Bridging gap between state & private schools (interested after reading below paying for private threads)

[user1473882712]

Like all parents dh & I want the very best education for our preschool aged dc. We will never be able to afford private school fees & the state schools are fine, we have heard no bad reports. We would like to think that in years to come our dc will be just as well able to fight for uni places & good job & will be able to compete with privately educated & those who have come from outstanding primaries & secondaries.
How can we bridge the gap? What can we do at home to extend their learning etc so they don't feel inferior or not good enough to those who have had thousands spent on their education...?

My single parent comment has nothing to do with logical absurdity I think you misunderstand the concept.

my ruined joint has nothing to do with logical absurdity either, you don't FORCE children into this sort of thing, you encourage and support, and listen to them and respond. FORCING does nothing to improve their prospects in any way, just the opposite.

We have always had great dinner table arguments/conversations about current affairs in our family. I think this is also important as part of DCs wider education. Our teenagers have a passionate sense of right and wrong and it's always enjoyable to have a good debate with them about the events of the day. They always know what their friends think about Trump, Brexit and so on, it's encouraging to know they talk about the wider world to them. I think this is a good way that parents can contribute to kids development, in helping them explore their own views and how they can discuss them with others in a constructive way

I don't think there is anything "liberal" about what you are saying, Boring, its just a normal family event in a normal, happy family life,

Mine can argue their way out of a paper bag. Sometimes leads to v loud dinners but I'd not swap my 5 loud, opinionated, bolshy kids for anything. Yes they haven't had ever advantage life can give you, and sometimes life has thrown us all a load of poop, but things seem to be turning out ok. And I am incredibly proud and know my big sis would be too - our kids are awesome. At Uni one of mine was shocked that another student had never done their own washing or cooking and she found their belief in themselves quite scary at first. But she v quickly realised she was better at managing life and money 💰 and helped her new friend sort out her cash after she'd spent it all in first few weeks. Every kid deserves a chance regardless of the schooling chosen by their parents.

Not an obtuse question but what exactly is the gap you want bridged?

There isn't automatically one just because it's a state school therefore if you perceive there to be one you first need to identify if.

I think private school kids are, in general, putting in more hours of work. They may get a couple of weeks extra holiday in the summer, but this is more than counterbalanced by (in general) longer school days, more homework, more weekend work, more holiday work. That's why I would personally recommend doing some extra work outside of school, esp. during the holidays which is when kids tend to slip back

Some kids read and write a lot off their own bat, so are likely to do well in the language arts regardless of what type of school they go to and regardless of what their parents do. That was me, incidentally--comprehensive student, went on to Cambridge. I think I would have done better in maths if my parents had pushed me more and had me tutored, though.

(Disclaimer: I am talking about standard academically-focused private schools. There are different types of private schools, of course, including some that pride themselves on being very alternative and child-led and so on.)

You know what I find myself wondering, though? You hear a LOT of parents saying that they decided to send their children to private school because of the sport and music options.

(I don't know whether they are being a bit disingenous and really it was better exam results they were hoping for but felt a bit embarassed about saying out loud... but, OK, so private schools usually have better music and sports facilities.)

So:

What happens if you send your kid to a private primary school with all these glorious facilities (requiring glorious fees, needless to say, to cover all the costs), and then your kid turns out to be interested in neither? I went to a state primary school that had a good orchestra and unusually good sporting facilities (and lots of emphasis on sport).

I hated the sport with a passion, and despite being approached and asked to take up an orchestra instrument, made it clear that the only thing I wanted to play was the piano. By myself. With the neighborhood piano teacher lady who lived down the road.

My parents, of course, didn't mindno skin off their noses, since this was a state school anyway. But I'm just trying to imaginehow would they have felt if they were stuck paying $$$$ a year for all these wonderful facilities and their child simply wasn't interested? I can't imagine how frustrating that would be.

I think it makes sense, in most cases, to pay for extra curriculars outside of school , since this means you can opt in and out and you don't have to pay for anything that your child doesn't want to do.

If the child doesn't take advantage of the clubs etc.? I don't mind. I wasn't very clubbable at private school either. i don't pay fees so they haev to join clubs. Some of my 5 have been joiners and others like to be home and to think or just to relax. I am paying for a wide variety of things and if they don't want to do school trips that's fine. Mine could have done a school year swap with China I think it was - wonderful opportunity, didn't want to. All kinds of things they haven't wanted to do and that';s absolutely fine. They get a lot out of all kinds of elements of school life. I don't have one thing they must do.

I agree with Empress. It is high expectations in many academic private schools. I suppose I buy a peer group where all or most of the children will go to good universities and the children expected by school and parents to do well (academically selective private school). You can of course find that at state grammars too.

Why did 3 of my children win music scholarships and all of them have lots of grade 7 and 8 exams passed? Sheer effort. The good music fairy gene did not wave a wand and they get the grades. Instead every day of the year they work at their music and they do their music theory and yes it's hard and you have to memorise stuff but hard work never did you any harm. Ditto sport. I am not saying children in state schools don't learn the violin to grade 8 level (Associated Board) because of course they do but perhaps not quite as much as some private schools. Same with choirs. If you want primary age children to be able to sing things like latin church music, in parts etc etc then they need hours of slog. State school teachers usually don't stay quite as late after school for clubs on the whole.

On the original question, how to make these primary age children keep up with their private school educated cousins who seem very confident is that just personality? I am never sure what this confidence is. You get shy and not shy children at all kinds of schools. The "social capital" or whatever they call it which Sutton Trust speaks of will be life experience things which you say you can afford. Try the following:-

1. Correct the children when their accent, grammar and the like is wrong.
2. Put them in for speech and drama exams
3. Have them learn two proper orchestral instruments whilst at primary school and sit in on their practice for 10 minutes a day. Do exams. People duck exams because they are hard. Instead get them used to pressure and passing and failing at primary level. Or pick a difficult sport.
4. As someone said above main differences at primary level are reading and spellings. Make sure they learn 20 spellings a week and practise times tables all the time. We had a very nice set of tapes in the car of times tables, sung I think. Hear their reading every day. Buy the school reading scheme and do it at home. Read them stories every nice from good nice children's books appropriate to their age. Sing to them when they are in bed too.
5. I don't know quite what people mean about confidence. In our family there are 9 cousins all at or have been at fee paying primary and secondary schools and some are noisier than others, some are shy. I suppose they all would feel able to hold their own with everyone from King to cleaner. They would know how to speak to people, shake hands, find something in common but even there in all private schools loads of children will be shy as teenagers and younger children surely so I do think this confidence thing is over done a bit. I went to a fee paying school from age 4 and I was very shy as a child.

As I've said in an earlier post I have no objection to private school and would have moved my four to one had they needed it and had our local non selective comp and sixth form college not worked for them however it wasn't needed and I am really glad they were educated at a non selective state school.

I genuinely don't think they missed out on anything and I think they have done 'almost' as well academically as they would have in a private school. They had to take responsibility for they own success which I think was a good thing for them. It obviously wouldn't work for all DC but there were enough DC at their school who had the same work effort and determination. In sixth form nearly all of their teachers were excellent. (Unfortunately there was one exception which meant one DC had to self teach )

As for extra curricular activities and trips I think as long as you can afford it and are prepared to put the effort in then I can't see that they missed out on anything.

The money that we have 'saved' by not sending them to private school will be given to them to buy a house - so we may not have bought them a peer group but we will have bought them a house or at least a good deposit. 😂

It worked for us at our 'very nice' state school but I know we would have just sent them to a private school in different circumstances just to reduce the risk of things not going well.

Sounds like that has worked out well Changed. Loads of people we know use state schools and in London there is a pretty wide choice of different schools. that is not the case everywhere. As I have always worked full time I can also help the children both to graduate debt free without loans and also to buy a property although even there you have to make them work and earn otherwise children never get on with anything so there is reasonable help and instead handing everything on a plate which does no good.

Lots of privately educated children have a house and the private education! It is not either or for many.

I think what you get out of education (and life) depends on the child and what they out into it. Parents who do the homework may produce a child that relies on them and this is not a good prep for university. Mine boarded and I very rarely saw any homework let alone do it. They stood ontheir own two feet. One did Leiths cookery course at school - she can cook. The other one is not so good at cooking good, but can do other things. Both are good with money.

We made a very big effort to give them an education outside school, usually via days out, holidays and conversation. Both did a lot of activities at school but that was their choice. They stuck at some of their activities for years too. In fact DD1 at 24 is still singing in a choir and DD2 had dancing lessons from age 4 to 18. They both did drama and were used to speaking in public. DD2 found that more of a challenge, but has confidence in her abilities. I think that too often drama is mediocre in state schools and should be given much greater emphasis to help wth confidence.

My very savvy younger daughter was only saying to me yesterday how glad she was that they only had the SIMS on the computer! No video games at all. I think therefore, that conversation is good, facilitating what a child is interested in is good, eg sport, music, dance, art etc. Taking them to interesting places and taking about what you have seen is good.

I tend to agree with goodbye that you do need to back off because you cannot make them into someone they are not. The most successful people have drive and determination and most, these, days work out what they need to do to be successful in their chosen field. Hopefully not a field chosen by parents. I think parents advise, take an interest and make suggestions, but children have to do it themselves, and be motivated to do it. As an adult, in the workplace, Mum and Dad cannot keep them up to speed! My DD1, who went to an all girls' school has told me recently that it was her male friends who spurred her onto succeed. They wanted good jobs. Lots of the girls drifted to university and out again with no career objectives. None of her male friends did this. They knew what they wanted. I do not think that private school necessarily produced drive and determination or indeed career focus. It does for some, but not for others. This is even more evident at the girls' boarding school 6th form DD2 went to. She says lots are now taking drugs and one has gone into rehab - at 21.

Lots of privately educated children have a house and the private education! It is not either or for many.

Err, I know that but thanks for pointing it out

I would be interested to know what proportion of Oxbridge admissions from private school are for Classics.

Apart from some grammars I daresay there is a big gap for comp students wanting to do Classics, Latin and Greek being very rare on the curriculum. At Dc comp they can do a Latin gcse if a minimum of 4 want to do it, but not Greek.

Classics must be one of the least competitive admissions to Oxbridge, unless the private schools have sussec this and ALL go for it.

But I would check how many Classics degrees account for a private school's Oxbrige entry.

But I would check how many Classics degrees account for a private school's Oxbrige entry.

You do know that Classics at Oxbridge has a small intake of students, right? So even if it was 100% private school (which it definitely isn't, there are a fair number of grammar and comp students too) this would only account for a very small number of students.

At Cambridge less than 90 students out of around 3500 undergrads accepted do Classics. Theology and modern languages have similar success rates to classics, as they are relatively unpopular courses also.

And for the record none of my DC's school's Oxbridge students over the past few years have done Classics... because very few do Latin/Greek at A level and very few want to do Classics at university.

However of the 4 teens I know personally who have gone to Oxford and Cambridge the two privately educated ones have done Classics and the state school students have done Maths and English Lit.

A PP recounts a private school sitting down with a student and identifying Theology as the least competitive subject, and planning the facilitating subjects accordingly.

State schools (especially academies) pull all sorts of stunts to up their stats. I know that private schools do the same in ways that suit them.

(I really do know, I have seen the e mails to staff in a high profile independent school about 'culling' students from courses in which they will not achieve an A) .

It's worth a look, that's all I said. Some schools may well have Classics an Theology, for example, well represented in their Oxbridge results.

MixedGrill you're overthinking it.

Is it a bad thing to choose GCSEs/A levels with entrance to universities in mind? If a student likes history and RS equally, is it unreasonable to point out that theology is generally less competitive at top universities than history?

Conversely, is it reasonable that so many state schools get bright students to take subjects which aren't as well respected by top courses (law, psychology etc)? Is it reasonable that some state schools tell students that further maths doesn't matter and not doing further maths won't affect them, when it manifestly does for maths, physics and engineering at top universities?

I would count it as a positive that a school (state or private) knows enough about university admissions to guide students towards well respected top courses that may be a little easier to enter.

There';s nothing to stop any 18 year old in the country researching which good universities are easier to get into for different subjects and if they aren't bright enough to do that then they don't deserve the places surely? It has always been so. We knew a friend who in the 80s did anglo saxon norse and celtic at Cambridge and won an organ scholarship - mind you he was brilliant at languages and ended up fluent in and working in Hungary and then Ukraine (not many people master Hungarian who are English). I think one reason he picked that subject was then was less competition just as my siblings applied for a single sex college deliberately (easier to get in) and (male) applied for single sex college just becoming mixed (so not so popular with men) and also got in. you don't need to be a geniue or at a private school to uip your odds but of course for many there is no need. My daughter's friend read English at Oxford not an easy subject to get into even from a private school, another did medicine at Cambridge. So it is not the case that private school pupils are picking subjects with easier entrance requirements (although my twins' Durham offers of AAA and AAA reflect the point made above- geography is the harder grades one and ancient history one grade easier - he doesn't need an A and he is sure he will get AAA (silly boy).

It's just one small factor in the great debate.

Of COURSE the majority of private school pupils are not opting for Classics, Theology and Norse Organ Playing.

But that given that some private schools make a selling point of 'numbers into Oxbridge', most state students do not study Classics, that the 47% success rate on to a Classics course represents a different picture to getting in to an Economics course,

It may be a small point, but surely Classics, and therefore an additional and enhanced shot at Oxbridge, form a tiny part of the gap ? If there is one.....

Why do defensive? Are you all Classics Moms ?

No none of my DC have done Classics, sadly. I'd like a Classics DC in the family. So far they've done Law, History, Law, Medicine, History, History. And this year's applicant is another scientist. But really, independent education at its best has more to offer than merely trying to spoon its less good applicants into the least competitive courses.

EnormousTiger I'm interested as to why your DC with all their very obvious talent (I mean that genuinely), and material and other advantages in life, nevertheless feel they need to go for less well subscribed courses. Surely they could all roar into whichever course appealed most at whichever uni. They're clearly an impressive bunch, so why the diffidence?

Re the less subscribed courses thing. My Ds looked fleetingly at Theology. Whilst Theology on paper has a better acceptance rate, and he was interested , he just prefers History. And as he says - it's not just "getting in" - you actually have to do it for 3 years. So he took the simple view of applying for something he was more enthusiastic about - even though it was harder in terms of % acceptance rate. His friend who is doing classics has peers who have not done Latin / Greek prior to university. He reckons ( and he did do both) after the 1st year there is no advantage to not having done the subjects at school. I believe the application process makes provision for those who have not studied Latin or Greek at A level. Also , Ds and his friend both took the view that even if you are only up against 2 or 3 rather than let's say 6 or 9 or more - if those 2 or 3 are more dedicated and interested , you still won't get in. It is not their experience that people are applying for Anglo Saxon etc just to get a place at university. Not saying it doesn't happen.

ach - no advantage to having done - not "not" having done the subjects ........sorry.

Absolutely Basilisk. In the old days when Oxford published a great big table with how many applicants there were per subject per college DD2 laughed that the only way she would get a place was to apply for Theology at St Hilda's which (I think) had a hit rate of one applicant in every three getting a place - then the reality of reading a subject she would probably be terrible at for three years kicked in as well as a realization of the fact that those other applicants might all be very, very good and the tutors could probably sniff out the charlatans applying for 'Oxford' rather than for Theology.

It is not their experience that people are applying for Anglo Saxon etc just to get a place at university.

Yes, this tallies with my experience as an academic. We don't see students applying for courses just because they've calculated this is their best chance of getting in. Those who can't show enthusiasm and interest for the courses won't get into top universities anyhow.

But really, independent education at its best has more to offer than merely trying to spoon its less good applicants into the least competitive courses.

Indeed. And Oxbridge statistics are not a very big factor in the better independent schools. The schools we looked at were completely open about the whole pattern of university acceptances (i.e. including subjects, including not just Oxbridge in their information).

"EnormousTiger I'm interested as to why your DC with all their very obvious talent (I mean that genuinely), and material and other advantages in life, nevertheless feel they need to go for less well subscribed courses. Surely they could all roar into whichever course appealed most at whichever uni. They're clearly an impressive bunch, so why the diffidence?"

I don't think they all have. My daughter did ancient history at Bristol. She is dyslexic but clever. She did not try for Oxbridge although the school did suggest it. She calculated she might not get into Bristol for law but more likely to for her subject (I don't think it's a massive difference in grades = may be one below - look at my twins Durham A*AA and other perhaps slightly easier entrance requirements AAA - still pretty tough, hardly a doss set of entrace grades) and she liked the subject anyway and she had 3 hours lectures a week and wanted just that - not hours in a lab; so it was just a sensible choice to me. Even so she did work hard at university.

Whether any of the 5 ought to have tried for Oxbridge is another issue too - none has including the twins who had AAAA in AS last year. I think they took the right decision. In the very academic private schools that get 25% of chidlren to Oxbridge you tend to find not surprisingly the top 25% tries and gets in or whatever and I don't think any of mine would be in that top 25% of those very academic schools. Also plentyo f them are very laid back - one of my daughters put most effort into sport in the sixth form, played a sport of England until recently etc, (lacrosse actually if we have to be specific and I suppose that is relevant as sports can have class issues in the UK)... so perhaps they just did not bother to work as hard as others who put their all into school work.

I don't think the twins would have got into oxbridge as their GCSE results were not all A and A. I think one got one B and the other has BBB, AAA and AAA so I can understand their choice not apply. On the other hand had they wanted to I would have supported that too. I hope they both enjoy university and get in somewhere reasonable later this year. I wish they would spend more time thinking about their careers and I wished the same for the 3 older ones. No attendance as last week's careers' evening for example - far too much effort. Oh dear.

I would imagine that the environment in a non selective state school and a selective state/private school would be very different, and there is definitely a gap in the provision. It may or may not lead to a gap in outcome for any individual child though.

IMO, besides natural talent, the most important element leading to success is internal motivation. My motivation when I was young was my competitiveness with able peers, the reluctance of letting my very hardworking parents down, and the desire for financial security for my future. I wanted to better my life. I fear that it will be rather hard to instill the same values for my children, who are now living a somewhat comfortable middle class lifestyle. This is the gap that I spend most time thinking about, rather than the music, sports or drama. And I still haven't figure out whether state or private will help to bridge it the best!