Class regrouping primary school- thoughts?

[happymom92]

My daughter is in primary school and from September they are regrouping the 2 classes in her year. Done the same for a few other years in her school, so not just her year.

Reasons being mostly they want kids to make new friends, work in a different environment, different dinamic.

I am looking for genuine answers from teachers why are they actually doing this? And is there an actual benefit?

I might sound biased, but it looks like the way they split the classes are more like “more gifted and less gifted children “. Or the “troubled children to be separated “. Looking for honest answers. Thanks!

Usually, this is to balance out the classes. That might be:
One class has lots of boys, the other lots of girls
One class has lots of challenging behaviours, the other doesn't
One class has lots of SEND needs, the other doesn't
One class has lots of higher attaining students, the other doesn't
One class has lots of pupils new to English, the other doesn't
One class has lots of pastoral needs, the other doesn't

Having unequal classes is unfair on children and on teachers.

They do this for a variety of reasons.

if there is a set of twins, they may wish to separate them.

They may wish to have the students in sets, so the more academic ones in class one and the ones with difficulties in another class. Makes it easier for the teacher to offer the correct support.

Or it may be the opposite as PP says- they may wish to balance things out. Sounds like in your situation it’s the first one though.

There may have been issues with cliques or bullying, or pupils holding each other back for whatever reason- the teachers may want to separate students due to this.

Some (bigger) schools regroup most years.

the problem with keeping them in the same groups is the dynamics can become really entrenched. So say a kid is bullying another kid, if they regroup they can split them up. Or if there’s a group of boisterous boys in one class, regrouping means they can be split up and there is less disruption.

you also get changes in ability levels - at reception the children are generally about the same level. But by age 7 differences are starting to emerge - the school might rebalance by for example if one class has turned out to have a lot of high achievers they will move some over to the other class so that it’s balanced.

it’s unusual to create higher and lower ability classes at primary - the schools that want to do that usually do it year 3 and above and have different groups for maths and English. So the children move classrooms in the mornings but stay with their mixed ability classes for everything else.

Having been in a single entry form school, count your blessings that the school has the option to shift things around a bit. We’ve got a very challenging class with a hefty girl/boy imbalance and it would have been easier all round to be able to shift things up. It was lovely for infants but by juniors, they were all in desperate need of a shift.

Our school is a four form entry and the classes get shifted around most years. The children usually get to list 3-4 friends they’d like to be in their class and the teachers do the rest.

Teaches children to adapt, cope with change and be resilient should they not get exactly the groupings they would like. Allows new friendships and helps them learn about maintaining old friendships with those in different classes.
Is standard in many countries for classes to be shuffled every year so none of the entrenched problems pp have mentioned get a chance to develop.

Edited to add that if it was done every year parents would also accept more easily and support instead of being suspicious of the motives. If parents are not encouraging about the changes their DC will find it harder to adapt.

My older dc had mixed age teaching for 3 years, so her infant class was split and then for each year after their half of the class was joined with another half from the year up or down. The school did it for budget reasons and it was abandoned due to impact on teaching quality, but the actual mixing each year was really positive for making a great variety of new friends, and easing transition to high school (or the social element anyway) as my dc was very used to mixing with new people and quickly making new friends.

Ours does this at two points throughout the school. It helps to rebalance, break up any negative groupings, freshens things up.

We have always trusted the school to know what’s best for our children when they did this, and it has always worked well. They always guarantee that your child will be placed with a close friend.

Balancing out the classes eg sharing out the SEND kids or troublemakers sounds like something that would benefit the children so I don’t know why you’d see it as a negative, which is what your OP implies. Unless you want your child in some kind of special group of just gifted and / or well behaved children, but that’s not how it works.

It’s very standard to mix the groups. If you don’t want that you should have chosen a single form entry school.

Our school regroups the classes every year. It helps them to rebalance things.

Yes, there are plenty of benefits, as has been stated. It’s good to mix things up, change the dynamic, rebalance classes.

As a teacher, i can only see positives for mixing classes. Every 2 form+ school I've ever worked in (or went to myself) has done this, so to me it's completely norma. In fact, it's an alien concept to me that some schools let 2 or more classes in the same year group move up through the school as completely separate classes. It's healthy for the children to mix in order to make new friendships, while still maintaining the existing ones at playtimes. They see themselves as one united year group, rather than 'them and us'. Keeping them separate does not prepare them at all for secondary school.

It's unfortunate when this can't happen in one form entry schools, as there are some children who would definitely benefit from being split some years (whether that's because they clash, or they're too silly together). Making friends is a life skill, which children can become lax with if they're only ever with the same children from a very young age. It makes moving to secondary school such a shock to the system.

As other people have said, there are all sorts of reasons why they may have decided to do it this year, even if it's something which historically never happened. Classes may have become uneven over the years, with lots of leavers and new starters. You may have one class which is boy/girl heavy, or SEN heavy. Maybe they've just had more behaviour issues this year and want to split certain personalities.

Enter it with a positive attitude, for the sake of your child. Splitting classes each year is a very normal, healthy practice in schools.

Thanks everyone for the advice! I was concerned as this never happened before and DD is emotional about it, but we’ll embrace it with positive attitude 🙂