Standards- be careful what you name, you might just become!

Abstract

The educational mantra “Good, better, best, never let it rest...”, which as children we parrotted in our classes went on to conclude “... till your good is better and your better, best”. The phrase has measures (good), method (being tireless) and, of considerable note, the self-referencing and reflective ‘your’. Somewhere in my teacher’s drawers were also miraculous, be-sparkled stars for ‘excellent’. Only the teacher’s pets, Glenys and Karen ever got these. As a male, boys never became teacher’s pets, at least not in my experience. These days, ‘good’ and ‘best’ seem to have been upgraded to ‘excellent’ or ‘excellence’. Excellence is the totem cry of awards, rewards, and prizes and, just as it was in my school child days, for the non-excellent, also the cry of disappointment. Many of our institutions summon forth ‘excellence’ as a modern mantra. As we focus our attention on teaching standards, we need to be very responsible about the values underpinning any standards we care to name. These standards will present choices, each with their own methods. They are therefore ethical propositions. We need to recall we are not primary school children, but adult teachers and learners who should not need parrot phrases nor seek prizes and stars to keep us focussed, directed and aware of who we are and who we wish to be.