It's time to bite the bullet

Are cracks already beginning to appear in the new curriculum? Okay, the new English course won't actually be taught until September this year, but in-service days, educational publishers' soirees and staffroom discussions are proceeding apace. So far so good?

Take one publishers' gathering, at which there was a good cross-section of teachers - different age groups, teachers from designated disadvantaged schools, good urban and rural representation - and the same problem manifested itself in a number of different ways. As ever, it boils down to the old versus the new.

Not everyone is convinced of the benefits of a new curriculum with less emphasis on reading performance in the early years. It's understandable when teachers are being lambasted in the media for our poor levels of literacy in the international tables. If we want to improve literacy, why are we starting later? On the other hand, the Scandinavian model shows it can be done - teach reading from the age of six or seven and still come out tops.

It was clear at this meeting that some teachers intend to follow the old ways. They are perfectly happy with the standard achieved, say, at the end of senior infants, and don't see any reason to change. Irate new-curriculum supporters threw scorn on these views - it isn't simply a question of "to read or not to read?", but a complete change of emphasis: to enhance children's oral and aural skills in a television-dominated world, to give them the tools to assimilate and question, to develop their emotional responses and to teach them to appreciate language for itself through rhyme, drama and story telling. If they pick up some reading skills on the way, well and good. When their intellects have matured, then bring on the formal reading.

The dilemma didn't resolve itself in the night and is certainly echoed in our staffroom, with older teachers in particular clinging to the tried and trusted.

So what's going to happen come September? Some children will go home with their readers and little envelope of words and others will not and the question of how come little Johnny can read when Mary can't will haunt many a teacher.

As a profession, shouldn't we follow the same general pattern? Are we going to follow the new curriculum or are we not? Recently it was said on radio that teachers are losing the public relations battle. Parents will compare notes. And nobody knows better than teachers how parents react if they even suspect that their offspring is not getting his due. Come on - let's get . We don't need to open up any more fronts to attack. Let's embrace the new curriculum wholeheartedly and as a whole.