To be fed up with my DD having to prop up the less able children

[endlesschatonthecarpet]

OK, I know I probably am being unreasonable and await a flaming! My daughter (in year 1) is very quick, very clever but not blessed with much patience! Because she is one of the top in the class she always seems to be paired with a talk partner who is finding the work more of a struggle. I completely understand that this can be useful sometimes, but it seems to happen every day and some days my DD comes hope very fed up and grumpy because she's had to "waste time". She gets what the task is once the teacher has done the initial set up and is keen to get going. This endless sitting on the carpet with whiteboards talking to another child who is not working at the same level is doing her head in! Now, I fully accept that the teacher has to consider the needs of all the children - not just my precious DD, but couldn't she at least sometimes just send the more able children off to get started while she does a bit more work with the others or pair up the bright children so they can really develop their ideas?

Obviously I've said to my DD that she needs to get on with whatever the teacher asks her to do and haven't given her any indication that I share her feelings about this practice but I do feel really frustrated on my daughter's behalf.
Anyone else feel the same or am I alone in my unreasonableness?

hawkmoon Even with all my bitching in this thread, that sounds like one stuck up school!

The OP is not talking about the experience some of you are recounting. Her child is paired for the purposes of the relatively brief time on the carpet, with different children (not the same child all the time).

When she goes off to do her work she will, at least most of the time, be on a table which will be levelled according to ability.

And the practice is incredibly helpful for EAL children - some of whom are very bright but need more exposure to spoken academic language

lurking Why? Seriously don't understand why you'd think that? It's a excellent school. I live in a big city, lots of patents want their child to go there. How does that make it "stuck up"?

There are many more applications than there are places for the excellent local state schools. Does that make them stuck up too?

Some independent schools focus on music or sport and select primarily on those criteria. Most select on academic ability. Nothing to do with being "stuck up."

parents

My daughter is in P3 (she's just turned 7), they've always done this in her primary school, she loves it. She's a lovely child and imo to use a MN favourite quite "bright" , I have absolutely no issue with it all.

I don't believe she is being "held back", and I think she herself has a lot to learn from other pupils. She can be a touch sensitive and she has gotten a great deal of confidence from being moved about to sit with various partners and do different tasks at differing levels.

Sorry hawkmoon I was meaning to be a bit tongue-in-cheek. Need to remember text can be interpreted so many ways! Sorry I have shocking insomnia and it's 5AM here so I'm probably making a dick of myself

My cousin went to an independent learning school that focused a great deal on the arts. I remember being insanely jealous because her school had pet peacocks!

We only got a vicious budgie that was always changing colour..

And I agree with you youarekidding

It's unfortunate that some academically able children are already looking down their noses and dismissing others

That said, OP, I think if the balance is wrong for your child, then it's worth raising. Be prepared for the fact that you may not know the facts though

I never saw this whole 'smart kids bullying the less able kids' thing that parents seem to believe happen. It was always you are the nerd and no one likes you when I was in school. :(

Ah, sorry lurking

I'm a bit defensive about schools - sorry!

I worked in a highly educated, competitive City field. People were teaching each other and learning all the time. In fact, my boss's motto was "watch one, do one, teach one" for every aspect of work life. The ability to teach someone to do what you already could was highly prized, and the way people moved up the ladder quickly. You also have to understand something far better to teach it than just to do it yourself. I don't think spending some time "teaching" does anyone any harm, at any age.

That said, there needs to be time for the "watch one" and "do one" as well.

Which is a rambly way of saying what is happening to your daughter may or may not be a problem. For me it would depend what balance of the week she was grouped like this and for which activities.

Thats why i am glad my childs in a school that practice stetting and streaming

YANBU. Children (and adults) learn best when working alongside others at a similar level. If I joined a course to learn (for example) a foreign language, I wouldn't expect there to be others at a wildly different stage (in either direction) on the same course.

Guava - have you read my post and the posts from teachers?

OP - now I think about it, your title is pretty darn dismissive and presumtious, when we are talking about 6 year olds.

presumptious

I am a teacher and the use of learning/talk partners is embedded at our school.

If it is being used correctly at your school OP, then the pairs are selected completely at random, with no input from the teacher. My class draw photo's from a bag.
There is soooooo much learning that goes on from this. The talk that goes on in my class and the vocabulary the children are practising is amazing. Yes, it can be a social exercise but it is so much more than just that. Children are taught how to converse, ask questions and form opinions. The expectation is that they will talk to each other and listen - probably one of the most important life-skills. It needs teaching - not every child is a natural conversationalist. To assess if a child really understands something, watching them explain it to a peer tells you so much. You also don't need to have 'hands up' - I ask a question, learning partners discuss it, then I randomly choose someone. All children have the opportunity to rehearse their answer and gain ideas - so you don't have the one-man show you can often get in a classroom where the same children answer all the questions and the others doze off.

I could easily write an essay on the benefits of this teaching approach - please ask the teacher - I bet if she knew how you felt, she would be able to put your mind at ease and explain that at the moment, the children your daughteris being paired with are randomly put together. It could just so easily be her best friend the following week.

YANBU. DD was paired with a brighter child in KS1. It masked the areas she was struggling with and she didn't get adequate support from the teacher or teaching assistant as a consequence.

I think teachers look at it too much from their own perspective. The vast majority of pupils, including the vast majority of high achieving pupils are not going to become teachers. Yes, we learn from colleagues and teach colleagues - that is one of the main ways we exchange information. But I don't think most people do spend a lot of time teaching things to people who have a different intellectual level to their own as adults. Or if we do teach people who are very different things, it is not usually with the intention that they master our own skill set. A midwife teaches me a little about babies; I don't learn midwifery. A firefighter might teach me a little about smoke alarms; I don't learn about how to go into a building to put out a dangerous fire.

I am in favour of mixed ability classes, but I think that is organised through differentiating work, not by getting children to pair up with children who have a very different ability level.

My mum works at a school. We've actually had this discussion before. She thinks it's a useful tool but the problem is not every kid is the same and not every kid benefits from it. And it's usually the smarter kid who loses out in this scenario.

However OP as others have stated with your school system, if it's such a short period of time I think YABU. Hours on end like I endured? No. A few minutes a day? Your child is being precious and needs to suck it up unless he's being nasty to her.

Thats why i am glad my childs in a school that practice stetting and streaming

At 6 years old?!

Don't really have much of an opinion on the questions asked but some of the opinions on here have surprised me.

I really don't believe it's possible, apart from very extreme cases, to have a very clear idea of which are the able and which are the less able children at 5. At that point I think probable that other factors are swamping that out. I have a few colleagues who are now internationally recognised researchers who were "nothing special" at school until quite late on. (At that kind of age Einstein's parents were apparently worried about him being slow). On the other hand, I also have a few colleagues whose children were put up a class on the basis of being "gifted" whilst at primary school and who are now producing disappointing work - the "giftedness" in question turned out to have been more or less entirely a product of the parent's social status.

I believe that any type of "selection" at age five is selecting nothing other than the right kind of middle-class parents.

I teach first and second year students. I have a good first in my subject from a Russell Group university, and have done 8 years of full-time study and 10 years of professional experience under my belt. The students in my class are mostly of fairly average ability. I can honestly say that

1. Every time I have had to teach a new class for the first time to these students who are light years from my level I have come away with a much deeper understanding of the subject and

2. teaching the less able students forces me to reappraise the material much more thoroughly than teaching elite students (which I've also done) would.

I appreciate that this probably isn't relevant for year 1 pupils, but I'm a bit saddened by the number of people on here who seem to think either that "ability" is set in stone, or that teaching people who know a lot less than you is a "waste of time" for the person teaching.

I was like this when I was at school. They moved me up a year.

My sisster child had 34 children in his class and he is very bright the teacher is basically useing him as a ta for two other chidren

Which is out of order

Caramel

At 6 they are learning to talk and listen, take turns, ask questions, not to explain to their partner the workings of the internal combustion engine. You say the teachers are looking at it from an adult's perspective. I think it's you who is doing that!

I dunno..I was a gifted kid and I was in the school on some sort of benefits to my mum. It's confusng and she won't talk about it. Only reason I knew I was up top was because I knew the sticker system. This would have been when I was six/seven and in Aussie grade one.