Nanny Knows Best

Nanny Knows Best
Dedicated to exposing, and resisting, the all pervasive nanny state that is corroding the way of life and the freedom of the people of Britain.

Tuesday, November 04, 2008

Nanny Bans Spleeeling

Nanny Bans Spleeeling
Oh dear, Nanny is worried about the dangers that educashun might instill a sense of failure in children.

How so?

Surely educashun instills confidence?

Ah, how naive we all are for thinking that!

For you see dear readers, when you teach a child something like spelling what happens if he/she makes a mistake?

In my day I would be made to write the offending word out several times, until I got it right.

Now we live in more enlightened times, Nanny tells us that learning to spell and making mistakes in spelling will give rise to a sense of failure.

I am grateful to Nanny for pointing this out, now that I have reached a ripe and productive middle age I now realise that in fact (because I made spelling mistakes...and still do) I am in fact a failure.

Anyhoo, if you think that I am making this all up think, I would like to direct you Whitminster Endowed Church of England Primary School, near Stroud.

Headmistress Debbie Marklove recently decreed that pupils will not be given lists of words to learn by rote as homework.

For why?

There is a risk that children will feel a "sense of failure" if, having learned the words at home, they were unable to spell them at school the next day.

She has even written to the parents to tell them about the change:

"You will notice that the children will not be given spelling lists to learn over the week and then be tested in class.

We have taken the decision to stop spellings as homework as it is felt that although children may learn them perfectly at home they are often unable to use them in their daily written work.

Also many children find this activity unnecessarily distressing.

The spelling patterns will continue to be taught explicitly in the classroom and assessed as part of the normal marking by the teacher
."

Errmmm...how would she have been abel to rite that lettter if she coodent spell proper?

Surely no one would have been able to understand it?

Mrs Marklove went on to dig her own grave by saying:

"If children are given spellings to learn and get five out of five when practising with mum and dad and then only get one out of five the next day at school, it can give them a sense of failure.

I've heard comments in the playground from children asking each other what they got and, where this can be a positive thing when they get five out of five, it can also impound failure
."

A small piece of advice for Nanny's teechers, competition is good as it encourages pupils to stretch themselves.

Learning to compete, and fail, is vital in order to be able to interact and succeed in the adult world. Those adults who as children have never tasted failure, and have not picked themselves up afterwards, are usually immature spoilt individuals who cannot cope in the adult world.

Nanny is stunting children's growth by not stretching them in this way.

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12 comments:

  1. Anonymous10:53 AM

    Blame it on Prezza who never seems to have got over the fact that when 'e were a lad, a grammar school girl returned his letter to her with spelling mistakes corrected.

    Jay

    ReplyDelete
  2. Anonymous11:47 AM

    Of course the useless teacher won't assigning spelling for homework.

    She can't spell, herself. "Spellings"

    Spellings?

    What the hell kind of word is that? There is no such word in English.

    What is it with the Left and their need to pluralize words?

    I have seen: Teachings, Trainings, Genocides,Starvations, and of course the most overused word of the Left.... Eeeeeeeshoooooes. (Issues)

    Another attempt of the Gramscian whores to destroy the Civilized World so they may stand glorious among the ruins.

    Ivan The Horrible

    ReplyDelete
  3. Question: "Errmmm...how would she have been abel to rite that lettter if she coodent spell proper?"

    Answer: Texting!!!!

    Nanny isn't really interested in raising children who can dust themselves off after a fall, as they'd soon have little enough use for Nanny.

    Ken, we're more or less the same age. Please stop describing yourself as "middle-aged." I for one prefer to think of myself as inhabiting the glorious, golden sunset of my young adulthood.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Anonymous1:34 PM

    This is just typical of the way educational standards have declined, and are still being dumbed down over recent times. Like you, Ken, if I spelt a word incorrectly, I was required to write it out correctly several times (in my best handwriting). Although I may not have appreciated it at the time, I do now. This is because, although I do still spell some of the more difficult words incorrectly, my spelling is far superior to a good many of the younger generation of my acquaintance.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Anonymous1:44 PM

    In an era when communications play such a big part in our lives, surely spelling is an important skill; It is difficult to communicate effectively with another if they cannot understand what you've written.....God knows it's hard enough to understand the young when they speak in their Jamacian Gangster dialect or use text abbreviations, so let's continue to teach and test spelling so they have at least one viable option to communicate in.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Anonymous2:18 PM

    Learn 5 words for a spelling test?

    Five?

    Just bloody five?

    Well, why not drop it? Hardly a useful exercise anyway.

    And that may be the problem. Make it 20 and it may challenge all the kids and give a more balanced result as well of a greater feeling of achievement. If any kids truly do struggle I think these days there should be plenty of people around who would diagnose dyslexia and offer assistance.

    Perhaps Nu Labour as simply trying to promote ideas that ensure that no one in the future feels over-educated for the travesty of a society that they are trying to create.

    On the subject of age I would have thought an alternative to 'middle-aged' is indeed desirable.

    'Sub-prime' would have been useful and offers at least two possible interpretations but recent events may make it a somewhat less attractive investment for conceptual promotional activity budget.


    Grant

    ReplyDelete
  7. Anonymous11:30 PM

    Two more clichéd phrases/words that New Labour and their Nanny minions love to use:

    "Sending a message" - they use their projectile-vomit laws to send lots of messages. Don't do this. Don't do that. Do this. Do that.

    "Unacceptable" - used to describe behaviour they have banned/are planning to ban/would like to ban in this country or the activities of foreign nations they wish to censure, but not too strongly, in case said countries say "Boo!"

    Nanny, like the effluence from a leaking toilet, will always take the path of least resistance.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Anonymous10:52 AM

    Children today simply cannot be allowed to feel upset or disappointed about anything can they. I heard a discussion on the radio yesterday about "How do you tell children that, with the credit crunch, Christmas might not be so good this year".

    All I can say (perhaps an appropriate comment for the said time of year) is "Jesus Christ..."

    ReplyDelete
  9. Anonymous11:32 AM

    smithy said...
    "All I can say (perhaps an appropriate comment for the said time of year) is "Jesus Christ..."

    And long overdue. This country, and indeed the world, would greatly benefit by following Christian principles, by which I mean the actual teachings of the Saviour, and not some of the garbage spouted, ostensibly in His name, by some of the leaders in the 'established' churches or the extremists and fundamentalists.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Anonymous2:07 PM

    Whilst I agree with much of what Ivan the Horrible said, and all of what Grant said, I must take issue with the statement that "spellings" is incorrect in itself.

    Spelling can be used as a noun or a gerund. More commonly used is the gerund form (e.g. Spelling is fun), but the plural noun form is also OK (Shakespeare's known signatures show several different spellings of the name)

    However, I'll bet anything you like that said teacher wouldn't know a gerund if it bit her on the arse, and that she had no idea that the gerund form is used generally in the school subject.

    5 words to spell? What the FARK do kids do at school all day?

    ReplyDelete
  11. Anonymous4:21 PM

    I expect the majority of working people (I'm including myself here)
    DON'T do Homework from their workplace so why should children get homework.
    Isn't it the responsibility of schools to teach the children within the time frame of a school day.
    Will someone please explain to me WHY kids get on average, 2 hours homework exch night and that includes infant shools , HELLO!!!! would you do 2 hours of unpaid work every night, well maybe you would but I sure as hell wouldn't

    ReplyDelete
  12. Anonymous4:24 PM

    Sorry, Hmmmmm, isn't it just typical, we get a spelling post and I go and spell each wrong, :-( I put exch.. No detention please

    ReplyDelete