Theresa May to end ban on grammar schools part 2

[noblegiraffe]

Continuation of the first thread from here www.mumsnet.com/Talk/education/2702565-Theresa-May-to-end-ban-on-grammar-schools

noble Earlier you said 1 in 10 "top grade students", suggesting, I thought, that children being outliers within their classes would be a bigger problem under selection than without it. However, even the Sutton Trust's "illustrative example" in Fig 1 on the following page (NB not from data) shows the misclassified children as being in the middle of the ability range - where you'd expect either school to be able to teach them. Outliers, either way, tend to be correctly classified. Of course no classification is perfect and even if it were, someone will be at the top and someone at the bottom of the ability range of any school. That is not in itself a criticism.

(Setting might indeed help. Let's just say, the idea pushed by some on mumsnet that "all" comprehensives set for "everything" isn't what some of us see on the ground. My local comp sets for just one subject in the first year, and two in the second. As far as I can gather, it never, at any stage, sets for science or for modern languages.)

TaIkinPeace The kids were known to go down the road (in school uniform) kicking in the front doors of the houses.]

I had one of my front windows smashed by some of the lovely, refined, educated, elite from my nearest local selective (they walk past my house to their Rugby field). No surprise that my DC refused to go there.

Bertrand I'm absolutely sure in due course that data will be published. Meanwhile, you might do well to keep up with policy trends.

teacher it's not a single super selective adopting that policy, it's now very widespread. At many schools the FSM DC go to the top of the eligible list, outreach work has been going on for years, the CEM tests are used, those in charge are keen to identify DC in primaries within a reasonable distance who are thought to be likely to reach L5 in their SATs and subsidized transport is provided where needed. But real results will take a number of years. It's a bit insulting to those in charge of these things to suggest it's mere window dressing. It's at the core of a lot of development plans precisely because the grammar school heads implementing these things feel incredibly strongly about it. You claim to be a teacher in the job for vocational reasons so it would be gracious to acknowledge that others might very well be too.

Yes Bertrand DC have certainly got a place at grammar schools recently in this way.

"Yes Bertrand DC have certainly got a place at grammar schools"

Which grammar schools?

Bertrand ask any super selective at random rather than attempting to bully posters into identifying a school or schools they might have a connection with - it's against the guidelines surely? If you want to find out information on a spread of schools you'd do better asking several in a range of areas for their recent data on this sort of thing.

shows the misclassified children as being in the middle of the ability range - where you'd expect either school to be able to teach them

relax the misclassified kids would be getting A*,A maybe B at GCSE. If you're saying that these kids could be as well taught at the grammar or the other school, then why have grammar schools at all?

goodbyestranger how about you help Bertrand out and name a few SSs for Bertrand to contact?

goodbyestranger Tue 09-Aug-16 23:13:06 the CEM tests are used, those in charge are keen to identify DC in primaries within a reasonable distance who are thought to be likely to reach L5 in their SATs

Few, if any, Grammar Schools have a close relationship with primary schools. In light of this perhaps you can explain to me how those Grammar schools thar you know so well are identifying DCs who are likley to reach a L5 (not that L5 exists any more) or in the case of a SS a L6.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secondary_modern_school

Teacher I was in primary school in the 1970s when the new HT decided to experiment with mixed ability teaching where we were all taught the same lesson with no differentiation. The point of my last post is I believe children need to be taught to their ability in order to maximise their potential what I don't think we need is the physical segregation of children into grammar schools and secondary moderns. One school should be able to accommodate for all abilities

Mixed ability teaching is a red herring. in know of no comprehensives - and actually no grammars either - where children are not organised into sets according to their ability for some or all subjects.

DD school only teaches maths in sets

Nothing else

Until Year 9 then only science and English plus maths

Rill on GCSE year

A passage from 'Seasons in the Sun' The Battle for Britain 1974-1979 about mixed ability teaching in the 1970s

Trendy Teacher Andy Dorn 27 Brighton College and LSE educated looked forward to the abolition of exams as they perpetuate the in-equality in the class system !.

Just popping in (I must avoid this threads as I'm too emotional at the moment to cope with what feel like personal attacks - when I KNOW they aren't).
Someone upthread went through a list of things that could disrupt the actual exam. I have invigilated the entrance exam in two areas and all of the things mentioned would have been noted by the invigilator and can be taken into consideration if someone is close to the boundary. However, erroneous appeals are often made based on things that children say happened but didn't. We have to be extremely regimented on how the exam is organised. Snacks must be offered and re-offered for example.

I must avoid this threads as I'm too emotional at the moment to cope with what feel like personal attacks - when I KNOW they aren't).

If you do leave this thread you presumably won't see this but I do understand exactly what you mean. My own DD is personally better suited to a comp than either grammar/SM. So if the evidence was clear that selection was better for all (and the government then quite rightly implemented it) I'd have to accept that what was best for everyone was going to disadvantage her. And that would be very, very painful.

sandyholme It shows how much socio-economic disadvantage is entrenched that children will do better in an SM in a rich area than at grammar in a poor one. It's not just this grammar it's all the grammars that have a higher % of poorer children. I'm not sure how it proves the pro-grammar case about social mobility though. It seems more like evidence against it?

"Doctor" try not to let the very few socially inept and rude people affect you.

Your experience of the invigilation is in line with mine. We have to write down word for word any interactions and sign them and put the timing on them.

Our exams officer is a little upset that I was unavailable last year (DS's due date) and this year (stall at a baby market). I've done it so often, I get trusted with the special access rooms.
This year, I shall be marking again.

This on whether comprehensives are the same as secondary moderns:

Treat yourself to a Mars Bar
Remove all the caramel
Do you still have a Mars Bar? Or do you have a de facto Milky Way?
What about removing half the caramel? What is it now?

Milky Ways are very nice in themselves, of course. Sometimes they feel nicer than a Mars Bar. But they're rather indisputably not the same thing.

Marking sounds pretty dull!! Do you see schools which all use set phrases?

"The small angry hot boy ran quickly and carefully into the old dark narrow corridor...."

It's more clear that people have been tutored to include all figurative language even when not appropriate to task

Thanks for referring to my blog post 'Which grammar schools want more pupil premium students' (link above).

However, I feel I should set the record straight. My post argues that, while around 28% of grammar schools make provision in their admissions criteria that is likely to have some impact, the extent of that impact is extremely variable.

Overall there has been relatively little improvement in the last few years.

Most grammar schools should be doing much more than they are to prioritise admissions from disadvantaged students. Further reforms to the admissions code would help to speed up progress.

Phoenix - I think, personally, that the problem goes back a stage. Having invigilated/marked I can see that we don't have enough variety in schools sitting the exam itself (different when I did the exam in my primary school). It's one of the reasons behind our summer school (to encourage people to consider our school) and our outreach work (historically in maths, science, languages and games). Unfortunately, changes to school funding has changed how some of these programmes work. When we were free to work with primaries (ie, the teacher time was funded through specialist schools programme etc), we were able to target schools with students/families who may not have been aware we were an option. We also used to do shared revision sessions with some local schools. This is the sort of thing that schools are now charging each other for.
Anyway, I've been up for a few hours with my son and I'm unsure what my original point was, oh yes, we need more diversity in the people sitting the exam before we address the diversity of the people getting in. With many teachers against the 11+ (I've been bullied on courses before, really!) that can be difficult to achieve. But I agree we need to put more effort into it.

DS1 goes to a fairly deprived comp. 35% GCSE pass rate last year. DS2 goes to a SS grammar.

They will both get extremely good GCSEs. Possibly identical grades. But there is no way they're getting the same education.

For example DS2 has 1 maths class a fortnight where they don't follow the curriculum but just prepare for the UK maths challenge. DS2 got a gold in that but DS1 didn't even sit it.

Ds2 has been exposed to Latin. DS1 hasn't.

DS2s education appears to me to be superior in every way. Better sport. Better music. Better drama. Better SEN support (they are both on the SEN register for Aspergers)

DS2s school has very few FSM pupils. it also has almost no white pupils. 3 white pupils out of an intake of 150.

DS1s schools is still excellent. His SEN has been well supported and he will get the grades to apply to Oxford. But it's still not as good as DS2s school. He still hasn't learnt as much as DS2 has.

And I don't think that's just down to the fact it has more deprived pupils. I think it's down to the fact it doesn't have many bright pupils.

In case anyone needs a break from our lively debate I started this thread in the News section:

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/in_the_news/2704861-Trump-assassination-threat?watched=1&msgid=62837709#62837709

I'm pretty confident we've found something we can all agree on!!

Hell yes. What is that all about?