to really regret the whole grammar school thing.

[newrecruit]

DS1 is in year 4 (DS2 in year 1).

I went to a girls grammar school and loved it. So when we moved out of London one of the reasons we chose this area was the schools. I don't think we are super selective (don't quite know what that means)

However, I was explaining the schools to him this morning as we drove past one and had an impending feeling of doom.

He's bright but can't be arsed. Resists pushing and I am against tutor on principal. I don't think he'd suit an all boys school.

What have I done! We should have just moved to a comprehensive area with a decent intake.

Some parents are already talking about tutors and its 2 years away. I want to hit them quite hard.

Please pile in and tell me to get a grip.

Nothing wrong with the IT lab at all, my ds was an inhabitant. But its a more overtly geeky place to be than the rugby pitch and potentially a more lonely environment, especially in a less selective school where there are fewer geeks.

teacher I was actually refering to good and bad comps in terms of their ability span (the selection by postcode effect), but take your point that good and bad can equally apply to school quality - in my local area there is a fairly strong correlation between the two effects, but that is not true everywhere.

Oh I was just looking to bust the stereotype a bit really. Being a geek isn't an issue with my children's school, ds is studying programming and animation this year, both of which are taught vertically so he has made friends with children from Yr 9 through to Yr 12, it's been quite an inclusive environment. They also both hang out in the special zone for children with learning disabilities (ds gets an invite because of his dyslexia and invited dd) which again seems a very welcoming place. It's a good school. Being inclusive shouldn't mean being isolated but the opposite really.

Oh and as our schooling system is totally inclusive, catchments are basically all children in the local area and it really does have the whole range of abilities, although how that works for children with severe learning disabilities I have no idea (probably quite badly I suspect).

Look what happened when I listed what I'd like to see. Nit tells me I'm boring her, despite that fact that she asked the question. And then promptly starts finding points of disagreement

I beg your pardon, word? Where? How? What??

Word I really would like you to read page 30 again and explain how you reached the extraordinary conclusion that I told you I was bored and then 'found reasons to disagree'. You'll find them, I'm sure, in the post which I began with 'ok word I am on board with most of that'.

Maybe Word thought you said "ok word I am bored with most of that", Nit?

I didn't think of that! You could be right.

Although I would hope that the rest of my post, which included concessions as well as counter arguments, would not be so easily dismissed as 'finding reasons to disagree'.

I think it wodul be pretty surprising if there wasn't disagreement with one person's slightly random view on what constitutes a good comprehensive school. Thinking about my own children's experiences:

dd says she wodul like classes to be streamed by interest, not aptitude (their elective classes are better than the compulsory ones because there are always people who aren't interested/don't want to be there). Bright children can be just as disruptive after all.

I love that my children's school is relaxed and that there are very few rules (uniform etc) so no I don't want strict discipline. Plus my ds was certainly disruptive at times in junior school and I would have been very unhappy to have him carted off to a PRU type unit unless it was very very good and set up to handle children with disabilities

I agree about having all science options and different MFL (my children are really enjoying Japanese, and it's a good option for dyslexic ds as it's not phonetic)

I don't really understand the obsession with Latin, I took it at school and don't feel that it brought huge value to me, but if there is the demand and the teachers then sure, why not

Our school is good on academic monitoring as we have a grade point average system here - we can see every mark they get online. Options are less restrictive, math, science, social studies, English are all compulsory to graduate and then the others are by choice, but you can change your mind as it's all modular (ie you can take say drama 9 in year 9, realise it wasn't the best choice and so instead of continuing to drama 10 pick up say Art 9 in year 10 instead. Might mean you miss out on another choice or graduate a term later though.

Our school requires PE to be taken until grade 10, so from 8-10 every other semester has 1 1/2hrs of PE every day. I think this is a bit too much really. Competitive sports are all voluntary and taken quite seriously.

I totally agree that SN provision should be much much better, well resourced as well as consistent and transparent .

13 GCSEs seems excessive I agree. I took math O level early followed by AO math, don't see a problem with that. Our system here doesn't use exams very much. ds will have three at the end of this year, and then one at the end of year 11 and year 12. They seem to be more for government monitoring than anything else, and aren't really taken into account by universities. As ds is dyslexic that's great for him. Also for dd who would probably get stressed and ill with that level of pressure.

Would my ideal school be better than Words? Who knows.

If my child was able to access a comp where 20% had arrived from primary school already having reached level 6 maths I would be ecstatic. Sadly the reality is that around 20% reach level 5 and very very few get level 6 in my region. A child who gets level 6 would be an outlier where I live.

"A child who gets level 6 would be an outlier where I live."

A child who gets a level 6 is not necessarily an outlier- but is unusual anywhere but Mumsnetland. As it is supposed to be.

If a comp has 20% reaching maths level 6 when they arrive, while only 2% do nationally, then, obviously and logically, that comp is very rare and not at all representative of the country as a whole. (If it weren't, then more than 2% would be leaving year 6 with level 6s as a matter of mathematical necessity.)

Therefore, no broad decisions should be made based on anyone's experience of that comp with 20% of the children arriving in yr7 with level 6s. That school is just statistical "noise." A rogue variable if you like.

I was referring to teacherwith2kids post when she was sharing the data about 20% arriving at the comp with level 6 maths levels. I don't think it is the norm and I think if most parents of bright children had the option of a comp where 20% arrive with level 6 maths they wouldn't even consider grammar school and possibly tutoring because they would have a perfectly good option where their child would have lots of similar ability peers.
I don't actually know what level makes somebody an outlier (I presume it varies according to the ability of the cohort) but in my area very very few get level 6 in any subject.
I have no idea what level my own child is going to be when he arrives at senior school. He was level 4a across the board at the end of year 3 and has made steady progress since then. I don't think he will be top of the class or perhaps even top set whether we choose a selective school or not. At the moment he is flitting between wanting to go to a selective school and wanting to go to the local comp so he can have extra time in bed in the morning. We don't have long until we make his application.

Sorry, 4c not 4a across the board.

Hak I think you woefully misunderstand what kids in a super selective are like. The vast majority are absolutely bog standard 'normal' on the basis of what you've just outlined as 'normal'. They do all the normal teenage things in life, they just happen to be in the top few percentile for cleverness. Perhaps that's something you don't want to hear.

How do you rationalize academic selection for university incidentally? Do you object to that too? And if not, why not, if you don't mind explaining?

ey do all the normal teenage things in life, they just happen to be in the top few percentile for cleverness. Perhaps that's something you don't want to hear."

No, I do understand that. I was just musing about the concept of normality. I am not saying that my ds is academically gifted- he isn't. But in the environment he's in, academically relatively he's in the same sort of percentile as superselective kids. But I think he still feels "normal". I don't understand why you have to be surrounded by people who are the same as you in all ways in order to feel "normal".

Oh, and universities are for adults. And are not a compulsory part of everyone's education. And do not select based on an arbitrary test consisting, to a greater or lesser extent, of stuff you're not going to have needed before and will not need after.

And universities do not have as part of their brief, the role of teaching their students how to be grown ups.

I would hazard a guess that Word Junior is in fact properly exceptional, in that he got an academic scholarship to probably the most selective school in the country. Credit where it's due. Word may prefer not to publish his GCSE results on line, if indeed he's taken them. I'm not quite sure why posters get so mean about kids they don't know - why shouldn't this DC be truly exceptional? Someone has to be.

Yes, I think he is, too.

And of course there has to be a discussion about what to do with kids like him....but I think that's a complete separate discussion to the one about more general academic selection. The enormous majority of kids in grammar schools in this country would fit happily into the top sets of comprehensive schools. As, indeed, in non selective authorities, they do.

It's not an arbitrary test though Hak is it? It's a test designed to assess potential. Which is what the top unis are looking for too, just at a more advanced level. These primary levels are just a rough guide, they're not much more useful than that.

I don't really get your point about teaching students to be adults.

Hak your Kent grammars are different beasts from the top super selectives. I don't think you can usefully make an argument based on Kent.

Universities are there to teach academic subjects.

Schools have a much broader function than that.

It is a bit boring, to be honest. " I don't like selective education" "Oh, so you must want to shut down elite universities" Really????

Brave I do not say there is one way to live a life. I repeatedly say if the children want to be buddhist monks or till the land or run a bar in Costa Rica that's fine. I just want mine to have opportunities to find their way.
I very often write about happiness being about levels of seratonin in the brain and beta endorphin levels and those come from things like what we eat, how we move, sleep and the like.

I certainly agree that being good with people is helpful in many careers and private schools seem to do a pretty good job at ensuring children are good at talking to others etc. As I often say on these kinds of thread there will be parents happy with their comp, others their state grammar and others their private selective or their private comprehensive mixed ability school. If we're all happyo with our choice, that's great. Some parents will want to educate at h ome. Some want a school with few lessons like summerhill. Some will want boarding state or private, others specialist music. Others fundamentalist Christian, Jewish or Muslim etc.

As for how to make a child feel normal, children tend to become like their peers as teenagers. So in a sense pick the peer group (local thugs (whether rich or poor ones), hard working Oxbridge types or whatever) and you have the resulting teenager in some ways.

"Hak your Kent grammars are different beasts from the top super selectives. I don't think you can usefully make an argument based on Kent."

As I think I said at 8.51. But you also can't usefully make an argument about selective education based on super selectives.

"As for how to make a child feel normal, children tend to become like their peers as teenagers. So in a sense pick the peer group (local thugs (whether rich or poor ones), hard working Oxbridge types or whatever) and you have the resulting teenager in some ways."

Fortunately I have a higher opinion of teenagers than that.