The Glass Ceiling - part 3

[WoodHeaven]

This is a continuation of the first two threads.
Please free to join us as we discussed challenges faced by our dcs (and how to kake the best of the giftiness)

Previous thread The glass celining - part 2

"bertrand what did you do with your dc so that he would fi better with his peers?"
Sorry, woodheaven, apparantly that's not what the thread's about. And even if it was, any contribution I might make will be unhelpful and irrelevant........

Bobo,

Actually, I do think that context is of relevance to 'how much of an issue being G&T is' - because context defines 'how different' a G&T outlier is from the norm in that environment, and the level of 'difference' can be a predictor of issues around effective provision.

You, I know, are an advocate of selective education - ie dividing children into broad groups which then have narrower ranges of ability within them. You have said that this improves the provision for outliers, because it collects those of broadly similar ability in a single location / classroom.

However, it does mean that some children who would NOT be outliers in a mixed ability system become outliers in a selective one. Because selection is usually based on a single test on a single day, false negatives and false positives are both possible. That means that a low-middle ability child can end up being seen as 'exceptionally low ability' in a selective school (and may end up as isolated as a child with significant SEN would in a mixed ability school, even though their ability is common in the general population). Equally, higher middle ability children may not pass on the day, and become 'high ability outliers' within a non-academic school.

So a child of a common ability can become a 1 in 100 or even 1 in 1000 outlier by being, effectively, in the wrong 'tier' of a selective system. That is Bertrand's son's experience. He may have advantages that 1 in 1000 outliers in the general population may not have, in terms of 'mainstream' hobbies and interests, but in the academic environment, he is an outlier.

(From personal experience, DS was an 'extreme outlier' in his first, village, primary. there was no other child like him in the school, and none of the teacher really had a clue what to do with him, not having encountered a child like him in their experience in that school over the years.

However, in a different state primary, in a larger and more 'well educated' town, he was a much less extreme outlier, and had very few problems as a result.

His ability had not changed, but the context and peer group had.)

This idea that some children aren't gifted enough to be "worthy" of this thread is just utter bollocks tbh.

How many UK kids get an proper full-scale WISC done by a competent psychologist? Without that, how can you make any claim about IQ? And even with a figure, you do know that the margin of error is very significant, and that the younger a child is tested, the more (a) the error risks being large and (b) you are testing the child's home environment as much as innate intelligence (the innate component increases in older subjects but environment plays a very significant role at the ages that many young gifted children are tested).

Of course some children are obviously scary bright and definite outliers (there's a kid like that in my DD's class) ... But if these children are by definition extremely rare and hardly worth a 2000 post thread ...

I don't think anyone is saying very able children can only make good friends with their equal peers. Just that if you have a child that is very able, therefore starting out on the back foot of 'different' and doesn't have the social confidence/ shared interests of the majority, they are more likely to find the social side easier with like minded peers.

Eg from what she's said I can't imagine vars ds1 finding much common ground with dds sporty friends, or girly friends, or 'playing out' friends etc. But his interests would appeal to dd, a few other teens I know and from what I gather to her school friends and others at her school.

teacher

before H.ed at dd primary we found the same, except the support and encouragement was second to none.
Although as you stated she was an extreme outlier, and they struggled to accommodate her at times, the children were lovely to her and her best friend she has known since reception, and still keeps in touch with several other children who attended the same primary.

Even though I know it isn't enough for many G&T children, supportive teachers and good friendship groups can make the difference between your outlier being happy at school or being unhappy.

teacher very similar with DD. Reading fluently in 2 languages at age 3, village school had never seen anything like it. She was much less of an outlier in a bigger town school, although it's also true that with very early readers, the "shock factor" diminishes once they are in a class with other bright kids who are keen readers (DD has been extremely lucky to always be in classes with other able children, this is mostly luck of the draw as it hasn't been the case for DS in exactly the same schools).

What is noticeable, though, is that with each step up (primary to middle, middle to high) while the average class grade declines (as expectations rise), DD's have so far remained completely stable.

"Just that if you have a child who doesn't have the social confidence/ shared interests of the majority, they are more likely to find the social side difficult"

I've edited that - because it isn't a function of ability. If children are socially less confident, they find social things difficult. The ability thing is a red herring - correlation, not causation.

WoodHeaven,

DS is only 7, so I know he is only just starting and that many challenges might lay ahead.

Socially he is okay right now, much better than I was at his age. Whether this will change or not as he gets older I don't know, I'll have to see.

Regarding his bilingualism (I remember you said your dc are also bilingual), I've read a lot on the topic and was always expecting that at one point I would find resistance or rejection to the minority language from him. First when he started nursery, then pre-school, and eventually school. I had seen it happened so many times with other children who were also being raised bilingual. But reception came and went, same with Y1 and Y2, so far he is still the same. English at school, and as soon as I pick him up switches to the minority language just like that, no matter that the other children are still around. In one book I read, it said that being an extroverted/confident child was one of the factors that would contribute to keep and develop the minority language throughout the school years more easily and it seems to ring true in his case.

Regarding the three things you mention that you feel would make the school a better experience for able children (an other children as well), I totally agree with them and feel that DS's comprehensive state school fulfil them.
They totally get my son, he is valued for who he is, his ability is recognised and praised rather than reproached. And the fact that he speaks another language at home is also praised, which probably helps for other children to see it as a good thing instead of something to make him feel bad about.

teacher

You are right though, whichever way you put it
Whilst able children can make good friends as dd did, they can get lost when friends don't share their interest and like different things.
Mine was left behind when friends got into make up and pop music.
Whereas at her school now, they may listen to the odd bit of pop or wear make up at school disco, their life really doesn't include much of this and their free time is taken up with shared interests.
Last night she called to say her and a few friends had composed a jazz version of Chopin nocturne no9 / 02.
This probably means nothing to many people but they saw this as such fun and took them over an hour of their limited free time.

Do you think that the issues we are mentioning is all about IQ or is it more abouot relativbe IQ, ie the difference in ability between one child compare to his peers?

I have no idea where dc1 is IQ wise.
In class, in a cohort of over 200, he is well at the top so for these children is a 1/100. Does it mean he is a 1/100 overall? Tbh I'm not sure. I actually think he might get a big shock when he finally gets to mix up with children/students of similar abilities.

But compare to his peers, in his secondary (and primary) he still stand out which makes him an outlier there iyswim?

Wood, I think there are elements of both.

From a teacher's POV, there are issues around 'absolute ability' - access to higher level work, pace of progress, test ceilings, ability to manage cross-phase transitions (e.g. primary to secondary), all the discussions around acceleration vs depth, curriculum content vs non-curriculum enrichment etc.

From both a teacher and a parent point of view, there are also issues around relative ability - the extent to which a child is an outlier in a specific environment and is therefore perceived as 'different'. The specific way this impacts on a child will depend, to a large extent, on their own nature and other skills - a range of hobbies, or none; socially skilled or socially awkward. However, there are some common theme around 'how worthwhile / feasible it is to provide for a group of near peers', rather than 'provision for 1 very different individual', and simply around the experience and knowledge teachers and other staff have of dealing with a child of this level of 'difference'.

It has its parallel at the other end of the ability spectrum When woking weith a child with significant SEN in school, it is both the severity of the SEN, and the presence or absence of children with SEN of a similar level or type, that affects how easy a school may find it to meet that child's needs.

However, an over-riding factor in all cases will be the general 'philosophy' of the school, and the willingness of staff to 'go the extra mile' and to see ability as 'exciting', rather than 'a nuisance'. Tjhis is not a function of the type of school, and as others have said, can as often - sometimes more often - be found in schools with VERY mixed intakes than 'n 'naice neat MC schools'.

WoodHeaven - if your DC is 1/200 in an ordinary mixed ability school, the chances are that he will be pretty intelligent relative to the general population but might find himself less well educated than peers of similar ability in a more selective/ambitious setting. In a new selective setting he would need time to adjust to both the standard and quantity of work required of him.

This has always interested me, how on earth do you know where your child is?
How is it judged?
When you hear i/200 or 1/1000 or even 1/10,000 what on earth decides this?

Oh yes he certainly would need to adjust to the quantity of work! He has no homework at all and I suspect doesn't need to make much effort in pretty much anything .....

New I know he is somewhere there because he is on top set in maths (4 sets only) and even there is still cruising above the others.
There has been others pointers (like some after school stuff they did in Y6 for the 'able children' in maths. Again he was way ahead when all the others were still trying to solve the problems).

But as I say, I can only tell he is a 1/100 in his cohort. I can't tell as a national average (Even though he is clearly far from stupid)

newlifeforme I'd like to know that too!
I'm all for context but what on earth determines where DC's are?
End of KS1 Sats or KS2/3/4- where?

Bobo, one might hope so. Y8 DD (comp), and dancing friend in Y9 at highly selective grammar compared school books one evening. No massive difference, to their surprise. Attainment levels at the same ages pretty similar, too.

"When you hear i/200 or 1/1000 or even 1/10,000 what on earth decides this"

$deity knows. 1/10,000 is roughly 50 children in England per year and whatever people use to decide that, it's a unreliable crock.

DD's CAT test score says somewhere in the national top 1% for CAT test achievement, which is about the best resolution you can honestly get from those. But she might have got lucky (error bars/margin of error).

To muddy that further DD hadn't been near VR/NVR tests before, but I expect quite a few children in that upper region probably trained for selective school entrance tests and some of that stuff is susceptible to practice (a teenage prodigy published a proper research paper on that).

And how does DD's CAT score translate into what she actually does in the real world compared to someone with a lesser score? $deity knows.

I don't honestly know where dd is either. From what people in a position to judge have said, and her various achievements/ interactions, I know she's easily above the 1/100 level, but I have absolutely no reason whatsoever to think she's remotely in the 1/10,000 range either.

I don't think there's actually any foolproof way of measuring exactly either. Ability itself is too varied in how it manifests itself to be easily compared.

I suspect that those who train for CAT type tests are not the ones who get the top 1%. Why would you bother? Top 1%, 2%, 5% (maybe 10%, 15%) makes no difference to the education you'll be offered or anything else AFAIK.
Its not like you can even use as a status thing because you don't go around telling people that you are cleverer than them (unless you want to invite social exclusion)!

I know where both my two are, but that's due to the educational assessment report that I had to pay for in order to get the dysgraphia diagnoses.
They both vary, depending on which test (there's lots of tests and they all test something very specific). Some are only top 15%, others top 1% and everything in between. There were a couple of age tests that just put them off the scale.

Doesn't IQ vary over time though? I seem to remember learning that it is not fixed. I am not talking about a western bias on the tests, but rather the same person doing the same test every decade will get different results over time because the brain can be trained or left to rot. (Mine has definitely being doing the rotting thing since I became a mother!)

ProggyMat on arrival at secondary school, your DC would probably sit some CAT tests. Those results will give you an indication (if shared with you!).

Otherwise, if you look up the SATS test results you should be able to find the % across the country who got level 5a, 5b,5c and 6 and you can compare that to how your DD did.

Saying that, I just looked and can't find them. The levels for everything but 6 are easy to get, but 6 has always been well hidden and I can't find it at all this time.

We paid for an ed psych report for DD, because we wanted to know whether she was just freakily good at reading (which is what it seemed to us) or more all round able. So we know what level she's at.

Var - IQ does vary over time (women tend to dip in their results at puberty, for example) and there are other variations in general populations too, but if it is expressed as a percentile, then the actual score doesn't matter so much. And it's still a useful guide.