Today’s Guardian has some new notes on the ongoing scandal that is the British education system. This time it’s a new OECD report ranking countries by numeracy and literacy, and the United Kingdom has fallen near the bottom. Worse still, the study finds that on average 16-24 year old Britons perform worse on both numeracy and literacy than do 16-55 year olds – that is, educational achievement has gone backwards in recent times. The depth of failure is also astounding:
a quarter of adults in England have maths skills no better than a 10-year-old, a conclusion that also prompted a political row in which the Conservatives attacked Labour’s record in government.
That means an estimated 8.5 million adults are only able to manage one-step tasks in arithmetic, sorting numbers or reading graphs. The same body also concluded that one in six adults could only just decipher sentences and read a paragraph of text – the literacy level of a child in their final year of primary education.
This is a pretty disturbing indictment of the British education system. The rankings also show it is under-performing relative to other English-speaking nations, with Australia and Canada out-performing the UK on every measure and the US close behind the UK. South Korea is top in numeracy and Japan top in literacy, which finding is particularly staggering given that literacy in Japanese requires a huge commitment of time and effort just to learn the vocabulary in comparison with English. The UK government is trying to blame Labour, pointing out that a 24 year old tested by this report would have spent their entire education under Labour, but I think that’s a little simplistic – education systems are slow to shift, and education methods, infrastructure and workforce obviously have legacy affects that would strongly influence outcomes long after the government that set them has disappeared into the trash bin of history. The Guardian is taking a more nuanced approach, attempting to understand what it is about education policy in Japan that makes Japanese students so good. It makes the good and obviously alarming point about differences in attitude towards education between the countries:
Japanese senior high school teachers, and their pupils, are often incredulous when they learn that 16- to 18-year-olds in England can drop maths and literature and study just three A-level subjects of their choice.
Add me to the ranks of the incredulous. When I was finishing high school you had to do five subjects. What else would be reasonable? And to the best of my knowledge I could only drop maths in my final year, and had to do one science and one humanities amongst my five subjects. What do English students do with their time?
This article, however, also brings up the common criticism of Japan’s education system – in fact it brings it up twice – and presents this criticism as some kind of counter-balance to the system’s strong focus on rote learning and hard work. The article states:
Japan’s state education system is often criticised for quashing original thought among pupils in favour of rote learning, and for placing an emphasis on theory rather than practical skills …
The stress on memorising information and passing exams, which begins in primary school and continues through to senior high, has been blamed for stifling critical, independent thought
This is a personal bug bear of mine, and something I find really frustrating about western coverage of Japan in particular and of Asia generally, for two reasons: it exaggerates the extent to which western students learn “critical thought” and it valorizes western “critical thought” as something that somehow counter-balances ignorance, or has some kind of value separate from the basic knowledge and skills required to inform critical analysis.
In terms of exaggeration, I remember growing up in the Australian school system, entering university, and interacting with peers during that period, and I can’t say that between us we had a shred of critical thought. We all failed essays at university and had to be taught a whole bunch of things about analysis and critical thinking skills, and university tutors in the humanities will often talk about how the students they get in first year are just repeating rote what they learnt from parents and peers. So the idea that western schools are a haven of critical thinking strikes me as a little exaggerated. Yes, high school students in the west spend more time spouting their opinions in essays than Japanese students, but so what? I’m sure that lots of British students have spent time in the library photocopying their arsehole, but that doesn’t mean they’re good at art.
But more importantly – and the reason this annoys me – critical thinking is a complete waste of time, and can even be counter-productive, if it is alloyed with ignorance and an inability to read. Let’s review the facts about one in six adults in the UK, who could “only just read a paragraph of text.” Why don’t we slap down the IPCC summary for policy makers in front of one of these adults and ask them to critically analyse it. Are they going to produce an analysis with any critical value, no matter how well they learnt to spray their opinions at school? I don’t think so – especially if they have maths skills no better than a 10-year-old. Perhaps it might be better if these adults were first able to understand the IPCC summary, before they embarked on a critique. Indeed, it might be better if these adults refrained from criticizing things they can’t read, because if you don’t understand something it’s likely your critical thinking about it is going to be of little value. You cannot present “independent, critical thought” as a boon independent of the skills that underlie basic comprehension, because one depends on the other. This isn’t to say that both can’t be taught in school, but it’s clear that the UK and US are not doing that. If you teach “critical thought” without teaching the skills it depends on, what you are actually teaching is rhetoric: the ability to bend facts to support your pre-conceived ideological goals. That this is taught in UK schools is not a positive thing.
Critical, independent thinking is not actually a hallmark of western culture: spouting opinions is. If we are such good critical independent thinkers, how come we got lied into a war in Iraq, participated in the massive con that was the housing bubble and the GFC, still haven’t come up with a solution to global warming, and managed to wage the biggest and most disastrous war in human history (WW2). Is it possible that what we see is a virtue is actually a flaw? Or, more likely, we aren’t doing it at all? After all, the land of limited independent thought, Japan, has a low crime rate, high employment, little inequality, and has a strong opposition to engaging in any form of war. They have an economy much larger than their population would be expected to have, exert a significant positive influence in the world, and make all the stuff you use even though they have no resources to speak of. Perhaps an education system that doesn’t focus on “independent, critical thinking” is more beneficial to society than one that does? Or perhaps the West is so full of its own opinions that it mistakes ranting for thinking?
This article’s platitudes about critical thought might go down well with educated British readers, but to me they’re just another example of the standard rhetorical footwork employed by journalists about Japan: on the one hand, a weak and stereotypical assessment of Japanese as conformist; and on the other, a triumphalist reassurance that westerners are all free-thinking individuals. Both of these two steps in the movement are wrong, and the underlying assumptions about the value of critical thinking to a functioning society, as well as the facts about how prepared western school leavers are to engage in such thought processes are also deeply flawed. A little more nuance would be nice.
Also of passing interest in this debate that the UK will now have with itself over its education policies is the role of inequality, and the relative benefits of development compared to birthrates in preparing for the future. How can the education levels of young adults in the UK be going backwards at the same time as average GCSE scores are going up? One answer, readily deployed by conservatives, is “grade inflation.” The other answer is inequality: that if you looked into the background of that “one in six adults” you would find they were much more likely to be poor and from certain areas. Japan, of course, has very little inequality compared to the US and the UK, and Australia and Canada are much more equal than the US and the UK. Interesting how the rankings seem to reflect the inequality within these countries. Also, if one in six of your young adults lack basic literacy and one in four of your adults lack basic numeracy, I think it’s safe to say that you have a problem with your workforce, and no industrialized, developed nation can hope to maintain its economic and cultural development with this kind of lack of investment in its workforce. Although England has a higher birthrate than Japan or South Korea, which country has the larger number of suitable new entrants to its workforce? Who is better placed to maintain a high-skilled pool of workers? The UK with something like 20% of its workers incapable of even basic office duties, or Japan and South Korea? Maintaining birth rates is not the be-all and end-all of maintaining a sustainable social order, especially if a large minority of all those born are going to grow up to be completely unable to contribute to the economy. British policy-makers need to be looking at the long-term implications of their education and industrial strategies (such as they have any) if they want to maintain anything resembling the quality of life that modern industrialized economies have come to expect.
Perhaps they could start by reassessing what they consider to be educational priorities, and trying to look beyond party-political point-scoring. “It’s Labour’s fault” is hardly a sterling example of the “critical thought” that UK policy-makers supposedly learnt at school. But then, maybe it’s an alternative when you don’t have the skills to read the report …
Compromise and Conceit 
October 10, 2013 at 11:00 am
I agree that the analysis presented of the failure in the UK education is underwhelming, but I don’t agree this is just a pro-Western cultural bias coming through in the report. The discussion of “rote learning” versus “critical analysis” is a well established argument in the UK and Australia. It primarily manifests as conservative “back to basics” campaigns from right wingers versus “we need to be ready for the creative/future/knowledge/whatever economy” from left wingers.
The left wingers damn the rote learning for failing to teach critical analysis and the right wingers complain that kids these days have never heard of king X or how WWII ended or how to do long division by hand or similar. [1]
As such, citing Japan as getting better results isn’t cultural bias, it’s just data that actual could be used to support existing arguments but is instead being rejected on the same basis as it always is. I’d agree that rote learning absolutely has its place and should be increased in Western schools to catch up with Eastern education. For example, I barely understood simultaneous equations way back when, but I still find myself digging that knowledge out semi-regularly when calculating break even points on investments. Explaining that to kids is a waste of time as the use each person finds for it (or what they find a use for) is different. And has nothing to do with critical analysis…
I’d go further and suggest this plays into two other common flaws in Western educational discussions. I’d be interested in your thoughts on whether they occur in Japan.
1. In Australia, I’ve got a number of family members and friends with Arts degrees who get defensive about the value of their degree versus a vocational style degree (i.e. Commerce or IT) [3]. Every time the topic comes up they seem to take a stance that while Arts may not be directly applicable to most of life, it taught them critical information about logic and how to think.
I’m cool with that, but it’s like they think that Accounting doesn’t teach logic and how to think critically. Of course Accounting is also useful if you want to read a financial statement or become an accountant [4], but this ability to actually be used is treated as if its a weakness or detracts from the usual university fare of thinking rather than something that’s a benefit.
I’ll state my stance clearly: Anyone who thinks that a philosophy degree teaches you something about thinking logically that computer coding can’t has failed to think logically (or understand what good coding is). This is pretty much the same for all the other applied courses [5].
2. Related to the fetishisation of non-applied courses is an over emphasis on university attendance as the only valid educational outcome (also mentioned in passing in the Guardian article on Japan). Western countries seem to think that getting a degree in hospitality is better than running a hotel or working in a cafe.
I’m cool with the fact that jobs are paid different amounts, so this attempt to make everything any anything a university degree seems to just be pointless elitism. Surely we can all agree that a degree in homeopathy results in just an over credentialed con man – why not just have someone piss into a jar and overcharge for it like the old days? [6]
[1] In Australia, the argument I see most frequently is about the inclusion of phonics in the reading curriculum. [2]
[2] On a somewhat related note, I was trying to work out an English equivalent to learning 2000 kanji characters and the closest I could think of was requiring kids to learn 2000 difficult to spell works that contain exceptions to the usual spelling advice given (i.e. i before e except after x). Can you think of a better analogy?
[3] Interesting, I don’t know anyone with a Science degree who gets defensive about the content of their degree. All of them just went out and got jobs without feeling they had to explain why their degree was awesome. Some will admit that the degree isn’t directly applicable to most of their life, but never feel the need to explain that mixing toxic chemicals taught them logic and not to lick spoons or whatever.
[4] Here’s hoping no one reading this does, but each to their own.
[5] Even Accounting. I suck at it, but I can assure you that part of the reason I suck at it was I didn’t grasp the importance of decision making in the process. I thought it was like high school maths, when I suspect it’s more like advanced maths where lots of options are right-ish but some are more optimal.
[6] Anyone detecting a hatred of homeopathy? Good.
October 10, 2013 at 11:09 am
“Every time the topic comes up they seem to take a stance that while Arts may not be directly applicable to most of life, it taught them critical information about logic and how to think.”
It should be obvious, but I have no objection to Arts students telling me their 20th Century Literature subject taught them more about 20th century literature than I know or that their Philosophy subject taught them more about schools of philosophical thought than I do.
What I object to this abstraction of those things to universal concepts like logic or “how to think” as if thinking about software analysis, economics or damn near anything else doesn’t do the same to the same degree (i.e. highly dependent on the individual).
October 10, 2013 at 11:06 pm
My complaint here is not about the analysis of problems in British education, though I agree it’s underwhelming, but the sadly stereotypical analysis of differences between Asian and Western styles of education and the importance of critical thinking. Plus the misperception of where and how it is actually taught in Western curricula. You are absolutely right to observe, for example, that philosophy students very quickly bridle at the suggestion their degree is useless, and offer in exchange the idea that it teaches “critical thought.” Everyone is doing this – claiming that their own degree inculcates this mythical +5 bonus to everything[1]. Could it be that all university courses teach this because, well, developing more skills improves your ability to be a critical thinker? Or could it be that actually philosophy graduates don’t learn “critical thought,” but simply develop the skills required to apply their natural critical faculties in their field? This would explain why so many AGW denialists are engineers – because they’re lost and alone outside their field. It would explain a lot, actually! Could it be that when presented with an advanced text in any field other than accounting, an accountant’s critical skills are limited? And that “critical thought” is actually a non-existent phenomenon outside of the skills that support it?
I also note that your comments are about university whereas I was talking about high school graduates. I think this is because actually high school graduates don’t have any genuine critical skills to speak of, and this is something that we learn at uni – which is why in comparing critical faculties you naturally graduated to contemplation of your university peers. High school is for learning skills, not some sort of esoteric shit.
As to whether these things occur in Japan: 1. I have never encountered any critical comparisons of different degrees, but this could be because in Japan your undergraduate degree is not counted as anything except progress towards a job; and 2. Japan has a huge network of tanki daigaku (two year colleges) that teach practical stuff and are considered a perfectly acceptable choice. These colleges are also accepted as only providing a qualification and it is assumed that when you start a job in the field your qualification covers you will get actual training. I think Japanese people are more inclined to see university as a setting for further skill development, and don’t judge it for how well it trains you to twist facts to suit your own opinion.
The phonics issue is a fascinating moment of weirdness in education debate. I don’t know anything about the best way to teach English but I just get this general feeling that “phonics” vs. “not phonics” is a weird esoteric debate taken up by a few shock-jocks, that teaching professionals don’t even see as an issue. As I understand it most schools incorporate a wide range of these kinds of teaching philosophies into their curriculum and phonics is part of it; but for some reason some ideologue has convinced some shock jocks that phonics are the cat’s meow, and so those shock jocks are on a campaign to rid the world of all non-phonics teaching. It’s an example of how hard it must be to be a primary school teacher – everyone who doesn’t teach hard shit to kids has an opinion on how you should be doing it.
I only teach stats to adults now, but when I was a postgrad in Australia I was paid to do a bit of tutoring in basic maths to adults. Specifically, there was a program to train Aboriginal people to be teaching assistants in remote Aboriginal communities, I think partly because the locals didn’t necessarily speak English as a first language and partly because the teachers who went there needed local support (I’m sure you can imagine). I was paid to teach basic maths – i.e. fractions and the like – to these teaching assistants, who were mostly 40-50 something women from the stolen generation. I’m sure you can imagine that it was a bit strange to have a 25 year old white guy teaching fractions to these women who were old enough to be my mother. They took it all well – it was all good, and they were very positive and engaged – but the big lesson for me (an obviously untrained physics student teaching basic maths to people with no higher education background) was that teaching basic stuff is really fucking hard and anyone who does it on a daily basis is a legend. The students I get now are polished – even if they don’t understand something they know how to seek out knowledge and they have the necessary higher education prerequisites. But these teaching assistants weren’t, they were like a blank slate in many areas. This was much harder! When you are teaching basic algebra to people with no high school education, it’s an entirely different kettle of fish. You don’t want ideology about “phonics” or whatever then: you want whatever works. So the “phonics” debate just mystifies me, and suggests that it’s yet another area where a couple of arseholes (shock jocks and a few really weird conservatives like Chris Pyne) are turning a non-debate into a political cudgel.
Which is obviously a big problem in education and which is exactly what the conservative government are doing now with this OECD report, rather than deal with any nuanced attempt to understand what needs to be done better.
I should also point out that I’m a left winger in favour of rote learning. I wonder if the dividing line on these issues is not left/right but maths-science/non-maths science? Since rote learning is much more important in science …
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fn1: actually, in a rare point in their favour, I don’t have any knowledge of whether homeopathy graduates claim this[2].
fn2: which is just as well, since it clearly doesn’t.
October 11, 2013 at 8:43 pm
I started to read this article, but after a paragraph or two I realized I didn’t have the literacy skillz to read further. Must’ve spent too much time in primary school critically thinking about ninja turtles and footy cards.
October 13, 2013 at 5:42 pm
how do you critically think about footy cards?