To think this is elitist?

[FawnFrenchieMum]

State secondary school, year 7&8 currently has sets 1-5 for all classes (DD isn’t with her form group for any lessons and every class is different children).
Letter just before half term advised from next week when they return all the classes will be moved around and they will have a new timetable. Going forward, set 1 will be based on ability and be the highest achieving standard. Then classes 2-5 will now be mixed ability, there will be no ability setting within these groups.
Now I know there are lots of arguments for or against ability setting, but surely it’s one or the other. Why should the set 1 children get taught with like minded children but a child who just missed out on set 1 not, or a child who is really struggling academically now has to listen to a child who just missed out on set 1 know all the answers every week.
It feels totally elitist to me, but interested in hearing other peoples opinions.

Is it not a reflection of the actual abilities of the children? There's a stand out group who will benefit from being taught - and stretched - together. It's more difficult for the teachers when there are mixed abilities.

Because groups 2-5 will be all close in range. No it’s not elitist. Some kids need to go faster than the others, the rest will still be taught, but once you get past the top group it is really mixed in terms of ability.

If I remember correct (and it was years ago I read this but I’m freakishly good at numbers) the research says that the top 10% of kids do best with setting. For those who are from 10% to 33% then setting has no impact. For those who are not in the top third, they do better with mixed ability.

So they are trying to give everyone their “best option”.

However, you have spotted the fallacy with the method.

That the kids who are from 20% to 28% are the new “top 10%” in the mixed ability group and so are losing out.

I guess that you could argue that this is the best option though as now only 8% of the year are losing out rather than 10% (if they went completely mixed ability) or 67% (if they stuck with setting).

The concern is once it is set there will be no movement between the top sets and others. Also, types of teachers they will get. There is the potential for bias to be set. We see this happening in primary schools where parents can be very sharp elbow. Kids in top sets not move whilst others that have caught up have no chance to stretch or be expose to harder questions.

It is fine. Focus on your child, if they are engaged, well taught and not subject to bad behaviour from others it'll be fine.

I would judge it after a year.

Tall poppy syndrome - why is it always academic achievement that’s seen as elitist? Would you say the same about sport?

Academically it's-

Great for the top set
Good for the bottom set as they have stronger pupils to pull them up/learn from. Plus a mix of students some who may be more willing to learn
Rubbish for second set as they will be pulled down
Difficult for the teachers teaching mixed abilities

Socially it creates a divide that would see the top set as superior. Unless you go to a school like the one I did where education is not valued in which case the top set would instantly become targets

Im not surprised at the school doing this but its unusual to communicate it so openly. Most schools these days favour an approach of leaving you guessing what set your child is in and only communicate progress rather than relative achievement against peers.

Well yes I would if it was the same set up. DD plays in Div 5 at football, her best friend plays in Div 1. If the league suddenly said, Div 1 will remain but we’re mixing up Div 2-5 then yeah, I’d be upset, she’s playing at her right ability in Div, I wouldn’t suddenly wish for her to be playing again Div 2 every week. That’s how she gets demotivated and quits.

She used to dance, she was good enough to be invited to join the comp team. Of that team 2/3 from each age group were invited to compete in Championships, she wasn’t at that level, I wouldn’t wish for her to go and never ever get placed or look out of place every single week.

edit - this should have quoted @WickDittington ’s post

I assume because the children know they are setted currently that if they suddenly changed for class X2 next week to X5, they and parents will think they have moved from set 2 to set 5

This is an interesting theory. Will look at this more, thanks.

They're trying to give the best option to as many children as possible.
Most able children tend to do better with setting. Middle attaining and lower attaining children tend to do better in mixed ability classes.

By removing the top group, the mixed ability class doesn't have the same outliers so the teacher can focus on the smaller attainment range.

I don't mind teaching sets or mixed ability, but find that true mixed ability is very difficult if you're trying to extend your grade 9 students with A Level content at the same time as making sure the lower attaining student know what's happened in the chapter you've just read. It can be done, but it's difficult and I know of colleagues who've taught to the middle with a couple of extension activities.

This.

Or Music, or Drama, or any of the arts.

Kids at the bottom academically get extra help, so why not the kids at the top?
These are the people who will become high earners and pay lots of taxes. They will become the doctors, nurses, engineers, lawyers etc that this country needs more of to succeed as a country. The school will target them, but Ofsted will ensure it also targets the least able kids to help them be the best they can be too.

I’ve responded above about my thoughts on sports so yes I would think the same.

Based on your post it will be the middle / average children that are over looked. Not the top performing or least able.

There's also classroom behaviour to take into account.

You might assume that I mean the lower ability kids, but I don't; a bored, high ability kid or two in a class can be an absolute nightmare.

I know I was, as once I'd finished everything, done the extension work, helped everybody around me, drawn multiple cartoons in my exercise books and slumped in almost physical pain at the unfortunates struggling to read aloud and knew that whatever else happened, I'd be fine academically, there's only finding new and exciting ways to wind up the teacher (correcting spelling and grammar was one of my regular ones), arguing/debating about what they were teaching, taking them off on tangents, tapping, making excuses to get up or leave and generally making their lives a misery for the remaining 45 minutes of a 1 hour lesson.

The dds school have a kind of similar set up.
top set are on their own. Then there’s 3 mixed ability but “higher” sets and 3 mixed ability but “lower” sets. Then there’s the extra help set for those needing to go at a slower pace. This is only for maths and english, also science in y7 -9 but in y10 & 11 science is different due to some doing triple and others double (purely a choice, it’s not based on ability at their school). So there are higher and lower sets for both double and triple. All other subjects are fully mixed ability.

as far as I can see it’s works fine and the schools results are good. Both my dds have always been in the top sets though so don’t know first hand how the kids find it for sure, but it doesn’t seem to be an issue.

Research shows this is this most effective way to teach children as mixed abilty improves results for all except the most able. Pretty common approach nowadays.

We had this for GCSE Science and I think English. I used to get so bored in science because it was too easy. And then we had a supply teacher who couldn't teach

I am puzzled by the mixed setting below set one.

My GS is in the bottom set for maths and is perfectly happy with this - as he said "It is the right place for me." He gets set work that is at his standard, as do those in the other graded sets. He would not want to be in a set with "set one just misses" as he would struggle.

The nature of the setting is open and transparent and he and his parents are entirely happy with this.

Elitism does not come into this at all - it is about teaching each child appropriately to their ability.

It seems odd to me and not in your child’s interests if they are in the top third but not in the top 10%

I suspect it’s because it gives them a grammar school stream, guaranteed to get great resents, and then less timetable hassle for the rest.

I can see that PPs say there is research to support it, but I am instinctively doubtful about it, especially because of the disruptive caused by lower ability kids in the classroom (not because they are bad, but because they are bored).

Kids aren’t thick! They will work it out pretty quickly

OP, I'm a primary teacher in UKS2 and we do something similar.

There's no perfect solution when you have 32 children in a class with a huge range of abilities and attainment levels but this approach works pretty well tbh.

The very highest attaining children benefit from working like this because they pick things up very quickly; grasp concepts more easily; and are able to apply them more readily. As a pp said, they do become bored and it's hard to challenge them appropriately if you are busy explaining the basics in 101 different ways when they'd understood it almost before you'd finished teaching it the first time. They get to collaborate with children whose thinking is on the same level as theirs and develop the deeper understanding that they are ready for.

Presumably, there would be a separate group for the working below keystage children who maybe aren't accessing the curriculum at all?

The rest benefit from the collaborative working working in a mixed ability group offers. Eg the ones who get it more easily consolidate their understanding and learning by discussing concepts and explaining them to children who haven't quite got it yet. And the ones who haven't quite got it yet equally benefit from exploring it with a peer.

There's a big focus on metacognition at the moment. Being able to discuss what they are doing facilitates this.

Sometimes the highest attaining children find this hardest because they don't know how they know the answer, they just 'know' it and this can be a focus.

The lower children in the mixed groups get exposed to thinking that is higher than they are currently doing which benefits them, the more able children in the mixed group benefit from explaining.

And, again, as a pp said, there isn't much difference in the others. The very highest and the very lowest attaining need a different approach the rest, teachers can pitch it to the middle fir the mixed ability groups and better meet their needs.

As a working class child under the poverty line who went to what is now an academy that was always requiring improvement, I’m happy I was in the top set. It gave me the confidence to keep achieving.

When I was at school we had a top, middle and bottom set. Initially I was put in the middle set then a year later ‘promoted’ to the top set. The abilities (and behaviour) of the middle set and bottom set were not compatible, there was quite a gulf so I can understand your view that this is not fair. There really should be some middle ground.