Four words that put the fear of God into secondary pupils.
Tonight I was at my daughters secondary school to listen to the Head and Deputy emphasise how important the choices that the students have to make are. I sat through 35 minutes of them both standing in front of a Powerpoint slide show and reading out what was written on the screen. Arghhhh Death by powerpoint. I'd only talked about this the other day, and here was another example of it. They could have printed it out and given me the sheet to read in my own time, rather than make me sit and listen to them.
Anyway, with the Powerpoint torture over, it was time to go and discuss the actual content of the lessons that she might opt for. ICT was first. What would the course contain? Well, nothing had been finalised (new course content - still writing it!) but it seems that in Years 10 and 11 they'll be learning to use excel to make spreadsheets, publisher to make posters / adverts etc, and (wait for it) using video to make multimedia content. I don't want to sound smug but my juniors are doing this now. And as for the exam paper - the example I read had some classic questions "what does multimedia mean", "what is a flash stick used for".
History seemed better than I remember it when I was at school, and her languages options (French and German) were OK too. So it seems sorted. All four options chosen. Hopefully.
