That glass ceiling! Part 2

[var123]

Continuing the discussion about artificial limits placed on G&T children, and the resulting impact on their health and happiness (not to mention futures).

Do they really matter less because they have a perceived "advantage"?!

original thread here:
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/gifted_and_talented/2507232-The-glass-ceiling-for-very-able-children?

WoodHeaven - about teaching ahead. For better or worse the following is everything I have done for the last three years, since Ds1 was in Y6.
Ds1 is very able and very insecure. He was panicking about the L6 sats, and knowing how low priority they were back then (not reported externally), i doubted that the school had covered everything. Ds1 would be liable to go to pieces if he hit a question he couldn't do early on.

So, I went through one of the L6 past papers Ds1 had done at school and then made a list of the things he had got wrong and I simply taught him how to do them. I just explained it and gave him a few examples to do. I helped with the first one and he would do the rest, knowing he could call me over if he was still stuck.
Then when we'd done the 2 or 3 things that he was consistently making mistakes on, I gave him another past paper and let him see that he could now do everything on a L6 paper. I was surprised by how little there actually is on those papers. I looked through a few, and its the same topics each time, give or take.

Then in year 7, Ds1 was so scared about the end of year exams, that we did something similar but on a level 5-7 past paper. This time it turned out that the secondary school had covered everything, but by doing a past paper in a non-stressed way at home, with me near by ready to help, it again gave Ds1 the confidence to sit and pass the exam.

Then in year 8, the school set a target of 8B. However, the class were still working through level 7 modules when the exam came around. Ds1 got into a panic again - very irrational this time considering L8 had not been touched. So again i printed off a L6-8 past paper and deduced what L8 must consist of. (Its not much BTW - the only thing I can remember now was it introduced sin, cos & tan). Then I taught it to DS in the fortnight before the exam, in between his revising for all the other subjects. Then he got a 8A.

For me, that's what teaching ahead means. Just helping Ds1 revise for exams, usually just to calm his nerves.

Ds2 hasn't been taught ahead, apart from what eh's learned by listening in the time that I was talking to Ds1 about something when he was in the room or the car with us.

I don't think this enough, but I take the view that the school will practice the hell out of it with the DC, so I don't need to.

wood I don't know what primary teachers are saying to parents, but surely you recognise that saying 'Little Johnny's on the top table, they work at a faster rate than the bottom table' is different to saying 'Here's what I'm going to be teaching Little Johnny next week, why don't you teach it to him tonight?'

I think people end up talking about maths because it is far easier for children to self-extend in a writing-based task - they can just write more and more interestingly and put more thought into what they are writing about. They can do better research and more of it and self-extend by using their critical faculties to find out what is important and what isn't. And most other subjects involve writing/reading/research as a basic component of the activity being undertaken. With maths, particularly at primary level, where so much of the curriculum is focused on calculations (which isn't necessarily really maths), children who find this easy can be very easily switched off to something they are good at and might find enjoyable later on when it turns into more of a thinking exercise and less of an arithmetic exercise.

Oh, and I probably taught Ds2 ahead today by accident.

He had some maths homework. He scribbled some workings out down and afterwards I asked him why he didn't make the effort to write out his workings in a sensible, easily followed way? I gave him an example and I mistakenly gave him a telling off for not doing it. I pointed out that he'd done homework that was supposed to take an hour in 15 mins and then he'd spent another 15 mins checking it but there were no mistakes. So why couldn't he use the time when he is twiddling his thumbs in class to write out his workings properly? then I showed him what i meant.

My mistake was that the school still have not showed them how to structure their workings out. So, I felt guilty for the unjustified ticking off I'd just given him and guilty for increasing the boredom he'll feel when the school does teach it.

FWIW, Var, in your shoes, I might have focused on working on the fear of failure rather than the actual things your child needed to be able to do in order not to 'fail'. Not getting everything perfectly right every time is OK, even for a more able child. I spend a lot of time telling DD that it's OK to get things wrong sometimes. I don't know if she's gifted as such but she is very very able and working at Y6+ level or more across the board in Y4. Apart from PE. I have also been much at pains to ask her to look at this period of her education as a social learning experience rather than something that's going to fulfil her every academic dream. It's not going to do that. But she still does have a lot to learn about social stuff and that's as hard for her as trigonometry is for other children so it's her work for now. She does take my point even if she personally would rather just learn more maths.

What topic was it, var

I can PM my maths credentials if you really care noble. I'd rather discuss the subject on its merits. Chess is one set of rules. There's no deeper structure. You learn some set pieces, some rules of thumb, a helluva lot of rote learning of openings if you want to get anywhere. The main benefit I can see is that it practices if-this-then-that thinking. It doesn't deepen understanding of number, geometry or anything else that I can see.

The one today for Ds2 (yr7)? Volume, surface area and perimeter of straight-line shapes.

Ambroxide - yes, we do that all the time. The progress has been slow, but we are getting there. I don't know if its my efforts or just his increasing maturity.

The various tests have just been quick fixes. Last year I only meant to teach a tiny bit (enough to get an 8C). However, there was so little to it, that i ended up covering it all. I was thinking he'd only remember a little in the exam - given how little time we'd spent on it, but he remembered the lot.

I think you are right, though, var, that children don't seem to be taught the explicit ways of setting out work in a logical way that I was taught (not in the state system, was after I went to an independent school and they were v hot on setting out every logical step very clearly - I do try to pass this on to DD as it really was helpful if annoying at the time).

My sympathies, var - if your kid is anything like mine, it's hard work! I have been making it explicit the last year or two since DD has been learning violin and we have the bloody conversation every week - you know last week when you couldn't play X and then we broke it down and you practised and you did Z, Y and X? Well, that. That thing. It's slowly going in, I think.

Just to explain, DS1 had a difficult teacher in Y6. He was diagnosed with a SEN during that year, but she publicly ridiculed him. I could see that he was very unhappy and he was very stressed but I didn't really believe him about how the teacher was until I saw evidence. She wrote down her thoughts in his workbooks and he took them home. They were enough for me to lodge an official complaint if I had wanted to (and I was very tempted!).

Anyway, that's why Ds1's self confidence was so low. He was unbelievably stressed by what he had to endure. So, it was more important than it should've been that he did well in the SATS because he'd lost his self-belief completely.

It was actually a secondary teacher who taught dd further up the nc whilst at primary noble. A teacher that deliberately held back on the nc as much as possible, but still couldn't avoid going ahead.

bert I'm using maths partly because its the area dd is a true outlier, and partly because it's the area hardest to differentiate in, and unlike some subjects doesn't require emotional maturity. I'm also using it as a cover all for anything fact/ logic based. She also appears to be the same way in sciences, but that doesn't form such a large part of primary curriculum so far less experience to discuss. Unless you wish to hear my personal account of how utterly slow and boring I found every subject at school, with new heights of loathing reached for stem lessons?

The main benefit I can see is that it practices if-this-then-that thinking.

Which is a pretty big benefit when it comes to tackling maths problems. Visualisation, patience, concentration, resilience, problem-solving and a lot of logical thinking are exactly the skills that will be used in maths as it gets harder.

It doesn't deepen understanding of number, geometry or anything else that I can see.

So? Teaching the next bit of the curriculum in an ad-hoc fashion doesn't necessarily do that either. I did post a link to some extra-curricular books covering those areas if that's what you're interested in.

Ambroxide Yes, that's it exactly!

DS1?: "I tried x and I am no good at it."

Me:"Well something aren't easy - you have to practice. Remember that other thing you struggled with and are good at now?"
DS1: "That was different. I'll never be able to do this....." etc

Wood Heaven

Noble pointed out that there is a problem with the Maths knowledge of some primary teachers, and asked where we got subject-specific help with (ie help with how to teach maths better, both to able children and to all others). We get that help / support / training / visiting secondary teachers / lots of resources etc from the local Maths Hub and from NCETM, their parent body.

Var, it's tough. And public ridicule is not OK for any child of any ability. That is poor teaching, IMO.

I think if this then that is good. That IS maths. Logic is never a bad thing to practice for a child (or anyone) who is interested in that kind of thinking. That is precisely why I am loving DD's extension maths classes, because they are totally working on logic and not calculation.

The Maths hub school does also run Maths events for able primary school children, but it's not their main activity IYSWIM?

teacherwith2kids - is there a minimum standard that primary teachers have to have in order to teach level 5 or 6? e.g. if someone just scrapped a C in GCSE English or Maths, maybe not even on the first sitting, then wouldn't it be quite difficult for them to teach level 5 or 6 in that subject several years later?

I suspect I would struggle to do a A level maths paper now, even though i have a degree in it. So, i am not getting at teachers - I am just saying that if you weren't that secure in it in the first place, how can you teach close to the level you learned to several years alter?

Your maths hub sounds great, teacher, but it does make the whole provision very local. Clearly something national is needed.

It does sound like the hub could also do with advising primary schools on how to advise parents with regards to maths.

advising primary schools on how to advise parents with regards to maths

I would love that.

I have got brilliant advice on here from you, noble, and others with regard to how to deal with DD's interest in maths. The Number Devil in particular has been a great hit and DD has read it about six times since she got it at Christmas. We on MN are the lucky ones with access to good teachers and good suggestions and stuff that we can use when the class as a whole is tackling something that is not challenging or interesting for our children. I would love to see that broadened so all parents had access to good advice on how to broaden their children's experience of maths and any other subject where their children felt unchallenged and ignored.

re chess- I wouldn't have any objections to a teacher saying 'look, I can't differentiate appropriately for your child in this topic. So we'll leave her to play chess till we reach the next topic'

By the way noble, why javascript or python sound "bit heavy" for 7/8 years old?
He did scratch before, and he still does it sometimes, but he said he likes the freedom of writing his own code rather than using premade blocks, even you can create your own.

In the last two years of primary my DD (French school) moved automatically into extension work in all subjects once she'd demonstrated mastery of the topic under study. The class started all new topics "as a whole" but some DC quickly moved onto extension work (problem solving) whereas others got more teacher time to grasp the basics. It wasn't especially complex for the teacher to manage. The problem-solving extension work didn't require teaching as it always used concepts that had been taught and tested.