Does anyone have experience of mixed ability for ks3

[lindsey077]

My daughter is in y5 and we're starting to visit secondary schools - we live fairly rurally and only really have one school in catchment along with a girls grammar which she is sitting the 11plus for in September.
We viewed our main local school yesterday which seemed fine but my worry is that they have all classes as mixed ability, including the core subjects until ks4. She's a fairly bright girl and her teacher seems to think she has a good chance of passing her 11plus but we've not been able to afford regular tutoring which in our area I'm worried will disadvantage her. With this in mind I'm concerned that being at the brighter end of a school that has had all of it's brightest pupils skimmed for grammar will mean she will not get appropriate teaching, especially in maths.
I'm hoping I'm wrong and that it's more common than I think, the head is new and seemed to think it works but didn't inspire too much confidence!
Any experience/advice would be appreciated greatly.

[thehumanjam]

I thinks the SMP books that I remember. Over time my marks got lower and lower and I left secondary school with less skills than I started with.

[thehumanjam]

Think it's. Stupid auto-correct.

[Noodledoodledoo]

Another maths teacher here who hates teaching mixed ability. My school used to not set until half term but I pushed to bring it forward earlier.

We have a very wide ability cohort even with local grammar schools so in one group you could have level 6 students down to below level 2 (where they should be by yr 2!).

Unless they are set up and very effective at this style of teaching there is a high risk of boring the high ability and making lower ability feel really bad about there ability - I have tutored lots of adults who 'hate' maths due to bad experiences at school.

Maths is often different topics at different levels - teaching algebra techniques to students who still can't count (and yes I had to teach a yr 7 this skill) is a recipe for disaster.

[OldBeanbagz]

DD was setted for Maths in Y7 and then Maths, English & French for Y8. The rest of the subjects are taught in mixed ability classes which she has found quite disruptive at times. Certainly in a couple of subjects i feel she's being held back as others are way behind her.

We are really lucky that she's managed to work through this but she's really looking forward to the sciences being setted in Sept and then onto GCSEs the following year.

[LL12]

That is what I'm afraid of when my dd starts a local secondary school in Sep Noodledoodledoo.
I live in a county which has a farce of a new 11plus test, now there will be a much higher number of children having to go to secondary school that are working at L5 if not L6. Her head teacher has said she will be at the very top but I am worried about how it will work if they do mixed ability.

[lindsey077]

Thanks again for all of your opinions, reading them all and thinking it through we won't be putting this school in our three choices at all and hope that either she passes her eleven plus or that one of the out of catchment schools have a place for her.
I'm so glad I posted, it has really helped me to have confidence in my decision.

[Noodledoodledoo]

LL12 if I am honest I would rather be the brighter one than the one who struggles. If you are aware you can make sure she is pushing herself, asking for extra challenges to supplement work NRICH website is good for self study problem solving.

I feel for those who spend their lessons feeling 'stupid' when I teach bottom sets it's easy to boost their confidence but if it's mixed the kids point out they are doing 'easy' stuff.

[clary]

I teach MFL and would find it much harder to teach unsetted classes in yr 8 and yr 9.

Unsetted for maths is very unusual - is that definitely the case OP?

My school doesn't set for English at all tho there are some "groups" and it seems to work OK.

I would be most concerned about maths and MFL tbh, and maybe science. I would double check with the school.

[PastSellByDate]

Hi lindsey077

I've posted about my niggles regarding mixed ability & my very able DD1 (only in maths I hasten to add - very ordinary otherwise) - www.mumsnet.com/Talk/secondary/2329423-state-comprehensive-secondary-schools-stretching-able-pupils-opinions

Earlier this school year (2014/2015) I got involved in a really interesting (although sometimes heated) post with BrendaBlackhead about mixed ability in English: www.mumsnet.com/Talk/secondary/2204126-mixed-ability-for-English-just-why

So this is a question that I've been really thinking about. DD1's school (DD1 is current Y7) starts mixed ability and gradually sets until by Y10 it only has sets.

So that got me researching and I found this:

Understanding and using Progress 8: creating an integrated curriculum to raise grades in GCSE English by Laurie Smith, King’s College London

link to full text here: www.kcl.ac.uk/sspp/departments/education/research/crestem/Research/Current-Projects/CogAcc/files/Understanding-and-using-Progress-8-final.pdf

Now there is a bet of self-serving advertising going on in this report as LTE (Let's Think in English) is a research programme the author (Laurie Smith at KCL) is directly involved in - so writing a paper saying my approach is the way forward is kind of the usual thing amongst academics...

but Laurie Smith was a school teacher for 22 years in London and has quite a track record: personal web page here: www.kcl.ac.uk/sspp/departments/education/people/academic/smithl.aspx - so she may well know of which she speaks.

What I will say is having read this document I now understand several things about the upcoming changes to GCSE - which are interesting in and of themselves....

...but....I've linked to this paper because on page 19 there is a long discussion on the advantages of mixed ability teaching & why it is the way forward and what research underpins this viewpoint - which I think links well with your post -

It's one viewpoint - and as I said the Let's Think English scheme is being heavily promoted as the solution for the English Language & Literature GCSEs - but just as a lowly parent reading what was suggested as the scheme of work for the Jekyll & Hyde example - it's more what I would expect from an academically ambitious school and I think it would be more interesting for pupils.

Anyway - there's a lot of food for thought in that report and more importantly I think it's the first thing I've stumbled across that really sets out the changes and the logic behind them/ implications fairly clearly.

From a parent's perspective I think the comments about schools taking the option of setting aside 1 lesson a week specifically for targetting work to improve ability levels - so extra time to support low ability students and perhaps stretching classes for middle ability & extension classes for high ability would I think satisfy much of the concerns raised in my post & Brenda Blackhead's posts.

There are disadvantages for more able pupils in a mixed ability setting but there clearly are huge advantages for low and middle ability pupils. Nonetheless schools need to consider their intake and the outcomes for their high ability group as much as other ability groups. I get that the Progress 8 figures will not reward above expected achievement as well for higher attainers as low attainers - but Progress 8 figures for high attainers will look very stark if schools don't put some effort into this cohort as well and in light of the DfE threats regarding coasting schools - there is the pressure there to ensure that all pupils of all spectrum of ability make at least their targetted achievement and most interestingly this report explains what will happen from 2019 (the year current Y7 pupils from 2014/2015 intake will sit their GCSE's) - when the government will issue targets for GCSE Progress 8 score for each pupil based on their KS2 attainment in English/ Maths.

HTH