victoria reigned, or who invented television. Well over a third failed the most famous trick question in popular English history: how many wives did Henry VIII have?

In yesterday's Whitaker's research, the UN secretary general, Kofi Annan, fared better than John Prescott (the deputy prime minister) in achieving a 58% recognition rate. But 8% mistook Mr Annan for an Iraqi general or the president of South Africa, while 6% thought he was the head of US defence or chief of the EU. About 5% misidentified him as one of the following: the Liberal Democrat shadow deputy prime minister, an athlete, a novelist, a musician, or the new editor of the Daily Telegraph.

 

The Decline of A-levels.

2003: The pass rate for A-levels is creeping closer to the 100% mark, increasing by 1.1 percentage points to 95.4% this year. The A-Level pass rate has risen for the 18th consecutive year, fuelling the annual 'grade inflation' rows that occur each year. The proportion of entries getting grade As is up 0.9 percentage points from 20.7% to 21.6%. In 1983, the figure was 7%. The pass rate in 1980 was 68%.

At the same time, the proportion of young people entering higher education has risen rapidly. In 1979, just over one in ten young people entered higher education. By 1997 this had risen to almost one in three. In numerical terms, since 1980 undergraduate student numbers had more than doubled to almost two million. These figures were even higher in 2003 with 44% of young people entering higher education. Many of these young people had a number of grade A passes to their credit. However, a number of Universities were complaining that A-levels no longer allowed them to select for excellence because the standards were too low and they brought in their own, more discriminating, assessments in order to identify those students of high ability and achievement.

By the time 25 per cent of entrant are gaining an A-grade, the exams are failing to discriminate between average, good and excellent candidates. By the time 96 per cent of papers are attracting a pass grade, it smacks of an award for turning up and writing your name on the paper. What are we to do when everyone taking the exams gets straight A’s, as is likely if present trends continue? BBC News.

 

“The truth is that the real academic worth of A-levels has nose-dived. The so-called "gold standard" is at best a pale imitation of what it once was, at worst an elaborate excursion into banality. I have taught them for more than two decades and have been party to the whole sorry slide.

There was a time when A-levels required one to translate from English into Latin; to steer a path through Milton and Dryden as well as Shakespeare; to know thoroughly 100 years of British and European history; to recite Racine and Baudelaire. The higher tier of candidates wrote answers which were characterised by breadth of learning, depth of understanding and a use of formal English so assured as to command instant authority. A-levels were hard currency and everyone knew it.

This was a state of affairs that persisted until the early 1980s. Then, with the onset of recession, it became politically expedient to keep youngsters in full-time education and off the dole queue. However, until about 10 years ago, a serious A-level grade demanded rigorous reading and independence of mind, sharp conceptual clarity and weight of knowledge. Virtually every sixth form had access to a reasonable quota of books, and pupils learned basic skills of reading and noting.

That began to change. I was slow to read the runes, succumbing instead to self-congratulation when, in the mid 1990s, a string of excellent results suggested that my pupils were getting brighter by the year. Finally, the evidence of grade inflation became so gross that it overcame even my complacency.

In 2000 there came a further, seismic, shift. From now on, all A-levels became "modular", with half the papers customarily sat after one year (the AS) and the balance (the A2) at the end of the upper sixth. Pressure for this had arisen, in part, from the politically awkward recognition that "full" A-levels were simply unattainable for some pupils.

Great for grades this may have been. It has only harmed scholarship - sounding in particular the death knell of the essay. It is unverifiable, of course: the architects of the present system have artfully isolated the different "components" which constitute good analytical writing in different papers. The resulting melange is confusing and intellectually banal. Moreover, whatever claims are made by the examining boards, the effect is clear: there is no longer the need (let alone the time) for students to read further than a small assortment of examination crib sheets in order to secure a top grade. Trenchant analysis is a great skill and a real possession - it is grievous to see it discarded with so little protest.

The expansion of higher education has been achieved not so much by a dilution in standards, as by all-out warfare. I have yet to meet a teacher of more than two decades' standing who will not acknowledge (sometimes only after a few consoling drinks) how enfeebled A-levels have become.

Once upon a time, serious sixth form students were knowledgeable and incisive, with a shared experience of hard work. Theirs was a great tradition, and a fine national asset, but we have squandered it almost without a murmur. Today's exams are bland, soothing, undiscriminating pap - an accurate reflection of the squalid compromise between the society we are and how we wish to be seen. To hold out against such a diet takes a teacher of rare determination, or a school in unusually fortunate circumstances”. David Hargreaves. Sunday Telegraph. August 2004.

A survey of 100 academics at Russell Group universities found that 90 of them believed that an A grade at A-level was worth less than it was 10 years ago. Report published August 2004.

 

Children 'watch more than 4 hours of TV a day' Sunday Telegraph. July 25th 2004.

A poll of 2,100 children conducted by the Telegraph has found that half of eight to 14-year-olds watch a minimum of four hours of television a day during term time. Even more time is spent in front of the television at weekends and holidays, with some children more than doubling their daily viewing.

It follows earlier warnings about the amount of television that children watch. Last year, research commissioned by the Early Learning Centre found that a third of children below the age of six watched television for between two and six hours a day. A joint study by the Broadcasting Standards Commission and Independent Television Commission found that a fifth of children aged between four and 15, were still watching television after the 9 pm watershed and that the average child watched television for two hours and 23 minutes a day.

The Telegraph survey has found that children - most of whom regularly watch beyond 9pm - have largely abandoned traditional children's programmes in favour of more adult-orientated fare. The survey also revealed a lack of parental control over television viewing with 54 per cent of children reporting that they regularly watched television without the knowledge of their parents. Such viewing has become possible because of the increasing number of television sets in each household. More than three quarters of all children - 79 per cent - now have a television in their bedroom. As a result, 87 per cent sample and more than 78 per cent of primary school children have watched television beyond 9pm. More than three quarters of the primary school children (76 per cent) who have stayed up late have continued watching beyond 11pm, often into the early hours of the morning. The survey suggests that many parents have given up trying to control what their children watch. More than two thirds of children (68 per cent) say that they are not banned from watching any programme.

 

Skills in maths( Guardian, Friday October 31, 2003)

Half the adults in England are so bad at maths they would fail to score even the lowest grade at GCSE, the most authoritative survey of their skills so far reveals. Published yesterday, the government-backed research says that 15 million workers struggle to grasp basic calculations, and many are also illiterate. Ministers blamed the results on "decades of neglect".

The study forms part of the government's Skills for Life campaign and was commissioned in response to continuing concern over low standards of reading and writing among British adults, who lag behind most of Europe. It found, for example, that nearly seven million men and women cannot work out the totals on a supermarket till receipt, and 1.7 million lack the writing skills to compose a short note or memo at work.

Yesterday's study, described as the "most definitive" so far, involved more than 8,700 adults in England aged 16 to 65, who were given basic tests by the researchers. They included interpreting a bar chart, calculating a percentage price reduction, or picking a phone number from a list provided.

The survey concluded that 1.7 million (5%) of adults have literacy skills below Entry Level 3, the standard expected of 11-year-olds, and 5.2 million (16%) below Level 1 (less than a D-G GCSE). And that 6.8 million (21%) have numeracy skills below Entry Level 3, and 15 million (47%) below Level 1.

 

Why do many children lack basic language skills? (Daily Telegraph, 3rd March 2004)

Ann Jones is used to getting blank stares. As a primary school teacher of 20 years' standing, she has seen the communication skills of her classes deteriorate steadily. "Too many children are starting school lacking basic language skills," she says. "A simple request such as 'Go to the cupboard and get the pencils, please' is met with a blank look. Some of them simply don't know what I am talking about."

Nursery teachers agree with anecdotal evidence that children are less verbally advanced than at any time in recent history. A simple question such as "Would you like apple or orange juice?" leaves many confused and unable to answer.

A recent survey of nursery staff carried out by I Can, a children's charity, revealed that almost all had at least one child in the nursery with communication problems. Ten per cent said they had 10 or more children with difficulties.

They reported that growing numbers of pre-school children could not accomplish simple tasks such as explaining what they were doing, concentrating, speaking clearly and following instructions. They said that children often responded with monosyllabic answers or gestures, rather than appropriate language.

Staff pinpointed several factors for the increase: 92 per cent felt that the lack of adult time spent talking with the children was the key reason and 82 per cent blamed the passive use of television. Two thirds mentioned a trend for parents to talk for their child and others suggested that the use of videos and computers was also to blame. Almost half felt the situation was a matter of extreme concern.

"The hard research evidence isn't there as yet because it hasn't been done," says Gill Edelman, chief executive of I Can. "But there is a growing body of opinion among professionals that there are more children than there used to be with communication difficulties.

Researchers have looked at 750 Ofsted inspections of primary schools, and in 50 per cent of cases inspectors expressed concern that half the children arriving at school lacked basic communication skills. One professional said that, in the old days, you could look around a nursery and highlight the children with difficulties because they were unusual, but nowadays it's the other way round - you highlight the children without difficulties.

Maths Spiral of Decline. June 2005

Maths teaching in schools and universities has entered "a spiral of decline" and the Government has failed to grasp the nature of the crisis, leading mathematicians said. They said the performance of more able pupils had collapsed; the numbers taking A-level maths were falling dramatically; those with top grades were "increasingly innumerate and even ineducable"; the shortage of qualified maths teachers had reached "dangerous" levels; national test results were grossly inflated; and postgraduates with a PhD in maths from a British university were now "largely unemployable" in British universities. The country was "no longer producing sufficient competent mathematicians to supply the bulk of its core needs". The maths community could no longer reproduce itself. "The UK is in danger of becoming totally dependent on imported intellect" they stated.

The report, by mathematicians from Cambridge, King's College London, University College London, Warwick, Manchester, Birmingham and Hull, said that maths had been dumbed down under political pressure to make it easier, more "accessible" and to show continuously improving results. Over the past 15 years the subject had become fragmented - reduced to a collection of simple, one-step routines that had made mathematics unappetising and unchallenging.

Decline of History Education (July 2005)

Specialist schools have enlisted Cambridge historians to develop new examinations because of their exasperation at the "appalling" state of the history curriculum. The Specialist Schools Trust, which represents more than three quarters of England's secondaries, has asked the leading university to review the history courses taught in its schools following concerns that the content is too narrow and repetitive.

The development comes as concerns grow that children are leaving school with little historical knowledge. Ministers have admitted that pupils learn too much about the Nazis and are increasingly ignorant of British history. This "Hitlerisation of history" has robbed young people of any real sense of chronology and left large gaps in their knowledge, according to the Historical Association.

Sir Cyril Taylor, the chairman of the trust and a key government adviser, said there was a dire need to overhaul the teaching of British history to give children, among other things, a sense of Britishness and citizenship. "Many academics are appalled at the way history is taught at the moment," he said. "There are so many options and teachers can repeat the same modules in different lessons, so many pupils never learn anything more than Henry VIII's wives and Nazi Germany."

The tie-up reflects the impatience felt by many teachers and academics who complain that little is being done nationally to address shortcomings in the curriculum. In 2003, Charles Clarke, then education secretary, asked the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority (QCA) to investigate whether pupils were failing to develop a broad sense of history because they spent too much time on detailed study of eras such as the Third Reich and Stalin's Russia.

A-level exam is 'terminal decline' (August 2005)

The A-level examination system is "in terminal decline", a spokesman for independent schools says today, and its destiny is beyond the Government's control. Geoff Lucas, the general secretary of the Headmasters' and Headmistresses' Conference, representing 243 leading independent schools, says that the purpose of A-levels - to regulate entry to the most academically selective universities - has been subverted. His words reflect the widespread despair of heads at the majority of leading schools.

Writing in The Daily Telegraph, he condemns Tony Blair and Ruth Kelly, the Education Secretary, for failing to tackle the causes of the "malaise": rampant grade inflation and a surfeit of A grades, making it impossible for the best universities to identify the strongest applicants. Mr Lucas hints that academically selective schools which have not already abandoned A-levels in favour of the International Baccalaureate, as more than 70 have done, may be prepared to strike out on their own by devising a substitute exam that meets their needs and those of leading universities.

Anthony Seldon, the headmaster of Brighton College commented, "It is not just that A-level no longer discriminates between candidates; it no longer prepares them properly in key subjects because it has become such a mechanical exam. It breaks up subjects into bite-sized pieces, does not test what really matters and allows candidates to retake modules until they achieve the desired result.”

Many Independent School Heads think that the last straw was the Government's rejection this year of Sir Mike Tomlinson's proposals for reforming GCSE and A-level while simultaneously introducing a high-quality vocational alternative. In what Mr Lucas sees as an unprecedented rebellion at the top, the Government's position was condemned both by Ken Boston, the head of the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority, and David Bell, the head of Ofsted.

Almost Half Of UK Workforce Fails Basic Reading, Maths (January 2006)

Up to 16 million adults - nearly half the workforce - are holding down jobs despite having the reading and writing skills expected of children leaving primary school, a new report reveals today.

MPs on the Commons Public Accounts Committee claim that a major government scheme costing billions of pounds has done little to improve the quality of adult literacy and numeracy teaching. The committee examined progress made improving the literacy, language and numeracy skills of adults in England, expanding learning provision and improving its quality, and targeting adults who need to improve their skills. It looked in depth at the effectiveness of Skills for Life, which was launched in 2001 with a target to improve the skills of 2.25 million adults by 2010. There are about 12 million people in employment with literacy skills and 16 million with numeracy skills at level 1 or below - equivalent to the the levels of 11-year olds and younger, the committee found. The number of people underskilled in both aspects is unknown. The workforce comprises 30 million people, working full-time and part-time. To achieve level 1 in literacy a youngster would be expected to "understand straightforward texts of varying length on a variety of topics accurately and independently" and "obtain information of varying length and detail from different sources", according to the DfES.

Anger over 'dumbing down' of Shakespeare in schools (June 2006)

Thousands of teenagers across the country are studying 'dumbed down' Shakespeare plays at school, it was revealed yesterday. They are using texts and GCSE revision guides which reduce the great works of literature to a series of simplistic cartoons and jokes.

Critics yesterday condemned the 'puerile' attempts to make Shakespeare more accessible and claimed it made a mockery of attempts to drive up standards in the country's schools. They believe that the move to simplify everything to the lowest possible denominator explains growing numbers of howlers in students' exam papers. Examiners recently complained that teenagers are approaching Shakespeare's plays as if they are TV soap operas, peppering their essays with conversational cliches and references to popular culture.

Coordination Group Publications, which describes itself as one of the country's most popular educational publishers, produces a series of complete plays of Shakespeare and revision guides. Last year, more than 126,000 copies were sold direct to schools and on the high street. But critics have rounded on the content of the books which are primarily aimed at pupils studying for GCSEs and also Key Stage Three national curriculum tests aged 14.

The first page of the complete play of Romeo and Juliet states that 'reading Shakespeare can be a real headache'. It goes on to say that there is 'the odd bit of ever-so-nearly entertaining humour in the notes and pictures to help you breeze through the toughest of scenes'. A cartoon strip summarises the story of the star-crossed lovers for students who may struggle with the whole play.

Shakespeare poetically describes the build up to the kiss between Romeo and Juliet in Act One, Scene Five. Romeo then kisses Juliet and declares: 'Thus from my lips, by thine, my sin is purg'd.' The climatic scene is reduce to the following in the CGP book: Juliet: What are you thinking about?

Romeo: Oh, just moons and spoon in June.

Juliet: Wow. Give us a snog then.

Similarly, in Act Three, Scene Five, when Juliet wakes up with Romeo, she famously says: 'Wilt thou be gone? It is not yet near day. It was the nightingale, and not the lark That pierc'd the fearful hollow of thine ear. Nightly she sings on yond pomegranate tree. Believe me, love, it was the nightingale.' This is translated into: 'Well that was nice. You'd best be off now.'

The play is then produced in full with 'plain English' notes alongside. In Act Two, Scene Four, when Juliet's nurse comments on the departure of Mercutio and Benvolio, she actually says: 'I pray you, sir, what saucy merchant was this, that was so full of his ropery?' The translation becomes: 'Bye. Romeo, who was that smart alec with the dodgy jokes?'

The play Macbeth receives a similar fate and is promoted with a series of 'tragic comics'. In the text guide accompanying the play, Macbeth struggles with his conscience as he plots the murder of King Duncan with his wife in Act One, Scene Seven. Macbeth declares: 'I'm not going to do it' and only changes his mind after Lady Macbeth calls him a 'cowardly custard'. When he sees the dagger in Act Two, Scene One, he says: 'Ooh! Would you look at that.' He goes on to stab the King, shouting: 'Eat dagger old man!' Shakespeare actually wrote: 'Is this a dagger, which I see before me, The handle toward my hand?' After slaying Duncan, he asks Lady Macbeth: 'I have done the deed. Didst thou not hear a noise?'

Professor Alan Smithers, director of the Centre for Education and Employment Research at Buckingham University, yesterday attacked the texts as 'depressing'. He said: 'If examiners detect the signs of teachers or their students having used these texts, I hope they will mark them down. 'The point of studying Shakespeare is to engage with his thought and poetry and to enhance the students' lives. 'This seems to be circumventing that engagement. It's frightening really that it's thought necessary to use this sort of thing at GCSE level.'

Nick Seaton, of the Campaign of the Real Education, added: 'I think most parents and sensible teachers will be horrified. 'This is absolutely an attempt to reduce Shakespeare to the dumbest level and can only damage pupils' future prospects. It's a puerile attempt to dumb down.'

Simon Cook, spokesman for CGP, yesterday denied 'dumbing down', claiming they were simply trying to capture children's interest. He said: 'We believe that when people are encouraging students to look at Shakespeare at school it's very important to make it accessible. We are stopping people being afraid of it.' The company, which was founded in 1996 as a schools-only revision publisher, has an annual turnover of over £15million. It initially only sold to schools but has since expanded to the high street as well. It also produces revision guides for Key Stage One, Two and Three, across a range of GCSE subjects and some A-levels.

Britain Has Europe’s Worse Teenagers (October 2006)

Parents are to blame for teenage delinquency in Britain by leaving children to their own devices, suggests a new report which depicts British teenagers as the worst behaved in Europe. The Institute for Public Policy Research says that parents do not eat with their children, or talk to them enough, and tend to leave them to learn about life from other teenagers. Nick Pearce, the institute's director, said: "Adult role models are vital for children to learn about the norms of behaviour and values in our society, but in Britain children spend less time with their parents than is the case in culturally similar countries."

According to the report, which is to be published in full on Monday and is based on a series of studies conducted in recent years, the UK was at, or close to, the top on a number of indicators of bad behaviour for teenagers. These included drugs, drink, violence and promiscuity. Fifteen-year-olds were drunk more often, involved in more fights and more likely to have had sex, compared with children in Germany, France and Italy. One study suggested that in 2003, 38 per cent of 15-year-olds in Britain had tried cannabis, as opposed to just seven per cent in Sweden.

The IPPR said British adolescents could be defined by how they spent their spare time. Whereas 45 per cent of 15-year-old boys in England and 59 per cent in Scotland spent most evenings with friends, in France that figure was just 17 per cent. In Italy 93 per cent of teenagers ate with their families, compared with 64 per cent in the UK. Mr Pearce said the figures pointed to "increasing disconnection" between children and adults, with youngsters learning how to behave from each other, which damages their "life chances."