Hinds urges schools to make their pupils more ‘resilient’

SCHOOLS should foster greater resilience in children through public speaking and sport to help them in the workplace, the new Education Secretary has said.

In his first speech since his appointment earlier this month, Damian Hinds spoke of the importance of instilling children with “soft skills” from a young age.

He told the delegates at the Education World Forum in London that in his previous role as employment minister, he was used to hearing from businesses about the importance of workplace or employability skills.

He said that these abilities – which can include, for example, teamwork and communication – are sometimes referred to as “soft” skills. “But I would suggest to you that there is nothing soft about these skills,” he said.

The “hard reality” is that teaching children how to build “character resilience” and workplace skills is crucial for a thriving economy, he added.

“Now I don’t suggest that they can just be taught, but clearly what happens in school – the ethos of a school, the expectations that are set for students and the support that’s given, alongside what happens in extracurricular activity, in sport, in public speaking in voluntary work and so on – all of these things will have an effect on character resilience and on the workplace skills that our young people will take with them,” Mr Hinds told delegates.

He went on to say that around nine in 10 new jobs created will require digital skills to some extent, and there is now a generation of children who are “digital natives” that are growing up with technology such as the internet and smartphones. He spoke of the importance of schools embracing digital techniques, adding that children should be taught how to create apps.

Mr Hinds said that he was aware of the “trepidation” felt by the teaching profession towards technology. He said that it would be used to assist, rather than replace teachers, adding that it could help ease teacher workload.

“With our new computing curriculum we have moved beyond ability to use apps to ability to write apps,” he said, adding that millions of pounds is being pumped into improving the teaching of computer science.

In the November Budget, the Chancellor announced that the number of computer science teachers is to be trebled, with a National

‘Those qualifications were not as highly regarded … in the jobs market’

Centre for Computing established. Philip Hammond pledged £84million to train up another 8,000 teachers for GCSE computer science, a subject that only became part of the national curriculum three years ago.

Mr Hinds said that schools should concentrate on the core subjects – such as maths, English, sciences and languages – rather than waste time on alternative qualifications. He said that before 2010 there was too much focus on alternative qualifications, which did little to recommend pupils to employers.

“It turned out that those qualifications were not as highly regarded, did not have the same worth in the jobs market and in society as the traditional qualifications,” he said.