What are the goals for the 30-1 course?
Why writing only about literature in the secondary ELA course?
What happens when the test corporation/ministry decides for the students what they will write about? This kills passion for writing, and so they don’t invest themselves in their writing. Ultimately, this means we really don’t know how well they write.
Portfolios are the answer–they give a much better sense of how well students write.
How do we quantify aspects of writing like “passion”? This is a requirement of accreditation reviews.
David Jolliffe: Common core standards lead to a standard test. Personal writing is not a value of the standard tests used in the US. Passion doesn’t figure into it.
Breadth of figues in the conversations: how did you deal with power dynamics and hierarchies within the educational system?
Bob Broad: local decisions matter
Similar project happening in Buffalo, NY
No doubt this is true for an experienced teacher. I can imagine the people who made the initial comment agreeing with your point, but also pointing out that the overall effect might not be good for all teachers in a system. But let’s assume you are right and topic-setting is not a great problem: are there other issues that we should be worried about more than this one?
Speaking as a high school English teacher, I’ve found that there are always ways for students to get invested in a topic, no matter how pedestrian or (initially) uninspiring it is. That some government ministry is going to set topics for what students can write about is a) already happening to some degree on the diploma exams anyway; b) alarmist and unnecessarily provocative; c) not a problem for a creative teacher and a responsive student; d) an unavoidable situation when there is results-based evaluation. Hint: that’s not a multiple-choice question.