Who saw BBC 2 Grammar schools - who will get in " last night?

[Foxy333]

Watched this last night with interest. We're not in Grammar school area and generally I think it was / is a bad system that works for the top abilities but not for the middle and lower ones. However I've seen my daughter suffer in years 7 to 9 or a comprehensive from not being stretched and teachers concentrating on the most demanding pupils who need lots of help and ignoring the quiet well- behaved pupils who going to pass GCSE's anyway. Often some pupils disrupt the class and the whole class gets punished.

They only set them for 2 subjects and I've heard that's changing in future to one. so I see why a Grammar would suit some. But why cant all schools be good. Is it stricter discipline that's needed?

Felt for the children in the program, so young to face this divisive test.

KEY STAGE 2..

Piggy

I was wondering whether it would have been illegal for her to be on her own. Would she have been taken on as a TA? It seemed like she was planning lessons etc

Don't know user : would love to know. I assume she had the lesson planned for her. She was certainly very good and , sadly, won't end up teaching I'll bet after Harvard!

lets , Year 7 is KS3.

Piggy my mistake Sorry Key stage 3 is years 7-9 !

I dare say that many of Erith's year7/8 will still be doing Key Stage 2 work designed for 10 year olds !

Always have to have a pop: I am sure they don't.

I don't think extra years of entry for grammar schools solves the problem - comprehensives will just lose their top sets every year.

We saw one episode where Erith was considering expelling a bright pupil because she was complaining that she was losing out of revision classes through detention, and a bizarre system of handling misbehaviour by disrupting the class further by removing pupils. The next episode it takes them months to get a teacher for GCSE students, when there was an obvious solution.

They didn't try and get every pupil to do their best - regardless of ability - in the same way the grammar school did.

I don't like the grammar system, but I can't see why all comprehensives can't adapt the ethos they have of trying to get the very best out of every kid, and doing their best to do so.

It seems to me that Erith sees its job as 1) crowd management and discipline, and 2) getting pupils up to a C grade. The more bright students they lose the worse this situation will get.

adapt the ethos they have of trying to get the very best out of every kid

Lets see how that works out for Erith. Hopefully Desmond Deehan will show everyone how it can be done ;-)

in the same way the grammar school did.

I'm pretty sure the Grammar School was not paying for the tutor, the parents were.

The proponents of comprehensive schools seem to be deliberately blind to the fact that top-performing comprehensives are selective. Even the examples on this thread confirm this. After singing the praises to your comprehensive, it ‘accidentally’ comes out it is a Catholic/ religion selective school, or it is in an area with extortionate property prices where very few lower socioeconomic families reside etc etc. Education in this country is selective, 11+ selection is only one form of it. I for one don’t think my children should be condemned to a local sink school because I cannot get a mortgage 15-times my salary. Or that they can’t get into an outstanding school because we are not of Catholic faith. These barriers are so much more unfair than 11+.

Agree wholeheartedly with previous posters that it is disruptive behaviour that puts people off sending kids to a local school rather than further afield. If we could ensure the disruptive pupils would be removed somewhere educationally suitable for their needs, all this agonising as to where I send my DC would disappear.

Toomanynamestoremember - The proponents of comprehensive schools

There are no comps. where I live. My DC sat the 11 plus.

all this agonising as to where I send my DC would disappear

I don't agree. There would still be a battle to get DCs into the "best" school. I know a fair number of parents who had their DCs sit 2 or three 11 plus exams. They didn't just want "a grammar school", they wanted "the best Grammar School" (mainly measured by GCSE/A Level/Uni destinations).

Cantkeepawayforever, I am much older than you, and grew up in west Cornwall daffodil/potato picking and ice cream country in the 1960s. Then, everyone took the 11+ (after the 10+ for practice) for the grammar school. In most years three (3) of each year group passed the tests; nobody was tutored. Even then, most of the grammar school students would not have gone to university; the majority would have left school between 15-18 to become country solicitors, accountants and teachers. There were very few jobs then for which a degree was essential. I think we have made degrees too much of a goal. And while I am on my hobby horse, why are we still making kids take GCSEs when they can't really leave school before 18?

I've now watched all three episodes.

The extent of MH issues at Townley - and the fact that they seemed to be an accepted part of life for a high-achieving teenager (or girl?) - really depressed me. I think someone with that personality would be prone to anxiety/stress in most environments, but lumping 100s of them together is hugely problematic imo. I'm years off secondary school but we're (just) in the "catchment" (sorry, not sure if it's the correct term) for Bexley and Bromley grammars and I can't imagine wanting DD in that environment. Though we have what seems to be a good, comprehensive-mediated-by-house-prices on the doorstep.

I suspect the programme focused on those, however, for something to show as otherwise the selective school could have been rather dull for filming in? It is definitely true that MH issues are on the rise (but there will have been plenty in Erith, too) . There are many many students who are happy, settled, driven and focused without these issues. Some of those girls were a little naturally anxious rather than suffering form MH issues. I thought the dog was fab!

Erith tbh seemed to be placing just as much pressure on students (in fact one could argue the girls' school had an awful lot of 'self inflicted' anxiety whereas the lower achieving school was inflicting stress on students due to, no doubt, Ofsted anxiety) but the programme chose not to show the no doubt extensive MH issues in Erith and the lengths I am sure that school will also go to (minus the dog) to offer support when and where needed .

It still does remain that a girls' school will have higher levels of stress relating to academic pressures and self image - but boys suffer, too, and are less able to talk about it and seek help so a girl's school may well be able to tackle and handle these problems very effectively. Let us not forget that the suicide rate remains alarmingly high amongst young men.

I love teaching boys (despite their press,they are more engaged in lessons at their best than many girls) and do, personally, think co education is the better choice. But I can see the advantages of single sex, too.

In the episode with the boy who had siblings in prison and didn’t see his Mum, it is highly likely that his MH is affected and it comes out as poor behaviour. MH is present in all sorts of children for all sorts of reasons, not just the pressure of expected success.

I think the two schools working together could be a Godsend for the brighter motivated children at Erith. They may get to go to Townley for master classes or even some lessons. This definitely happens where I live. Further maths being a good example and Chemistry at A level which the local sec mod does not offer.

Townley is a very good school and Erith can definitely learn and borrow from them. Why not?

It is even more divisive to have multiple entry points to a grammar school. It carves up the secondary moderns even more and they could well become sink schools full of SEN and children with behaviour problems. The decent remaining children would be very demotivated and recruitment would be even worse! The only solution is to find/train good teachers for all schools. This would be helped by the pupils with behaviour problems being in schools that can meet their needs! Not struggling in a mainstream school disrupting everyone else.

I was extremely unimpressed with the Townley head's attitude to the inherent unfairness of the very rigid selection system for entry to the 6th form, i.e. that it was based on grades and nothing else. I would have thought that a child who had attained a 5 at Erith despite having no teacher for 5 months is a better bet that the child who has attained a 6 after extra lessons and major spoon-feeding. Yet he simply shrugged his shoulders and came out with the lazy "Life's unfair" mantra.

And the motivational exam speaker was talking a right load of rubbish. Trying to demonstrate that you allegedly can't multitask by using that trick of making your foot turn one way while rubbing your head the other way is dishonest, given that that is just a product of the way the nervous system is wired.

One thing few parents consider is what the children who go there end up like. My DS has many friends at grammar school, and in Bromley the boys one is particularly well regarded by people who don’t know what goes on there. They are good at keeping things quiet when things go wrong. Even when they are told there are problems or safeguarding issues they don’t seem to act consistently. DS has shown me photos in the public domain of boys taking hash on school trips. Photo was posted in November 2017 and is still there - and the boy is still a pupil!

Bibesia,

I would agree around sixth form entry.

In the schools i am aware of, HIGHER grades are needed from external candidates for grammar sixth forms than for internal candidates, even though the internal candidates have had the 'advantage' of a grammar school education up to that point. External candidates are offered places based ONLY on their predicted grades, with offers only given to the highest - in other words, the grammars (and some other desirable schools) are using the sixth form entry point to shore up any deficiencies in selection at 11 and make their final A-level results / destinations look better.

I would be really interested to see the A-level results of schools divided into 'results from pupils attending since 11' and 'results of pupils attending only for 6th form', with additional data about how many pupils leave the school (or are managed out) / join all the way through being published alongside. This should be the same for all schools to be able to compare e.g. schools who massage their results by managing out pupils vs schools who end up taking all comers.

Toomanynames

Education in this country is selective, 11+ selection is only one form of it.

I have been pondering this.

I am trying to decide whether we say 'the best schools - whether comprehensive or grammar - are selective', we really mean 'the things we choose to value - usually raw results, but also pupil 'profile' in terms of socio-economic background, behaviour, personal presentation - are concentrated in particular schools for a variety of reasons, and we choose therefore to regard those schools as 'the best''

So I am wondering whether it is circular - we measure / judge schools on something that is 'selected for' whether by ability, wealth, or religion, and then complain that the schools we judge to be good are selective.

Just as a practical example: 3 schools are Ofsted 'Good'. One has a %PP of

can anybody help with tutoring advice or suchlike.... am trying to prepare my daughter for streatham and Clapham Gdst...
thanks

Can'tkeepaway forever- you make an interesting point. As a parent of a child at an ofsted 'good' school, with a very high PP intake, surrounded by schools with a low PP intake - public perception is all it seems...
A virtuous circle continues for low PP schools and Ofsted favours the leafy- good becomes outstanding [in some] and so the virtuous circle continues on and the slagging off of high PP [working bloody hard for its kids] continues...

Hi all - just dropping my tuppence in...

Both myself & DH went to school in Bexley. DH has supportive parents, got into grammar & ended up at a top university. He has a very good job. My parents however didn't think education was important, I lacked confidence & failed the 11+ (all be it only just). Yes I went to university, but for that I thank the Bexley Music Service who were there to support me all the way. Did I feel like I had failed & was 'thick'? Yes. Did I enjoy my secondary education? No I hated everything about it except the music department. Do I think I would have done better at grammar? Certainly!
Back then, none of us were tutored for the 11+ & we just accepted the result (hardly anyone appealed). Might I have done better without the grammar system? Possibly. Would DH have had the opportunities he did? Almost certainly not!
Grammar schools are generally very good & I wouldn't get rid of them as they cater for the needs of those that need them. However I do think they are only part of the solution. I would also like selection based on Musical or Sporting ability. Possibly a science school. Basically I would like more children to feel that sense of achievement & pride at doing something well. Then who cares what kind of school those that disrupt & don't try go to - they are going to fail whatever school they go to! I am not normally one to give up on any child, but when they destroy the education & lives of those who want to do better I have no time for them!

but but but ... you are consigning the least able to a school with 'those who disrupt'... there are some children at the lower end of the ability spectrum, you know, who are lovely, hard working, positive and kind. Many posters seem to think it is OK to lump them in with disruptive pupils (because apparently none of them is able) or overlooks the fact they exist..

No I am absolutely against that idea - they need specialist teaching in a specialist school which promotes their achievements. The bottom 10% I am talking about are those who purposely disrupt!
This is the other part of our education system that is least supported - we really need specialist schools & individualised education plans for these kids.