Out, Damned Shakespeare

Chris Winson-Longley is a retired English teacher with over 25 years of experience and now Editor of Checkpoint Kids. In this article Chris asks whether the inclusion of “British” cultural icons, like Shakespeare, as core elements of the curriculum should continue unchallenged; and their relevance in “modern Britain”.

“Why do I need to learn Shakespeare?” was a question that became increasingly difficult to answer as my teaching career progressed. With the introduction of Michael Gove’s EBacc, and the Progress 8 performance measurement system, it’s a brave school that doesn’t enter even its least academically able students for a dual course combining English and English Literature. Under Gove, two GCSE passes in English became worth three – something that earns a school valuable points in the league tables. The EBacc consists of two English GCSEs, three Sciences, one Maths, one Modern Foreign Language and one History or Geography. This academic focus has been the centre of a considerable amount of criticism (most notably in a report by Lord Kenneth Baker) post-Covid and the very existence and relevance of GCSEs has come under question. Unfortunately, I’m not sure the Government will even begin to question decisions made by Michael Gove and that their ‘ambition … to see 75% of pupils studying the EBacc subject combination at GCSE by 2022, and 90% by 2025’ will remain in place however irrelevant it may be. Interestingly the model for the EBacc comes from 1904 which must surely lead one to question its appropriateness for the 21^st century.

…the model for the EBacc comes from 1904 which must surely lead one to question its appropriateness for the 21^st century.

With the removal of English Literature coursework, teaching became heavily focused on passing the exam, thus reducing the ability of creative teachers to find ways of engaging students in a subject they find incredibly difficult. It also places added pressure on students who now face the prospect of having to marshal their thoughts and articulate a response within a strict time frame, and on one particular day. Anyone who works with teenagers knows they have their good and bad days, just like the rest of us, and are particularly susceptible to changes in their environment. Knowing their future progress towards a career is determined by a two-hour exam puts enormous strain on their mental health.

At the same time, Gove insisted that the examination texts be written by British writers. Thus denying future generations the opportunity of engaging with texts such as “Of Mice and Men’ by the Pulitzer Prize winning author, John Steinbeck and devaluing the benefits of cross-cultural referencing and the appreciation that we live in a global world with a shared humanity. Teachers didn’t value this text, and others like it, because it promoted American culture or that it provided a critique of the failure of the American Dream, they taught it because it spoke directly and simply to students about the human condition, and particularly of those excluded from the ‘mainstream’ by dint of mental acuity, skin colour or being female. It is interesting to note that Animal Farm can be taught even though it’s a book about the Russian Revolution, promoted by the CIA, which requires several weeks of history to be taught before this complex political allegory can be put into context. Very British!

And so, I find myself wondering what answer I should give when asked “Why Shakespeare?” or Robert Louis Stevenson or any other specifically chosen, revered author that doesn’t articulate their narrative through contemporary language or address contemporary society. Although I fully acknowledge their historical relevance, there is no real value in the content of these texts anymore. Certainly, not for young people. So, why is it important for a few, now arguably irrelevant, cultural signifiers to be forced onto school curriculums?

Fear of culture loss

Is there a fear that Shakespeare, a bastion of our culture, will disappear if not imposed on successive generations? Where would we be without Shakespeare? How would we define ourselves without the Great Bard? And let us not forget Shakespeare has kudos. We can use him as a kind of international currency: he is great and by association so are we. Of course, there is no argument that Shakespeare is an important figure and should be celebrated as a British icon – in History lessons. But by prescribing the study of Shakespeare as a fundamental tenet of the educational ticket that the EBacc is supposed to give students regardless of their chosen career feels to me very Machiavellian.

Shakespeare is very difficult to teach if the ultimate aim is to pass an exam. Less able students find it particularly hard to decipher the poetry, the language, the complicated plots, the imagery… and then construct an articulate, evidence-based analysis in 45 minutes. To have a thorough working knowledge of the text, and to be practised enough to gain more than a Level 1 or 2, they need much more learning time than is available in Key Stage (KS) 4. Schools are therefore forced to allow the demands created by an examination culture to permeate and influence the teaching in KS3. No one wants this. Ofsted have openly criticised schools for teaching to the exams and have put measures in place to prevent GCSEs being taught in KS3. However, if Ofsted are genuinely interested in ‘learning’, then I would suggest they lobby the government to remove the EBacc and the league tables, otherwise schools are damned if they do and damned if they don’t.

What is it that we are trying to achieve through the teaching of Shakespeare? If it is to develop  an appreciation of Shakespeare’s art, then remove the straitjacket that is teaching it for an examination, and allow teachers to engender a more receptive audience. Or allow English Literature to be an option. Or, heaven forbid, allow schools the freedom to teach reading and its associated analytical skills up to KS4 and then apply those skills to Shakespeare in KS5.

Unappreciated and unengaged

Unfortunately, I do not believe that Shakespeare’s unique position in the GCSEs has anything to do with an appreciation of his craft. The texts have to be seriously reduced, adapted and ‘modernised’ for less able students. Quite often, all that remains are the character’s names and a simplified plot. Shakespeare is revered because he played games with language and form, he invented new words and he refused to be constrained by language. This is something only a minority of students can appreciate at 14 years old. If we are interested in all children, and not just the higher ability (in academic terms), we would do better to use more accessible texts and work our way up to Shakespeare. So why is he still here?  I believe it is because by teaching Shakespeare to every student, regardless of their ability to engage in such learning, allowed Gove and successive Governments to impose an agenda that has nothing to do with children’s educational needs but everything to do with using the curriculum to promote a politicised view of what being British is, whilst retaining a very clear divide between the academic students and those who have other skills.

In many respects, education is the establishment’s lacky. It is only interested in perpetuating its own vision of itself, which includes a narrowly defined view of what is valued historically – dictated by the Government. Unfortunately, it has no voice of its own. The education system doesn’t protest the irrelevant content it peddles because it is too invested in it.  The cultural and historical signifiers it promotes and celebrates are being seen more and more as flawed and unrepresentative of the majority of the British public.

…teaching Shakespeare to every student, regardless of their ability to engage in such learning, allowed Gove and successive Governments to impose an agenda that has nothing to do with children’s educational needs but everything to do with using the curriculum to promote a politicised view of what being “British” is.

Relevance and representation – appropriate for today?

If Shakespeare was written for, and so in some sense represents, a patriarchal, empire-building, warlike, white nation, what and where is its corollary? If we don’t appreciate Shakespeare, we are deemed unintelligent, uncultured, not British. If we prefer something else, we always feel less than perfect in the eyes of the establishment. The teaching of Shakespeare to developing minds promotes self-doubt and guilt – it also allows the establishment to set the agenda for a perceived British identity. The exclusive club which propagates such talents as Shakespeare and Austen excludes too many British citizens. This can be seen in the rise of the #MeToo, LGBTQ+, Windrush, #BLM – as well as many other – movements. British citizens who have been abused or feel disenfranchised by the education system are rising up through the democratising power of the internet. Popular culture like Facebook and Twitter are allowing their voices to be heard, and they are gathering momentum through strength of numbers. Ironically, it is the uncontrolled, uncontainable nature of the internet that is allowing for this revolution by the masses in a similar way to the rise of the workers’ voice and the introduction of unions when education was first introduced to serve the needs of the Industrial Revolution. I think Shakespeare might have been quite proud.

I think that the present government is fearful that if they don’t embed the value they place on our cultural icons in the minds of the young; if they don’t convince them that their lack of appreciation for Shakespeare is a personal failing on their part, then our cultural identity as a nation will be questioned. Their position as protectors of British values as defined by them will become untenable. The majority will no longer subscribe to their exclusive definition of what it means to be British.

Let his work stand on its own two feet

A measure of how important Shakespeare is to our sense of national identity would be to stop teaching him. Let his work stand on its own two feet. If we have to be educated to appreciate its worth or browbeaten into submission by the cultural weight it throws around, then it occupies a space in the culture akin to opera or modern art, neither of which are compulsory subjects in schools. I’m afraid I can already hear the nanny state saying that Shakespeare is good for us. But how is it? And who is ‘us’?

I believe that the questions I have raised about the teaching of Shakespeare to an audience it was never intended for should be applied to all of the texts studied in schools. In fact, I would go so far as to say all the content of the syllabus should face the same scrutiny. Is it fit for purpose? What is the reason for teaching this particular content? A text may have considerable merit as a work of literature, but what will be the effect of using it in the classroom? To state the obvious, Literary texts were written by specific people at specific times for a specific purpose. Once removed from their context they become relics, ancient historical artefacts. Unless they contain widely acceptable moral instruction or insights into the human condition, what is their relevance? What are children supposed to benefit from by studying them? The education system should ask whether these benefits can’t be more productively gained through other mediums. Children should always be at the centre of the learning. The education system should be preparing them for the adult world they are about to inhabit. It should celebrate global values of humane behaviour and not claim these to be exclusively “British”. And it should not use the education system to promote its own agenda of what defines being British.

Literary texts were written by specific people at specific times for a specific purpose. Once removed from their context they become relics, ancient historical artefacts.

Next time you talk to a teenager about what they are studying for their GCSEs, ask them what text they are reading in English. Ask them about its themes, the characterisation and the setting. Ask them about the language it uses, what values it is endorsing. And ask them who they think its audience is or was. Then ask them who it excludes, what it doesn’t discuss, who it ignores. If you have the time, ask them what they would like to read. As fiction generally concerns itself with the human condition and has the ability to put the reader into any situation imaginable, what they would like to experience? What insights would they like to be shown? How might the literature they read illuminate the contemporary world for them and help them to negotiate their way forward with confidence and enthusiasm? I’d be surprised if many of them chose Shakespeare.

Preparing the future generation

Ultimately, education should concern itself with the needs of the child, rather than the needs of the society in which they exist. The world is changing rapidly. Technological advancement together with our global interconnectivity mean that we can no more predict the future than Shakespeare could have predicted or even imagined the smart phone. To try and predict what our society will be like in only a few years’ time is not only futile, but also irresponsible. Especially if we persist with an education system based on an EBacc created in 1904 and an inaccurate and outdated definition of what constitutes British culture. 

There is a growing consensus that the present system is unfit for purpose. More than this, it is damaging young people with its attempts to impose an outmoded and outdated curriculum so that the establishment can validate a view of society that is familiar to them and that they have an unhealthy interest in perpetuating.

The change they fear may be frightening but it is inevitable; to inculcate that fear in young people is unconscionable. We can eliminate that fear by equipping young people with confidence and a sense of their own innate worth, and by equipping them with the tools to negotiate a future that will present as many difficulties as it does advantages. That means that what they encounter at school should be relevant and accessible. The content of the curriculum should not be of itself a barrier to learning.

Be the change

And we’re trying to do something about it.
At Checkpoint Kids we create Learning Packs inspired by videogames which develop intrapersonal skills. They focus on the same learning objectives identified by the Government’s Programmes of Study, but they utilise videogames’ unique ability to enthral and engage their audience: their capacity for developing the skills that industry, higher education and forward thinkers like the House of Lords, and Lord Baker in particular, subscribe to. They remove the barriers to learning that the curriculum content creates. Child-centred, they develop literacy and numeracy skills with recognisable outcomes such as newspaper articles, letters, encyclopaedia entries and leaflets. In addition, we facilitate dialogue between young people and professionals ranging from videogame developers and scientists at ESA to members of Team GB. Young people experience a real connection between themselves and the adult world that surrounds them. They feel enthused and inspired.

The future needs students who can work in teams, who can cooperate, collaborate, solve problems, think creatively, and who understand the technology of today so they can stride with confidence into tomorrow. The future demands risk-taking, the courage to fail and determination. Unless the education system changes the way it does business, it will be put out of business by the very change it fears.