If you were in charge of secondary education, how would you organise it?

I would say the poster has used commas frequently and in the correct places. Just a word of advice on the use of commas - one can use hyphens if one wishes when a pause is appropriate - in place of a comma.

Also regarding education I would like to make another contribution. Many of my friends have studied history from year 9 'til year 13 and quite a few only learnt the Second World War. I get the feeling too much emphasis is on this event and not enough on others. Many of these events may include Britain before, during and after the Roman invasion (I only did this briefly in year 7), Viking invasion attempts, more about Norman I, the Spanish Armarda (sp) and then the subsequent battles involving England against Wales and Scotland, and then Great Britain against Ireland. I wonder if it would be possible to allow further flexibility in which topics can be learnt? I have not studied history at any level and so I will listen to anyone who has. I suppose you could encourage exam boards to broaden possible routes. There are five possible routes in A2 Government and Politics for Edexcel. And since quite a few self-study it may be a better option for many students.

I've been studying history since Year 7 (now in Year 12) and I've been quite shocked at the lack of British history we cover! In Year 7 we did the Middle Ages and Medieval periods, in Year 9 we did the Industrial Revolution and in Years 10-11 (GCSE) we briefly did 20th-Century Britain. Apart from that, it's all foreign stuff. Year 8 was the French revolution, we also did a bit of Russia for GCSE and my school waaaaaaaay over-does (is that even a word? ) German history! We did it for GCSE, it's one of my AS units this year and it will be 2 of my A2 units next year. So all in all, most of my GCSE and half of my A-level is on Hitler and the Nazis. Our other AS units are Italy and the First World War and our other A2 unit is medicine through time. It just seems like in other countries, they concentrate on their own history a lot more, and it's not that I have anything against German history, but there's only so much you can do before it starts to get

One AS group at my school is doing two units on Hitler!

I've got quite a nice mix, Russia in Revolution, Civil Rights '45 - '68 and Nazi Germany for AS and at A2 my school does Tudor England, Italy under Mussolini and the USSR under Stalin.

I would bring back the grammar-secondary modern school model albeit i would get rid of the 11+ and replace it with SAT type tests at regular intervals up until the age of 16 to ensure that nobody is stopped from recieving an academic education simply because of a single test thus academic late bloomers would be able to move into grammars from secondary moderns if they should decide they do not want to follow a vocational path.

It just seems like in other countries, they concentrate on their own history a lot more, and it's not that I have anything against German history, but there's only so much you can do before it starts to get

-Give teachers more power and increase the level of discipline. Ressurect corporal punishment in extreme cases of repeated misbehaviour.

-More encouragement and praise for students trying to do well.

-Make all subjects of equal difficulty. It's disgusting how, for example, general studies and further maths are on the same qualification level.

-Students should be made to work much harder.

-All mickey mouse subjects should be abolished.

I know that if I had been pushed more throughout school and last year i'd be a much better person right now.