Ability grouping in primary school

[blackandwhitecat]

Just interested in whether and how your children are grouped in school from reception on. If they are grouped are they aware of where abouts they are in terms of rank? Are they given separate work?

yes, DD was grouped from Yr1 - at first she just knew she was in 'Red' group - but then she started saying they got harder work than the other 2 groups.

They all now know which is top, which is middle and which is the other group. Not sure they know their 'position' in the group but DD def knows that 'XXX' is 'the best at everything'.

Yes they stay in their groups for certain subjects/pieces of work and the work is slightly diff for each group.

coloured tables - given work according to ability - I think!!! Can be in different colours for numeracy/literacy. Seems to work quite well and they know which group is which - I have told my ds that the ones in the top group are the oldest in the year - which they are - and have therefore had a whole extra year in him to learn stuff. He seems happy - not sure at what age the difference in age/ability should level out though!

yeh like huw said!

and you're right Octo - the kids in my DDs group are all (or mostly) the pre-Xmas birthdays.

At what age do you think the youngest and oldest in the class start equalizing? My dds are both amongst youngest and while I think they compare well to others of the same age you can definitely see the differnence between them and those with September birthdays.

They have a theme each half term or term - current one is flowers - which started aroudn New Year in Reception. The tables switch slightly for maths. Not aware of any great differentiation of work but dd is probably in the middle so less noticeable to her perhaps. Year 2 they get grouped across the yearfor spellings too.

when does the age gap level out anyone know?

dunno - DD1 is my older girl, so haven't got any further than that yet!

In my boys' school they group within the class in Reception and early Year One for reading, literacy and numeracy - so three different groupings. From the last term of Year One, they stream for literacy and numeracy across the year group (two classes), and then group the children within those sets. They also group across the year group for spelling, but stay in their class reading groups.

In terms of summer/winter birthdays, it is supposed to even out by about Year 3. DS2 has always been the only child born after Christmas in his reading group, and the only summer-born boy on the top table of the top literacy group. However, I think some children get an early advantage by being older that translates into the school always seeing them as better.

"I think some children get an early advantage by being older that translates into the school always seeing them as better."
Not if the school does its assessments properly - they should use age-standardised scores to allow for age differences and I'm sure that most, if not all do.

think, at dd and ds's school, they are streamed in maths from yr3 onwards.

from yr1 to yr3, they sit in groups for maths and literacy (but do other lessons together). The groups are quite fluid and children can move in and out depending on how much they are understanding I think.

My dd is an August child and I think, at the end of yr2, the age thing is starting to make less of a difference (though the older girls are still quite obviously more mature and better at writing etc.).

The age gap statistically stays with them their whole school career. Sorry!
I cannot remember the actual numbers involved but I believe it's in the order of: 70% of Oxbridge students' birthdays fall in the first school term, Sept-Dec. Obviously they should only account for 33%.

I am not joking when I urge the young women in my workplace who are contemplating babies to make sure that baby is born in September!

Anecdotally I believe it's less of an issue with DDs than DSs, but, being the mum of 2 x DSs born in May, I can attest for the gulf that can exist between the Sept babies and them. The older ones invariably get the kudos of being in the 'top' group, they get to go from Beavers to Cubs, for instance at the very start of yr 3 rather than feeling like being stuck down with the 6 yr old babies in Beavers to the END of yr 3 (DS1 is at junior school, Yr 3- most of his Beavers compatriots are in my DS2's yr ONE class, and DS1 is the ONLY Beaver in his school now!!). SATS may be 'age adjusted' but I know full well that DS1 could have handled that work SO much better had he been 9 months older when he tackled it- bearing in mind he would also have had 9 months more schooling (but Sept babies do get the chance of 2 years' nursery to 'compensate!).

At the end of the day there's not much we can do about it. Our one-size-fits-all education system just isn't flexible enough.

And I'm aware I've just opened the floodgates for :

"My DS was born on August 31st and is absolutely brilliant at absolutely everything so your theory is obviously completely wrong!'.

Beginning to think you're right Miljee. If I knew then what I know now, I'd have planned September babies.

At our school, they are grouped onto "tables " for maths and literacy until year 4, when they are put into sets and into groups within the sets. For example,year 1 ds is on " John's table" - so called because John sits at the end. They are not supposed to realize that they are on top, middle and bottom tables, but they do, of course - they know what books theya re reading for example and what numbers theya re working with. DD's year 6 class is divided into 4 sets for maths and literacy, and each set is divided into two or three groups - dd is in Set 1, Parentheses for literacy and Set 1 Axes for maths. There's no pretence that these are anything but ability groups.
I haven't noticed any paticular age correlation, by the way. The very oldest in ds's class are on the "top"table and the very youngest on the "bottom" but I think that between these extremes they are fairly scattered about.

Sorry, of course there is an age correlation. What I meant is that it it is very noticable at the extremes, September and August birthdays, for example, but November through May/June birthdays seem pretty much on a par.

Miljee - you are generally right. Naturally the brightest boy at DS2's school was born on 31st August but generally the older in the year you are the more mature you are and the more you progress through school because you are more able to understand the work set for your year group. I have one mid-year DS and one August DS and the August one has always struggled - now nearly 16 he is finally getting towards where he should be in his year!

I think you can overestimate the effect of the age difference. Yes there is a slight difference in old and young in year even by the end of school, but it's not that large (I can't quite believe that 70% Oxbridge statistic can be accurate - can someone post a link to the research?).

I tended to think that if your children were likely to be better than average academically, it would be good to have them younger in the year, so they didn't get so bored (see thread this evening on clever children who are old in the year being bored and disruptive). It's perhaps swings and roundabouts which you'd prefer - your child to possibly be bored at the older end of the class, or struggling at the younger end.

Incidentally, my late august child is my most academic, and I'm very relieved that she wasn't born a week later. My clever 4yo niece is bored silly at preschool, being an autumn birthday.

Miljee, totally agree with you - at dd's school all the ones who are seen as really bright and amazing are the very eldest in class.... dd is May birthday. they are soooo aware of the levels thy are at.

ds (2 and 3/4) is a Sept birthdya, thank goodness.

I've read birthdays has a lasting impact on sporting aptitude as well. THe bigger kids are always going to be the ones more able to compete at sport and more likely to be picked for football team. By the time the younger ones catch up they've already been put off. Think I read similar stats to the Oxbridge ones about professional athletes. That is that 70% or some such have Sep-Dec birthdays.

Locally the 11+ tests are slightly age adjusted, but only by 1% or thereabouts.

Of the 4 on the top table in my dd's year 1 is Sept 1 birthday, 1 October, one June and one 24 Aug. I think the biggest difference though is maturity.

The youngest was actually booted off the top table becasue he was being silly and disrupting the others. Dd (summer baby) lacks maturity and it shows in her attitdue to work as she is less inclined to buckle down

Teacher friend says that the age difference within a year is apparent until Yr7 or Yr8, much less obvious after that.

DD's reception groups were divided by social circles / gender balance initially, but then sorted by ability after a month or so. I noticed yesterday it's been reorganised again to be entirely mixed ability at the end of Reception, I don't know why.

many professional sports people are September to December born far many than would be expected than by chance from school age they always get picked for the year group teams as often bigger so by the time it evens out at secondary school the summer children have given up trying.

Academically the younger ones catch up as the older ones are held back to some extent, eldest DS born early September cannot progress as he needs to as we keep being told "can't go on to those books/that work they are year 1 and he is only reception" if he was three days older he would be in year 1 and actually doing the year 1 stuff but he has to wait. Well not at home he doesn't and if he throws a tantrum in school because of boredom then they will be told why