The Saber Tooth Curriculum (1929) and how is still a metaphor for the current education system

The saber tooth curriculum is a book written by J. Abner Peddiwell containing seven short stories full of satire about the education system. The most well-known is the saber tooth curriculum.

An individual (New-Fist) in his stone age society came up with a curriculum of fish grabbing with bare hands, Woolly horse clubbing and saber tooth tiger scaring with fire to teach the children. These were all relevant at the time and the students developed real skills that were beneficially in their life.

As times changed, the need for the three skills in the saber tooth curriculum were no longer needed and relevant. There were no fish to catch, woolly horses to club or tigers to scare. The cave dwelling society refused to changed its curriculum despite an impending ice age.

 A radical questioned the curriculum “you will have to admit that times have changed. Couldn’t you please try these other more up to date activities? Maybe they have some educational value after all?”

The wise old men were indignant. “If you had any education yourself, you would know that the essence of true education is timeless. It is something that endures through changing conditions like a solid rock standing squarely and firmly in the middle of a raging torrent. You must know that there are some eternal verities, and the saber-tooth curriculum is one of them!”

This story for me is still so relevant in 21^st century UK regarding the current mainstream education system. Some of the points I feel are still important are:

• ·        Schools are teaching in an outdated way, outdated skills and knowledge to students.
• ·        Schools are out of touch, they are not flexible and responding to the emerging needs of the current and future generations.
• ·        School reforms meet residence from many angles.
• ·        Jobs now are looking for a different skill set than what is being taught.

The current generation are dealing with technological advances at a speed that has not been seen before. Information is available at our fingertips through the internet; so is curriculum content that still teaches content to memorise for tests still beneficial?? I would argue it is the same as still teaching saber tooth scarring when the saber tooth tiger became extinct.

I would love to see an education system that focuses on skills that will be beneficial in today’s world.

Skills such as:

•       Critical questioning
•         Divergent thinking
•         Creativity
•         Working collaboratively
•         Experimentation

With the global drivers such as sustainability, demographic change and technical advances we need a generation that will think outside the box creatively to create solutions NOT stay with the same skills that were created for a different time.