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English literature GCSE

Arran Cameron
What does the IET and the engineering community think of the English literature GCSE? Is it relevant or beneficial for engineering or is it (like food tech) something that hardly anybody cares about?


English literature is a near compulsory GCSE in England but is now optional in Wales where it has experienced quite a heavy decline in the number of secondary school students taking it.
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    I hated my English literature studies, paid the subject no heed and was late for the exam, but if I recall correctly it was my only grade A at O level. All credit to an excellent teacher.

    Today I very much enjoy reading, mostly via old fashioned paper and sourced from charity shops and stalls, and find factual history, largely military, to be fascinating.
  • Former Community Member
    0 Former Community Member
    I read on Sunday afternoon.

    I finished my MBA in 2004.

    Then, I started to read.

    So far, I have read 96 books.
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    I have only managed two or three this year so far, like Mark due to being too busy on other things.

    How many books you read is nothing to do with your profession, though the type of book you read may be. I spent my time at school avoiding reading the set books as I couldn't get on with them, but read many others. We read through Shakespeare's plays in class so I couldn't avoid them, but have enjoyed seeing the plays in the theatre or on film since then. However reading is just one of my interests. Am I unusual in having a wide range of interests both within and outside engineering?

    Alasdair
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    Cheong Tsoi:

    How many engineers will read a book once a week? Once a month? Once a year? Think about it?.....:-)




    <Raises hand>


    OK, I've only managed to pick up a couple so far this year because I've been busy on other things in my spare time.

  • Former Community Member
    0 Former Community Member
    How many engineers will read a book once a week? Once a month? Once a year? Think about it?.....:-)
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    Mark Tickner:

    English Literature ought to be used to encourage reading for pleasure and reading a varied range of genres... I suspect it doesn't.



    A parent mentioned at a home education meeting that English literature is a subject that you either love or hate. English literature is one of the most popular A Levels, which is indicative that a lot a children enjoy the subject at GCSE, but for children who didn't enjoy English literature at GCSE, then after being hammered with all the Shakespeare et al then they will probably never want to read fiction for pleasure again.


    Lisa Miles:

    I did Pure English Literature at A level and I can confidently say that yes it has enriched my life. ? I absolutely loved studying Shakespeare and love watching his plays be they in a theatre or on TV.   See 45 Everyday Phrases Coined by Shakespeare to understand his influence on the English language. 



    I consider Shakespeare's plays to be sophisticated in style and probably too complex for a sizeable fraction of secondary school students to properly appreciate and comprehend to be in a compulsory GCSE subject. There are many students who are struggling with English language at GCSE and most don't have a hope in hell of ever managing to understand Shakespeare to the level required to achieve a respectable grade in English literature. Therefore I think that Shakespeare is a subject for an optional GCSE or after school club.


    Roy Bowdler:
    I would therefore strongly recommend the study of “storytelling” as a something valuable for engineers looking towards leadership. As a purely personal feeling, I also think that it is easy to slip “over the line” into intellectual pretentiousness through the use of language intended to impress rather than inform, but that is in the eye of the beholder.  Examples might include references to classics, Latin etc, which are primarily the realm of those privately educated or specialised academic language.



    Stories are one thing but the classics of literature are another. There are times when I think that any work of fiction that cannot be understood by a 12 year old of average intellectual ability is specialised material. I'm from a faction of society who prefers cartoons and video games to literary classics. One of my favourite cartoons is the Mysterious Cities of Gold which has a very strong storyline behind it.
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    There was/is a an A level icalled 'the use of English', this was purely covering, as far as I can assertain structure, grammer, composition, etymology and possibly historical etymology.

    However, as you might have perceived, this was not one that I took.


    However, any strucutred learning has value if only to discipline the mind to concerntrate and evaluate ideas.


    Legh
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    My mother took just 8 O Levels and so did most other students of her generation. English literature was compulsory at her school (along with English language, mathematics, and one science) but given the choice she would not have taken it although she was happy with her other subjects. In more recent times it has become the norm to take 11 or 12 subjects at GCSE. There is some evidence of a law of diminishing returns when it comes to the number of GCSEs taken, so that the advantages of 12 GCSEs over 8 is marginal and far less than the advantage of 8 GCSEs over 4.


    There are times when I think that there should be a technical and factual English GCSE that goes into greater depth than what is covered in the existing English language GCSE. Whether Britain has the teachers who can teach such a GCSE is a different matter.
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    Arran Cameron: What does the IET and the engineering community think of the English literature GCSE? Is it relevant or beneficial for engineering... 




    My view is that it's helpful at GCSE level for prospective engineers to appreciate at some basic level the rich and varied literary heritage and culture of the society they will likely serve. Being able to write clearly, accurately and coherently, adapting language and style in, and for, a range of contexts, purposes and audiences, use discussion in order to learn, elaborate, and explain their understanding, and their ideas, and make formal presentations and participate in debate, are all useful skills whatever profession students ultimately pursue.  English Literature, when taught well, can help with much of that.  (Excuse the earlier run-on sentence - it certainly wasn't my strongest subject) ;-)  ?

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    Arran Cameron:

    In a survey of parents, asking what the most useless and pointless secondary school subject is (not the one that they were worst at or hated the most), English literature was a clear first. Nobody picked English language or ICT.




    Well its very important to get 'gang wise' and slaughter your first saber-tooth as entry to the tribe and then to provide food and clothing by hunting down and killing your woolly mamouth But then that's the choice the human race has to contend with......hunt with the pack or starve in a garret....

    There is definitely a problem with developing enthusiasm in young people to take up the arts. Can the arts tell us anything about life? History and that old chessnut, Classics are better candidates to give us direction but it seems that young people do not desire positive direction but instant access to self gratification and self grandiment.  As soon as the hormones kick in antlers start to grow and the brains drop down the legs, but then that is not such a bad thing as we're producing some fine young performance artists.


    Legh

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