Moving Tables yr4

[Stopshrieking]

Ds was on top table for a subject he likes and is good at - he didn't get on with Child B who is known for being confrontational to other children so Ds was moved down to next ability group and not child B. Ds feels a bit sad about this as teacher even said to me that child B is known for making fun of others a lot but Ds has to learn not to react and that he had moved tables that day. At the time I didn't know how my son felt and ability wise they are both very able in this subject and ds is probably slightly stronger - but overall academically child B would be higher level and they are also middle class where we are working class.
I've tried to tell ds that the table doesn't matter and he can still work well on the group he is in now - but he liked and thrived by working with a group who were similar and higher ability than him - so he is now on a table where he is being asked for answers from the others. Is it worth asking teacher why he moved ds even though it's common knowledge that child B causes and still causes a lot of issues.

Clarification on "class" - I did not mean that children are blatantly seated by social class - what I was trying to explain in a few words is that child B is mc and we are wc so teacher may have a more fluid interaction with the parents than with me. Therefore easier to move my ds.

Why would a teacher have "more fluid interaction" with the mc parent? Sorry really don't understand

No of course Mrz they're not grouped wink wink nudge nudge

I think the fluid interaction thing points to the fact that special parents evenings are held for MC parents. They are also statistically more likely to be on the PTA.

Mine sit at separate tables so where is the grouping?

Lepetitmarsellais

I have never heard anything so ridiculous as what you have just described!

Our Year 2's are ability grouped,but , particularly for maths , it can be 'fluid' - for instance when we recently did time and also money. Some of those who were on the higher ability table ( non of whom are ' middle class')
needed to move to lower ability tables and vice versa.
It has absolutely nothing to do with your social status and I am shocked you even think it!
As for interaction with parents- we don't have 'special' parents , evenings (just ordinary ones) or a PTA at our school. ( Sometimes we ask for helpers for the school fair).

No PTA here either or "special" parents evenings

My class have seats for English and maths. These change regularly and are based on mixing the children up so they are with different people. The closest I get to ability seats is those more likely to need help are the easiest for me to get to (tiny classroom) in maths for example each child can choose daily from three levels of challenge so children next to each other could be doing totally different tasks. Same for English. The whole school does the same. Works for us.

I have heard of schools grouping by lunch options to try and fox the competitive and over invested parents who want to know the class rankings.

So one school had a packed lunch table, a school dinner table and a FSM table. That worked well I believe.

My dc school is very progressive Levitt we have scrapped the FSM table, we let its former inhabitants sit at the ends of the packed lunches tables (well, ones with chocolate in their lunch boxes, the ones with fruit are allowed in the same side of the hall as the paid for school lunches)

I think more schools should follow this model of inclusion 👍🏻

Lepitit not Levitt, sorry

So my DD's (Ofsted outstanding) school is doing it wrong?

There's shit teaching in every school. Ofsted outstanding doesn't necessarily mean everything they do is "correct", no.

That's very true. I just commented on the grouping thing because all the CPD, books i've read and conventions I've been to in the last few years have been very outspoken about the abolition of top, middle and bottom table groups in Primary schools. However, it would be wrong to suggest that everyone should do things the same. My DS' school is outstanding and they do things very differently to my school. Some of which I agree with, some I don't.
The thing that makes me really sad, is that some people can't seem to have a sensible discussion on a social media platform. We should be trying to change the world for the better using this powerful media, not being antagonistic or just plain provocative. Grow up.

It's not a thread about FGM or terrorism or Brexit. It's about what table a kid sits on at school. Get over yourself

Lol at this thread, particularly lepetit

The "choose from 3 levels of challenge" thing fills me with dread. Both DC have areas they're massive outliers in. Nothing for them then?

catkind can I ask you what you mean by that?

I assume even the hardest level one is too easy for some outlier children? (Which is very true.)

DS's school's differentiation really sucks, tbh. They give you exactly that, 4 levels of difficulty. No personalised ones.

Irvine, it takes so so long to differentiate. Finding/creating an appropriate activity takes minimum of 15mins. Adapting it 4 ways, that's 5 mins each so that's 20 mins. I'll cut it down to 15 mins to give benefit of the doubt. Times that by 5, that's 2 and a half hours planning lessons for one week. If we do that for maths and English, that's 5 hours per week.

Not saying they shouldn't be stretching higher attainers, just saying it's really hard. Use of challenging questions can be good, NCETM has good stuff. We differentiate 4/5 ways but the top one really does hit the hardest stuff and challenges HA through open ended questions etc. It can be done and doesn't require personalised activities which just aren't realistic in a class of 30+

I meant to say, three personalised ones for example, say 5 mins each to create the questions, that's 20 mins for each subject, 40 mins per day if planning Maths and English, that's a lot of extra time per week.

To be honest I think their should be a nationalised scheme with a wide range of activities as we are all creating the same things anyway and it's not efficient. My school have said we don't need to write 'well done' etc in maths books and just tick or dot if wrong. Saves time so more time to plan activities but so far parents don't like it.

Skeleton, I do understand what you are saying. Your differentiation sounds great anyway. Ds' school seems to differentiate by simply making numbers bigger.
If teacher was giving ds problem solving/ open ended question from ncetm or nrich etc., I would be more than happy.

Ah I hate the bigger numbers thing!! That's really going out of fashion though so I really hope that you start to see some better, more challenging work. There's so much good stuff out there.

I'm not overly happy with the assumption that the self chosen challenge excludes personalised learning.

Low threshold, high ceiling tasks that children self-differentiate 30 ways.... The thinking takes getting used to, but once you're on the zone the prep takes minutes. And I never use a worksheet in maths, ever. Marking takes a bit longer though! I used to sub-contract it out til my kids left for uni! How I miss those days!!

How comforting to know that children's work is being marked by teachers' own children