Grammar schools -a "think" piece.

[seeker]

New readers start here. I live in a small town in Kent. We have a fully selective secondary education system,- children take 11+ tests in Sepetember of year 6, and are allocated either to the grammar school ( the "top" 23%) and the high school- the remaining 77%, which consists of those that don't reach the required mark in the test and those that didn't take it at all. The grammar school is an OFSTED outstanding school, with 99% a-c. The high school is a good school, with, if I recall 40% a-c. It has excellent vocational facilities and very good sport. There are no comprehensive schools in any sort of travelling distance. One or two children go to other selective schools in the area, and a few go private, but the vast majority go to either school A or school B. ( It's important to say here that I am only talking about a fully selective system here. The areas where there is a grammar school for the very top of the top 5% and all but comprehensives for everyone else are a different discussion)

The reason I think this is interesting in a broader context is that this is the model which many people would like to see replicated by the introduction of more grammar schools. To a grammar school enthusiast, it looks perfect. I think they sometimes forget that more grammar schools means more "secondary moderns" .

Living in in the middle of such system, is possible to see it's damaging, divisive consequences.

We have a town where children, at the age of 10, are told that they are not good enough for the grammar school, with all the societal and psychological problems this produces. The supporters of the system say that it isn't a "pass or fail" system- it is just an "allocation of appropriate school" system Which would be fine- if wasn't described as "passing" and "failing". If the town was not full of congratulations and comiserations when the results come out in March. If the children themselves were not fully aware-because they are not stupid- that tests produce passes and failures. And if the grammar school did not have less than 2% children with SEN and 2% FSM -against the high school's 27% and 22%.

Basically what we have is a comprehensive school cohort, but rigidly separated. The top set are educated completely separately half a mile away. There is no opportunity for kids at the high school to move into that top set if they suddenly discover an academic streak at the age of 12 or 13, and no opportunity for a Grammar school child to move if they discover that they are not as academic as they appeared on one day in their 10th September. Which a properly streamed comprehensive would provide. Such a school would also provide a proper top set, as well as opportunities for the less able. But there would be the possibility of movement. AND, crucially, you wouldn't have a massive group of kids who have been told, in however sugar coated a way, that they have failed at the age of 10. What's, as they say, not to like?

"Do you mean that ALL DC, in ALL lessons, should be taught to the level of the worst performing pupil in the class, so as not to make THEM feel like a failure?"

No. That's why in my OP I talked about properly streamed comprehensive schools.

I imagine that at secondary school, once you have set, movement between sets becomes increasingly difficult, assuming the more able sets are working at a faster rate and therefore increasing the gap. I there isn't much movement between sets, you have stuck a label on 11 even though it is within the same school.
Our local ' comprehensive' streams, not sets for the first two years. The top stream is called the grammar stream. How is that any less divisive?

Seeker, streamed or set? Streaming is, IMO, v divisive. Setting is more common?

Sorry. Setted. Slip of the finger!

The whole point is that if all the sets are in one school there is the possibility of movement between them- up or down. If the kids are in different schools there isn't. It just seems like a no brainer to me!

Why do only the brightest get a route out of poverty? Are the rest supposed to stay there -'you are poor and not very clever -so you can stay in poverty and you don't need a good education?'

Of course they can move up at a later date-you don't hold back late developers by saying 'sorry mate you missed the boat'!

IMO, if you allow your DC's too feel like a 'failure' because they haven't 'passed' the 11+, you are doing something wrong as a parent, because you are not teaching them to discover where their personal skills lie, or how to develop those areas where they are struggling.

I have spoken at length to my DS1 on the subject of his 11+, coming up this September, and he knows that only 90 DC from our County can get into the super-selective Grammar school.

He is perfectly capable of understanding that only those 90 with the highest marks in the County CAN get a place, and you could be supremely gifted, but there might be 90 DC that are slightly more gifted than you, hence THEY would get those 90 places.

He knows that the local Secondary is an excellent school, will teach him almost as thoroughly (though with less 'flashy' equipment, and shared textbooks, but i buy my DD her own from Amazon!) and it is down to how much work HE puts in, whichever school he attends, that will determine the rest of HIS life.

He 'gets' that there are 700+ boys applying for just 90 spaces at the Grammar, as long as he does HIS best, then there is no problem.

If it is a super selective you have not failed-you just haven't been selected. If it is merely selective and about 23% pass then you do feel you have failed. My parents didn't make me feel a failure-I can't say that anyone did-but I felt a failure.

Totally agree, CouthyMow. No child is a 'failure' because they fail 1 exam on 1 day at the age of 11, any more than they are a failure if they fail a SATs test at a similar age, or fail a GCSE at 16 etc (or fail a phonics test at 6, as we are about to have). These tests don't test every aspect of a person - they test specific things on a specific day. Any parent who tells their child that failing the 11+ makes them a 'failure' is a truly dreadful parent. When my dd did her 11+, I made it 100% clear that it was not a brainscan, determining 'who' or 'what' she was, it was a particular exam on a particular day that might or might not highlight her strengths, and all she could do was her best on that day. I also felt that, as a bright girl, she'd do well and be a credit to whichever school she went to. As it happens, she did get into the selective school, but I feel the school is as lucky to have her as the reverse.

Bright kids who by some accident do 'fail' the 11+ will go on to do well elsewhere and the schools that get them will benefit from their presence. The idea that a child who happens not to get into get grammar school is thrown on some hopeless educational scapheap and is condemned to a life of 'failure' is a lie and does no service to the very pupils you claim to support, seeker and exoticfruits.

Ok. Please explain to me how, if you have an exam which talks about a pass mark, and you know that if you get over this mark you get congratulated and go to this school and if you don't, people commiserate and you go to that school, where people ask you whether you passed or not, you are not going to feel, at some level that you have failed?

A super selective is very different- if only a tiny %age get in of course you don't feel like a failure if you don't. But if 23% "pass"?

As I said before, my friend's dd has thrived far more at the comp than she would have done at the grammar - failing the exam has not turned her into a 'failure' - she feels like a success.

YOu need to stop labelling people - it is you doing it, not the system.

"Bright kids who by some accident do 'fail' the 11+ will go on to do well elsewhere and the schools that get them will benefit from their presence. The idea that a child who happens not to get into get grammar school is thrown on some hopeless educational scapheap and is condemned to a life of 'failure' is a lie and does no service to the very pupils you claim to support, seeker and exoticfruits."

Well, I certainly said nothing of the sort. I though you hadn't read my posts!

And I haven't lbelled anyone!

Or even labelled them!

And re failing a particular exam,as I said, that's life. Kids have SATs - some get Level 3s, some 4s, some 5s. They all know this. Thy don't imagine they're all academically equal. But equally, they may be fantastic in non-academic ways and know that too.

I went to grammar school, and was at the top of the class academically. BUT i was always the last person to be chosen for games' teams - because I was crap at sport. I knew it. That's life.

But the whole point is that if you have rigid segregation at 10, there is no possibility of movement - and in a comprehensive there is. Why is that a bad thing?

Yes, I have read your posts, seeker. Your OP began by stating that the only alternative to grmaar schols for the 77% of pupils who failed the 11+, were shit secondary moderns, where kids were condemned to failure.

That's a lie - others from Kent on this thread have stated that is a lie.

And even if it were true, it would only provide an argument to improve secondary moderns, not get rid of successful and popular grammar schools.

I had hoped for a rebittal of my earlier points, seeker, re the left-wing ideal being differentiation not identikit education. But clearly you haven't read my posts.

rebuttal. Though rebittal could be a partial rebuttal. :)

seeker, i actually agree with your point about the rigid cut-off at 11 - the only point I do agree with you on, possibly - and would suggest that introducing, if not already in existence as some on this thread suggest, 12+ or 13+ for late developers would be a good thing.

The thing is there is often very little movement between sets within a school (it was almost unheard of at my school), and the top sets are always full of middle class dc so just as divisive socially. 'Failing' 11+ isn't great, but for some dc it can give them the motivation to prove themselves in any case. I don't think the alternatives to grammars are as rose tinted as you like to think seeker, even though I am no fan of 11+ either.

When my dd did her 11+, I made it 100% clear that it was not a brainscan, determining 'who' or 'what' she was, it was a particular exam on a particular day that might or might not highlight her strengths, and all she could do was her best on that day. I also felt that, as a bright girl, she'd do well and be a credit to whichever school she went to. As it happens, she did get into the selective school, but I feel the school is as lucky to have her as the reverse.

I think that was more or less word for word what my parents said-but it happened that I didn't get in, and although in the long run it might have even been more beneficial because it gave me determination-there is no doubt that it made life much more difficult and I felt a failure.
It was other people as much as anything with 'and what do you want to be when you leave school?' and if I said 'doctor' or similar I go the doubtful look and 'can you still do that?' and you get totally fed up with saying 'yes-I just do x, y and z'. You are obviously-in their eyes not supposed to aim for anything that requires A'levels. Why do people think that a secondary modern DC can't aim for the top -if it is just one exam on one day? As it is -11+ failures from my school have among them company directors, a C of E vicar, several Head teachers and quite a few other high flyers. No one looks doubtful if a grammar school DC says they want to be a doctor. At least in a comprehensive no one pigeon holes you at 11 yrs of age.

If my brother hadn't got to the grammar school at 12+ no one in the secondary modern would have discovered that he had a flair for Latin and Greek.

Also let us not forget how imortant failure can be for children. You need to learn sometimes we fail at things. I sometimes think one of the advantages of priuvate schools is that you get things marked wrong and realise you may not be the bee's knees and don't get constant praise for mediocre efforts and even fail at sports day too. Real life is like that.

@seeker you consistently label people as failures. And 'goats'. You have done this throughout numerous threads on this subject on MN.

Of course you expect to fail-everyone needs some failure to learn. They don't expect it to make a huge obstacle in their life.
You are labelled by the result at 11yrs. People will assume that the grammar school DC will be a vet and not the secondary modern DC.
It is the 'sheep' and the 'goats'-you have two 12 yr olds and one says they want to be a vet and they are taken seriously-the other is thought to be deluded or unrealistic.
If people don't know seeker's DCs, which we don't, the assumption would be that her DD is brighter than her DS-they put labels on them.