Grammar Schools (given green light by Theresa May part 3)

[sandyholme]

Part 3 ... Let the sparring continue..

maths I posted before you did, so you are arguing in favour of more children being in the position that your DC are in?

I hope it is not always the case that a small number of able children in a cohort cannot be adequately catered for....
I do agree that reason for small number of able in a school is mostly due to parental preference for another close by.

Well maybe the children that you know are just lazy - there is a lot of competition so they have to constantly strive or they will get left behind (however clever)
If they are regularly going to Oxbridge from the schools what exactly is the school not managing to provide?
Why would taking the same children into a separate building make it different?
I still haven't been told why my sons need a different school, other than there is a teacher shortage and high ability pupils need the best- and the others don't matter!

I am arguing in favour of comprehensives and can't see any need for my sons, with different abilities, to be in different schools.
Must leave you all to it for a while- not ignoring just getting away from the computer!

noblegiraffe, not a single person on this thread has proposed kids in non-grammar school schools should be screwed. I have no doubt that some comps, especially very big ones, can cater for very bright children.

Are kids in non religious schools screwed? Are kids in non private schools screwed? Are kids in non expensive catchment schools screwed? Are kids in non arts schools screwed?. Are kids in non sports schools screwed?.. etc etc etc

I have not been arguing for above average, 'bright', children. I have been arguing for the very small number of gifted children.

Compulsory comps for all, or selection for all?

I've got a friend who teaches in a secondary modern 'comp' in Kent and just had a look at their intake. They have literally a handful of high achievers, yet I know they still offer triple science.

I do feel sorry for the teachers, the kids who do really well (but how can that be??) tend to clear off to the grammar for sixth form.

But mathsmum you are appearing to be saying that your bright kids are screwed in a comp because comps can't cater for your bright kids.

Comps can cater for bright kids.

I wonder if the 'foremost's' poster DS will emigrate to the grammar !

noblegiraffe, sorry can't post as fast as others so my reply's must seem 'delayed'.

I do not favor children being in the same position as mine. Its a despairing waste of obvious talent/potential. I don't care what a school is called, all I know is comps cant currently provide what is needed. Grammars would be a cost neutral way of doing it but I would be happy with comps being giving the resources to do it. I am not a politician but guessing that's more expensive?

FreshHorizons How can currently predicted A* pupils (or lvl 7-9 in new money) get left behind? I have the feeling we are talking about different things, have you any experience with gifted children?

They will almost certainly be Oxbridge phd

Unless they have already graduated with a PhD, this is quite a strange statement to make. Do you have any idea how competitive it is to get an Oxbridge PhD position (or equivalent)?

well noblegiraffe I wish I lived in your county. I only have experience here, never been to kent. In DCs school triple science, computer science, languages etc is compulsory' for majority of pupils. They just cant provide for very top end. You can make some people happy for some of the time but you cant....

maths I see exactly what you mean, and agree, but when it comes to dc able enough to get top grades easily, the majority either can't or won't understand your point. People seem to subscribe to the general misconception that the only dc who find a top grade easy must be the incredibly rare 1 in a million, or that they are just normally able and you are deluded/ pushy, or that it's the parents fault if they find school boring.

haybott Yes I know how competitive it is. Given how many people have the qualifications to get into Oxbridge, it is almost a lottery getting in. Hence I used the word, equivalent.

If your wanting proof of what level my DC are at then PM me.

I am perfectly prepared to accept that there are children so gifted that the normal school system can't cater for them. I wouldn't expect a normal PE department to be able to coach a potential Olympic high jumper either, or the music department to teach a prodigy, like one mumsnetter's daughter.

But I would absolutely oppose adjusting the system to cater for these exceptional children. Yes, of course they need provision. But even a grammar school wouldn't be able to cater for a genius. Something else need to be done for them. But not at the expense of everyone else.

Lurkedforever1, thanks, most people think I hothouse, I dont. Just try forcing a gifted child onto the football pitch, when the are busy working out pi to 101 decimal places in their head... Wish I had never shown them that film now.

BertrandRussell , why would it be at the expense of anyone else?

That's the one of the main points of the anti-grammar argument - that is is to the detriment of many other children and a large proportion of those are already disadvantaged.

Even in a very academically selective school, a pupil capable of studying an Oxbridge PhD (for which admission does not ressemble a lottery) will be unlikely to have many peers. My old school sends a quarter or more of its pupils to Oxbridge, many more to medicine, law etc. Of these only a handful end up doing PhDs at top places; such pupils would almost certainly have not had many peers at school. So differentiation within top sets between bright, very bright, exceptionally bright is required, differentiation which is very hard to provide.

As somebody who finished school curricula many years early and went on to Oxbridge PhD (and academia) what helped me most was individualised teaching, not being in a selective school per se. None of my classmates were anywhere near me in what is now my research field, although a big fraction of my year went onto Oxbridge.

BTW one point not mentioned in this thread is that being at the bottom of a selective school can be very demoralising. I have school friends who are only just beginning to understand how bright they are, after years of thinking they were "average", relative to the rest of the year who went to Oxbridge.

all I know is comps cant currently provide what is needed

No, all you know is that your DC's comp apparently isn't doing enough for your children (not sure what it is you are expecting?).

There are plenty of comps out there doing very well by their able children.

So if a kid does well at a grammar it's because of their education but if
they do well at a comp it's in spite of it?

Noble you see this everywhere, throughout Mumsnet and indeed the wider media. When two Traveller girls became the first Travellers to go to Oxford and Cambridge none of the articles about them mentioned that they'd both come from comps, imagine the Daily Mail editorials if they'd been to grammars. When Sadiq Khan was running for Mayor the only time he was asked about his school the question was "Was your school very rough?".

noblegiraffe, yes I accept your point. So aside from my personal perspective. Why all the reports that comprehensives are NOT doing well by high achievers?

As I have said several times in this thread, I am on the fence about grammar schools. I can see that many comps currently don't provide adequately for high achievers.

But grammar schools are not a magic solution to all the current problems either. As an academic I see quite a few incoming grammar students for whom the teaching in my subject has clearly been very poor - the students got their As and A stars mostly through high ability and self study and weren't taught to the standards I would expect. Provision for very high ability students in some grammars does not look particularly better than in comps.

Just as an aside, my brother with his Oxbridge PhD doesn't seem terrifyingly bright to me. His partner on the other hand... One of his hobbies was to memorise the local numbers in the area phone book but other than that he didn't seem that different to anyone else and perfectly stretched at school.

So after a short think. Maybe the solution is to only allow grammars in areas that can prove comprehensives dont provide for gifted pupils?

So. What % of children are gifted?