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(satire – sort of)
Education secretary praises learning by rote and avoidance of vulgarity as he explains the philosophy behind his shake-up of schools and exams
Learning facts by rote accompanied by character-building cold baths, regular beatings with a leather strap and applications of six of the best from a well-oiled cane to the nether regions should be a central part of the school experience, the education secretary, Michael Gove, will argue on Wednesday in a speech which praises traditional methods of learning.
In his address, titled In Praise of Stout Educational Virtues and Avoidance of Unwholesome Excesses of Youth, Gove describes the ideological underpinning to his planned shake-up of British schools, a philosophy which is likely to prompt criticisms from Conservative Party traditionalists worried that he is seeking to drag the party forward several hundred years from the stone age into the middle of the 19th century.
Competitive, difficult exams for which pupils must prepare by memorising large amounts of facts by rote – while at the same time making sure naked table legs are adequately covered to avoid arousal of bestial urges – will ensure motivation, solidify knowledge and guarantee highest standards of moral hypocrisy in Britain’s Godless, Devil-spawned wayward youth, Gove is to tell the Independent Academies Association, a trade body for academy schools.
According to extracts of the speech provided by his department, Gove will say:
Exams matter because motivation matters if we are to avoid an excess of cads, ruffians, suffragettes and fallen women in our schools.
If we know tests are rigorous, and they require application to pass, then the experience of being made to stand in a freezing bath while reciting passages from the Bible – without the upsetting bits of course – spurs us on to further endeavours and deeper learning.
Gove professes himself a great fan of Daniel Willingham, a US cognitive psychologist who has sought to use scientific research to show pupils learn best through the use of memory, routine, pain and hypocrisy, arguments outlined in a book, Why Don’t Students Like Going Up Chimneys?, also popular with free schools guru Toby Young.
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Pride's Purge 
I went to a military style Grammar school in the 70’s and 80’s.
We were taught by retiree Naval officers and career bastards who exercised corporal punishment my means of slipper, cane, cricket bat or javelin
Frantically writing down the entire history of the British monarchy by dictation was a particular highlight wy a school master who looked like Cyril Smith.
If your fountain pen ran out of ink and you fell behind you were made to stay bento copy someone elses notes.
I particularly remember when my friend and I chuckled about something in class.
We were both brought out to the front of the class and instructed to smack each other as hard as possible around the back of he head, in turn until he was satisfied we had struck each other hard enough.
In light of this and other experiences directly and vicariously felt during 5 long years at the London Nautical school, I and many of my peers went on to become soldiers, sailors or bankers in the continued traditions of psychotic behaviour, which had taught us the crippling and debilitating effects of fear and anxiety.
Here I am, in my 40’s unable to form normal, cooperative relationships with younger people, whilst still harbouring palpable terror in the presence of older, authority figures.
I along with many of my peers have lost our jobs and struggled to re enter the labour market.
Why, because we are all un hinged and completely devoid of compassion or personality.
I completely relate to Mr Gove, a sound, upstanding and principled Man whom understands the metal and fortitude required to get these brats to learn.
This isn’t satire, this is a true reflection of my life and I totally understand him and his methodology.
Which is why i am praying, as many contemporaries
share similar accounts of our childhood, that someone shoots him dead.
Many people born since 1980 will listen to Pink Floyd’s “”The Wall” particularly the chorus, ” we don’t need no education” and berate the message of this rock opera.
Those of us over 35 understand the context of this song however.
You need to sing the whole line…
WE DON’T NEED NO EDUCATION, WE DON’T NEED NO THOUGHT CONTROL
NO DARK SARCASM IN THE CLASSROOM
TEACHER LEAVE THEM KIDS ALONE!
I’m off to lay down in a darkened room now….
NURSE!
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It obviously makes sense, because this was the regime enjoyed by Iain Duncan Smith, first at a school that did not exist until six years after he left it and then at HMS Conway, an Anglesey boarding school named after a sailing vessel the school wrecked, burned and sank.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iain_Duncan_Smith#Education
It obviously did him no harm, did it?
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A school founded on the back of the sinking of the Titanic in 1915, which tells you all you need to know really…
If IDS and Gove had half an idea…..
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“If IDS and Gove had half an idea…”
… their brains would burst?
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