The Education Rant.

Michael Gove (cracks knuckles, flexes muscles) Michael Gove. It's like an Anti-Mantra for the Lacksadaisical.Try it: run a bath, light some candles, pour a drink, take a week off work and relax. Wait until, say Thursday Tea-Time, and gently, gently speak his name aloud. Tense? Thought so. Imagine him peering down at you from Atop his Mighty Runaway Steamroller of Random 'Reform'. Your body is out of the bubbles and toweling off the disgust before you've even had time to neck the Pinot. You probably need a shower now, too. And therapy. During the 20 seconds it took you to dress, Gove has passed (it's really the only word for these emissions) yet another Decree, abandoning modular assessment for one big Bumper Exam that lasts for as long as it takes for every one to be distracted from the fact that the School Buildings have fallen down around us and there's a Super New Straw-Build Academy on the Playing Fields. You didn't know the School was failing? oh, well, it was decided Retrospectively, via the criteria which i am thinking up now as i type, whereby all the Educational Establishments that would look better as New Unaffordable Council House Developments (short-term lease only) are suddenly Declared Dead, even though they are still sat up, drinking a cup of tea and watching Countdown. This Morning, i listened, wearing what we will call my Coalition Expression- it combines resignation, disbelief and fury, don't try it, i am RADA trained- to Gove explaining the cuts in the Sports Budget, how the Lack of Trained Staff, and Equipment will lead to a resurgence of The Greats: Hockey, Football, Rugby. As opposed to under the last government, where all the cash was being spent on- serious tone, disapproving shake of the head- Circus Skills. The latest Whizz-Pop idea, maybe one Nick Clegg has dreamed up on his Specially Calming Medicated Cigarettes, is that Trainee Teachers should spend a much higher proportion of their time learning in the classroom. Practicing (on Your kids, not Theirs) to  See if they're Up To It. Because if they aren't it would be Stupid to let them into a Real School where the Children's Whole Future depends on One Huge Monster Exam that they might Bugger up because David Cameron met a Squaddie once who he thought might be able to Learn the Oiks some Sums. Oh. Oops. Tightrope Walking or Juggling? You were waiting for the Clown Joke, weren't you? Don't Worry, it's Here.