§ Preamble
§ 1. The Education Reform Bill, currently before Parliament, proposes the establishment of a National Curriculum of core and other foundation subjects for pupils of compulsory school age in England and Wales. For most of these subjects, including English which is a core subject, the Government wishes to establish clear objectives—attainment targets—for the knowledge, skills and understanding which pupils of different abilities and maturities should he expected to have acquired at or near the key ages of 7, 11, 14 and 16; and, to promote them, programmes of study describing the content, skills and processes which need to be covered during each key stage of compulsory education. Taken together, the attainment targets and programmes of study will provide the basis for assessing pupils' performance—in relation both to expected attainment, and to the next steps needed for the pupils' development.
§ 2. Both the objectives (attainment targets) and means of achieving them (programmes of study) should leave scope for teachers to use their professional talents and skills to develop their own schemes of work, within a set framework which is known to all. It is the task of the working group to advise on that framework for English, which is a core subject. The framework should ensure, at the minimum, that all school leavers are competent in the use of English— written and spoken—whether or not it is their first language.
§ 3. The Kingman Committee, established to advise the Secretary of State on what children should know about language, has made recommendations for attainment targets for knowledge about language at the ages of 7, 11 and 16. The working group should build on these to recommend attainment targets covering the grammatical structure of the English language. But English comprises both language and literature, including poetry and drama. The working group's recommendations on learning about language and its use should draw upon the English literary heritage; should promote the reading of great literature and the knowledge and appreciation of literature; and should indicate the types of literature which all pupils should cover in the course of their studies.
§ The Task
§ 4. The Government has made it clear that it expects most curricular time at primary level to be taken up by the core subjects of English, maths and science. But it is important that in the primary phases attainment targets and programmes of study in the core subjects are looked at together as well as individually. The working groups on mathematics and science are well-advanced towards their final reports. The English working group is therefore asked to give immediate attention to recommendations on attainment targets for ages 7 and 11 and the associated programmes of study and to submit a report on these to the Secretary of State by 30 September 1988.
§ 5. By the same date, the working group is asked to submit a progress letter to the Secretary of State on its provisional thinking about the knowledge, skills and understanding which pupils of different abilities and maturities should be 279W expected to have attained and be able to demonstrate around the end of the academic year in which they reach the ages of 14 and 16.
§ 6. By 30 April 1989 the working group is to submit a final report to the Secretary of State, setting out and justifying its final recommendations on attainment targets for the key ages of 14 and 16 and the associated programmes of study.
§ Approach
§ 7. The working group should consult informally with relevant interests and have regard to the work of the other subject working groups, in particular that on Welsh. Additionally it should take account of:
- (a) the broad framework proposed by the Task Group on Assessment and Testing for assessment and testing;
- (b) the need for attainment targets which reflect the fact that in the primary stage, particularly for 7 year olds, English will support learning in all other subjects, and will be developed by how those are taught;
- (c) the contribution which, more generally, English can make to learning about other subjects and the contributions which these subjects can make to learning about English, including the promotion of development of good written and spoken English in all subjects;
- (d) the recommendations of the Kingman Committee on attainment targets for children's explicit and implicit knowledge about language at ages 7, 11 and 16;
- (e) best practice and the results of relevant research and curriculum developments;