Junior Cert cut to eight subjects to assist literacy and numeracy

JUNIOR CERTIFICATE students will study eight rather than 10 subjects starting with next year’s first-year student intake as part of a radical strategy to improve literacy and numeracy.

Under the plan primary schools will increase the time spent on literacy study to 90 minutes while maths education will increase from 36 minutes to 50 minutes.

Assessment of students in reading and maths in second, fourth and sixth class will be standardised and parents will be informed about how their children are doing in maths and literacy. The results will also be sent to school boards of management and the Department of Education to establish national literacy and numeracy levels.

For the first time standardised assessments will be introduced for second-year students at post-primary level.

The strategy aims to increase the proportion of children performing at the highest levels in measured standards such as the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development assessments by 5 per cent at both primary and secondary level and to halve the number at the lowest level.

The development of the strategy follows the OECD literacy assessment which showed Ireland had slipped in the international rankings. One of the objectives is to increase the proportion of students studying higher-level maths from 40 per cent to 60 per cent for both the Junior and Leaving Cert.

Minister for Education Ruairí Quinn said an initial reform in a major overhaul of secondary education is to limit the number of subjects at Junior Cert level. Pupils “can study a lot of subjects if they want to but will only sit exams in eight subjects. That gives more time for literacy and numeracy”.

He stressed that literacy and numeracy was an issue for all subjects whether maths or geography.

Mr Quinn said parents were central to the reforms. “Schools will engage parents and tell them where their child is in terms of their ability. They’re not going to be testing them for exam purposes but they will be measuring them to see how well they are learning.”

If the measurement showed a child is “having a problem at age five, six or seven, then the first people who will be informed will be the parents”.

Department of Education general secretary Brigid McManus said there was “very good practice in individual schools where they actually will have parent days, where parents come into the school”. She said there were a lot of parents “who would be quite happy to do things if they got a bit of help on what they should be doing”.

The department will work with the National Adult Literacy Association as part of the strategy. Often a “motivating factor for adults with literacy problems to do something about their literacy is to help their children”, Ms McManus added.

The Minister said numeracy and literacy was an issue of equality and without these skills “a young person or adult is often denied full participation in society” and condemned to poorly paid jobs, unemployment and a lifetime of exclusion.

He added that it was “no coincidence that more equitable societies tend to have more equitable education systems”.

MAIN POINTS

Recommendations of the National Literacy and Numeracy Strategy

* Exam subjects at Junior Certificate level will be reduced to eight starting with 2012 first-year student intake

* Primary schools will increase time for literacy study to 90 minutes a day and maths study will increase to 50 minutes from 36 minutes starting in September

* Standardised assessment will be used at 2nd, 4th and 6th class level, which will provide parents with focused results on their child’s performance

* Greater involvement of parents with better information on how to help their child’s literacy and numeracy development

* For the first time the same standardised assessment will be introduced in 2nd year at post-primary level

* The strategy aims to increase from 40 per cent to 60 per cent the proportion of students taking honours maths at Junior and Leaving Certificate level

* Targets also include improving the ratio of children performing at the highest level in standardised testing such as OECD assessment

* Bachelor of Education degree course for student teachers will increase from three years to four years

* Higher diploma courses will increase from one to two years

* Student teachers will spend longer in schools for teaching experience

* Major expansion of professional development courses for teachers with increased summer literacy training courses