to ask would you send your eldest Dc to a grammar school?

[var12]

Hypothetical question... if there were grammar schools in your area and your DC1 was offered a place, would you accept it?

"Yes I agree with that. What about movement between schools at ages 14 and 16? Isn't May proposing that?"

See, this puzzles me. Movement at 16 happens already. But at year 9? If grammar schools are all about accelerated learning and full of gifted academics, how on earth is is someone who's had 2 years at the "other" school going to be able to keep up?

"This thread is kindling the same feeling in me as Brexit and the earlier parts of the Archers on Sunday - despair at people's self-serving, short-sighted, fact-blind stupidity."

Ooh, I bet Denis was a grammar school supporter!

But its not about gifted academics, its about the middle class maintaining the status quo.

Not one good argument for grammar schools has be made here, other than the good old mumsnet justification of "My child".

"Not one good argument for grammar schools has be made here, other than the good old mumsnet justification of "My child"."

And to be fair, there are a couple of posters who are happy to admit to this.

Only because it worked for them.

There is another thread where it didn't because a PP kid got the place under the terms and conditions of the school and the bile on there is amazing.

Oh and, as pointed out before the "it worked for me" is flawed reasoning.

I

I do think there should be opportunity to move between schools after 11 though as some children do blossom later.

The thing is, how will they then fit seemlessly into the grammar school which is supposedly so fast-paced as it only has to cater for the needs of the most able, when they have spent a couple of years going at the pace of less able children in a school where pupils supposedly routinely throw chairs and some of the parents are uncouth?

The fact that some children did make this move suggests that the pace at the selective was not actually so fast and the able children in the non-selective options were doing pretty similar work. Which begs the question, why were they separated in the first place?

I have spent my life in and around grammar schools. I absolutely loved my time at a grammar school. I was on free school meals. It changed my life. But that's just an anecdote. I am no advocate of grammar schools as a system, and there is no way that this policy is designed with the best interests of children in mind.

AND I am sick and tired of this old debate. Why are 'grammars' vs 'comps' the only options? Okay, so there are children who would love an academic environment (they are not necessarily 'more' or 'less' bright than those who wouldn't) - and I don't see the harm in providing them with it. But what about the kids who are brilliantly creative, love art or music or performing arts, and who would enjoy their education ten times more (and I believe that everybody needs some level of academic education no matter what direction they choose to go in) if they went to a school in which this was supported and encouraged? In which they learned their Shakespeare or their history by acting it, or by making costumes for productions? What about sporty kids, or kids who learn best outdoors or hands on? What about the ones, like my DD, who'd learn her maths ten times better if she was working out pulleys and ropes and weights and measurements and angles because she was about to climb a rock face? Why can't we have lots of different schools for lots of different children? (I know the answer: money.) If we're going to 'select' children at all, then we should 'select' every single one of them for their amazing skills, attributes and talents, rather than saying that only one kind of skill/talent matters, only 20% of them are worthy of selection, and that all the rest can be lumped together.

Not sure I believe in that, either. The best thing anybody could do for education, in my view, would be to reduce class sizes to 15. Again: money. But it would make a hell of a lot more difference than grammar schools.

Great point.

I imagine they would do it the way my brother moved from bottom to top set at his private school having come in late from state primary, or the way the girl who moved to my superselective Essex grammar from a failing northern comprehensive did it, by putting in a lot of extra work.

(And in the latter case, already having put in extra work while she was in the first school.)

For both Cecily and Ineed

I went to a Grammar school long ago - it was really good for me in that it
introduced me to 'things I would never have the opportunity to experience within my local pit village community - it certainly made me realise that there were other options to becoming married at 17 and having kids that would go on to do exactly the same. Where it did not help was me being
'different' - not having a similar back ground to most of the others made me a prime target for bullies.

IMO the school has to fit the child and if the alternative is a shit comprehensive then you need to consider where your child will gain most.

I have no problem with selective education but do believe that there should be entry points a 11/13/15 etc

Do you think they need to be seperated out into different buildings?

In primary (K-6) no, as this would harm their development of socialisation. K-4 should have three levels of standard running in the same class. 5-6 would be separated into selected general schools that would run an advanced academic/T&G class unit and a disadvantaged student unit. Years 7-12 would have separate high schools, ideally, or be partially selective.

People who think that the bottom 10% should be sent to a 'trade' school have entirely the wrong thinking. I have seen kids in the top 10% opt out early to pursue trades because they did not want to pursue academic education. No shame on them, they were people who KNEW what they wanted to do, a damn site more than many people who stumble into university because that is just the next step on the educational treadmill that leads to...umm.. well... somewhere or other better... I guess.

The bottom 10% should be given an academic eduction that allows them to function in the real world, because being asked to write an essay about a Shakespeare play when all they will write is 'fuck you' is not only a failure that they do that, its a failure they are asked to do something now irrelevant to their future.

They don't need to be separated into different buildings, different rooms should suffice, in theory. In practice, it doesn't though because the teacher gets switched into another room to help those who need it more and yet another cover lesson is arranged.
I wouldn't have a problem with cover lessons if the teacher had any subject knowledge at all, but they more often than not don't e.g. a PE teacher delivering a ICT lesson or a history teacher taking the science class.
Then there is the policy of making the top set big in order to allow the bottom set to be small.
And then, there is the move-3-or-4-students-up-to-boost-their-confidence strategy.
Finally, there is the patchy provision of extra curricular G&T things which gives the message that the needs of the most able are just very low priority, pretty much permanently last in the queue.

These are all criticism of schools lacking budget, and government policy, not of schools failing students.

I don't understand how you expect lessons to be covered by experts unless they are long term absences.

I don't expect lessons to be covered when the scheduled teacher is in the school.

You never told me how you expect the govt to fund an increase in school budgets? Tax hikes? Or reducing expenditure elsewhere?

or indeed borrowing?

Well borrowing would make sense as the interest on gilts is negligible, or maybe not funding free schools, allowing massive profits to be made by business associated with academy chains.

Or maybe just by spending the extra money they're going to "find" for grammar schools on education as a whole?

The bottom 10% should be given an academic eduction that allows them to function in the real world, because being asked to write an essay about a Shakespeare play when all they will write is 'fuck you' is not only a failure that they do that, its a failure they are asked to do something now irrelevant to their future

I haven't taught English to secondary pupils, so I'll take your word for it that this is what the bottom 10% will do. Although surely an essay on Shakespeare is equally irrelevant for a child who wants to take STEM subjects, or MFLs, for example, at university, isn't it?

Are you basically saying, the bottom 10% should do the same subjects, but not the hard bits?

smallfox2002 - did i read upthread that your specialism is economics?

KS2 data is not a good predictor of outcomes

DD got brilliant results at KS2. At a parent teachers evening her teacher was forecasting great things in academia. I sat there thinking he had the wrong child. DD is dyslexic and ADD and is not academic in the least.
At GCSEs she scraped through with 1 B and 6 Cs. If she had been put in a Grammar school she would have been deeply depressed.

DD wouldn't be claiming unemployment as she is what she does is considered self employed. But instead she has to go to college for the next 2 years.

""Not one good argument for grammar schools has be made here, other than the good old mumsnet justification of "My child"."

And to be fair, there are a couple of posters who are happy to admit to this"

I actually didn't use the "my child" justification as my children attend private school. But what is wrong with parents who do use that argument? Sorry but EVERY parent wants what is best for their child above all other children SURELY? And if they believe that is a grammar school system they will support it. Opponents of grammar schools would do better trying to rationally convince the supporters of them that they aren't going to benefit THEIR child, rather than shooting down every point made in favour of them as "flawed". I'm glad I don't have to use the state system but I still want to see children educated well within it.

Oh yes Var, would you like to try and take me on there? Seeing as you can't put together a decent argument for grammar schools I'd love to see you try in economics.

Everyone uses the "my child" argument for whatever school system suits their own family best. You are one of the most vocal "my child" posters out, Bertrand.

Ells.

But the argument being used to justify the creation of more grammar schools is that they improve social mobility, when all of the data proves that they don't. People then come and offer the "it works for me" which brings about the fallacies that have been pointed out.

Properly funding all schools would benefit the entirity of society, following the current policies of cutting funding to state schools, whilst finding extra funding for grammars isn't going to work.