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.

But even if it is fair to clever but poor children (and I don't think it is) what about all the others who aren't quote clever enough to pass - does not being the right amount of clever mean they don't matter?!

Still leaves grammars as the best and fairest way to select.

So Grammar schools select on faith and wealth but are fairer?

But I though Grammar Schools "try to select on the child's ability
Well you have obviously picked a hybrid grammar/religious school, not really what this thread is about. When I/most people say grammar we am talking about academic selection not academic and faith selection.

But selecting on any grounds is unfair. Unfortunately our education system is a reflection of our society as a whole, which is fundamentally unfair and based on privilege.

Walkingdeadfangirl it is the Grammar School Damian Hinds went to.

I work in a super selective grammar school and I am shocked at how many DC are entitled to extra time in their external exams. I'm sure there is a lot of playing the system going on. Conversely my DS2 at a local comp, who has ASD and has had a statement and now EHCP since he was 5, did not qualify for extra time. He qualified for a scribe, however, as his fine motor skills are very poor, and his writing/typing was very slow, but not extra time.

MumTryingHerBest I am against faith selection, I think it is unfair as its about the beliefs of the parents not the needs of the child. I would also be pro banning private schools.

And any suggestions on how to end comprehensive school selection by wealth? Until then grammar schools seems the fairest way to select.

A poor family can tutor their child for free (if it even helps pass the test).
Some 'poor' families probably can - those that have engaged, reasonably able parents who also happen to have a relatively low income.

However it largely depends on each family's circumstances - the parent's academic ability, parental engagement/ambition for their child, health issues, including mental health, within the family, alcohol/drug dependency and a whole range of social issues will influence how likely a child is to get the support needed.
Some people's lives are so shit that unfortunately helping a child to pass the 11+ is pretty low down on the priorities.

The system doesn't really benefit those who need it most. It's a comfort for some to think that's the case, that hard work and intelligence are rewarded, but the reality is that isn't true. And it ignores all the other kids who don't make the cut.

DS had 2 boys in his year who came to UK at 9-10 as refugees. They had to learn English from scratch. Both are bright, from very poor backgrounds. It's hard to imagine kids being much worse off. One is v gifted in a particular subject (self taught). They are deserving. And clever. But they don't get the grammar school benefits. They don't even get the benefits of a normal comp in a non selective area.

And any suggestions on how to end comprehensive school selection by wealth?

I'm guessing you are oblivious to the fact that families buy houses in the catchment of Grammar Schools?

Add up the cost of moving house (nice bit of post code shuffling to get the preferred school) to the cost of tuition/mocks/learning support material and I suspect a Grammar place is not quite the bargain buy most people believe it is.

I just watched this on catch up and was horrified! We're really lucky to love somewhere where the vast majority bu a very long way just go to their nearest high school. There are 2 grammars just about commutable distance but the numbers going to them are insignificant and most people don't even mention them at secondary transfer time. My children see all the year 6s leave and go to the high school nearby and rightly expect that's where they'll go too. No fuss, no drama, no sensation of it being related to their ability or of critical importance...this programme was just shocking and very sad.

I'm guessing you are oblivious to the fact that families buy houses in the catchment of Grammar Schools?
And yet the child still has to pass the test. No amount of tutoring can guarantee a pass. Its still about the ability of the child, which is fairer than the ability of the parents to pay.

We live on the county borders in a super selective county. We gave the choice to the DC as to whether they wanted to take 11+ but in the end neither wanted to, and so in the end we chose an excellent comp over the county border. In our view, I didn't think the grammar was worth a 1 hr commute (each way) each day + £200 a month on bus fares. Though the money would be better spent on private tutors, if we needed it at KS4. And so far, have been very happy with that decision - DC1 has flown at the local school and I fully expect DC2 to flourish too - but as a teacher, education is very much valued and prioritised in our house, so I expect DC would flourish wherever they went. We will reconsider for A levels.

I feel that living on the edges of a SS county has given us the best of both worlds - we did have that option if we wanted it, but only a few children go each year (due to the lengthy commute), so we still have excellent comps. My friends who have children that go say they're brilliant, but they also rave over the local (rural, High achieving) comps too.

Nobody particularly buys to be near our grammars One is in the arse end of nowhere and the other two aren't in areas with a lot of work or work commuting distance. There is no need to live near said grammars as there is no catchment.That said I'd love to live near them as house prices are so much cheaper. We live near the more desirable comps so house prices are higher than near the less desirable comps.

Please do not be put off grammars if your child has dyslexia or visual processing disorders. Read on (long post) if you are in this category! We moved to Kent shortly before my DD sat the Kent test and she failed, which we thought she might but she failed by a huge margin and did worse in Maths than English, which for her ability is back to front. Actually it was a blessing in disguise as it triggered us to find out about her Irlen Syndrome (visual processing disorder) as she came out of the test saying the answer boxes were racing round the page! She had never mentioned difficulty with reading before ever as she thought that having to chase words was normal and never said. Since she got her Irlen glasses in January, her primary school put her through CAT tests that showed her ability to be averaged 93% across the skills and we have now successfully appealed for a place at her choice of grammar - where they have 30 students with Irlen in Y7-11 and many more with dyslexia and have plenty of support in place. Please do not be put off trying for grammar if you child needs support for learning. My DS’s grammar has a large autism support department, for example.

I teach in an entirely comprehensive school. A single high school town, semi rural area with significant poverty. We have children who go to Oxford, we have families with horses and land, and we have low ability groups where every child has pupil premium status, some families are 3rd generation unemployed etc. It can be tricky, and it's far from perfect, but it is much less unfair than a system that deems children too stupid at 11 yo. Under that system the fearsomely bright girl in my Y13 (predicted A* x3) who is about to go and read History at Oxford would have been a sec modern kid because at the time her parents had split, they were living in a hostel and she had nowhere to study and no money for tutoring or even cgp guides.

Not necessarily. Anybody can set up as a tutor,many aren't even teachers and a complete waste of time. There are online materials and many grammars post familiarisation booklets online and even familiarisation days. Good vocab, solid maths and some kind of familiarisation is often enough. Many people on low incomes do manage to find money for books and tutoring. The lady on the programme in question sadly spent vastly more money than we did and she worked in Poundland.

Finally the lady in question at your school that you describe is truely exceptional. It's well known that bright low income children who score well in Sats often aren't doing so well at the end of secondary. Many don't get the GCSEs they should let alone places to Oxford. Hence the sums of money being pumped into pp children.To hold the comp system up as the saviour of bright poor kids is wrong. Many are let down.

As an aside I do think pp money in primary schools should be made available for bright pp kids who wish to go to grammar school. It could be used on decent tutoring or books. Sadly I think part of the problem is down to many being talked out of going or thinking it just isn't for them.

This is what has happened at Dd's primary. Out of a year group of 20 3 (all girls) are going to grammar school. A further 3 were discouraged from sitting the test (despite 2 having registered for it,one of them having actually registered herself) this is exactly what they were told variants on " you are not grammar school material" , " it's not for families like ours", " you wouldn't be able to cope". Shocking, the girls who have made it have engaged, educated parents.

To hold grammar schools up as the saviour of bright, poor kids is equally wrong as it currently stands - given that the vast majority of these bright, poor kids in grammar school areas are in the secondary moderns which in general do worse by them than comprehensives.

I went to a grammar school and I loved it. One of my friends, who failed but then got through for the start of the 2nd year on appeal, also loved it, although she spent the rest of her school career telling us all how thick she was and needing huge amounts of encouragement to do things she was more than capable of... so I dread to think of the effect not passing the 11 plus had on the peers she left behind, if she still felt it marked her out as inferior years later and needed huge amounts of encouragement to believe she should even stay on for A-levels. Quite a few of my other friends were miserable at the grammar school - the school could be very blinkered and unhelpful to bright children whose main talents were not actually the academic. If you didn't want to be a doctor, engineer, lawyer, vet, etc, they were actually utterly crap and unhelpful. There was also a huge divide in the town between the different schools which was deeply unpleasant, as were the last couple of years of primary in the build up (this was and still is a fully selective area and everyone was expected to take the 11 plus). It was made obvious who was expected to pass and fail and there was lots of ill feeling as a result. I loathed this experience so much I vowed not to put my own children through such a system and moved to a fully comprehensive county as a consequence. So far no regrets - there are only two perfectly good comprehensives to choose from and parents almost universally opt for the one which is closest to where they live. My dcs, like me, would have thrived in grammar schools, but they are equally thriving in their comprehensive, without having had to go through the divisions, stress and unpleasantness of the 11 plus. Children like mine - like the majority of children in grammar schools - do not need grammar schols to do well. The children who might benefit from the ethos and expectations of grammar schools are not getting into them and frankly never will, not while those who already have high expectations are aggressively shovelling their children in that direction.

I lived in a non grammar school area - we abolished them where I am from in about 1970 and my parents paid school fees instead. they both went to state grammar schools in areas where no one was particularly well off or even middle class I suspect so it was more of a genuine grammar school process (if such exists). They also both had a very high IQ so were lucky on quite a lot of scores and also worked very hard.

The Sutton Trust I thought had found that areas without grammars and just comprehensives got more children into better universities than those areas with grammar schools all other things being equal.

Great post Tansie

If they cannot shut up and sit still they need to be in a different place

It's a great theory

What all this selection comes down to is one thing, really:

You want your child in a focused, disciplined learning environment.

How DC are selected is almost irrelevant. As has been said before, imagine you had a very ordinary 'bog standard' comp (we all know what I mean when I say 'bog standard', so don't pretend you don't!); if you opened a school that had all the appearances of being reasonably funded, with a credible senior leadership team, but where the entry requirements was the parents being able to juggle, those admitted DC are almost guaranteed to do better, because their parents have bothered to take steps to get that DC into that school.

This is why 'Faith' schools do better- you're either of the faith, a practicing member where all major religions teach childhood obedience and elder respect, or you're sufficiently committed to pretend for sufficient years that you'll make sure your DC doesn't mess up that 'opportunity' you worked so hard to give them.

And, if you 'select in', you can very often 'select out'.

My GS's secret weapon was the girls' SM down the road.

Sadly, in many areas, the comps have too much low level disruption, which appears to almost be 'the norm'. We all know it takes one or two DC per class to wreck the lesson. If the lawmakers in power over Education were serious about tackling the under-achievement of so many DC, both the perpetrators of poor behaviours and the victims, they'd come down like a ton of bricks on this behaviour; the DC would go to PRU's, the parents to parenting classes.

However, improving a nation's educational standards requires far more than band-aids at school; it requires a nationally mandated living minimum wage; the banning of zero hours contracts; strong incentives to go out and work; good, affordable childcare; long term, secure, affordable housing.

Bunging in more grammar school won't touch that, the poor children emanating from some environments blighted by these failures being the ones we at present feel the need to shield our own DC from.