New GCSE Criteria
Clearly, student teachers beginning training in 2008 and 2009 will not immediately encounter the new GCSE criteria, but the potential direction the subject will take should the criteria be adpoted in 2010 in anything like their current form suggests to me that student teachers should engage with the criteria and the issues that they raise as part of their course even now. By 2010, asuming new specifications are introduced as planned, student teachers will of course need to know of the new requirements. There are some profound changes contained within the draft specifications as they first appeared in 2008, changes that may have great impact on the school pupil's experience of English.
The most obvious change imminent is the addition of the new GCSE in English Language, which will sit beside English and English Literature to offer three potential awards. Within the criteria's regulations, it is stated that at the end of Key Stage 4, student teachers will have to be entered for either English, or both English Language and English Literature (combinations such as English/English Language or English/English Literature are prohibited). English Language – though it will include Functional Skills and count within the five A*-C statistics – cannot be taken as a single course in Key Stage 4 since it does not fulfil the literary requirements of the National Curriculum. It's suggested, however, that it might be a useful standalone post-16 course, or something appropriate for EAL pupils, though the reasons for this are far from clear.
There are, perhaps, some potentially encouraging aspects to the new criteria. The new English Language course involves the explicit study of spoken English, a previously neglected area, but one that has received increasing attention from QCA in recent years (for example in their publications New Perspectives on Spoken English, 2003 http://www.qca.org.uk/libraryAssets/media/6111_new_perspec_in_spoken_eng_class_room.pdf and Introducing the Grammar of Talk, 2004 http://www.qca.org.uk/libraryAssets/media/9431_intro_the_grammer_of_talk.pdf) and thus goes some way to raising the status of speaking and listening. The Literature criteria include the demands for the study of 'linked texts', perhaps opening the door for genuine wider reading. Both the Language and Literature criteria suggest greater coherence and continuity with post-16 qualifications in the area. Within English and English Language there is an increased weighting for internal assessment, something teachers would generally support, though the devil here, given the demise of traditional coursework, will be in the detail.
The draft criteria do raise many concerns, however. There is, for example, the curious division within English between 'English in the Daily World' and 'English in the World of the Imagination'. Such a division is at odds with more enlightened thinking that sees creativity as central to our everyday uses of language, and acknowledges that creativity in texts need not be confined to the world of fiction. Also, there seems to be conflict with the new National Curriculum, where creativity is one of the four 'C's and ought, therefore, to be central to student teachers' overall experience of English. It might well be argued that in practice English teachers will not themselves make this apparent creative/functional divide explicit, but that does not change the fact that policy makers are attempting to define the subject in such mundane ways. Although the second, revised, version of the criteria softens the distinction between 'English in the Daily World' and 'English in the World of the Imagination', the distinction is still made.
The gulf between the new criteria and the National Curriculum extends further. The National Curriculum promotes creativity, cultural diversity and flexibility and suggests that it is a curriculum for the twenty first century. The draft criteria seem somewhat backward looking, with a curious notion of 'English, Irish and Welsh' heritage (and then all 'the rest') in relation to literature, and an assessment system that condemns non-fiction reading to external examination – a move that would seemingly limit this area to print media, hardly appropriate given the scope for exploring multimodal texts within this field.
There are, too, other issues with the assessment regulations. Though an increase in teacher assessment may be welcome, the nature of the 'controlled assessments' is not clear, and there is a fear that teachers will have little freedom in their choices of assignment. Given, too, that pupils who are entering for both Language and Literature must complete different tasks even if the same text is being studied within both fields, there seems to be the potential for a huge increase in the assessment workload for teachers (a cynic might say that the powers that be want to do away with what they view as getting GCSEs on the cheap via crossover coursework). The first version of the criteria had very tight prescription of which areas of the criteria needed to be assessed in which form – particularly noticeable with the strict distinction when assessing 'English in the Daily World' and 'English in the World of the Imagination'. This would have meant that examination boards had little flexibility and so there may have been little choice for departments when they sought for a specification that meets the needs of their pupils. The revised criteria have opened up the assessment framework somewhat, however, so it may be that when the examination boards present their specifications there is some interesting diversity and some genuine choice for schools.
Assessment of Functional Skills raises concerns, too. These will be assessed separately, but a Level 2 is required if a 'C' grade at English or English Language is to be awarded. Given that the Functional Skills descriptions and those for Grade C are not necessarily obviously comparable, the danger would be – despite the criteria's claim of integration – that teachers find themselves under pressure to teach to the test for the Functional Skills component.
Finally, and most worryingly at this stage, and in some ways a result of some of the already mentioned factors, is the possible future of English Literature. Given the additional demands of the Literature criteria – six texts, 75% external examination – which on the surface appear to increase significantly content from the current English/English Literature double entry, the worry is that Literature will again become an elitist, option subject. The focus on functional skills, the importance of the 'C' in English for the league tables, and the demands for time of other statistically important subjects, may mean that English departments feel under pressure to focus on straight English for the bulk of their pupils. The criteria claim to offer flexibility, and suggest late decisions can be made about which subjects to enter pupils for, but it's difficult to believe this on closer inspection. It may be that by the end of Key Stage 3, the path for pupils severely restricts their exposure to literature, with the subject becoming solely the preserve of those destined to further study. A danger related to this – and indeed to some factors above – would be the further pressure to set or stream classes in Key Stage 4, a practice that many English Departments have consistently struggled to resist, believing mixed ability to be the most appropriate organisation for English teaching.
