Middle class access to grammars via tutorproof 11+ part 2

[boschy]

May I do this? only there were some contrasting views at the end of the last thread which I found interesting.

One was mine (sorry!): "I think fear actually drives a lot of those parents who are desperate to get their child into GS, so they can be 'protected' from these gangs of feral teenagers who apparently run rampage through every non-selective school in the country.

Because clearly if you are not 11+ material you are a knuckle-dragging Neanderthal who likes nothing better than beating up a geek before breakfast and then going to score behind the bike shed before chucking a chair at the maths teacher and making the lives of the nice but dim kids a misery."

And one was from gazzalw: "If you had the choice would you opt for a grammar school or a comprehensive that has gangs?"

Soooo, do people really think that all comprehensives have vicious gangs, and all GS children are angels? Or that only those of academic ability adequate enough to get them through the 11+ should not have to face behavioural disruption of any kind? If you are borderline, or struggling but still work hard, should you just have to put up with disruption because let's face it you're not academic?

PS, re the knuckle dragging Neanderthals I mention above, should have said - "and that's only the girls"

Bonsoir, seeker is even more virulently opposed to private schools than she is to grammar schools.

Yes, I know, gelo. Why?

Seeker - if you don't want your kids to be part of the conversation then stop tellling us about their test scores or GCSE results.

"What is so magical about a GS that makes people think that exclusion from one will consign your DC to a life of unfulfilled dreams?"

I don't think that about my own ds. Because I have the resources, knowledge and time to fill in any gaps.

For many other children, however, being sent to a high school will, in fact, stifle dreams they may not have known had.

Bonsoir, I don't hate my ds being in a high school. And I have never said I did.

socially divisive I think. Below, when I said a change of opinion was OK, that was wrong - seeker won't change her opinion I know, what I meant was it would be OK to use a system you don't approve of when the wellbeing of a child is at stake.

"Seeker - if you don't want your kids to be part of the conversation then stop tellling us about their test scores or GCSE results."

I don't mind my children being part of the conversation. In the circumstqnces, it would be a little strange if they weren't. I was just pointing out that it isn't me who brings them into it!

And I have only mentioned GCSE and test results in response to others comments about them.

Oh come, come seeker you started a thread about your DD's GCSE results! And one about your DS being upset about not egtting in to GS.

I have absi=olutely no issue with you doing either BTW, but I think it's disingenuous to say you only mention your DC in response to things.

In what ways does a SM stop a kid from realising his or her dream or is that just a sound bite?

note to myself - memorize the word 'disingenuous' and remember to use it the next time seeker post about her children and then accuse others of involving her children.

If I recall, I started a thread about a conversation I had with my brother about our dds' GCSE results. Oh, and I did start a thread about how my ds was upset about being separated from his friends. I have started loads of threads about my children- this is mumsnet! However, I am pretty sure I have never started a thread about about my views about selective education in which I was the first to talk about my ds. I could be wrong. But as I keep saying, it is not on their behalf that I am so incensed about the 11+. They will be fine. There are many children who won't be, because they don't have my childrens' many advantages.

"note to myself - memorize the word 'disingenuous' and remember to use it the next time seeker post about her children and then accuse others of involving her children."

I didn't accuse. I don't mind other people posting about my children unless they are unkind. As I said, under the circumstances it would be very strange if they weren't involved. I merely poured out that I wasn't the first to do so. Which is true. When I have finished making sugar roses, which is what I am doing as I mums net -250 made, 150 to go- I'll go back through the thread and prove it to you.

You are being contradictory again seeker.

Either your DS is 'doing fine' OR he is damaged by being labelled as a failure by society because he failed the 11+ (a paraphrasing of an earlier comment made by you)

You insist on holding him up as an example of the unfairness and how it affects you as a parent. But when it suits you it's - he is doing fine. It is other people's kids I am concerned about.

Your 'many advantages' didn't exactly get your DS into the GS or better than a level 4 at year 7.

Cheap shot I know but I just couldn't resist it.

unusually, I think you were the first to bring them up on this thread seeker (07:03.12 this am), but unfortunately not everyone heeded your request about the sticks.

"I am happy to use my children as laboratory animals in this matter, so long as they are not used as sticks to beat me with."

What is the point in making this thread all about seeker? (and FWIW I understand where she's coming from, don't know why it is so difficult. We all work within the system/means we have available to us).

I am considering myself and my children more and more lucky to be in a school with brilliant management, high expectations, excellent behaviour, wide range of out of hours stuff etc etc etc even though we are in a GS area and their school is 'only' a SM. By the way, it is a 'good' not 'outstanding' school.

Seriously though, those who think a GS is the only suitable place for their child, I really want to know why.

Do you think they will 'catch' something from less academic students?

Do you think they do not have a strong enough work ethic to achieve in an environment where others might achieve less?

Do you think that they will suffer just because they are clever?
Do you think that because they are so clever they might not have the resilience to cope with differences?

"Cheap shot I know but I just couldn't resist it. " Not very nice.

By 'not everyone' I mean you APMF. Just leave it alone please. And he got a 5 or a 6 at SATs for maths as someone else has already told you. Even lots of advantages doesn't buy immunity from a bad day, and 'doing fine' include recovering well from minor (or even major) setbacks.

Yes. Very cheap shot. I do wonder why you took it. Factually incorrect too. But hey ho.

I have always said that my ds will be fine. Always. You can search my posts until your eyes bleed, and you will never, ever find me saying anything different.

But many of his schoolmates do not have his advantages. School is the only chance they have. And while the school they are at will help them get the best levels and grades they are capable of, it does not provide a properly rounded education. It does not broaden their horizons, show them things they may not know about, open their eyes to dreams and hopes they may not even know they have.

"And while the school they are at will help them get the best levels and grades they are capable of, it does not provide a properly rounded education. It does not broaden their horizons, show them things they may not know about, open their eyes to dreams and hopes they may not even know they have."

That has nothing to do with selectivity, though, does it? The lack of wider cultural education is just a failing of that particular school.

Well I think it is to do with selectivity.
My dd and ds1 have been on visits to universities, had talks about careers such as law, medicine etc. They have opportunities to take 3 languages at GCSE as well as the "standard" GCSEs
At the comp, those things do not exist, they are offered an NVQ in Mechanics or Hair and Beauty.

It has nothing to do with selectivity. The choice of course/subject on offer in a school is an entirely separate matter to its intake.

It is most definitely to do with selectivity. If you have a school which has a very high %of children from very disadvantaged backgrounds, you are not going to have many arriving at the school with, for example, the musical training to form the core of an orchestra.

Whether or not disadvantaged children are exposed to music is, once again, nothing to do with school selectivity and everything to do with what is on offer at school. In the case of orchestra-readiness, those children would need to have been prepared in primary school.