Contempt for Grammar Schools

[PencilMom]

Yesterday’s thread regarding the exclusion of private schooled children from state grammar schools has really highlighted that many people dislike grammar schools (and even more so private schools and the parents who can afford it).

AIBU for completely not understanding where the contempt stems from? There is dislike of the parents who explore this as an option for their children (many are characterised as elitist), the parents who can afford tutoring (which in many cases focuses on becoming accustomed to the test format), the children who go to grammars, I have even seen teachers accused of choosing the easy route.
There is not nearly as much dislike of sporting schools, creative arts or technical schools. If there is a school which caters to a child’s particular strengths or interests, why is that considered bad. Where possible all counties/cities should have a varied range of focused schools.

Please explain why you are opposed to or support grammar schools?
(I totally understand that the 11+ / selective tests has a negative undertone for those who “fail” — but is that not on the parents/primary schools to positively frame the experience regardless of their child’s score).

Ah the enlightened envy theory

Leaving aside the issues about admission, grammar schools or selective senior schools tailor their syllabi to their intake, and it's usually academic. If non-selective schools provided a less academic range of subjects appropriate to their intake, and got tough on disruptive behaviour, life would be easier all round.

I remember doing supply teaching at a non-academic school in this grammar school area. For English, which was on modern post-nuclear poetry (On the Beach at Cambridge by Adrian Mitchell), they were hellishly behaved; for technology, which was on diseases of timber (dry rot etc) , they were quiet and industrious. I asked them why: 'Well, technology is useful innit, Miss...'

I am not ignoring those who can not access tutoring, before we went that route we looked a library books/ free online resources / subscription based online resources/ spoke to the school. This I expect would be the only options alongside the on going support of the parents. Many succeed this way. Unfortunately I don’t have all the answers.

My DC would very likely have got in with no tutoring but that was a gamble I decided not take. As I also stated they enjoy their tutoring and the engagement with the other students, and as a result we have decided to continue up until the exam.

If it was decided that formal tuition is not allowed prior to the test, how would that account for the children with teacher and educators as parents? How would that account for prep schools, how would that account for those who can afford the large number of available prep books, all the online platforms? There are so many factors to consider but in my own case I have done what I can afford.

Maybe I stated this on the other post but there needs to be more balance and variation in the education system, free travel, the ability to teach in smaller classes and mostly importantly flexibility to move between all types of schools if required.

Rubbish. Again the local grammar schools have many students competing national in a variety of sports and their students also perform in many arts opportunities like county orchestras and dance shows. This thread really shows (and this isn't aimed at you) how much ignorance there is around grammar provision.

But it is simply envy. So many labour voters spouting anti grammar school rhetoric with the privilege of living in affluent areas with good schools.

If primary schools were able to tutor their bright students for the 11+ it would make grammar entry far more equitable.

I will just add though, the state school my DC attended had a 6th form in the grounds and more DC that went to Grammar school would apply to entre the 6th form there than stay on and attend the Grammar schools own 6th form.

You’ve already said the reasons in your opening post. Grammar schools are meant to improve social mobility for all but in reality they favour the few. Private schools - elitist in their very nature so are not going to be favoured by the masses. I think it’s pretty self explanatory really.

That',s probably because only 5% of school kids in the UK go to them because they haven't existed in most areas for over 50 years ,I actually studied the tripartite systems of education in History and I left school in 1990!

Well it wouldn't because so few exist .

I agree - they go onto any politics thread and bring it up no matter what the OP is. I had to delete a politics thread because I specifically said I didn't want to debate VAT and they simply couldn't leave it alone.

I think grammar schools do change a catchment area though and make it so you have to go private if you don't get in if you have SEN or just a bright quiet child that would sink in an academy.

A lot of people are talking about how grammar schools are OK because the choice is between a grammar and a terrible, crime-ridden comprehensive where nobody can get good grades. But isn't it pretty despicable to say that it's fine for the majority of children to attend the terrible schools so long as a few children who are good at exams get to go to a different school? Introducing a grammar school won't fix the problems at the comprehensive.

I just think that nobody should have to live in conditions that we wouldn't want our own loved ones to experience, whether that's education, housing, access to healthcare, working conditions, care for elderly and disabled people etc. Taking a few people out of a bad situation doesn't make it OK to leave the rest to struggle indefinitely.

It isn't better- we have the best academic results in the UK, BUT also the worst!!! Many of our secondary schools are seriously bad!!!! It is only great if you get into a grammar.

My children both had small extra needs. No grammar schools in the area. We looked at the 2 local comprehensive schools and shuddered, they were both awful. So we went to an open day at the nearest independent school. The difference was amazing. We thought long and hard because neither of us really approve of the system but in the end accepted that we could jump up and down for our political beliefs all day and it wouldn't get our kids a decent education, our cheque book however would. So we all but bankrupted ourselves for the better school. It was worth every penny

I live in a grammar school area.

Every year there are loads of DC tutored who have no chance of passing or thriving at grammar school which is sad but I can understand why their MC parents do it - one year paying for tuition and hopefully passing Vs 7 years of paying for private tuition - it's worth a punt.

To the original question, for me it's the selection at 11 with limited room to switch track after. I think most people accept academic selection at some point, most notably minimum GCSE grades to continue for sixth form at 16. If we're honest, we know even at 16 more well-resourced families are able to provide tutoring or just simply a more supportive environment. They're advantaged no matter what.

The main difference to me is that at 16 the children drive the selection outcome much more than the parents. Generally speaking, they understand what's at stake, and there's so much resources online at relatively low cost, or even free. I'd hope most aspirational 16 yo will be able to seek out these resources independently.

So if that’s the issue then why aren’t there as many angry threads with people demanding the government make it easier for schools to remove badly behaved children?

As soon as anyone mentions poorly behaved children, you get multiple responses saying ‘what if they have SEN?

If parents marched and lobbied the government to focus on behaviour in schools, it would make a difference.

It’s much easier to disrupt the educations of those in grammar or private than tackle the root issues which make them choose other options available to them.

I’m certain nobody would pay £££ for a school or lose years of their free time and paying ££ tutoring kids to get into grammar, if they could be assured their kids would be able to progress at the local state school.

Yes it’s unfair the majority can’t afford to pay or tutor but the conversation should be on why they are doing this and how it should be fixed.

The conversation never seems to be on how we level people ip, it’s always about levelling people down. It’s bonkers.

It’s politics of envy. Many grammar schools are also populated by BAME students, so there is an element of racism/discrimination/prejudice against these groups and why they are doing so well.

And this is what I'm struggling to understand - so if no grammars, then both you and your brother would've ended up in the same rough school with slightly higher concentration of "non-rough" kids, but still the same cohort of those ones with hammers.
Do you believe that those grammar kids could change dynamic and improve lives of "hammers" kids? or you'd sink with them?

My point is - hammers are coming from homes and parents, it takes really exceptional teachers to turn this around with teenagers and we just don't have enough of such personalities. So why not to save at least some proportion of kids?

Which is an argument for creating more...

I think the idea is that if the class was more tailored to the pupils then the behaviour wouldn't be as bad because they'd engage more.

I don't know whether you can read music, but imagine being in a music lesson where it's expected that you can and that you should be able to play an instrument. You won't explicitly be taught to read music, but you can probably, after a bit, recognise middle C and read the treble clef by counting up. You have to take music every year, and over the years the rhythms get more complicated, people are starting to play Nocturnes and concerto movements, and you can still only really manage Three Blind Mice on the recorder because you learned it by ear.

Wouldn't you be fed up and feel demotivated when you went into a class that wants to talk about analysing chord progression in Beethoven? You'll either sit quietly with no idea of what's going on, or, if you're a different type of person say there's no point in being there and maybe be disruptive?

There are people who feel like that in every lesson. And the answer isn't to make them all take A-level music.

It's to realise early on that they need a different type of class — one that teaches reading music, assuming little knowledge. Introduce the instruments in an orchestra, listen to famous pieces from films and video games and listen out for the flutes or the brass. Talk about why music is important in everyday life. Group teaching on the ukelele, singing, and clapping games to improve knowledge of rhythms. They might never get to grade 8, or analyse a chord progression but it's fine. Some might only do it for a couple of years, also ok. They can appreciate music, and if they want to join a local community choir or band they'd be able to.

And having a whole class with that as the plan means people don't feel embarrassed that they're behind or like they'll never catch up with the person who has just done their grade 7 violin at 13. And learning music properly, even if they don't cover as much, means they can go to a concert without feeling like they don't fit in or shouldn't be there.

(Ok, it's stretching the analogy quite a lot, but hopefully it makes some sense. Another example would be
swimming lessons that keep moving on to different strokes when you still haven't managed to take a foot off the bottom.)

The main problem I have with grammar schools beyond the cost of tutoring is that there is zero flexibility in the system - one shot and you're out. Because children develop at different speeds, this is a HUGE waste of talent. The rigidity in the system means that children who belong in a grammar don't get the chance to be there. It's wasteful, it's inefficient, it's impractical and it perpetuates inequality. And societal inequality is in itself wasteful of talent - the UK needs to do better by its young people.

I come from a selective system, but it has flexibility for people to move up as they develop. When I did my A levels, I had a 21-year-old in my class who had gone through all the upward steps. Can't have been easy, but at least he had the chance!

S3fy so true!

One of top 5 grammars here, 95% kids BAME. I did hear with my own ears a parent saying "my DC got the place, but they'd be the only white child in year group, so off we go to PS" and accepted one of the top 10 schools in the UK.
With VAT policy a lot of kids like this will move to grammars changing demographics there and taking up places of amazing kids who didn't have a PS choice in first place.

Or we could invest more money into specialist provisions for SEN so that those kids who are disruptive are able to be educated in a more suitable setting which benefits everybody not just the privileged few

I get your point as a teacher.
But as a parent of a child who is likely in that top 10%, in the nicest way, my child isn't there to teach other children - which is what her teacher asks her to do, along with collecting photocopying, running various errands and generally being what seems to be an unpaid TA.

And before I get 'but it's important for her to learn to be considerate of other children' - she already is! She regularly does litter picks round our village, volunteers with the local Rainbows group.

I attended both a church comp and a state grammar with boarding. Comp didn't stream by ability in first year and wasted a year of education teaching me things I already knew (it was a top 400 UK school by results too versus a top 100 school).

After 2 years in a comp I had fallen way behind the streamed grammar and never caught up when I was there. They were doing 15-20 hours homework a week in the grammar versus 5-10 hours (at the most) at the Comprehensive - how can you catch that time up? It was at least 1000 extra hours of homework in the first two years plus the benefit of streaming in the first year - big differences in knowledge levels and learning.

It isn't being around more intelligent and motivated children that makes a difference at high achieving grammars, it's the hours of graft kids put in outside school. Comprehensives could do the same, nothing is stopping them. Getting rid of grammar schools won't help improve outcomes at comprehensive schools.