What a Nottingham University professor told this newspaper last Sunday came as no surprise. An exercise carried out by The Malta Independent on Sunday last year specifically said the same things and, frankly, at that time we were not surprised by what we had found out, either.
Roger Murphy, Professor of Education at the University of Nottingham, said that having short school hours is a major shortcoming in our education system, and is the main cause for up to 78 per cent of fourth and fifth-formers having to attend private lessons in one or more subjects.
Labour MP Evarist Bartolo went one step further than Prof. Murphy, telling this newspaper that the time has come to seriously consider increasing both the number of school hours per day and the number of school days per year. This, he said, must be coupled with other measures to ensure that a more holistic type of education is offered to our students rather than one which, in Prof. Murphy’s words, is based on spoon-fed information rather than aimed at the development of thinking skills.
I agree wholeheartedly with both Mr Bartolo and Prof. Murphy. I think that the short school day and school year is detrimental to our education system. For one thing, syllabi have to be crammed into fewer hours of teaching, which adds to the stress for teachers as well as to the frustration of students. More contact hours would also help the provision of a more comprehensive type of education.
The Malta Union of Teachers, however, will not budge from its position. It wants to keep the hours as they are, defending the teachers’ privileges at the expense of the overall interests of the community and the nation. Likewise, the government said that there is no intention to adjust the schooling hours.
The exercise carried out by The Malta Independent on Sunday last year clearly showed that Maltese students enjoy the most number of holidays during the academic year. In total, Maltese students have 90 days of holidays, and this excludes the weekends. Our report was uncontested.
The average number of holidays in the 29 countries listed in the European Commission study on school time in Europe for the 2010-2011 academic year was 76 days, with Dutch children having the least, just 60.
Maltese students spend a maximum of 170 days in school, while their Japanese counterparts spend 243 days. In the United States, students attend school on 180 days but there is a push, backed by President Obama, for this number to be increased to 200. “We are no longer a nation of farmers,” he said.
Neither are we.
The above statistics are evidence that Maltese children spend less time in school than their counterparts. When one then adds the fact that Maltese students have six-hour days – and this includes break-time – it becomes even clearer that the number of student-teacher contact hours is lower than that experienced elsewhere. Abroad, schools finish later than 2.30pm, and there are countries that also have lessons on Saturdays.
What Prof. Murphy said makes sense – the less contact hours, the less students will learn, and the more the need arises for them to make up for this by going to private lessons. This obviously comes at a cost to the parents, and not every family has the financial means to support such an expense. What is worse, he pointed out, is that private lessons are unregulated – in all aspects.
I just wonder whether the type of results that are obtained by our children would be possible without them having private lessons. Should we be proud that, for our children to succeed, the great majority of them need extra tuition outside school hours? Should our schools be proud that what they are doing is not enough?
Increasing the number of school days and extending the school day by a couple of hours will go a long way to reducing the need for private lessons. But there are other reasons why children should be spending more time at school.
One of them is that, apart from getting that extra time they need for academic subjects, they will also have more time for extra-curriculum activities for which there is no allocation in the current format.
Our students lack time – in school – for drama, art, music, dance, sport and other activities that help them develop physically and psychologically. As things stand today, students sit behind their desks for long hours, and schools do not fit such activities into their curriculum simply because there is no time for them.
Is this the right way? We get children with pencils in hand at three years of age and at five they sit for their first tests. And the older they grow, the less time they have to develop skills that go beyond learning mathematics and English.
This takes me to another issue that was raised by Prof. Murphy. And, again, he is right. “Much teaching in Malta seems to be designed to impart factual knowledge. Elsewhere, students are encouraged to develop their thinking skills”.
What he is saying is that our education system just feeds information to students which they are asked to absorb like sponges. They study things by heart, simply to pass an exam, not as part of their life-long education. Little time is given for debate and argument in the classroom. What the teacher says is irrefutable – it cannot be contested. This is why it is hard to find a student with opinions, one who can argue in favour of or against a given topic. It’s because students have always been taught to accept things as they are without raising questions.
Some bring up the excuse that it is impossible to extend our academic year because of our hot summers. This is a ridiculous argument, similar to the one that is made by pampered civil servants who do not want to work full days during the summer months, and it is an argument that simply does not hold water. Today, buildings can be constructed to better withstand the summer heat and, in addition – and unless I am mistaken – air-conditioners do exist. Malta is not the only country with a warm climate and, turning the argument around, there are many countries in the north where the winters are cold and it snows for weeks on end – and yet schools open in winter too, and there are no holidays just because temperatures are below freezing point or thereabouts.
There is then one final argument why school days and school years should be longer. We have the lowest percentage in the EU of women in the workforce, and the main reason for this is that they want to be home when their children come back from school. The way things are, it is impossible for them to take a full-time job. Others make do with a part-time job that enables them to juggle with their employment and family duties. If the school day was longer, and if holidays were shorter, I am sure that more and more women would be encouraged to find employment.
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