Why is school years by age not ability?

[Talksense]

Just thought really and after a discussion with my DP it's got me thinking.

Why do kids progress through 'years' when they might not have grasped that 'year' content putting them at even more of a disadvantage when starting the next year? Especially in primary with a lot of schools just one class per age group?

Sorry if i'm not making much sense as i'm in bed with the worst brain fog with possible Covid.

Because emotional development is not in line with academic development. I speak from experience as a summer birthday accelerated a year. I was totally out of my depth from a social perspective and it was not a great decision

I agree that a system with a little flexibility to repeat a year once, or, more occasionally, move ahead a year, would make more sense than the rigidity of our current system. Once you have a child out of sync by more than that, different ways of supporting their needs should be looked at more carefully. Not every child's emotional development matches their peers anyway and if you are academically out of step it can also become more difficult.

I didn't find my peer group until university, would have still been out of step accelerated a year but, if it had been done early enough it would have really helped. And I was educated in a system with more flexibility than the current UK system.

More practically, I would like to see the option of repeating the next school year made generally available with some careful work put in to decide which children would benefit. This September I think most children should remain with their year group as all will have 'catch up' to do, except for a very few who were already struggling. Over the next year it may become clear that a small but significant group of children have been more greatly disadvantaged by the current situation and they should be able to take an extra year to consolidate. Decisions need to be teacher and parent guided, but a framework to allow this will have to come from the top.

Oh, I meant to say, I know an 18 yr old who has been late to grow, physically and emotionally, and would have been positively impacted by repeating a year even though it would have put him in the same year as his younger sister.

"Because there is massive stigma in countries where this does exist."

I don't agree about the stigma. Where this is common there is less stigma. Repeating a year isn't a big deal when lots of people do it.

Repeating a year isn't a big deal when lots of people do it.

While there are countries where it is more common, there aren't really schools where 'a lot of people' are held back and even with several, they will stand out. 'Super seniors', 'doing a victory lap' and other sarcastic labels are generally applied to Americans kids held back or otherwise end up being 19 when they start their final year (with the youngest being 16 when that year begins).

Young kids who are pushed forward also stand out, though less so in schools with mixed age classes, but those in US systems which strongly encourage high school kids who can test in to take university classes, there is a big issue of burn out, emotional and social isolation, and the youngest who do start anti-social 'adult' behaviours tend to start doing them at a younger age compared to their older peers (as they're likely doing it alongside older classmates). A 16 year old might have the academic ability for University English, but that doesn't mean they have the ability to handle all the adult situations that go with University. There is a reason why even in parts of the UK which have college and university programmes for pre-16s, they usually mark those students out so staff can keep an eye on them and often keep them mostly separate from older students.

There just isn't much evidence that repeating a year helps anything - in most studies I've seen, there is a strong correlation with grade retention and dropping out of school entirely and making less progress both within the repeated year and over the long haul compared to those who haven't ever been held back. Targetted, additional remedial classes work better than just doing everything all over again (if it didn't work the first time, why assume it will the second just because they're older?) and would also be better to support those students who could do extra without putting them at greater risk.

No system is perfect, and age year groups certainly aren't, but I'd rather push for better support within age groups with maybe more flexibility around the edges for the oldest and youngest than make an ability-based system which I'm not sure how it could ever be holistic. If someone is Y8 level for English but Y5 for maths and Y3 for PE, how would that work and what would happen to them socially?

@Gwenhwyfar

I don't agree about the stigma. Where this is common there is less stigma

I think I asked before. Are you or have you been in such a country?

Princess - yes, I worked in a Belgian school where children had to repeat a year if they didn't pass. I was a uni student in France when one friend said to me 'I might repeat this year - I haven't repeated a uni year yet' - it was seen as quite normal.
I remember telling a teacher that we didn't really have 'repeating years' where I come from (but see para below!) and she was quite confused 'what do they do if they haven't passed the year then?'.

As I've also mentioned it even happened in my school in Wales for GCSEs and A levels. In lower sixth we had pupils re-sitting GCSEs and in upper sixth we had some re-doing the year to re-sit their A-levels. The lower sixth ones got to wear the sixth form uniform, but were part of the fifth year really.

"Targetted, additional remedial classes work better"

Well the OP is about grouping by ability so this would fall into that.
My secondary school did have remedial classes and it was a version of re-doing years actually because they did work that was meant for children younger than them as far as I remember.
I suppose it would be expensive to have special remedial classes in primary school especially if each year group had its own.

From the other end of the "ability", moving up a year does nothing, the more able acquire skills more quickly from teaching - it's what more able mostly means. The year above still teaches at the same pace as the current year, they explain for the same amount of time, they spend the same time consolidating and practicing it, the only reason someone moved up will find it slightly trickier is if they missed entirely a load of the foundation for part of it so will be learning more that year.

For most who fall into these situations that doesn't apply anyway - as they're encouraged to do work ahead of their year. So they don't find the work any more relevant, they just lose their peers, disadvantaged in sports, crafts or anything that requires emotional maturity. They may well of course do fine in those too as particularly in primary a lot of the advantage does just come from early development, but they'd've done even better with longer time to develop and more time exploring things that interested them or developing non-academic things.

The kids in the year above, are just as average as the kids in the current year, the truly able gain nothing from being ahead - other than perhaps a year less in school, which might be good for some.

@Smallsteps88

Why is school years by age not ability?

Because schools aren’t funded well enough to facilitate it properly.

This is not true. In schools that are 2 or 3 form entry each class is still mixed ability because it's better for the children. Where I work we have even moved away from grouping by ability within the class and it works really well.

Gwen fair enough, thank you for your reply.

Learning isn’t linear. The curriculum has breadth too. Accelerated DC would miss out on this. Few DC would take happily to not progressing with their friends. Teachers have to differentiate work and in most schools, DC are working with similar abilities. Where they don’t, the quick DC help explain to the others. That can be beneficial to both. Often parents don’t like this either though.

Someone will always be the youngest or the oldest. Being the oldest and repeating a year will always cause problems. Size and maturity are two issues but self esteem takes a big hit. It’s not the way to go.

Happened me when I was 11. There weren't enough to fill a class room of 12 year olds, and there were too many for a classroom of 11 year olds, so they put the brighter 11 year olds in with the 12 year olds for their last 2 years of primary school. For me personally, I didn't like it on the one hand, as the previous year had a lovely kind female teacher and we were stuck with the male headmaster who taught us loads of history and shit (that I had little interest in). While the other half of my cohorts were baking pancakes on Pancake Tuesday, we were stuck going through compound interest and APR. On the other hand it meant I was kinda cool already, having already spent a year in the headmaster's class when my friends moved up.

I like Tommy Tiernan's hilarious take on it

@GimmeAy where I live composite classes are in most primary schools.

My daughters went to a tiny school with only about 50 pupils in the whole school, so all their life they've had at least two years in with them. I never realised it until they were playing being a school teacher/at school and DD1 was going between half her dolls telling them to do maths and the other half, 'now you can practise your letters'. I presumed they were all taught the same thing, but no, the teachers I think there were 4 in total in the school - maybe 5? were having to spend half their time teaching one class one thing and keeping them quiet/amused while they taught the other half something else! I wouldn't be a teacher for love nor money! And they were the loveliest teachers ever. Must have been on Valium or something because they were so chilled out!

A teacher-pupil of 1:10 is a doddle. Even 1:13 is twice as good as most schools. This was generous staffing. The teachers cannot teach the same curriculum to 3 different year groups. Even 2 year groups has, potentially, a wide variety of abilities. So teachers have to differentiate and accept a wide ability range can be a challenge.

I found a parent/child ratio of 1:1 quite challenging. If I was teaching 20+, I think I'd be Fun Bobby from Friends (on the drink).

@GimmeAy

I found a parent/child ratio of 1:1 quite challenging. If I was teaching 20+, I think I'd be Fun Bobby from Friends (on the drink).

I’m a teacher. I’d take 10 children over 1 any day.

Teachers are trained and presumably wanted the job!

PrincessConsueIaBananaHammock
I grew up in such country and there was stigma. But there is stigma in this country too if you are in bottom set in everything. No perfect system I am afraid. Some kids that don’t have the ability but have to sit through 5-6 lessons a day where they have no idea what is going on. It must be mental torture for them.

School is about more than academic ability. I was moved up a year, but as my birthday is in June, I was 22 months younger than others in my class.

I was always in the top sets, but was always picked last in team games. I was desperate to get parts in plays, but lost out to those who portrayed more emotional maturity in the parts. The others in the class thought me a bit babyish - I was.

In the end I stayed two years at the top of primary school Despite getting into the school my parents wanted me to go to. That year was soooooo boring, I spent most of it reading in a corner.

Do not ever do this to a child, unless they are also emotionally and physically mature!

in my infants school, there were 51 registered in the one class.
if most of them were in, some had to lean on windowsills.
it relied on some being off sick, or absent somehow.
can't imagine what the staff would have done with the current system of presentee-ism.
i never really fitted in at any of my schools. (not only the ones with no room). think i'd have done much better with a few tutors.
i hated being all herded together, it really bothered me, felt like imprisonment unjustly, without wrong-doing. having to do time.
i would go and stand in a little space 18" between fence and classroom. then when found and demanded, what are you doing there.
i was standing, as they could see. they were angry, indignant. i couldn't understand them. pupils fighting, breaking things, being obnoxious seemed to be expected. i wasn't. i remember one fair teacher, she seemed to accept me as i was. wish i knew her name.

did anyone see that documentary about a man in kenya.
when he was aged over 80, the govt said everyone now was entitled to free elementary school. he had never had the chance to go to school.
so he went along. and tried to sit in the little seats and follow the teacher. very rural area. it had always been his secret desire, to go to school. very touching. and to see how much everyone there values education.
guess he was the opposite to me. i didn't want to go. was disappointed by the experience.
he keen as mustard, made great efforts. and everyone was nice to him.