Views on ability groups

[averywoomummy]

Having just read the thread about summer borns and having done a bit of reasearch on the internet about ability groups I was just wondering what people's views were on them.

Personally I am quite worried about how they are used at DCs school and wonder if I am right to be so. The thing is I could understand if they sat at mixed tables and then went into separate groups for maths etc but in DCs class they sit in their ability group for the majority of the time - even doing crafts within their group. This seems to very much fix them in their ability band and they don't get the chance to work with children of different abilities and share knowledge.

This also means the groups are very obvious and as they use the same names year in year out parents instantly know what group their child and others are in.

It also concerns me that it is a small classroom with a fixed number on each table and so for a child to move up - another has to move down (and vice versa) this doesn't seem right as surely children's development is very fluid and just because one is ready to move up doesn't mean that at the same time another child is ready to move down. It also seems quite divisive as children could perceive their place has been "taken".

As DC is in a lower group I also worry about her learning being capped and I think that even if she is capable of a bit more she may not be encouraged to do it. I worry that the lower group will start to see themselves as not so capable and that it will become a self fulfilling prophesy.

I can understand differentiation of work but does it have to be so obvious?!

Really interested to hear others opinions of how this has worked for their DCs - also how does a class with no grouping work?

"Not at all - the work the ability groups do at DDs school is differentiated within the groups." perhaps you would explain why that can't happen if children are in mixed ability "groups"

Spanish11 didn't say her son was falling behind because he was in the wrong group, averywoomummy

Also, the fact that some schools aren't implementing it very well isn't an argument against the principle.

kesstrel my Y1s sit at 2 person tables does that count? and they don't have a static seat in the class moving around lesson by lesson day by day.

mrz assuming reception age children are generally not taught as a whole class:

you suggest it's best to have mixed ability small groups, in which the teacher will differentiate.

I suggest it's best to have ability groups in which the teacher will differentiate.

The differentiation required is less if the kids are roughly at the same place, surely - and thus the extension work will be of interest to those not doing it as it seems feasible they could do it, plus the higher ability kids are not listening to lots of things they already know.

I fail to see why you would prefer to teach a group with a huge range of abilities rather than a more narrow range - surely it's more efficient to do one set of work with one set of kids rather than explaining it to those kids one at a time as differentiated activities when they are in mixed groups?

big assumption ZooCheur ...there are times in the day reception children will be taught as a whole class and times when they will work with adults in small groups and times when they will work independently. Speaking as someone who taught reception until recently it is NOT best to have ability groups. Your argument seems to be that it is easier for the teacher rather than it is the most beneficial for the child.

There is a child in my DDs reception group that reads with the high ability reading group from the year above. How would it be beneficial to him or the others in his class if he was reading with them, given he clearly has the ability to read to a much higher level?

I think there's some confusion between 'ability groups' and 'working to your ability'.

The former is a rigid construct - a set of children are identified as being of a certain ability and are taught together.

The latter is identifying the needs of each child in each learning opportunity and teaching to their ability in that instance.

It doesn't have to be rigid though, The groups at DDs school have changed twice already I think

Why do you suppose he would be reading with other children ZooCheur?

I've taught reception children with reading ages of 9+ in mixed ability classes without any ability groups

If he isn't reading with other children, he's being taught in an ability group that happens to only have one person in it ...

Why do you think children should read in groups ...they all should read individually ... it's good practice and nothing to do with ability

If they all waited for their turn to read individually with the teacher at my school, they wouldn't read every day unless their parents do it with them.

Doing both guided reading and individual reading is a good thing IMO. As are ability groups.

How often does each group do guided reading WooWooOwl? In most schools it's once a week!

The reception age child I am talking about does guided reading with the year above - I think that means they all read the same book and then talk about it - a book group with one member is dull.

I presume the child in question reads on his own too.

Every day unless there's something special going on.

Yes ZooCheur they all get to read one page of the same book ...often once a week unlike WooWooOwls child (av of 5 groups of 6 children x 1/2hr = 1/2 of each day spent doing guided reading and you haven't even started on the other subjects )

Spanish11 - my dc1 also never caught up in maths relying on school alone. Dc1 got 2c for ks1 so dc's target was 4c in yr 6 so 3c at the end of yr 4 was acceptable for school. But it was not acceptable to me or to the wider world. So I made her do maths with me for 15 minutes a day with some text books from various bookshops. Thank god within five months dc1 skipped two sublevels to 3a. School did not alert me that she needed extra support or advise me how best to help dc. I had a very long meeting with the teacher re my dc learning. To be fair the teacher was very understanding but then I think in the end of the day she has to work in the way according to the school's policy.

As well as being her mum now I am also her life coacher and cheer leader in maths.

One of the reason why I started tutoring my son is because in year 4 the teacher didn't allow him to do the level 3-5 test, he did level 3 and got level 3a. In this school there is 3 group for math,top, middle and bottom. And in English another 3,the middle and the top are mixed, and the bottom.
In each group, there is the top table, second top table...
My son was in the top group, but he was not progressing, because the teacher did not let him try to do the top table things.

I wasn't talking about my own child, nor was I talking about one teacher having to cover 5 groups of 6 children.

Not all schools have the same number of children, and not all schools do things in the same way. Bizarre, I know!

What ZooCheur said ^

True WooWooOwl many schools have combined reception classes of 90 or 120 children!

As I have said on here before - I move children around A LOT. In theory, I teach a maths set (big school, unlike my previous smal one), in which there are often 3 variants of work going on, a class english group, with up to 4 variants, guided reading - 5 groups - and mixed ability tables for other things.

In practice, the work a particular child experiences will vary from day to day. Today, for example, in English, the children reinforcing yesterday's learning consisted of children from across the 3 groups set up the previous day. Equally, the genuinely hard extension task was attempted by children from across yesterday's groups, because it was set based on what they achieved yesterday and therefore what they needed to do next today. Similarly in Maths, the groups were re-formed today based on yesterday's work, and will be re-formed again on Monday based on today's. I do physically sit groups in different areas of the classroom each day, for simple logistics of adults and resources, but children move around all the time. Eqwually, on 1 day 18 children might be doing the 'easiest' task and 2 the hardest, on another day it might be 2 on the easy one, 10 on the medium and the other 18 on the hardest. It will vary all the time.

Yes, proper differentiation requires work. It's my job.

[We do guided reading for an hour once a week, btw, but every child reads aloud at some point every day. Basically, I never read anything execpt occasionally an end of day story or poem, the children do it all - even just the task for the lesson is read out by a child. They don't realise that i am continually observing and assessing them using that]

I can spell, btw. Just not on Fridays. It's been a LONG week

And some only have 15 reception children who don't yet do guided reading anyway.