Excellent article by Paul Kelly (editor for The Australian) entitled
"A clarion call for the sake of our kids" on the corruption of the social
sciences curriculum in our schools.
OBE in WA gets a mention "Western Australia’s experiment in
outcomes-based education has failed and Queensland has
“absolutely no external assessment in the entire preparatory
year to Year 12 spectrum”. This means they have “no way of
knowing what standards their schools are achieving”
The article has recieved a massive number of responses from readers
and is well worth a read, can be found here.
Lastly I found an easy to install site-meter from www.sitemeter.com
Very excited
Tuesday, September 26, 2006
Outcomes Based Education - The flawed option
The following is an extract of an article written by Kevin Donnelly and a fairly accurate summation of the failure of outcomes based education (OBE).
"As stated in the Curriculum Council’s Curriculum Framework document, published in 1998, Western Australia’s school curriculum is based on an outcomes-based approach. Since the late 90s, OBE has been implemented during the compulsory years (K-10) and now the intention is to extend it to years 11 and 12.
The above document defines OBE as: “… identifying what students should achieve and focusing on ensuring that they do achieve. It means shifting away from an emphasis on what is taught and how and when, to an emphasis on what is actually learnt by each student.”
While, in theory, OBE might sound fine, in practice, both in Australia and overseas, it has proven to be a dismal failure and those countries, such as the USA, that have experimented with OBE have forsaken it in favour of more academic and rigorous alternatives.
Bruce Wilson, the recently retired CEO of Australia’s Curriculum Corporation, freely admits that Australia’s adoption of OBE is inherently flawed and that it represents, in his words, an “unsatisfactory political and intellectual exercise”.
The flaws and weaknesses of an OBE approach are manifold. Firstly, unlike syllabus documents that give teachers a clear and succinct road map of what is to be taught at the start of the year, OBE documents are inefficient, cumbersome and impossible to implement in the classroom.
http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=3431
Sunday, September 24, 2006
Wednesday, September 20, 2006
OBE Course of study - Assessment problems with scale
of achievement
The Science Teachers Association of Western Australia
(STAWA) conducted a survey of it's members regarding
the OBE Courses of Study for the Sciences.
On of the most damning statisitcs is that the teachers surveyed
had major problems with the scales of achievement and their
lack of clarity.
In other words students cannot be assessed accurately using
the ill-concieved "scale of achievement".
From : http://www.stawa.asn.au/uploads/surveyresults.doc
"Assessment and Scales of Achievement
Results
When asked about whether the Scales of Achievement are clear,
the majority of respondents indicated that they are not. The
breakdown of responses by Course of Study is presented in Figure 7.
Figure 7: Proportion of respondents answering ’yes’ and ‘no’
to the question: ‘Are the Scales of Achievement clear?’."
Friday, September 15, 2006
Apologies to the original concept artist who came up with the campaign pictures on the WA governments attempt to mislead the public on the benefits of the OBE style Courses of Study.Ye Gods - Imagine Lil teaching a class! She'd probably spend all lesson mumbling "Google it".
Outcomes Based Education will be the destruction of education in Australia and the WA government is spending thousands of dollars in advertising saying the exact opposite.
It really must have hurt Ljiljanna and her flunkies in the Curriculum Council when the report they had commissioned to find the benefits of OBE came back to say that the levels produced
by OBE were as good as useless.
So firstly the taxpayer pays for the report then pays for the propaganda to ignore the reports finding.
The only thing that Ljiljanna Ravlich does better than "dumb down" education is waste money on dumbing down education.
Outcomes based education - Levels are flawed says Andrich report
I was going to write an article on the uselessness of levels which is probably the greatest failure of outcomes based education in western australia (and everywhere else it is used) but an interesting article appeared on perthnorg that caught my eye.
Outcomes Based Education levels are flawed
The much maligned OBE system in WA has once again gone under the microscope now that a meeting of teachers from ten state high schools have labeled the leveling system as "inaccurate, unworkable and too difficult for parents to understand".
The lack of precision and accuracy in the leveling process has also lead to students all being graded the same with the teachers commenting that ".. it was so imprecise that 90 percent of the students in a year group were often awarded the same level, removing any incentive to strive for better results"
This report comes shortly after a report by Professor David Andrich an international assessment expert from Murdoch University whose report found that teachers should use traditional numerical marking systems based on percentages when ranking students for University. Other finding included that the specialized jargon of OBE was difficult for parents to understand and that the "outcomes and levels" assessment system was too crude to rank students for tertiary entrance.
Written by "Darren" as well, so he must be a good bloke!
http://www.perthnorg.com.au/
I was going to write an article on the uselessness of levels which is probably the greatest failure of outcomes based education in western australia (and everywhere else it is used) but an interesting article appeared on perthnorg that caught my eye.
Outcomes Based Education levels are flawed
The much maligned OBE system in WA has once again gone under the microscope now that a meeting of teachers from ten state high schools have labeled the leveling system as "inaccurate, unworkable and too difficult for parents to understand".
The lack of precision and accuracy in the leveling process has also lead to students all being graded the same with the teachers commenting that ".. it was so imprecise that 90 percent of the students in a year group were often awarded the same level, removing any incentive to strive for better results"
This report comes shortly after a report by Professor David Andrich an international assessment expert from Murdoch University whose report found that teachers should use traditional numerical marking systems based on percentages when ranking students for University. Other finding included that the specialized jargon of OBE was difficult for parents to understand and that the "outcomes and levels" assessment system was too crude to rank students for tertiary entrance.
Written by "Darren" as well, so he must be a good bloke!
http://www.perthnorg.com.au/
Wednesday, September 13, 2006
OBE suffers setback in Tasmania
Can Western Australia learn from the Tasmanian OBE experience?
Outcomes based education has suffered another serious setback this time in Tasmania where it was introduced under the banner of “Essential Learning”. The new minister of education, David Bartlett, has now had to step in and replace the overly complicated Essential Learning framework with a new streamlined and user-friendly curriculum.
“Tasmania’s New Age school curriculum - widely criticised for being vague and meaningless - has been thrown away in favour of an old-fashioned syllabus in traditional subject areas.”
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,20300726-13881,00.html
Outcomes based education is suffering under immense public scrutiny in WA at the current time, with most parents, teachers and students also not liking what they are seeing.
“While, in theory, OBE might sound fine, in practice, both in Australia and overseas, it has proven to be a dismal failure. Those countries, such as the USA, that have experimented with OBE have forsaken it in favour of more academic and rigorous alternatives.”
Kevin Donnelly
http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=3431
Although OBE was introduced into WA schools in 1998 under the guise of “The Curriculum Framework”, the heat really cranked up when the Minister for Education, Ljiljanna Ravlich, attempted to implement the OBE-style “Courses of Study” in 2006 into the states senior school classrooms.
OBE instantly went under the microscope and the new courses were found to be wanting. Teachers dismissed them as inferior to the current courses, because they lacked the most basic elements of an educational course such as a well defined syllabus and a sensible grading system.
“Western Australia’s proposed Outcomes-Based Education (OBE) courses of studies have none of these features. They have no syllabus, no support materials, nebulous “outcomes” written in edu-babble and “anything goes” assessment. A trainee teacher who developed such a course for her university assignment would flunk.”
An opinion from retired Associate Professor Steve Kessell, Science and Mathematics Education Centre, Curtin University
http://www.platowa.com/documents/Kessell_5-06.html
Teachers also found the “Outcome Statements” and “Level Descriptors” that they were expected to use in assessing students to be incredibly vague and completely useless in any form of assessment.
Example 1: Earth and Environmental Science Course of StudyStudents use their understanding of the Earth System and society’s need for resources to make balanced and informed decisions about personal, community and global impacts on the environment.
Example 2: Physical Education Course of Study
The student: uses skills, strategies and tactics in response to a wide range of variables that are constantly changing; and selects and applies an extensive range of highly refined skills, strategies and tactics with precision and consistency in varied and complex physical activity environments.
Example 3: Engineering Studies Course of Study
The student: applies a range of technology skills and knowledge to work with materials both co-operatively and independently, applies know (sic) solution to predictable problems, recognises potential hazards in the work environment and adopts safe work practices.
http://newwace.curriculum.wa.edu.au/pages/teachers_courses.asp
The above statements are ljargon-rich and too difficult to assess with any accuracy and were often ridiculed by teaching staff particularly on the PLATO website where a discussion thread elicited 128 separate responses under the banner “More examples of silly Level descriptions needed”
http://pub39.bravenet.com/forum/3280197123/show/538412
The Courses of Study received a seemingly endless series of criticisms from professional teaching bodies and academics such as the following from Peter Ridd, a senior lecturer in physics at James Cook University.
"To most of us, the idea of a syllabus without some content or facts is almost inconceivable, but in the ethereal world of education theory, teaching content is for the dinosaurs. To many of our educationists and academics there is no such thing as a fact; everything is open to interpretation. "
“That may be OK for psychology and philosophy, but in physics there are facts with a capital F. It is impossible to teach science and maths without some minimum level of content, and it is the role of the syllabus to guide teachers on what to teach.”
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,19835058-12332,00.html
The Australian Institute of Physics was also quick to condemn the WA Physics Course of Study
“Quality education is facing a major threat from an educational philosophy called Outcome-Based-Education (OBE) that on the surface seems fine, but can be applied to the assessment process with disastrous consequences. In Western Australia its application means that all you can assess are broad and coarse levels of achievement. No marks out of a hundred and no competition in the classroom! The levels are so vague that if three different levels were provided for comparison you would not be able to place them in the "correct" order of achievement with any confidence.”
http://www.aip.org.au/news.php/95
So is OBE to die a slow death in WA? Probably. OBE has been a resounding failure wherever else that is has been introduced and has only survived by being seriously modified.
“We roundly condemn what OBE has become in practice … setting standards that are not academic in nature and cannot be verified through objective testing. Outcomes which are so soft and fuzzy that student understanding and proficiency cannot be verified are intolerable. How do you test a student's values and beliefs, and what, or whose values, set the standard? At best, these Outcomes distract from more important knowledge and skills. At worst, some of them intrude on the sanctity of vulnerable adolescent minds.
We do not have and desperately need schools based upon the first kind of Outcome; we cannot risk the future of our children, our nation, and our world on the second kind.”
http://www.halcyon.org/obeinfo.html
Western Australian education bureaucrats now must learn from the mistakes made in Tasmania and rethink their position of the value of outcomes based education and the implementation of the OBE inspired “Courses of Study”.
Can Western Australia learn from the Tasmanian OBE experience?
Outcomes based education has suffered another serious setback this time in Tasmania where it was introduced under the banner of “Essential Learning”. The new minister of education, David Bartlett, has now had to step in and replace the overly complicated Essential Learning framework with a new streamlined and user-friendly curriculum.
“Tasmania’s New Age school curriculum - widely criticised for being vague and meaningless - has been thrown away in favour of an old-fashioned syllabus in traditional subject areas.”
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,20300726-13881,00.html
Outcomes based education is suffering under immense public scrutiny in WA at the current time, with most parents, teachers and students also not liking what they are seeing.
“While, in theory, OBE might sound fine, in practice, both in Australia and overseas, it has proven to be a dismal failure. Those countries, such as the USA, that have experimented with OBE have forsaken it in favour of more academic and rigorous alternatives.”
Kevin Donnelly
http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=3431
Although OBE was introduced into WA schools in 1998 under the guise of “The Curriculum Framework”, the heat really cranked up when the Minister for Education, Ljiljanna Ravlich, attempted to implement the OBE-style “Courses of Study” in 2006 into the states senior school classrooms.
OBE instantly went under the microscope and the new courses were found to be wanting. Teachers dismissed them as inferior to the current courses, because they lacked the most basic elements of an educational course such as a well defined syllabus and a sensible grading system.
“Western Australia’s proposed Outcomes-Based Education (OBE) courses of studies have none of these features. They have no syllabus, no support materials, nebulous “outcomes” written in edu-babble and “anything goes” assessment. A trainee teacher who developed such a course for her university assignment would flunk.”
An opinion from retired Associate Professor Steve Kessell, Science and Mathematics Education Centre, Curtin University
http://www.platowa.com/documents/Kessell_5-06.html
Teachers also found the “Outcome Statements” and “Level Descriptors” that they were expected to use in assessing students to be incredibly vague and completely useless in any form of assessment.
Example 1: Earth and Environmental Science Course of StudyStudents use their understanding of the Earth System and society’s need for resources to make balanced and informed decisions about personal, community and global impacts on the environment.
Example 2: Physical Education Course of Study
The student: uses skills, strategies and tactics in response to a wide range of variables that are constantly changing; and selects and applies an extensive range of highly refined skills, strategies and tactics with precision and consistency in varied and complex physical activity environments.
Example 3: Engineering Studies Course of Study
The student: applies a range of technology skills and knowledge to work with materials both co-operatively and independently, applies know (sic) solution to predictable problems, recognises potential hazards in the work environment and adopts safe work practices.
http://newwace.curriculum.wa.edu.au/pages/teachers_courses.asp
The above statements are ljargon-rich and too difficult to assess with any accuracy and were often ridiculed by teaching staff particularly on the PLATO website where a discussion thread elicited 128 separate responses under the banner “More examples of silly Level descriptions needed”
http://pub39.bravenet.com/forum/3280197123/show/538412
The Courses of Study received a seemingly endless series of criticisms from professional teaching bodies and academics such as the following from Peter Ridd, a senior lecturer in physics at James Cook University.
"To most of us, the idea of a syllabus without some content or facts is almost inconceivable, but in the ethereal world of education theory, teaching content is for the dinosaurs. To many of our educationists and academics there is no such thing as a fact; everything is open to interpretation. "
“That may be OK for psychology and philosophy, but in physics there are facts with a capital F. It is impossible to teach science and maths without some minimum level of content, and it is the role of the syllabus to guide teachers on what to teach.”
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,19835058-12332,00.html
The Australian Institute of Physics was also quick to condemn the WA Physics Course of Study
“Quality education is facing a major threat from an educational philosophy called Outcome-Based-Education (OBE) that on the surface seems fine, but can be applied to the assessment process with disastrous consequences. In Western Australia its application means that all you can assess are broad and coarse levels of achievement. No marks out of a hundred and no competition in the classroom! The levels are so vague that if three different levels were provided for comparison you would not be able to place them in the "correct" order of achievement with any confidence.”
http://www.aip.org.au/news.php/95
So is OBE to die a slow death in WA? Probably. OBE has been a resounding failure wherever else that is has been introduced and has only survived by being seriously modified.
“We roundly condemn what OBE has become in practice … setting standards that are not academic in nature and cannot be verified through objective testing. Outcomes which are so soft and fuzzy that student understanding and proficiency cannot be verified are intolerable. How do you test a student's values and beliefs, and what, or whose values, set the standard? At best, these Outcomes distract from more important knowledge and skills. At worst, some of them intrude on the sanctity of vulnerable adolescent minds.
We do not have and desperately need schools based upon the first kind of Outcome; we cannot risk the future of our children, our nation, and our world on the second kind.”
http://www.halcyon.org/obeinfo.html
Western Australian education bureaucrats now must learn from the mistakes made in Tasmania and rethink their position of the value of outcomes based education and the implementation of the OBE inspired “Courses of Study”.
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