Children will be taught how to spot extremist content and misinformation online under planned changes to the school curriculum, the education secretary said.
Bridget Phillipson said she was launching a review of the curriculum in primary and secondary schools to embed critical thinking across multiple subjects and arm children against “putrid conspiracy theories”.
One example may include pupils analysing newspaper articles in English lessons in a way that would help differentiate fabricated stories from true reporting.
In computer lessons, they could be taught how to spot fake news websites by their design, and maths lessons may include analysing statistics in context.
“Extremist content” == “not wanting Palestinians to be dehumanized, dispossessed and murdered by Israel”
Hopefully it tries to be as neutral as possible, and just gives kids the general tools to spot when something’s fake/exaggerated.
Introducing this sort of thing without trying to be strictly impartial sounds like a slippery slope.
Hopefully it tries to be as neutral as possible
No. Forcing a neutral perspective between absurdity and objectively true claims is how we got here.
When one party says that scientific evidence is real and the other says it’s a Marxist conspiracy, forced neutralized lends undue credence to the latter.
Similarly, forcibly neutral newsrooms and the neoliberal Starmer government consider it extremist to acknowledge that the fascist apartheid regime of Israel is committing genocide and to call for your country to not supply them with arms, funds, and political cover.
It should try to be as FACTUAL and OBJECTIVE as possible, not chase neutrality when neutrality flies in the face of evidence and the most basic accountability and human rights.
Introducing this sort of thing without trying to be strictly impartial sounds like a slippery slope.
Yeah, they’re GOING to consider extremism as anything too far from the interests of the neoliberal and capitalist elite in either direction rather than pursue an evidence-based curriculum of critical thinking like they’re pretending.
this class sounds like a malicious teacher could easily introduce bias and radicalize children… :/
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This is rich, coming from the government that labels pro-palestine protestors as extremists and antisemites ( yes I’m aware that the government changed, but looks like the new ones are more than happy to continue the policies ).
There are many people in a government, and different people pull in different directions.
Regardless of other policies, this is a step in the right direction.
There’s admittedly some potential in there, like teaching them to analyse statistics and ‘teaching critical thinking’ whatever that implies.
Conspiracy theory belief however is emotional rather than rational. You cannot ‘teach’ people to not do it. I worry that they will condition kids to dismiss any news that deviates from official propaganda by just labelling them as conspiracies. And frankly with the UK being the police state that it is, that might just be the end goal.
This is the UK: whatever New Labour or Tory politicians say should be presumed to be complete total crowd-pleasing bollocks until proven otherwise (by it actually being done, in the way it was promised and properly funded and supported, which is a pretty rare outcome over there).
I have mixed feelings. The UK has an incredibly broad definition of extremism. Socialism and antifascism are considered extremist ideologies.
The justification is to stop people like the ones doing pogroms rn, but giving the state power will always be a double-edged sword, one where the edge that swings left is sharper.
giving the state power will always be a double-edged sword, one where the edge that swings left is sharper…
Uhh, beg pardon? How so?
Capitalist economies accumulate wealth and power into the hands of capitalists. Capitalists are not threatened by fascism, they’re threatened by socialism. Therefore, capitalists will always attack the left more strongly than the right, and they wield more power than the working class in a liberal society.
Idk critical thinking skills might be good as long as it’s not politically backed to single out a specific ideology or propaganda source.
I don’t know about you, but I have a sinking feeling that a country organized on liberal principles will integrate liberalism into its education.
This already happens, most people that become socialists only do it by university age, I still think teaching kids to identify fake news is a good thing, maybe they radicalize even earlier thanks to that.
“Kids, when you see someone talk about the climate catastrophe or rebellion, report them immediately!”
I know this is a bit of a shitty take, but there just isn’t a fix for shitty information constantly streaming in. As long as we allow some insane people that think maximizing profit above anything else to own the means of communication, things are going to continue to get shittier.
Critical Thinking has been an established subject in many schools for a long time. My former GF did it in her last year as a mandatory subject.
The problem up until now is it has been mainly an A-Level subject and only really offered in Grammar schools.
I’m glad it’s being rolled out
Another data point. I was taught critical thinking, particularly as it pertains to news sources as part of GCSE English - in 1987 at a normal comprehensive school in a fairly deprived area. Maybe the problem is that you can lead a horse to water etc.
