Entitlement

All students are entitled to syllabus outcomes. All students are capable of achieving syllabus outcomes. Some students require special consideration but all students are entitled to have access to syllabus outcomes, because all students are entitled to achieve success in learning. Access means whatever it takes in the way of explicit teaching to give students the knowledge, skills and attitudes that will enable them to achieve all syllabus outcomes.

This emphasis on entitlement is a new emphasis. Historically, it has no precedent.

Prior to the 20th century, schooling and pedagogy was based on social class and perpetuated social divisions. Secondary schooling was not even available to anyone other than upper classes.

In the early 20th century, progressive reforms to education made secondary education more widely available, but there was no concept of entitlement. Social stratification was still perpetuated. In NSW in 1911 there were different types of schools for different types of students. The curricula and expected outcomes were all different. Students sat for an exam at the end of Year 6, which determined which type of student you were and therefore which type of school you went to.

If you were a high performer academically you went to a grammar school, and from there to university and a position of social power. The less academically successful went to a vocational school: a domestic school if you were a girl, and either a commercial or a technical school if you were a boy.

The least academically successful simply did not go to high school, which was OK in 1911 because you could go off and die in the trenches of some war, or learn a useful trade and pursue it for the rest of your life.

There was no disagreement about this and no critique. People generally believed in the concept of a station in life and were happy and even reassured that divisions in education reflected this.

This started to change because of the work of American educational theorists such as John Dewey, who pioneered the concept of natural ability , which, for its day, was progressive. Educators who agreed with Dewey favoured IQ testing, believing that students had varied levels of intelligence (or "mental constitution") which should be matched to varied curricula. This was meant to reflect the diversity found in nature and was, in their terms, therefore more scientific. Intelligence testing throughout the 1930s to 1950s was regarded as the application of scientific knowledge to education. This sort of education was well regarded as a branch of applied psychology.

Again, educational inequality was accepted without critique, but for different reasons, throughout the 1930s to the 1960s.

Cognitive development
Educators like Piaget continued the scientific approach and pioneered the related concept of a natural process of cognitive development, which facilitated progressive education of the 1960s and 1970s and was therefore suited to the preference at that time for school-based curriculum development.

In Piaget's thinking, the curriculum should be matched to typical phases of cognitive development, which was also determined by nature. There was no point in addressing skills or concepts for which students were not ready. Early childhood education appears to provide ample evidence for this sort of thing, eg babies typically crawl before they walk. This is extrapolated into the design of curricula, eg students typically deal with concrete concepts before abstract. The consequence of this idea was that curricula should be designed not centrally but by schools, ie as close as possible to the students to whom they are to be delivered, because the design of curricula was supposed to correspond to those students stage of cognitive development.

Piaget's thinking is still found implicitly in many of our pedagogical practices. However, it is a model that has been subject to powerful critiques over the past 30 years. One example: early childhood educators influenced by Piaget have the concept of conservation of numbers and spaces, eg very young children believe that if you squeeze a plastic cup and the liquid rises to the top, then there is more liquid, or if you scatter some objects more widely then there are more objects. At some stage in their development, children realise that those numbers or spaces are conserved through other changes.

This, however, has been subject to research that brings the concept into question. One researcher tested groups of young children on conservation of number. As expected, a high percentage of children under the age of three thought that there were more objects if the researcher scattered them more widely. However, when the researcher approached the task differently, with children of the same age group, the results were different. That is, different pedagogy apparently changed the very nature of cognitive development.

What the researcher did was to make a game out of scattering the objects. She had a teddy bear who came along and scattered the objects ( naughty teddy ), then when she asked the children whether there were more objects a greater percentage of them replied that of course there were not, because naughty teddy just came along and scattered them. I suppose when the researcher (ie the teacher) asks you whether there are more objects you almost feel obliged to answer that there are, because the teacher must be getting at something. However, when it is a game, you can be more relaxed about the answer.

Intervention
This sort of finding raised the possibility that what seemed to be stages in cognitive development were actually determined not by nature but by pedagogy. Other differences in cognitive development were therefore probably determined by social differences. The huge implication of this is that anything that is socially determined can be altered by social intervention, and education is the greatest form of social intervention that there is.

As Bertolt Brecht said, Such is the world. Need it be so? Something has been happening in the 20th century, and is just coming to a head in curriculum development now. That is, the realisation that all things, including not only human nature but also the outcomes of teaching, are socially constructed. Also, that the effects of delivering the curriculum are determined not by natural ability but by pedagogy. So, if we are not happy with inequitable outcomes, we can intervene/ If we believe in entitlement, then we must intervene.

The implications for educators are great: whether you go to high school or not used to be determined by your station in life but our thinking has collectively moved far beyond that. Now, we believe that a secondary education should be available to all. We used to believe that success or failure at school was determined by intelligence, but we noticed that success and failure correspond too closely to postcode, and we are not prepared to accept that intelligence is linked to social class. We have to recognise therefore that success at school is also socially constructed. It therefore follows that failure at school is also socially constructed.

In 1891, we said that curricula should be based on people s different stations in life.

In 1931, we said that curricula should be based on people s different levels of intelligence.

In 1971, we said that curricula should be based on the different needs and interests of students.

In 2001, we say that curricula should be based on learning outcomes to which all students are entitled to have access. People who uncritically assume that stages of cognitive development and varied levels of intelligence are determined by nature and are unchangeable find it hard to believe in outcomes for all students. Understanding that success or failure at school was socially determined gave us the confidence to insist on outcomes for all students.

This emphasis on entitlement is the key to outcomes-based education in 2001.

Social view of language
These considerations apply particularly to literacy. A social view of language recognises that all exchanges of meaning are socially constructed and take the form of texts. A text is defined as any meaningful unit of communication, large or small, spoken or written. Exchanges of meaning always occur in social contexts. These contexts vary widely, according to situational and cultural factors. That is, different situations require different ways of communicating successfully. For example, in some situations you must use a knife and fork while in some other situations it would be inappropriate. The same applies to different cultures, eg in some cultures it is good manners to burp at the end of a meal, while in other cultures it is bad manners.

As children progress along the continuum of learning, even if they do not even go to school, the texts that they are able to deal with increase in sophistication and complexity. Even if you lived in a society that had no written language, only oral, you would always be dealing with oral texts, which would increase in sophistication in the same way. Oral cultures have highly developed ways of making meaning, along with amazing strategies for committing texts to memory. We would be deluded to think of them as societies populated by people with less intelligence.

Also, all teachers who observe the behaviours of their students holistically recognise that even low achieving students are capable of quite sophisticated communication practices but these are usually confined to situations of their own choosing and often within cultural contexts that are alien to schooling. More and more we are coming to realise that schooling itself is culturally constructed along the lines of middle class culture. And the more diverse our society becomes, the more we realise how relatively narrow middle class culture is.

A social view of language helps us to recognise not only this, but also that middle class communication practices are still the key to social power and influence. Notice, however, how the power of a plummy accent has been fading in Australia since 1980, particularly since we got used to listening to Bob Hawke as Prime Minister.

In the past, there was nothing we could do about the ascendancy of middle class values, which put us in the invidious position of having to accept that the schooling practices of 1970 did no more to address social inequality than the schooling practices of 1890. In 1970, postcode was still the main predictor of success at school. It still is in 2001, but we are determined not to accept it.

Explicit teaching
Explicit teaching enables us to break this cycle of failure, provided it is linked to outcomes and entitlement.

That is, we now believe that, in the interests of social justice, literally all students are entitled to have access to all the learning outcomes that the community values. We have a process for articulating what are the learning outcomes that the community values: in NSW it is our process of syllabus development. Since 1990, we have a Board of Studies that represents all the stakeholders. Its job is to arrive at a consensus about what these outcomes should be and write them down. It is our job to make sure that literally all students in NSW have access to these outcomes.

In 1891 you could get away with saying that a child from the wrong side of the tracks did not need to go to grammar school because it was beyond their station in life and there were many things in the curriculum, such as Latin and Greek, that they simply did not need. Future leaders, however, did need these things in their curriculum, so they got them.

In 1931 you could get away with saying that a child from the wrong side of the tracks did not need to go to be put into the A class because they were less intelligent and there were things in the curriculum such as Latin and Greek that they were not intelligent enough to learn. Future leaders, however, did need these things in their curriculum, so they got them.

In 2001 we can no longer get away with this. Today, a child from the wrong side of the tracks is, by law in NSW, fully entitled to have access to the same learning outcomes as any other child. We say this with confidence now, knowing that intelligence and language are mostly socially constructed. And we now know that a social view of language, along with explicit teaching, is the means by which we can make available all the learning outcomes that are related to literacy and communication.

Frankly, we cannot say, about any student, that there is a syllabus outcome which they need not be taught, for reasons of ability or needs and interests. Needs and interests used to be code for social class, by the way.

Raising Expectations
Dewey would not have been comfortable with high expectations. He would have said that something was too hard for less intelligent students. However, we now know that explicit teaching can give more students access to difficult concepts.

Piaget would also have been uncomfortable with high expectations. He would have said that something was too hard because children were at a stage of cognitive development which meant they were not yet ready for it.

However, as we have seen, a student's cognitive development can be influenced not by nature but by what we choose to teach them and how.

Knowing that texts are socially constructed, we know that to withhold access to certain texts is to limit access to society itself. So, if we fail to expose students to the sorts of texts they should encounter as they progress through school, then we deliberately limit their capacity to participate in society. In most cases, these limitations would happen along the lines of social class. Children from the wrong side of the tracks do not have access to the language practices of middle class people unless they are given this access through explicit teaching. The good news is that a social view of language enables this to happen, in an inclusive way that values students home languages.

Curriculum guarantee
This is why we speak of a curriculum guarantee. We define it as guaranteeing that all students have access to all the syllabus outcomes at their stage of schooling.

Teachers must ensure that all students in the stage have access to all the syllabus outcomes for that stage. This involves addressing all the syllabus outcomes in their programs, ie teaching programs should include strategies and activities designed to ensure that all students in the class gain the skills and knowledge required to achieve those outcomes.

Students who are currently performing at a level below their stage will need intervention strategies to ensure that they are able to address the outcomes in their stage while they are still in that stage.

Classroom practice
To establish and maintain high expectations for all students, access to syllabus outcomes refers to the syllabus outcomes of the stage the students are in. For example, a student in Year 5 is in Stage 3 and is entitled to have access to the teaching required of Stage 3 outcomes.

With students demonstrating a range of achievement of syllabus outcomes at any one time, in any classroom, what are teachers to do? How can teachers use the syllabus to plan teaching programs that support all students to achieve syllabus outcomes?

One approach is that if a Stage 3 student has not yet demonstrated achievement of one or more of the Stage 2 outcomes, for example, the Stage 3 teaching program reverts to teaching Stage 2 skills. This strategy focuses on starting where students are at and is based on a belief about learning that is developmental and focuses on skills but not knowledge. This approach focuses teaching on skills which are closest to what the students can do and introduces what they need to learn next.

Another approach was made possible with the development of a social view of language and Stage outcomes in the current K-6 English syllabus (1998). A social view of language requires teachers to teach about how and why language is used at the same time as teaching skills. It supports students experiencing difficulties because these students are taught to understand a wide range of uses for language at the same time as being taught the skills of using language. This is explicit teaching.

The K-6 English syllabus outcomes are divided into two groups: the learning to outcomes (skills) and the learning about outcomes (knowledge). Most teachers are becoming more comfortable with teaching learning to outcomes at the same time as teaching learning about outcomes. They are starting to understand the connections among knowledge, skills and understandings. However, teachers are still asking the question, Which outcomes do I program for? If the range of demonstrated achievement in my class covers all stages, do I need to develop three programs with three sets of content and outcomes? To answer this question we need to understand the implications of the introduction of stage outcomes and how they differ from level outcomes.

The 1994 English K-6 Syllabus introduced level outcomes. It identified five levels of outcomes which students from Kindergarten to Year 6 might achieve and described them as benchmarks or standards to which students achievements can be compared, regardless of their ages or grades. Teaching focused on where students were at and reported on progress compared to where the student was at the beginning of the teaching program.

The 1998 the revised English K-6 Syllabus introduced Stage outcomes. Stage outcomes differ from level outcomes because they were designed to align to ages and grades. This in itself influenced the nature of the outcomes because the age and grade of the students were considered as part of the design of the stage outcomes. Teaching needs to build on what students know and can do while teaching the content of the stage and report on demonstrated achievement of stage outcomes.

Stage outcomes are the results intended by the syllabus. The outcomes are statements of knowledge, skills and understandings expected to be gained by most students as a result of effective teaching and learning of English K-6 by the end of a stage. The syllabus also states that outcomes are achieved as students engage in the content of the syllabus. What are the implications of stage outcomes linked to content for teaching? What might the practices look like?

Some comparisons might be useful. For example, in the past we would assess what a student could do. Now we need to assess what a student knows as well as what they can do. In the past we would have designed a teaching program of skills building on where a student was at. Now we need to design a teaching program which does more, that is, teaches skills, knowledge and understandings related to the content and stage outcomes that have been designed by the BOS for the age and grade the students are in.

Teaching programs need to build on what the students know as well as what they can do while at the same time teach to the outcomes of the stage the student is in. This requires explicit teaching. Explicit teaching is providing the student with support so that they can access the outcomes of the stage they are in. This requires teaching a range of knowledge, skills and understandings at the same time. This approach benefits students experiencing difficulties when K-6 teachers understand the standards framework in which they are working. Teachers of Stage 3 students, for example, must read and come to understand all outcome statements from early stage one to stage 3 and address the elements of each stage outcome the student has not achieved, at the same time as introducing new knowledge and skills. This needs to be taught in the context of the content of stage 3.

This approach requires skillful and well trained teachers. Teachers who understand a social view of language, teachers who know how to teach reading, writing and talking and listening and teachers who know and understand the standards framework outlined in the English K-6 Syllabus. It is possible to address elements of earlier stage outcomes within the content of the stage students are in. In some ways it is easier to introduce some skills with more complex texts because these texts engage older students as well as provide the opportunities for students to use a broader range of strategies. Recent research based on a social view of language is demonstrating that giving students access to literate language use through listening to and reading more complex texts is working, where other strategies that were skills based and relied on starting where students were at have failed.

As stated in the syllabus, while most students are expected to achieve the outcomes of the stage they are in by the end of the stage, not all of them will. It is important that teachers understand syllabus outcomes so that they know how to meet the needs of all students. Because the achievement of outcomes is the result of effective teaching, it is important for teachers to provide this for all students on the assumption that they are all capable of achieving the outcomes.

Providing all students with effective teaching and giving them access to the content of the stage they are in, gives all students a chance to catch up and to do better. Teaching that builds on what students know and can do, but also confirms high expectations by effectively teaching the content of the stage the students are in is what the syllabus requires.

Paul Hardage, Chief Education Officer English
Bernadette Thorne, Senior curriculum Adviser English K-12