to ask how do private schools produce such "confident" kids / adults and how I can do it at home?

[dragontwo]

Ok, I have my reservations about private schools, but I recognise that often they produce kids / adults with high self confidence and self assurance.

I want to know how they do this, how they drill this confidence into them, and how I can replicate any beneficial aspects of this at home into my own kid (state schooled)?

What do they say / do / teach that encourages them to be so confident and expect success?

I know there are down sides to everything but I'm just thinking about good ideas I can help my kid. NB I'm no tiger mother and do my best to encourage my kid as it is already but just looking for ideas and general thoughts on how it's done!!

Just curious!

“I am not sure 'baby daddy' is a term that should go unchallenged. It's really very insulting to all the family members in the situation thus described.”

Agreed. The assumption that “more elderly posters” automatically don’t know what they are talking about is unacceptable too.

Imogen - I think that’s a big part of it. When looking around my DC’s prep school they emphasised that all children perform in the end of year concert and play etc (and not in one massive bunch with twenty children trooping on stage and then trooping off having delivered one song as a group with most of them mouthing it which is what his current school does - and is probably the most they realistically can do with the numbers and time they have; I’m not criticising them). They have drama lessons from Year 3. So you get the training in this whether you are naturally keen on it or not.

Not sure about all this compulsory performance thing. I have performing children- it’s their thing. But a lot of people would rather eat wasps than perform in front of an audience. And surely that’s OK?

My brother in law is a scholarship pupil at a private school. He’s not entitled, rich or any of the other spiteful things that have been mentioned on here. He’s intelligent and has been given the opportunity to attend a very good school.

I agree that all children should have access to the same level of education however that isn’t and is unlikely to ever be the case. It’s just the way it is.

He does a lot of public speaking lessons and debates, they also perform a lot with choir or music class so have to be confident in front of lots of people. That said, he has friends who are painfully shy.

I imagine for some children it would do no good and possibly some harm - those who are hugely shy or for example some people with Autism. I would hope a school (whether private or state) would be able to make provisions for those special circumstances.

But I do think in general that whether you like it or not, you’d be likely to get more confident through doing that kind of thing. My DS had a performance thing yesterday and I was talking to my husband who used to loads of them as a child, whereas I didn’t. I used to shake when doing this kind of performance on the rare times I had to do it. My husband believes doing it a lot meant he wasn’t fazed by it. On the other hand, that may not be true for everyone (maybe I’d just be shaking more often!) and it may not confer the long term benefit of confidence or matter - I get by generally well as an adult in life without that specific skill). I don’t know if there is actual evidence to back it up, or just lots of prep schools and drama teachers saying it’s good for them.

Plus private schools are selective

Not all private schools are selective. The majority maybe but not all.

All private schools are selective. They may not be academically selective, but they are all selective.

I don’t go with private schools not being selective

They don’t have to follow rules that state schools do

A child that is vey disruptive can be moved on easily

I’m amazed how many parents at ds school winge about how they struggle to pay fees, can only afford fees as their parents are helping out (not many grandparents I know could afford £10k per child for 12 years), they don’t go abroad on holiday but of course go to Cornwall, and the best one I heard they are cutting back on extras and putting aside a few £’s here and there to pay for fees for two children wtf were they buying before that’s nearly my wage a year

Let’s be honest the vast majority of children in private education are from privileged backgrounds yes I am well aware for some more than other (ds has one parent who can afford it and he is privileged) and what they get is more individual attention, little to know disruptions from lack of teachers, school renovations, having to take on extra pupils as other schools are being renovated, disruptive pupils are dealt with by the extra staff that is available and if that doesn’t work asked to leave the school as it’s felt they would benefit from going to a different school, many having successful parents that enforces their belief that they could do it so can I , the extra tutoring many have, the constant reinforcement that they can achieve high grades (much easier to do when you can give children individual support), the social activities (again easier with smaller classes)

I'm getting more confused about confidence is, all the recent posts have been about performance and public speaking. Which to me is quite a different thing to being confident, it's certainly an area in which a shy or anxious person may exhibit greater amounts of anxiety but being able to do it is not at all for me a definition of confidence.

I want ds to understand that he has been very privileged not to feel that he is if that makes sense

And no before anyone asks I don’t think private schools are always better but in our circumstances it was absolutely the best for him and he has been lucky to have had been that opportunity

I don’t go with private schools not being selective

Sorry. DD is in one.

A child that is vey disruptive can be moved on easily

DD’s don’t do this. There’s a number of children with extremely difficult behaviour. They believe in giving that child a place, in 9 years there I don’t believe anyone has been “moved on”. Not least because the children in question are still there!

50% of DD’s class alone have varying degrees of EN; the majority of which have come from state schools who aren’t giving them what they need.

That should have been SEN

“I don’t go with private schools not being selective

Sorry. DD is in one.”

So if there’s a space anyone can just turn up and have it?

I went to a private all girls school. Of course this was decades ago, but many of my classmates say the same as me, we all feel that the school destroyed our confidence completely . The school had fairly narrow parameters of what sort of girl was considered the ‘right “ type. If you didn’t fit into that, then you were left feeling hopeless and sadly lacking. I was interested that a pp said that even now this can still be the case for girls’ schools.

So if there’s a space anyone can just turn up and have it?

Yes. Some classes have space, others like DD’s is full with a waiting list.

And that is what they sell their school on a school for children who may have extra needs

They have the money to deal with those situations (and some fee paying schools have set themselves up to deal only with children who have extra needs)

If this becomes too much of an issue and has too much of an impact on other students that child can be moved on. Schools that are specifically for children who may need extra support will have the money to buy that support

I would love to know where these private non selective schools that cater wonderfully for SEN are as I would put my ds in one in a hearbeat if it existed close to me.

So if there’s a space anyone can just turn up and have it?

Yep, my dds private primary school was/is first come, first served. You register a few years in advance for a reception place. Most yeargroups will have a waiting list for if places become available further down the line.

But a lot of people would rather eat wasps than perform in front of an audience. And surely that’s OK?

It is OK, but then when there is the requirement to speak in a meeting at work or make a pitch etc you could expect the people who had not been allowed to avoid practising to do better.

In deciding promotions the conversation is not going to go 'oh we'll promote Rose, she never contributes any ideas in team meetings but we know the poor love would rather eat wasps than speak in front of a group of people.'

Re selection- I think Bertrand's point was that ALL Independent schools are socio-economically selective.

If this becomes too much of an issue and has too much of an impact on other students that child can be moved on

It doesn’t tend to impact the other students. Each class has a minimum of 2 full time teachers plus support staff so there’s plenty of resources.

I would love to know where these private non selective schools that cater wonderfully for SEN are as I would put my ds in one in a hearbeat if it existed close to me

I’m in the North. DD is in a prep. There’s two secondaries that also work on the same non-selective ethos with excellent provision for SEN.

Re selection- I think Bertrand's point was that ALL Independent schools are socio-economically selective

A fair point and whilst there is the offer of 100% bursaries, I guess you need to be able to access them.

I remember a poster who used to say that all the extra curriculars at their private school were free.....

i daresay it's primarily a money thing, private school kids behave like mini versions of moneyed adults.

i should think that if you extracted a sample of state school pupils whose parents could easily afford to send them private but didn't for whatever reason and compared with a sample of those relatively few private school kids whose parents are of, earnings & assets wise, bang average means [but went private due to a full scholarship, random inheritance from a distant relative, lottery win, or similar], the behaviours that OP is interested in would be markedly more prevalent in the first sample.

I remember a poster who used to say that all the extra curriculars at their private school were free.....

Some of ours are, some aren’t.

The sports clubs, library club, art club, drama club, choir etc are free

Dance, music lessons, speech & drama are paid for by the parents.