Is everybody happy with their choice of a selective secondary education over an non-selective one?

[PooshTun]

DS's primary school wasn't particularly academic so he found the transition during the first three weeks at his selective school very tough going. They get three pieces of work a day and in theory they should only take 20 minutes each. In practice, for the first week DS would be up until 10pm doing it. He would then drag himself off to bed half asleep.

Most of his classmates came up from prep schools so they were use to the academic pressure. Also, since they had already been introduced to the material in Year 6 they were whizzing through the homework.

DS's middle initial is 'F' and during those dark days he would often say to us that it stood for 'failure' :(

Things werren't great on the friends front either. Most of his classmates had known each other for years from their time at the prep school so DS found it difficult breaking into these friendship groups. DS ended up going to the library during breaktime because he had no friends to hang out with.

Round about week 4 things started to come together. He got use to the routine, he was coping well with the work and he had made some great friends and friends begets friends.

Now, looking back, DS can laugh at his 'F' is for failure remarks. He looks forward to school, is very active in athletics and music, doing very well academically and was recently made 'editor' of the Year 7 newsletter.

During the first few 'dark' weeks DP and I did doubt that we did the right thing in placing DS at such an academic school. But everyone pushed on and now we are 110% sure that we made the right decision.

But that is us. Any parent out there who have regretted their decison to chose a selective education for their DCs?

The thread is about Year 7 experiences and whether parents feel they did the right thing by putting their kids down for a selective education.

You've added nothing to the conversation. Instead all you do is snipe and bitch about what I said in other threads about tutoring and selective education.

Did your DC fail to gain a place at a GS or indie and you blame people like me. Or are your kids in a sink school and you resent people like me because mine are at private school? Or did you fail to achieve what you perceive to be your full potential and you blame it on tutored kids who took your rightful place at the GS or at university?

I'm curious to know what motivates you such that you would read a thread about a subject you have no interest in contributing to in a constructive manner and basically just bitch about my opinions on education.

Not a personal anecdote, but our local Catholic Comp had a lad last year go to M.I.T, turns out he had won a place at super selective (Birmingham), was more than academically able, but was very unhappy socially and just didn't fit in and left after one term.

Oh Pooshtun I have no idea if he was tutored.

@ThePathan - DP did Engineering at Birmingham a few decades ago and had a great time so I was surprised to hear that he didn't fit in socially. I mean, it was/is hardly heavily populated with the Champagne Set, unlike unis like St Andrew's.

Anyway, MIT is an even better choice, at least academically. DD is still years away from it but DP would like her to eventually go to MIT.

I think it was a Birmingham sup selective school The Pathan's comments referred to, not Birmingham university.

Thanks seeker. I stand corrected.

@Poosh Yellow has certainly had more DCs going through Y7 at one of the top selective schools in the country than any of us. And like me (I think) she still has one left to go - so I'd say this is a very relevant thread for her and I'm certainly always happy to read what she posts on this subject because of the whole she's been there nd done that so many more times than I have thing.

Yes but she isn't contributing to the thread beyond making personal hits at what I said in other threads about tutoring.

Various regulars have strong opinions in favour of comprehensives. Is Yellowtip suggesting that these posters are obsessed or fixated with selective and/or private education? No she isn't.

But for whatever reason she feels a need to come onto a perfectly non controversial thread about Year 7 experiences and start insulting me.

Yes she has contributed to the thread.

@ Metabilis Thank you . Croydon solidarity . I'm certain the last bit's not true.

@ Poosh. My littlest might not get into her sibs school but seven out of seven so far have and been or are happy. Metabilis is correct that it's one of the top schools in the country so I'm pretty satisfied with that. I've been told it's a record but haven't checked the school's 500yr history, so that's possibly wrong.

I myself got a couple of direct grant scholarships at the dawn of time to what was then one of the more academic schools in London. I then attended a Champagne Set university, had a lovely time and even emerged with a degree. I then declined an offer of post-grad at another Champagne Set university and went to muddle around in London instead. Before too many years elapsed I went into child-rearing on a fairly intensive level which I only sometimes regret . Thank you for your suggestion that I might have failed to fulfil my potential though, that's definitely cheered me up :).

I was pointed in the direction of MN a year and a half ago, to look at these threads - in particular the threads about tutoring and grammars etc. What I found were many very articulate and knowledgeable posters but also a fair few who spout nonsense and that nonsense can be pernicious. That's when it's tempting to put a contrary view.

Thank you for your interest :)

Just a couple or three points from reading this.

a) I think the wrong question is being asked.
Are parents of DC's in selective schools happy with the choice -well I have yet to meet a parent of a child in such a school who is not

However, if you ask the children themselves you may get different answers. Just as you often get very negative answers from grammar school educated people of my own generation who were very displeased ( but never said so) and struggled and are often extremely vocal about their poor experience.

It comes down to whether the DC was in the right school in the first place - and that is determined by the validity and reliability of the test that got them there.

b) On the other hand,ask a parent of a DV who has a child at the alternative - a non selective school, or a school which is effectively functioning as an SM
(in a state system of grammar schools) and the answer may well be very different.

Children themselves are rarely asked ( I recall as a child not being asked myself - and had I been,I dont know if I would have been honest, not wanting to upset my parents)

I think yellowtip made this point.

c) I think it is an interesting point about employing a tutor to do homework instead of doing it yourself!

I would also suggest that those who do not think that the majority of DC's getting into GS are not tutored need a reality check.

Just my opinion.

Yellowtip - I'm interested in your kid's experiences in a selective environment as opposed to your cv but thank you for posting it.

Poosh, you are the one who accused her of having failed to reach her full potential so you really shouldn't be surprised that she responded to that.

@yellow I must say, despite having not been at all worried about DD1 - just blithely believing everyone who told us 'of course she'll get in' (foolishly - she is nothing special in terms of the school, although she is getting decent marks I suppose), I am very worried now about DD2, not because of anything to do with her ability (I'd say she is brighter - but way naughtier- than DD1) but because now I know first hand what DS's school is like I don't think it will be the right school for her, not least because I think it's a good idea to keep her and DS apart. And secondly because I now know a whole load of younger sibs of DD1s friends who didn't get in last year.

So, I'm not about to start cramming her. But I have bought a Maths workbook (which I believe is currently lying on her bedroom floor).

I understand there was a family who did loads of Irish dancing who had a lot of DDs at the school - but not, I think, 7. :)

As far as potential fulfilling goes - our early lives were so similar, and I wish I'd had 8 kids (although this morning 3 seems about 2 too many). So I reckon it's me who fell short! ;)

PooshTun- you were the first person to mention tutoring on this thread!

Soup - I didn't need her life history.

That would be Scottish dancing Metabilis; it was their mum who told me mine had broken the record of five. Actually, there are a number of families with five.

I've got the green grass syndrome too, particularly when I look out at this rain and you mention Malta :)

I feel exactly the same about DD4, though she's at least as sharp as the sisters. It's wise not to be complacent, though I think unwise to cram. I haven't got a Plan B - well, not a good one - yours is better than mine! Still, not long to go :(.

@jabed I don't know about the current Y8s, Y7s or the ones with a place for next year, but certainly in DD1's year, Y9, at our GS, tutoring wasn't very common. Our school is the only GS in a 50 mile radius, and it may be that tutoring is a thing in some of the bits of the zone of influence that are as far away from our bit as it's possible to be (we are at the outside edge of reasonableness in one direction (south, I think - I'm not the best at geography or cartography)). Perhaps the people who are at the far north east bit of the inclusion zone all do tutoring. I don't think DD1 knows anyone from that end. The kids I know who are there might have done a few exam practice sessions but that's it. Tutoring isn't a 'thing' where we live at All, so far as I can see. Perhaps that is reflected by the relatively low numbers who get in to the GS from our city compared to the kids in the posher villages closer to the school - I don't know.

DD1 adores her school. It was only when she went there that we fully realized how unhappy she had been at her primary school. DS was happy at his comp until he had whooping cough and missed the whole of the half term just gone. It remains t be seen how happy he will be when he goes back :( I think there might be a few kids at the GS who do feel pressured. Some of the ones in Dd1s friendship group do seem to get inordinately worried about tests and marks etc.

seeker - Why are you on auto attack mode?

I mentioned a kid in DS's class that was struggling and I conceded the point that others have made, that tutoring/pushing borderline kids is bad.

I'm conceding the point and I'm still getting flamed for it. Jeeze!

Mm I'm interested in this, tho my eldest is still in yr 1.

I went to a selective inde (gdst) did fine, passed my 11+ and went onto the senior school part.

I did ok for the first few years, was in middle to bottom sets. When the gcse years started it was awful and I coudn't keep up. Back then I don't thin anyone I'd tutoring (or if they did I was oblivious). The schools way to deal with me was to make me drop subjects they thought I wouldn't pass (league tables). I got my gcse's anyway and went off to art college which was much more me :)

With hindsight I was just very disorganised, so struggled to do homework as never had right books, class work just diasspeared into a pile in my bag and my parents never really checked on if I was doing my hw. And I never asked for help.

Dd is at a small private, academic (but not selective) primary and ds wil follow. Thoughts of senior school do lurk in my head. Lots take the 11+ and go on to grammar but I'm not sure that is my dd, she is scarily a mini me. I don't want my experiences to taint hers, but i will be very aware of pressure etc... And although she seems bright enough she is not top of the class. or we have a private senior which we can just about afford thanks to a good investment once upon a time, but I hear tales of parents flying in helicopters etc which is not us in the slightest! Or there are the state schools, of which I know nothing yet.

Not sure I've added anything useful more thinking out loud!

Auto attack mode?

You said people were obsessed with tutoring- I pointed out that nobody mentioned it til you did!

Sorry about spellings am on iPad.

If you didn't want her life history, Poosh, perhaps you shouldn't have insulted her.

@yellow is your DD4 in Y5? My DD2 is in Y4. It all seems to suddenly be quite close. It doesn't help that the primary school has just had a terrible OFSTED.

One thing which I do think is a downside of having a child at a geographically distant GS is the events. DD1s school is involved in a cultural Olympiad thing With two performances - one 50 miles away, one 70 miles away. For an area with no proper public transport to speak of, this is a real issue.

Some of you ladies are obviously looking for a bun fight so esqueeze me if I filter out your posts on the subject of parents with kids who are thriving/not thriving in a selective environment.