If you're anti grammar schools, then please answer me this:

[Proseccocino]

If your child had a gift for music, then you might send her to a school which excels musically.

If your child had a talent for sport, you might send him to an academy which excels at sport, one where he can really focus and develop in the area in which he is better than his peers.

And so on....!

So, if your child is intelligent, academically gifted... Why is it bad to say you would send her to a selective school where she can study along with other bright students?

If it's OK to separate children according to ability in sport or music or drama or technology, and send them to specialist schools which excel in these areas - why is it a different story if their talent with their academic ability?

Special schools educate about 1% of the school population. Most SEN kids are in mainstream with support.

A fifteen year old with a mental age of a three month old baby has profound learning difficulties . Thankfully such disablity is very rare. Such a child will not do GCSE or even entry level certificates. With children who have severe learning difficulties the emphasis of an education is life skills. Helping them to communicate and be as independent as possible. Incidentally having severe learning difficulties is not the same as being in a wheel chair. Many childrenwith severe or even profound learning difficulties are 100% mobile and don't necessarily look disabled.

What you fail to realise is that there are many types of special schools. Children at a BSL school often sit GSCEs and do well. Children in hospital schools often do well in public exams. These child don't tend to have learning difficulties as such.

There has been a big move to get children with moderate learning difficulties or behavioural difficulties in mainstream. The children left in special school have very complex needs. For example if a child is extremely violent or needs a calm environment.

Giving an appriopiate education isnt deeming someone as uneducatable. For some children an anger management course is of more use to them than French or triple science. There are a finite number of hours in the day. Even at my son's mainstream comprehensive some children drop studying an MFL if there is a pressing need to learn something else.

I can't really see an argument for separating the top 25% from the rest. They don't need anything radically different.

There are schools that specialise, off the top of my head there's Chethams (music), possibly Sedburgh (rugby), but these are independent schools so, again, out of reach to those without the funds to back it up, although there will be a small number of scholarships available, and bursaries, but not enough to make it accessible to every child who may show talent.

When it comes to state schools, all children should be able to reach their potential regardless of background or family wealth, and in the grammar school town that I live in, there is a (dare I say) divide where children from the grammar school feel superior to those at the other school, and are quite vocal about this.
This happened over twenty years ago, but it's still happening now.

bombadier it will focus the parents who give a shit and have the finances to back it. Those academically able whose parents can't afford to or don't back them will suffer.
It comes back to the same failings on a grammar, they can't level the field.
If it's house prices of a good catchment, private school, tutoring or even just being able to afford to be at home to help the kids homework. It comes down to parents money

I dont think so because it will be really hard to compete with the 27 other tutored middle class lovelies in the class. a lot of those parents might suddenly decide they are less keen after all on grammars. or indeed start researching the local sink schools :)

zzzzz Fri 09-Sep-16 22:40:43 You're welcome to go and post on the SNChildrens board or even SNChat if you don't want your query to hang around and ask them if any of their children at SS will be entered for and pass GCSEs

All you had to say is that you don't have anything to back up you claim.

BTW, I have a DC with SEN. They would never qualify for SS in a million years because they can access the NC (which is one of the dertermining factors for you to qualify for a SS where I live).

zzzzz Fri 09-Sep-16 22:17:13 child 29 and child 28 would probably both be well served in either school. What I was saying was that a larger gap between you and the majority is not so fun. It is immaterial if you are significantly out of step in either direction.

So why are you supporting Grammar schools then. The lower the score the more children will have achieved it. Therefore Grammar schools will have a critical mass of students that will do just as well at comps. This isn't based on guess work, this is based on children I actually know who are in Grammar and selective schools.

Simon Keeler
Simon attended Breckenbrough School from the age of 11, after being described by our Local Education Authority as unteachable as he was diagnosed with Asperger Syndrome & had had many problems at primary school.
True to the traits of Aspergers syndrome, Simon was a bright lad and we felt he deserved a chance at an Education. There was nothing in our county to support Simon’s needs and therefore we made the heart-rending decision to allow Simon to go to Yorkshire and never looked back. Simon flourished at Breckenbrough, with their small classes, 24hr curriculum and ethos of conflict resolution. He gained 6 GCSEs, all A-C.
The school then continued to support Simon in their 6th form to attend York College and study 4 A levels whilst living in the independent blocks of school, being taught the necessary skills to live independently. Going out to college with the backup of the school enabled Simon to put coping strategies in place to deal with people & situations that he was presented with. This included him running the “geek” club for the computing department after the college day and winning student of the year, for 2 years running in his computing class.
But Simon didn’t just gain an education. He acquired confidence, social skills and independence enabling him to grow and move forward with his life.
Simon always had a passion for flying since the school’s DT teacher took the boarding students flying one weekend. Once Simon decided his university path would see him studying Aircraft engineering, the Headmaster thought it appropriate to support Simon with flying lessons, resulting in him now having a pilot’s licence. Part of the licence required him to fly the plane alone and so to get the necessary flying hours in, Simon flew the plane from Yorkshire through to his home town, tipping his wings in recognition as he flew out over the school.
Simon now attends university, studying ‘his’ aircraft engineering and it’s all down to the care, support and commitment of the school and its Headmaster that he has been able to continue his Education. Without Breckenbrough our Son would not be where he is today and we feel privileged to be have given that opportunity. Simon is a mature, funny and most of all happy young man.
Our Local Education Authority now consider Simon to be their success story but he truly is a Breckenbrough success story and for that, Simon and us, his family will be forever in their debt.
An article on the Teeside University blog about Jonathan Marsh's graduation:
Jonathan’s graduation to a career in computing

An article on The Northern Echo about our fundraising drive for multi-sports pitch:
Breckenbrough School in Thirsk launches fundraising drive for multi-sports pitch for children with behavioural difficulties

The ignorant comments about what children with SEN's can achieve educationally are appalling !

Yet posters call me for wanting grammar schools...

I taught a kid in mainstream a while back who got, but whose parents rejected a SS placement in Y7. They got some GCSEs and BTECs, some vocational qualifications in college and then got an apprenticeship.

www.breckenbrough.org.uk/

Sandy, we're not far from Breckenborough, it has an amazing reputation round here.

Worth reading this article
davidhencke.com/2016/09/09/an-11-plus-failure-speaks-outtheresa-may-wants-conformity-over-opportunity/

not sure why we are now talking about a (private?) school for children of average and above average intelligence ?

noblegiraffe Fri 09-Sep-16 23:04:53 I taught a kid in mainstream a while back who got, but whose parents rejected a SS placement in Y7.

Perhaps access to SS is based on "most need" as per the area they are located.

This is my nearest SS: www.compare-school-performance.service.gov.uk/school/117667

zzzzz Fri 09-Sep-16 23:04:17 Can I pm you mum?

Of course you can :-)

sandyholme Fri 09-Sep-16 23:04:23 The ignorant comments about what children with SEN's can achieve educationally are appalling

Please feel free to provide an example of a dyslexic/dyspraxic child that is so well supported that they go on to achieve great things.

Actually I would be more impressed if you could give an example of a child with Chromosome deletion.

Um, there's a little girl at my church with CP. She uses a wheelchair, doen't have any speech. She's at special school and studying GCSEs. She's also a pretty good poet.

genuinely gifted pupils who cannot compete against aggressively tutored average pupils.

at aggressive tutoring!

You cannot tutor a child who doesn't already have the capability of passing the 11+, otherwise no tutored child would ever fail. And some do fail, even taking into consideration that most reputable tutors will tell parents if they feel a particular child is unlikely to pass. You can maybe tweak a few points here and there, but no more than that.

The advantage that tutoring gives is confidence. The child will have the fear of the unknown removed, and will be familiar with the types of question they are likely to encounter. You wouldn't enter a child who hadn't been taught to swim into a swimming gala. Why is there such an inverse snobbery about tutoring for the 11+?

TinklyLittleLaugh Fri 09-Sep-16 23:28:13 Um, there's a little girl at my church with CP. She uses a wheelchair, doen't have any speech. She's at special school and studying GCSEs. She's also a pretty good poet.

There's a DC at my DC2s primary with CP and uses a wheelchair. They wouldn't get into my nearest SS because they can access the NC.

*You cannot tutor a child to pass

LetitiaCropleysCookbook are you basing your comment on fact or assumption? Do you actually live in an 11 plus area?