On Thursday 03 Jul 2003 10:06 pm, ian wrote:
On Thu, 2003-07-03 at 21:24, David Bowles wrote:
Here are some observations based on my experience in secondary schools:
But what evidence have you based on your experience that will provide Richard Rothwell with a case to take the OFT? Have you observed or been told by teachers that they must buy M$ Office because the exams require it?
If you look through the exam specifications (www.edexcel.org.uk, www.aqa.org.uk) there are no really explicit pushes for M$ stuff, though it is mentioned here and there, and the exam boards penalise students for talking about brand names and not applications. However, the key texts for GCSE, GNVQ, and GCE, AVCE are all written exclusively for M$ products (see www.payne-gallway.co.uk). I was at an A Level examiners meeting last year and mentioned that some students would be familiar with other systems and that had to be taken into consideration and I was told that it was insignificant. I think this relates to the comments by David relating to ICT coordinators as many people that are running the exam boards are not really computer savvy. However, I have to say in defense that most people who know anything about computers would not be stuck in teaching. I use Linux for ideological reasons as I am a socialist and the ideals built into the system appeal to me. I am not (no offense to the people on this list) a computer geek and I struggle with it. At times I find Linux infuriatingly complicated and many of my attempts to wean students from M$ have failed because of technical issues that I don't have the man hours to overcome. The other thing, related to what I say above, is that there are no decent books and support material yet to support a move to something else. I am working on a book about using Open Source but I don't know how far it will get and may only be something I use to support my own teaching. At my current school I have a network manager who was trained exclusively on RM and M$. He is unwilling and unable to load and support OO for me or any other open source software unless it is approved and created by RM. I am hoping my new school in September is not the same :) Paul
We need to stay focused if we want any of this action to help. Describing the problems is less helpful than solving them - which is why OFSTED's job is a lot easier than the schools.
-- ian <ian.lynch2@ntlworld.com>