Can we have a heated debate about ability setting in schools?

[pinksquidgy]

New education minister Nicky Morgan was rumoured to be considering making setting by ability a compulsory part of getting an 'outstanding' Ofsted classification. Caused a bit of a storm and now looks like she's rowing back.

When I heard this I thought 'I wish she bloody would'.

I know whole-class teaching/mixed groups are better for children who are struggling (for whatever reason) and I do get that that's important.

But I have two very bright DCs (i know, i know) and I cannot tell you how bloody sick I am of them being given things to colour in while the teacher gives most of her time to those who are at the lower end of the attainment range.

I'm guessing this is a result of the target culture - it seems to result in schools desperately scrabbling to get the 'D' student up to a 'C'. Students who were always going to be a B or an A just get left to stew and it's starting to drive me potty. (I do also realise this is partly a function of bad teaching and poor management - but that, unfortunately, is what our local primary is like.)

Don't clever kids matter too? Would it be so wrong to prioritise them just for once - maybe just for core subjects like numeracy and literacy?

My older DC has just gone up to secondary. EVERY single one of the 'clever' kids he started out with in infants (those who were getting similar SATS scores) has gone into the private sector or free schools, by hook or by crook. He is the ONLY one of his academic peers who has gone into a state comprehensive. This is the flipside of schools failing to look after clever kids: their parents simply opt out of the state system altogether - which is no good for anyone, surely?

I'm deeply committed to the ideal of comprehensive education in my heart (and in my wallet tbh) but once, just once, I'd like someone to think about what might work best for the children at the top end of the attainment range.

please don't kill me

Who knows Prime minister maybe ?

Can anyone who has read my account of how my ds's teacher manage his ness in a music lesson and found it wanting suggest what else the teacher could have done that would have been better?

Rabbit- will answer the points you make later, but I just wanted to address my use of musician. I've never used it before and I typed it as a shorthand for "music is really his thing", then deleted it because it looked really gitty! Then I decided to leave it in to see how I felt about it. I was thinking that if Word thought of her child as a musician she wouldn't be afraid to use the word! But no, I'll never say it again- or least not unless he become a professional. There's too much baggage attached which isn't my sort of baggage!

" I think there are some studies which suggest children from lowest decile of income are 2 years behind the top decile by school entry"

Free, high quality nursery care from 1 for the children of parents with no or few educational qualifications.

Child benefit payments linked to attendance at early parenting education sessions.

The extension of the family nurse partnership programme.

Caseloading midwifery care.

For starters....

Pinksquidgy - why would the abolition of private property help children to get a better education?

Hak - I don't think you were necessarily wrong (although I suppose it depends how good he is). I think it's to your - and his - advantage that you are confident, it will rub off him and stand him in much better stead in the future than my relentlessly pessimistic forelock tugging 'not good enough' attitude would. One of the key differentiators between posh schools and the rest is the confidence instilled in the kids (but it doesn't have to be the unique preserve of posh schools of course, there will be state schools that do that too and the US education system is very good at turning out confident self assured people - I once participated in an exercise with US colleagues at a training thing where each person had to tell the group something they didn't know about themselves. The brits were, to a person, self deprecating and just generally non showy. The Americans were, also to a person, apparently super brilliant at a wide range of interesting things). I really wasn't criticising you I was identifying one of the qualities which might make your DS more able to benefit from independent learning than other kids.

As far as the actual approach taken by the teacher goes - I can't evaluate it, I don't have enough information. It might have been fine, it might not have been. I know DD2 was left to rot in class music lessons at her primary school . I know that DD1 was given some autonomy at your DS's age but it was still reasonably supervised. It wasn't ideal though - I'd have preferred (and so would she) her being allowed to spend the KS3 music time either practising or having appropriate level theory lessons. I suspect there must be a LOT of kids who need real differentiation in ICT who don't get it too.

IME, "independent learning," is a "midgets on the shoulders of giants," scenario. The students feels they are directing it, but actually there is a wise teacher whispering in their ear about which books to read; asking probing questions; and providing opportunities for their students to mix with each other in the context of exploring the same questions.

So, it looks like the teacher is hardly doing a thing, but in actual fact, the teacher is spending a lot of effort behind the scenes.

Hak I don't suppose there was much the teachet could do. But that doesn't make it a good learning experience.

For me, the setting was wrong. He was left an educational outlier which benefited neither him nor his peers.

Holiday I think that's what independent learning should be and what I try to achieve with my students at university.

However, in schools it's too often a way to keep kids quiet when they have already achieved a certain milestone. And then they're told it's good training and if they don't make the most of it, they're somehow flawed.

Yes, WordFactory, I agree. Fobbing kids off, is not independent learning. I just wanted to point out what it should look like.

dapple I wasn't being entirely serious. But agree with the earlier poster who said that comp/state schooling exists within an horrifically unjust social situation in the UK, and it's not really fair to expect schools to magic up a state of perfect fairness and equity when absolutely everything outside the school gates militates against this.

re ICT - just on a personal level, agree that this is something that both needs more differentiation and that loads of non-specialist teachers are hopelessly unqualified to teach. Older DS can program in four different computer languages (proper programming - he writes things that actually work). His primary school lessons had absolutely nothing to teach him about ICT - and at the end of Y6 he was assessed as 4a, probably because he was just utterly uninterested in producing shonky PowerPoint presentations

Mini. Why not take those who show genuine promise from difficult surroundings and place them in more academic environments.

The reason why my school was the worst in Kent was because the vast majority of kids there had no interest in learning. These were kids who came to the school at 11 who on the whole wanted to learn ( even though they failed the 11+). What happened was in the space of 1 year the 'bright' or keen pupils had morphed in to the 'incorrigibles' the school just went down to greater depths.

This is going on today and many children who arrive at secondary school bright , willing to learn have that knocked out of them shortly after arriving at these said schools.

The learning of these bright and willing pupils is destroyed by the high number of 'Bad' eggs that tend to frequent these schools. The able pupils need to be protected and sheltered from those who would seek to destroy other's educations.

The only way to shelter able pupils from inner- city schools is to either totally segregate them, or place them in separate schools made up of bright 'inner city' pupils.

I'm fascinated that the posters who talked about "the scrap heap" and "the dustbin" don't seem to feel any need to explain, withdraw or apologize.

"The reason why my school was the worst in Kent was because the vast majority of kids there had no interest in learning"

Yes - and shoving all these children together in schools where all the clever and ambitious children have been thoughtfully removed is REALLY going to increase their aspirations isn't it?

I don't believe in shovelling people into ghettoes - particularly not educational ones.

educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/toolkit/ability-grouping/

Posted earlier but I found this article fascinating.

To me it presents a political decision which we all have to make in many fields.

For those parents with "bright" children, according to the evidence, you can either:

a) ensure your child is in a setted, selective or similar environment so that they do better

or

b) ensure that your child is in a mixed environment so that the class overall might do better (relying on the evidence that low attainers benefit from this as shown in the link) but "sacrifice" the maximum potential for your child

This is clearly a political decision and there is no "right or wrong". People can justify acting in the interests of their child, exercising the right to property (i.e. wealth and school fees) and liberty and individualism (i.e. choose a high end comp, grammar or private school). Other people can cite the virtue of participating in a wider social political forum where it is more "moral" to make decisions best for all not just for one.

Nearly everyone I know and I suspect most here will fall into the liberal individualist model (whether left or right wing). Basically, we would all do what is best for our children. Those with LD kids that might benefit from a mixed environment in class will target that - they are less likely to act in a way that would benefit "bright" kids and visa versa.

Bit of a brain dump there but often people with very different views are actually behaving in the same ways and are only distinct by circumstance.

Hakluyt. My comments are not at the poor kids who go there.

How would you describe 20% GCSE /50.6 FSM Average GCSE grade for High Ability ( those that should be getting A grades C . Middle Ability average E for GCSE . These figures are from Thomas Ferens Academy in hull.

Would any body on here tonight send their children , to this place !

"The only way to shelter able pupils from inner- city schools is to either totally segregate them, or place them in separate schools made up of bright 'inner city' pupils."

Utter bollocks.

My daughter is at a school where 1 in 4 children is on free school meals, 27% don't have English as a first language, and where over 70% of children start as low or middle achievers.

Every year they get girls into the best universities to study subjects like medicine, law, psychology, English literature.

And quite a few at GCSE who get 7/8/9/10 A*'s.

It can be done - with dedicated staff and good leadership.

Can I add, that what makes dd's school great is the fact that many of the kids are second and first generation immigrants. And because the school has so many clever and studious immigrant kids many local middle-class parents don't shun it, despite the fact that it also takes in so many British born working class children and to outsiders looks like quite a 'rough' school.

Thank god for optimistic immigrants I say, who believe that their children can do anything, if they have access to properly trained teachers, books and classrooms.

Schools are communities. Any community which ends up being a working class ghetto, devoid of children and parents who have ambition and a good work ethic is going to become a difficult place to teach and to learn. Children shouldn't be socially 'corralled' in schools - so, so harmful.

DAD164. DD1s Primary Head would not back an appeal for her 11+ ( an appeal I was told was strong ) because he believed that the only way Kent's high schools could get better was if a few 'unlucky' but bright pupils went to them , those were his actual words. DD1 ' Cheated out of her 'rightful' education on two accounts by a system that would not take account of her Dyslexia I.E NVR and by a head who had his own political motives.

The reason I wanted DD1 to take an exam at 13 for the grammar when a place came up , I was told there was no NVR. I was very confident DD would pass it , alas she did not want to know about taking it, opting to stay at her 'modern' school instead.

Why should I apologise for using the term "scrap heap"? The bottom set at many comprehensives contain perfectly intelligent children who learn absolutely nothing.

The typical bottom set in many comprehensives is taught by an NQT who is like a rabbit caught in the headlights. Challenging behaviour makes any kind of teaching impossible.

Unfortunately my son has been moved to the third MFL set. His year 8 homework sheet was a colouring sheet. He was not expected to write any sentences and did the homework in two second flat. Honestly my five year old daughter could have done his homework. It was degradingly easy and its no wonder that bottom set kids play up!

I believe that my son is on the scrap heap for MFL. Unless he is at least offered the opportunity of more challenging he will never get an MFL GCSE.

Maybe the answer isn't in separating bright and not so bright children.
Maybe the answer is to let the brighter (and more mature) children go up one year.
Maybe it's about teaching children by levels rather than by age.
Maybe it's about having much set class sizes do you can give individual work to each child.
We are all talking about trying to make things right whilst keeping a system that clearly doesn't work for anyone, neither the bright, not the lower ability. It's not going to work.

"The only way to shelter able pupils from inner- city schools is to either totally segregate them, or place them in separate schools made up of bright 'inner city' pupils."

I don't agree with this statement. However I do feel that there needs to be more special schools or units within mainstream for children with severe behavioural issues. It is not right that a child can attend a mainstream school after being excluded twice. Usually its only one or two children who wreck the lesson for everyone else.

Reallytired - how do you account for the handful of students at every school languishing at the bottom of the league tables, who get outstanding results?

What is special/different about these students?

ReallyTired, what are YOU doing to help your son?

Do you sit down with him and help him with his homework? Ask for extension sheets? Go through the MFL resources (tests and revision aids) for KS3&4 on the BBC schools website? Have you asked for a copy of the scheme of work for the year so you can see what he should be covering? There will be one which will detail what he should cover from week to week. 10 minutes a day and it wouldn't be long before he was moved up a set.

Dd's school have an exclusion unit within the school where they can send disruptive kids for extended periods.

Sadly I know about this because dd has spent quite a lot of time in it over the past year. :-(

That's interesting dad164. Of course lots of people just don't have a choice at all - one of the fallacies of Labour and Conservative policy in this area is the idea that we're all picking and choosing between lots of different schools. In reality your bank account and your address have as much say in the matter as your politics. Given that I don't want to go private (and couldn't really afford to anyway) I had absolutely zero choice about where my kids go - in each case there was only one school that would take them because the better ones are vastly over-subscribed and we live too far away (like, three-quarters of a mile a way, in the case of the much better primary down the road).

Really. I am glad Niece no1 went to Chelmsford Girls then!.

The reason being Niece no1 got 'proper' MFL teaching this meant she has been able to get an A at A level and get a work placement in Paris for her third year of her four year French Degree.

The standard of MFL teaching in the England is terrible and the attitude of the kids is not surprising after reading what Really has posted.