Andrew's Current Issue 5

Title: Schools face up to global leagues
Date: December 1, 2007
Source: BBC News
Link:http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/education/7121718.stm

So, in the spirit of the discussion this week regrding global connections and communication, I found this article to be quite pertinant.

Of course, I always make comparisons between my teaching in the UK and here in NYC, and probably too often look at things through rose-tinted glasses (I hope that's a saying here).

So, it was very interesting for me to read this article having been out of the UK eduction system for 5 years now.

Much like NYC, the UK has a system of grading schools (the recent round of progress resports, and school evaluations is actually an idea from the UK and if you have a Brtish reveiwer, it's because the company the DOE hired, is British).

In the UK, these reveiews (test scores, teacher assessments, inspection reports, etc) go onto something called a League Table. These have been around for over a decade and are the cause of MUCH discussion amongst educators and parents.

Interestingly, the BBC are reporting on new GLOBAL league tables ranking the education systems, specifically in reading scores, and the news isn't great for England, at all.

The Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS) - http://nces.ed.gov/surveys/pirls/ is "an international comparative study of the reading literacy of young students. PIRLS studies the reading achievement and reading behaviors and attitudes of fourth-grade students in the United States and students in the equivalent of fourth grade in other participating countries"

Until I read this article, I had never heard of such a study, and the findings are interesting and eye-opening.

As the BBC reports, the countries making the most significant improvements or gains in literacy and reading skills are

• Russia
• Hong Kong
• Singapore
• Slovenia

All of which, have recently undergone significnt reforms in their education systems, noticeably in both Russia and Slovenia, a move to much earlier starting ages.

With more, similar reports due soon, and recent ones already published, it really is interesting for me to see what is happening globally in terms of literacy education.

For the record, the USA stayed the same in this global ranking.