Is a level 8 unusual at the end of year 8?

[MyballsareSandy]

The reason I ask is I've just met a friend for lunch, we both have kids in year 8. I was telling her how pleased I am that DD got a 7a in her end of year maths exam, how hard she has worked etc etc.

She replied that she was disappointed with her DD as she believes she should be at a level 8c at least by now.

I thought a level 7 was excellent at this age.

BTW this isn't something I normally chat about with friends, it does sound boasty, but this particular friend is obsessed with levels and always asks.

I'm still being gobsmacked at somebody's child getting level 8 at 8 years old- I want to hear more.

I think a level 8 is probably unusual at the end of Yr 8.

Dd was getting level 8 in year 7. She also got A* in her maths gcse in year 7. And yes she has always been told she is gifted or whatever. Doesn't mean a thing really. She is still in set 1 with her same friends who thing its great that they have such a "geek" for a best friend although they all seem to talk about school work and nothing else! Lovely girls they are (and boys actually) who just want to do well and are already deciding what courses they want to do at college and they start year 11 in September. These levels don't really mean a lot. In the end they are just numbers and letters scribbled on a bit of paper or in a book.

Very. That kids a genius . (well they would be in this part of the country where only 50% actually manage to get level 6 at the end of year 9)

Some children I'm sure are capable of getting a "genuine" level 8 at year 8 by just getting on with the work they've been set and then going on to teach themselves from their "GCSE workbooks." I don't think that's a marker of good teaching, though, just a marker of their personal enthusiasm and diligence. The same style of "teaching" could just as easily result in bright children not being stretched, because they haven't chosen, effectively, to teach themselves (which is what you're doing if you're plodding through a workbook having finished what the teacher fancied covering in the lesson...). The same style of "teaching" could also result in children who have taught themselves "to the test." I'm not sure what else you'd call working through a GCSE workbook by yourself, tbh, which is what one poster on here referred to when waxing lyrical about her child's school.

Fwiw, I don't for a minute believe in teacherwith2kids description of school B as being anything other than a school which gives a little springboard for the brighter, more inquisitive, children to go off and explore for themselves. Hopefully this is done in a better way than giving them workbooks to plough through, which really does strike me as just learning for the sake of passing a test. Nevertheless, they are pretty spectacular children under this style of learning to have miraculously been interested in just the right things to satisfy all the linear requirements of the level 6 (at primary), 7 or 8 (at secondary) criteria and to have provided nice, neat evidence off all this in their workbooks for the teacher to diligently mark... It's not as if you are supposed to give an artistic interpretation of what level the children are working at, you need the tiresome evidence to mark and tick off...

I really don't get the problem with believing in school B.

"In school B, maths is taught throughout the school in mixed ability classes. There are no booster groups in Y6, and in total 3 practice papers are covered for SATs in the coure of the year. There is a strong empahsis on a balanced maths education, with a teaching of the curriculum not to the test. However, once a fortnight an maths teacher from a linked secondary school comes to run 'fun maths problem solving' lessons for a largely self-selected group of more able mathematicians."

It teaches level 3 [or below] maths up to level 6 maths in mixed ability classes, through in-class differentiation. It teaches all year in Y6, with no specific SATs preparation / booster sessions (and daily maths lessons after SATs too). That doesn't mean that the L6 curriculum isn't taught and relies on children going off to explore by themselves - it is taught, in the same way as the L5,4,3 curriculum is taught, in normal lessons. That means it is covered thoroughly - many of the children started the year as mid-high L5s, so natural progression would mean they move onto the L6 curriculum through teaching during the year. They are taught to 'do L6 maths' in detail, in the same way as they have been taught the lower levels of the maths curriculum during previous years, not given booster classes that teach them to 'answer L6 questions in a test'. The sessions with the secondary teacher are a way to excite them about the breadth of maths, not a way of delivering the L6 curriculum. Certain children are encouraged to attend, but other keen mathematicians can if they wish to.

They take c. 3 practice papers to check 'exam technique' / familiarisation.

Does that help?

Nope.

Is it a very middle class intake of children?

I'm not entirely convinced the one teacher could simultaneously give a very thorough level 2/3 maths lesson and a level 6 maths lesson - at level 6 you've gone beyond the same sort of things you need to know for levels 3 and 4 but more complicated, and you've started learning entirely different things. I don't see one teacher in a mixed ability classroom being able to, effectively, cover entirely different topics in detail in the same lesson. I can see it working for up to level 5, but just don't see it for level 6, tbh. Not if it's being done "in detail" and all the level 6 criteria are to be covered. I think there would need to be a fair bit of pulling children out of class to learn with another teacher/teaching assistant, not having them all work together in the classroom the entire time. There's an awful lot to cover in l6 maths if you are planning to do the whole lot "in detail."

Good intake. Not as achingly MC as some local schools, but improving over the last few years and definitely not an area of deprivation.

Very few L3s in Y6 - I know that the L6s aren't pulled out, but it is possible that the L3s are: will ask DD. TA in the class for Maths, not for English - 2 parallel classes teach Maths at different times so that the 1 year group TA can always be in the maths lesson.

20% odd at level 6 based on last year's SATs, so it is a sizeable chunk of the class to teach at that level - i agree much more difficult to teach a lone 1 or 2.

DD sats no children pulled out during Maths, but TA sits with a few children during main teaching input and early in independent work. Suspect those are the L3s / low L4s, as DD says it's not her group.

I don't know why it is more impossible to teach the L6 curriculum in a mixed class than it is to e.g. teach the high L2 - L5 curriculum in Y5 - or as I did in a single form entry school, P6 - L4 in one class with a 1:1 TA for the just-verbal P6 and a class TA? Is there something 'magical' about the L6 curriculum that means it can't be taught in this way whereas every other level can be?

If the argument is that a single teacher can't teach e.g. high L3 - L6 in one class, then that would suggest that no single-form entry schools could get any pupils to L6 maths except by teaching outside the classroom?

There are, of couerse, various models for mixed ability class teaching: I've used a variety myself. There's the 'do main input, sending groups off to work after the bit aimed at them' model. There's the 'teach whole class the whole thing, but differentiate response' model. There's the 'each group starts working at an independent task, one, two or more groups get differentiated teaching input in turn' model. There's the 'teach whole class, very similar tasks but weith different levels of support e.g. concrete materials' model. There's the 'circus of teacher / TA led activities' model. There's the 'teach most of class, then teacher works with specific guided group for remainder of lesson' model.

All can be applied to the teaching of L6 in a L3-6 classroom as well as teasching L5 in a L2-5 classroom.

(Before I go: have done some interesting Googlng / DfE website comparisons on school B. The 'similar schools' measure comes up with the fact that there are no similar schools which are statistically better within a 75 mile radius. Average Y6 SATs level 5B based on average points score. I suspect that this means that you wll think I've invented it..... but I have quizzed DD again in detail and the Maths teaching is exactly as I have described it.

'Well, we might all be doing division. But we will be using different numbers, or different methods or different types of problem. We're all in the same classroom for maths, with the same teacher all year. We're doing fun practical problems at the moment, can I tell you about them?'