Cecilia Keaveney (Fianna Fail)

That is the kernel of one of the issues. It is great being in opposition. I was in opposition the first year that I was elected and I had a field day. I could fire out all the ideas about what I wanted to do without doing the costing. There is a battle between fourth level versus pre-school, second level versus primary, and VEC schools versus community schools. There are real issues. I accept there is a finite budget. However, if we are looking at the overall structure and where we are going, children up to the age of six must be core to that.

I welcome the fact the school building programme is ongoing because it is important. I declare my interest in that a primary school is currently being built in my home town of Moville and there is one in Clonmany. The construction industry is getting a boost from that, which is an incidental benefit because the building programme is important in itself. I am pleased the Minister made the point about the continuation of the summer works scheme and the devolved grants scheme.

Deputy Quinn had a bit of a go at prefabs recently. He made it look as if everybody was in some kind of prehistoric land in prefabs. There are expensive prefabs in Moville community college for the past seven or eight years and they are excellent. They are of high quality. It is dishonest to say they are not. However, I can see the other side of the equation. Our heating bill and lighting bill, especially the former, is much more expensive because we have two heating systems, one for the half of the school that is in prefabs and one for the other half of the school that is in the main building.

I urge the officials in the Department of Education and Science to consider the success they had when they went against their instinct and agreed with me and two or three Ministers to let the second phase of Moville community college go straight to bricks and mortar. We promised we would not go over budget or over time and we delivered. That second phase is more economic than the prefabs. Had we been allowed to do the two phases as one building we would have a much more economical building to heat, light and maintain. There are economies of scale. The right decision was made.

I do not accept the criticism of putting buildings before people. We are not doing that; we are addressing all the issues. This is the right time to invest money in buildings and if people think it is the wrong time they should say that rather than speaking out of both sides of their mouth. Labour costs are coming down. Anecdotal evidence suggests that the cost of blocklaying has come down from €2.10 a block a couple of years ago to €1.10 currently. Prices are coming down and therefore we are getting better value for money. This is the right time to invest money in buildings.

The focus must be kept on educators and educatees. Primary school is a child's first formal encounter with the education system and it is all about exploring the sand, discovering the different textures and exploring books and colours. The curriculum and teaching styles have changed to focus on the development of inquiring, creative minds, which is what we want. Even within the primary school sector, teachers are not confident in their Irish and, therefore, some children leave who are very fluent in Irish while others have virtually no ability. The structure of primary school teaching must be examined and perhaps the unions should be consulted. For example, if I am a musician and I have a primary school class, surely I should be able to take Senator Buttimer's class for music one day a week while he takes my class for history, geography, art or whichever subject in which he has an expertise. That might also be healthy for the children. That would not cost anything because we are teaching in the school anyway but agreement is needed between teachers and unions to take off the hat to allow children to gain from their expertise. They should not hide behind their lack of Irish by not letting on to anyone that is the case. If they are useless at music, their instinct is to not let on to the children that is the case and they do not teach the subject. There is scope for flexibility.

I agree with the Minister about giving schools flexibility regarding grants and they should decide what they want to do with them. Primary school teachers come to my clinics in the context of the cutbacks saying they have a lot of money for one venture but not for another, when the latter is the more important one and if they were able to use the money for it rather than the other venture, everybody would be happy. The Minister is totally correct about flexibility regarding grants. The grant should be embracing and the amount should not be less than that provided currently. It should be accepted resources will not be cut but things will change around with students having the right to go one way or the other.

I welcome that the special needs assistant issue in Inishowen was taken on board. A review was granted and while the number of SNAs was not maintained, it was not reduced significantly. I acknowledge the role of the National Council for Special Education in this regard. I hope it will do what it says, which is to work with us on a vision for special needs education. Perhaps the council is correct that we are engaged in a firefighting exercise by keeping people contained but in my area, we are well ahead in special needs education. However, we need the support and recognition the NCSE, which is the guardian angel, should provide.

Pupils move from the exploring life of primary school to second level and unless they have a good and enthusiastic teacher, they end up in class reading their books and regurgitating them in examinations to secure the necessary results. A mechanism must be provided to enhance a child's imagination, life skills and spirit of entrepreneurship, something we want to instill in him or her before he or she leaves the education system. We want people who are imaginative and creative. While the arts have a role in this regard, we are not fulfilling that capacity.

When students reach third level, they are encouraged to be creative again. They are told the location of the library and given a list of books, excerpts of which they must know. If they get through that, they obtain a degree. That is blasé but I do not have sufficient time to elaborate on it. Why does a child go from being creative and analytical at primary school and absorbing all the colours to being so at third level without being given the same opportunities at second level? There is not a consistent path. There should be a link between the teachers and those charged with teacher training. Teacher training should have two elements. One should be strictly about the subject while the other should be strictly about how to teach. Practising teachers should outline to those teaching in the training colleges what life is like in the classroom and what methodologies work. When I was training, those who taught me had not been in a classroom for 25 years. A strong link is needed between second level schools and third level colleges in order that they can exchange information to improve teaching methods and ideas.

I wrote a report on how to teach history in areas of recent conflict. Projects are under way throughout the world through The Image of the Other portal and these will come before the Council of Europe in the next year or two. The Department of Education and Science should examine this work closely because the concept of looking at issues using a multi-perspectivity approach is feeding into leaving certificate history but it is not being felt at junior certificate level. If the curriculum is too wide and students are only trying to complete it, they will lose much of the exploration and discovery aspects we are trying to create because our goal should be to produce rounded adults equipped for the world now and in the future and not for in the past. That is our challenge, which is not easy.