The result of an interview at IV International Congress of Educational Innovation in Zaragoza published in El Pais.
The educationalist, professor at Ottawa University and assessor of the Scottish and Welsh educational reforms, says, “Do not blame teachers for the problems that are due to the educational structure”.
Andrew Hargreaves has investigated influential educational factors at universities in the UK, USA and Canada, including Ottawa and Boston College, where he is professor emeritus. He was born 71 years ago in North English working class family. He has written dozens of books,as well as citing as an advisor to the Welsh and Scottish Governments.
Q. You suggest that students are unable to learn properly if they lack wellbeing, feel unwell, don’t have friends or suffer bullying.
A. For a long time we have thought that wellbeing was unconnected to learning. Children need to be cared for, to know that they belong and they matter. These are important in themselves, but they also affect learning.
During the pandemic we have seen that children live in all sorts of homes and have parents who have to work, at times they struggle to feed their children, as well as other adults that they care for. This affects their mental health, as well as their learning.
Well-being has moved to the forefront and that is good, but we must be careful not to see well-being as simply protecting children from harm. That is vital, of course. They must be looked after, well fed and have a comfortable place to sleep,
We can do more. Children need to develop, to feel fulfilled, to do well, not all the time, but for most of the time. The best way to achieve this isn’t to treat it as something separate from learning, but more as a part of it.
One thing that makes children feel good is to go to school knowing that their teacher knows them, cares about them and that they will learn something new every day.
Q. Do schools pay enough attention to this aspect?
A. I believe that primary schools have prioritised integrated care of their children. This is one of the reasons why people become primary teachers.
Q. And in secondary school? Research shows that the enthusiasm for going to school in Spain declines at this stage.
- Certainly, in many places around the world, when children pass a certain age, around 11 years, they stop feeling as satisfied and motivated by school, the anxiety that they feel increases. Some people believe that this is a natural process, part of growing up. What happens then, after 16, to those who have remained in school, this predicament increases. Why? Because they want to stay and they can choose between more options. In the previous stage, between leaving primary school and 16 years they become happier. They encounter more teachers than in middle school. The teachers too have more students to look after than in primary schools, which makes it more difficult to care for them.
In addition, the students are bigger and the teachers feel that they need more control, more discipline, instead of involving them in activities with more movement and noise, but these may cause behavioural problems. Thus, the loss of motivation towards school should not be seen as a problem of growth, but rather as one caused by how we organise our educational centres.
Q. In international comparisons, the Spanish system stands out for the low level of collaboration between teachers. How much of a problem do you think this is?
- That teachers don’t collaborate is always a problem, similarly with other professions, like doctors. Engendering effective collaboration between teachers is a challenge in many countries. At times, the initial response is to blame the teachers. That is to say that teachers, like parents, have their own ideas and ways of doing things, they don’t like others interfering. However, the problem is more connected with the way that we create the structure and culture of our schools.
Q. How can they change.?
A. The person most able to effect this is the Head. In Spain, there is a complicated tradition of how the head is elected. Whoever leads a school often has difficult things to do. If you have been chosen, you are there to represent the community, not to help them overcome difficult situations, something that may, at times, uncomfortable.
Heads need to gain the teachers confidence and to support them. It’s not about disciplining them or evaluating them, rather having the authority to lead people towards a definite place that will be better for the school, though not everyone will immediately see its benefits. The person who leads must establish a culture, habits and patterns of collaboration.
Q. And what can Governments do?
A. They can create systems that give teachers time to collaborate. Are there enough teachers in schools, not just to take classes, but also to spend time with other teachers to plan, prepare, evaluate and improve their ways of teaching, not to spend all the time teaching. If you are a lawyer and spend all your time in court, you won’t have time to prepare your cases. It’s the same for teachers. Finland, a country with the best educational results is a good example. The teachers spend more time out of the classroom than any other country. This allows them to collaborate, plan, prepare, reflect and improve.
Q. The Spanish educational system is moving from being one based on content to being based on competences. A change that is not supported by everyone. Do you think that this is the right road?
R. I’m pleased that you are going to publish what I’m going to say. “Professor Hargreaves asks the reader that before this paragraph ends, they should try to answer two questions.
The first, “What is Boyle’s Law”
The second. “Who won the Hundred Years War”
Whenever I have asked these questions to thousands of people in many countries, the majority cannot answer them, even though they are topics that are studied in many places.
The question not that we should stop teaching them, rather how do we teach them.
If you examine Boyle’s Law, which deals with pressure, temperature and volume of gases, properly, you will see that it does not apply in certain circumstances. If they had explained to me that this shows that Science is not perfect, but it continually advances and has to update its conclusions; I would have remembered that idea and used it for the rest of my life.
And, if they had explained to me that the Hundred Years War resulted in countries creating permanent armies. In view of the Ukraine War, perhaps I might ask myself, “Do we need bigger permanent armies? That is a relevant question”,
Certainly, we cannot teach everything, we are always going to have to make choices.
Whatever we select, the most important thing is how we teach them, so the children acquire knowledge, skills ad abilities that last for the rest of their lives, instead of forgetting them as soon as they leave school, for the rest of their lives.
Q. You have spent your career firstly teaching, then investigating Education; also you are a father and grandfather. What advice would you give parents about the education of their children?
A. The first thing that I would say to them is that we hear a great deal about preparing them for what they want to do, preparing them for work, “preparing them for jobs that haven’t been invented yet”, a phrase that seems mad to me. The Queen of England once said, “It’s a pity that people don’t have jobs for life”. That is to say that there is a lot of rhetoric about children’s preparation. But the best way of preparing children for the future is to educate them and care for them in the present and not treating the present as a waiting room for the future. Children spent a quarter of their lives in childhood, so we cannot treat childhood as a waiting room for something else. It is important in itself; it is important to feel loved, to belong, to live in a community and the family is their first community. They need to develop responsibilities and become the best that they can. To have a good time, but also to know how to strive and be aware that things can sometimes be difficult. It could be to play the guitar, which is difficult or become a great swimmer. There are lots of ways of doing it, but it is really about well-being, learning, a sense of belonging and of responsibility. If we do all of these, the future will by and large take care of itself.
I would say one more thing to them; “Listen to your son or daughter. Take them seriously and don’t downplay the importance of what they say to you and when something is bothering them, give them the same attention as if they were an adult.
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