London’s deputy mayor responsible for education and culture, in stating “this is about providing valuable knowledge to children, not just ‘learning to learn’”, shows that she has little understanding of the purpose of education. It is not acceptable for someone in her position to fail to grasp that learning to learn is immeasurably more important than gaining any “valuable knowledge”. Give a man a bowl of rice and you feed him for a day. Give him the tools to grow rice and you feed him for life.

Roger Broadie, Director, Broadie Associates.