The academic recruited by Gordon Brown to advise on school standards has become the first government adviser to admit that A-levels are getting easier.So to my exam papers. Latin language. Unseen translation. Two passages, one prose one verse, in 2 hours. No specified authors.
Sir Peter Williams, who was appointed last week to review the teaching of maths in primary schools, said that the A-level gold standard had been slipping for a 'long period of time'.
The distinguished academic and businessman, who chairs the Advisory Committee on Mathematics Education (ACME), said: 'Over 20 or 30 years, I don't think there is any doubt whatsoever that absolute A-level standards have fallen. They have edged south, continuously over a long period of time. I think all university academics and a good proportion of sixth-form teachers would agree with my assertion.'
The idea that A-levels are getting easier is a widely held perception, he added, but in his own areas of physics and maths it is also a 'testable fact'. He said that he did not, however, think the decline 'disastrous'.
Here is the prose passage from 1953, with no vocab given.
Scit Indutiomarus quid sit testimonium dicere? movetur eo timore quo nostrum unus quisque, cum in eum locum productus est? Recordamini, iudices, quanto opere laborare soleatis non modo quid dicatis pro testimonio sed etiam quibus verbis utamini, ne quod minus moderate positum, ne quod ab aliqua cupiditate prolapsum verbum esse videatur; voltu denique laboratis ne qua significari possit suspicio cupiditatis, ut et, cum proditis, existimatio sit quaedam tacita de vobis pudoris ac religionis et, cum disceditis, ea diligenter conservata ac retenta videatur. Credo haec eadem Indutiomarum in testimonio timuisse aut cogitavisse, qui primum illud verbum consideratissimum nostrae consuetudinis 'arbitror', quo nos etiam tunc utimur cum ea dicimus iurati quae comperta habemus, quae ipsi vidimus, ex toto testimonio suo sustulit atque omnia se 'scire' dixit. Verebatur enim videlicet ne quid apud vos populumque Romanum de existimatione sua deperderet, ne qua fama consequeretur eius modi, Indutiomarum, talem virum, tam cupide, tam temere dixisse. [Cicero]The verse passage was from Valerius Flaccus, and there was help - a title and two glosses:
The Argonauts are terrified by their first night at sea, but the helmsman Tiphys reassures them.Here is the passage:
Hagniades=Tiphys and Tritonia=Pallas Athene.
auxerat hora metus, iam se vertentis OlympiLatin prose composition - no vocab given:
ut faciem raptosque simul montesque locosque
ex oculis circumque graves videre tenebras.
ipsa quies rerum mundique silentia terrent
astraque et effusis stellatus crinibus aether;
ac velut ignota captus regione viarum
noctivagum qui carpit iter non aure quiescit,
non oculis, noctisque metus niger auget utrimque
campus et occurrens umbris maioribus arbor,
haud aliter trepidare viri. sed pectora firmans
Hagniades 'non hanc' inquit 'sine numine pinum
derigimus nec me tantum Tritonia cursus
erudiit. saepe ipsa manu dignata carinam est.
an non experti, subitus cum luce fugata
horruit imbre dies? quantis, pro Iuppiter, Austris
restitimus, quanta quotiens et Pallados arte
in cassum decimae cecidit tumor arduus undae!
quin agite, o socii; micat immutabile caelum
puraque nec gravido surrexit Cynthia cornu.'
But to know better the condition of his enemies, who were encamped before the town of Chatillon, Talbot sent his spies secretly around their quarters; moreover he sent word to those who were within the town that they should take courage, for he was coming with powerful forces and it was his intention to rescue them; and he bade them prepare themselves when they saw him approach on the morrow, so that each man might be under arms and ready to sally forth from the walls and fall upon the enemy, for it was his purpose, he told them, never to turn back until he had either driven away the besieging army or himself been slain in the fight. At this news the people of Chatillon took good heart again, for they concluded that Talbot was firmly determined to relieve them, since he came with such speed. Therefore they sent back word that he should come when it pleased him.Set Books. I don't have my Latin paper - we did Livy XXI, I seem to remember [later: I do have my Latin paper - see below*] - so I've look at the Greek paper instead. One could read two half-portions or one full portion.The half portions that we chose were Antigone and Frogs (the others were Ion, 52 chapters of Thucydides and Plato's Laches), but we could have chosen a full portion of Odyssey books I-IV, or the whole of Herodotus VII.
On each play we were required to translate two passages, one chorus and one speech, translate and explain three short (3-line) passages 'with reference to their contexts and to any points of interest or difficulty which they contain', comment on two grammar points in other brief extracts, and write an essay from a choice of two. The Frogs choice was:
(a) What are the chief criticisms which Aristophanes makes of Euripides in this play?This was a 3 hour paper.
(b) Discuss and illustrate Aristophanes' use of parody in this play.
The passages for verse composition have also disappeared, unfortunately.
Those who are teachers now will be able to decide whether present day papers are of a similar standard, and whether fewer demands in some aspects are balanced by more demands in other aspects.
* Having found the errant Latin Set Books paper in another part of the file, I can reveal that we read Livy 21 chapters 1-47 (Hannibal crossing the Alps) and Georgics 1 and 2. Or Horace Odes 1. I know we read all three texts. But then we also read Annals XIV, which is another half-portion. Could it be that we read four half-portions so that we could have a choice in the exam? It seems excessive. But A levels were brand new at the time, and perhaps the strategy for taking them hadn't been worked out.
