Do you think it’s true that ‘bright children do well anywhere’?

[Angelsandchanges]

I’m not sure it is. I read this a lot on here.

I think bright children may do ‘OK’, in the sense they may pass their GCSEs but I don’t think they necessarily have the optimum school experience and I don’t think they always reach their potential.

I think gifted children do, but there’s a world of difference between gifted and bright. What do others think? I’m asking because I’m wondering whether to opt for private or state.

Really hope so, can't afford to move house or send to private school ....

I’ve been telling myself this for the last year or so. Daughter is in yr 9 at local state school. Academically she’s doing well. I think she’ll get good grades if she stays there. But emotionally she’s really suffering. It’s the kind of school where being bright and wanting to succeed brings negative attention so she’s getting a lot of low level bullying for putting herself out there, either in answering questions in class, or wanting to be elected as school councillor. Plus the constant disruption in her lessons is draining. We’ve reached the stage where we’re going to pull her out and send her to private school. It’ll be life-changing to find the fees, and I don’t think she’ll necessarily get markedly better grades, but we’ve seen a real deterioration in her confidence and self-esteem that could impact on her long-term if we don’t resolve it.

But I think it’s very dependant on the school.

I think it could be the difference between "doing well" and "fulfilling their potential" that will change depending on where you go to school.

Bright resilient and self motivated children will do fine anywhere.
Bright, competitive but lazy children need people to compete with.
Bright sensitive children might well struggle if there's a lot of disruption and they're bullied for being swots.

If a school has a solid 30+ children getting multiple As on average I think most bright children would be likely to succeed, if they're struggling to get 30 through 5 A-C a child that will easily achieve that might well find results suffer as they should easily breach the target...

I was a bright kid who under achieved because of uncontrolled bullies whose favourite target were swots. So I know bright kids can be let down by their school in a way that impacts their results. We all know that wonderful teacher who inspired and made a difference. But in which school you will find one and avoid the other is a conundrum which is harder to pinpoint

I don't understand how they can do, but following with interest.

I got told this when having to deal with placing my children in less than good schools. Dd1 isn't particularly bright probably just slightly above average.

But my parents were apparently told I should go to a grammar school. But then 11 plus tuition wasn't a thing back then . A practice or 2 would have been.helpful though.

I have to say, that although I did work hard and do reasonably well. Top sets fir everything etc doing OK whilst not even really having to even try , it probably did affect how well I did. I could have done better with sone more motivated competition.

More motivation and competition

I would disagree, I was a 'bright' child not gifted by any means but I always scored highly on standardized tests and cruised through lower school years no issues. I got straight As at GCSE and then proceeded to scrape low passes in my A levels. I was at a low performing state school with a low performing sixth form, my class didn't have a permanent chemistry or physics teacher for the entire 2 years, instead we had a mix and match of whoever was available that term from the local authority. We where very much expected to teach ourselves some topics which had worked at GCSE for me but A level was to complicated. I scraped by on limited teaching, YouTube videos and text books. Perhaps I still would have struggled in a better school with the jump but i'd have done a hell of a lot better i'm sure.
As you said theirs a world of difference between gifted and bright, the girl in my class who was clearly gifted taught herself the content and then tried to teach it to the rest of the class she got As the rest of us got Cs and Ds

yes. I think bright children do very well in state schools who are very invested in these children. I think children with lower abilities are the ones who don't do well because of the poor behaviour and big class sizes in secondary. I also think that poor support from some kids' parents especially around behaviour means that some children who are not bright don't work hard enough and don't therefore succeed.

Totally agree with randomsabreuse

A motivated bright child will do well anywhere.
I think a lot of it depends on friendship groups.
At a comprehensive they are more likely to get in with the wrong crowd but if they don’t they can do amazingly well.
My daughter is bright but a bit lazy and a follower and my husband and I are very aware that if she does not get a grammar space her future could go either way.

This ^^

I think mine was a settler He would settle into what was the norm/average/what his friends did. Fortunately we could send him and he got into a selective indie where the norm was hard work and aspirations.

I think they certainly can do. But to do well, even very bright students need support and encouragement. Whether from home or school.

I went to a local government school for my first 9 years of school and a top tier private school for my final 3 years. I was a very hardworking and dedicated student. But at the private school, I had help available to me constantly. Teachers were rostered to help at lunch time, after school and even evenings for boarders. The minute you struggled with something, they picked up on it. There were so many different opportunities and it gave me some great social connections. I had been miserable at my other school and thrived in many ways at the private school. But I'm also well aware that had I not gone to that school, I could have kept my horses, my family could have afforded to holiday abroad etc. so I would have had other experiences and opportunities that were not possible due to school fees. Academic success is only one element of life and is not even the most important when it comes to living a good life. That said, I have chosen to send my own children to a small private school...

You might be interested in a book I'm currently reading called "Outliers" by Malcom Gladwell. A very interesting look at the factors that contribute to high achievement.

No, I don’t think they do.

Being academically bright is only one part of a persons make up. Children and teenagers will be heavily influenced by the attitude around them, and being bright doesn’t necessarily mean that a student is motivated or organised enough to fulfil their potential without the right support.

Even ‘gifted’ students can have other issues to contend with that will make them struggle at school, like dyslexia or autism, social or emotional issues.

Social contentment makes a big difference to happiness and therefore results too. A friend has a bright child at an excellent school whose results are top of the country, but dc mental health isn't great as they are in the minority in not owning either a pool or a pony and the entitled horrors they go to school with you couldn't make up. So results are suffering there.
It's a bit of a complicated recipe, and hindsight is a unfortunately not available in advance

Generally speaking this is the case. If a child has natural ability and interested parents, they will do well anywhere. A sizeable minority will be influenced by the environment. Being bullied by feral children can really set some bright ones back.

They'll do 'well' anywhere that's half decent.

They may not do their absolute best/ reach the absolute top of their potential for that they need the opportunities available in a fantastic school.

And this assumes a bright child willing t work. It's a different story if you've got a bright child who lacks discipline/ motivation/good behaviour.

I wish I agreed. But no, I think they don’t necessarily thrive or reach their potential. It’s an odd assumption to make, when you think about it, that intellectual ability protects from emotional and mental health issues. Or that school is only about what grades you get in public exams.

The thing is is that 95% of parents (made up figure but I have anecdotally heard of very very few parents who don't) would describe their child as bright. Mine are for example 😜

I don't think the difference is state vs. independent school.

I think it's:

Good vs. less good school.
Interested vs. disinterested parenting.
Motivated vs. unmotivated children.
Happy vs. unhappy children.

I was bright, reasonable state school, good GCSE results (not excellent), terrible A-Level results. I didn't really excel until I hit the working world... Then I suddenly became motivated, interested and happy, because I was doing something I cared about. And those things make all the difference.

No I don't think that, hence why I'm home educating my bright DS.

Yes, I think so

Bright AND self-motivated will "do well" anywhere.

But JUST being bright isn't enough without the right environment.

I think it's the other way around, bright children tend to do well anywhere, but the truly gifted, or children with asymmetric development can be at risk. Especially if they are poor or come from difficult family situations.

No, I don't think it's being "bright" that makes the difference, plenty of bright kids in good schools go off the rails.

I think children who are going to do well, will do well anywhere and what goes on at home has far more bearing than what happens are school. I'd even go so far as to say a big reason sought after schools get great results is the the parents winning the scramble for those places also spend on tuition and extra curricular activities that the school will take credit for in the results.

I'm a teacher who has worked in affluent and very not affluent areas...