CHRIS Woodhead attacks “windy rhetoric”, “self-indulgent nonsense” and “wacky theorising”. Wouldn’t we all?
In my experience, teachers are well able to cut through “pseudo-academic obfuscation”. What they find more difficult to overcome is the depression and distraction of inappropriate forms of externally imposed standards and inspection procedures.
What fascinates me about Woodhead and his position as chief inspecor of schools, is the evidence he uses to judge his influence on the educative processes in which teachers “initiate the young into those aspects of our culture upon which their (and our) humanity depends”. Could the chief inspector direct us to the evidence which shows and explains how he has influenced the humanity of anyone, including himself?
Jack Whitehead
School of Education
University of Bath
