Maths Sets

Don't bottom sets tend to be smaller? So they'd be getting more attention not less.

Most of the pupils are aiming for the same exam. The school want everyone to do as well as possible. It is up to your son to work hard... there is very often an advantage to being top of the lower set rather than bottom of the higher set.encourage your son to understand that the teachers are experienced and know what they are doing

I don't see why all classes just aren't mixed ability. Setting is unfair on the less academic children who are just shunted off to the bottom set where no one could care less about them.

Its not true that students in the lower sets are uncared for. It is just as important to the school (and schools results) that these students get their target grades. They are just put in sets that can teach to their ability. There is no point teaching algebraic fractions or solving quatratic equations by completing the square to students who still don't understand basic fractions and can't solve one step linear equations.
In fact students with SEN or PPI, whatever ability, results matter to the school even more than other students as they are judged on those results in particular by ofsted.

Maths classes aren't mixed ability because by the time you get to secondary there can be 7 years difference in the work being done by the most and the least able. It is impossible to effectively teach this spectrum of ability in a single class.

I don't see why all classes just aren't mixed ability. Setting is unfair on the less academic children who are just shunted off to the bottom set where no one could care less about them.

My DD prefers to be taught in smaller classes at her ability level than feel useless with all the brighter kids calling out they've finished before she has finished question 2.

She enjoys maths much more at secondary because she is set, and her confidence has come on no end.

Bottom sets are usually smaller and setting means that they can focus on what the group are weak at. No point in doing trigonometry if you can’t do fractions.
Can’t think of anything worse than being in a set with much smarter people who whizzed through the work while others struggled on much simpler material.

I don't see why all classes just aren't mixed ability. Setting is unfair on the less academic children who are just shunted off to the bottom set where no one could care less about them.

The work in his new set can't be so far behind his old set, if DC were able to move up ...

He needs to work harder and prove himself.
They aren't going to select a student who scored more highly than him and who works harder and so has more potential over your son.
They want the best results for them all.

I'm guessing you wouldn't think it unfair if the situation was reversed and your son had moved up to the top set? Those kids who did move up, must just have done better than him in year 8. As others have said, he needs to accept that there's a reason he's been moved down and prove he's got the ability to move back up.

fwiw, my yr9 son's saying maths is easy too atm, but as lots of the others on here have said, it's just them cementing the basics. I'd bet the kids in your son's school's top set are doing similar to him and a bit bored too!

I agree with JustRichmal,

One of my DCs appears to achieve most things with effortless ease but got put down to a second maths set in year 10. It later transpired that it was a combination of silly mistakes on the end of year test and irritating the teacher by talking too much in class (as found work very easy). Anyway it made DC realise that not everything could be taken for granted which was a positive.
If your DS is clearly better than his present set, working below ability in class for half a year or so will not really be a big deal for the longer term. My DC achieved an A* in further maths A level (still without much effort) and is doing a maths based degree.

but meanwhile time is passing and DS is not making progress Is he prepared to put a couple of half hours work in at home every week so he does not fall behind the higher set and gets results that are too good for the school to ignore on his next test?

In my experience as a parent, Maths is always ridiculously easy at the start of the school year.
They move kids sets depending on their assessment results here. In practical terms, some sets do the same work so moving down isn’t always a bad thing and it can be a confidence booster to be top of B set rather than bottom of A set.

If hes been moved down a set it means he has not been doing ok in assessments. It means he has been getting among the lowest in the class and has been struggling.
Bear in mind we have just started a new school year so the work usually begins with consolidation of number work, stuff that yes, he will have done before. If he finds it easy he needs to tell the teacher while doing the work and she can give him extension work. But just because he is finding the number work easy does not mean he will find new material easy.

I don't think they just go on test results either .After a year with them the teacher will be able to differentiate those who are developing the potential to think mathematically and those whose are well oiled sausage machines.

They have just come back after 6 weeks off though haven't they?
.As someone else said the curriculum is spiral.My Y8 dd is in top set maths and the first topic they did was dividing decimals !! (something that I think is first taught in about Y5!!) but then they build on it with extending what they know about standard form , recurring decimals and how to write them as fractions.
But they have to go back to the basics all the time to refresh their memories and to see how things link

So one question, perhaps, is whether this set is being taught at the right level - if moves down are more because of improvement of kids who needed to go up, then they need to still teach the ones who've moved down, to their potential. If homework has been set 6 weeks ahead then that doesn't imply they will be adapting what is done according to how well the children do the work ...

I don't know as I am not a teacher, but I wonder if expressing your concerns about whether the class as a whole is being challenged sufficiently, may get a better response? Because if a number have moved down with him that could be relevant.

Presumably the ones that were moved into his old set got a higher mark than he did. The fact that people were moved up into his old set proves that it's possible to move up a set, so hopefully if he proves himself he will move up again.

Have some children moved up into his old set?
In dc's class,when this happened, it was because children in a lower set were performing very well and getting higher results than some in the set above and so were moved up. Obviously a few from the higher set then moved down for class size reasons.
Dd revisits topics all the time.. but harder level work is added each time.
Hopefully it will be a chance for your lad to feel top of the group (which is always nice) and if he works hard and gets good results he'll movje up again.

I too have a dd who is quiet and can even seem daydreamy in class, so I do understand your concerns. I once had a teacher tell me they judged a child's level on teacher assessment alone, but that was in primary. I would check if they are set purely on test results.
If it is purely on results, would your ds be prepared to do extra work to get to a higher level again? You can easily get him a CGP book for maths KS3 or GCSE (depending if his school is doing 2 or 3 years of GCSE) . The more you practise maths the better you get.

It's probably worth keeping an eye on it. With the best will in the world kids do sometimes end up in the wrong set.

If you're not sure why he was moved down, there's no harm in asking. They should be able to explain it quite easily.

I think you are probably right to be aware of the fact that a gap could grow between him and the set above if he's in his current set too long.

My DDs school has overlaps between sets because some children work better at the low end of a higher set, and others (like my DDs) work better being the high end of a lower set.