New analysis - Grammar schools in England

[IntheMotherhood]

There's been quite a bit of engagement from various MNs recently over disproportionate focus on % A*/As league table and what this does to providing an actual education to our children.

There's also been discussion on super selective schools, specifically grammars and the continued obsession on 'getting in' being a pinnacle of 11+ academic ambition for many families.

Does it really make a difference if your child is of high prior attainment? Does the individual perceived benefit(s) of going to a Grammar outweigh the larger social disbenefit(s)?

Thought this new analysis published online today in the British Journal of Sociology of Education might be of interest.

Make yourself a cuppa and enjoy.

"....Using the full 2015 cohort of pupils in England, this article shows how the pupils attending grammar schools are stratified in terms of chronic poverty, ethnicity, language, special educational needs and even precise age within their year group. This kind of clustering of relative advantage is potentially dangerous for society. The article derives measures of chronic poverty and local socio-economic status segregation between schools, and uses these to show that the results from grammar schools are no better than expected, once these differences are accounted for...."

www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/01425692.2018.1443432

[noblegiraffe]

Noble Have you ever had a pupil who you felt you genuinely couldn't challenge?

One. And I’ve taught a lot of bright kids. Those bright kids might find maths relatively easy but they still needed to be taught and I could usually find something that would make them pause slightly or trip them up every so often.

I always assumed that the sorts of children who did GCSE in Y7 would have been tutored and hothoused through primary (the sorts of kids you see on the Child Genius programme) to get to that level. And tbh lots of bright kids I taught would have been able to do that with that sort of attention - whether that’s a good idea is another thing.
But this one wasn’t like that. They were in a class several years beyond their age group full of really bright kids and I don’t think they even paid attention most of the time.

what do you think of Kumon maths?

I think doing Kumon, as a previous poster said, is about making the kids fluent in arithmetic and other procedures which would help them at school, naturally boosting them in the class rankings. I think that the surprise might have been that your child was good at maths without kumon!

[TalkinPeece]

noble
But this one wasn’t like that. They were in a class several years beyond their age group full of really bright kids and I don’t think they even paid attention most of the time.
That is interesting because the lad at DDs college seemed to be away with the fairies when I met him.
His brain worked at a different speed than everybody else so he would drift off and then snap back with the answer.
His handwriting was shocking though and like all of the others at her party, he spilt his drink everywhere even bright teens are dingbats

[noblegiraffe]

anything called "science" gets bums on seats but "maths" does not for outreach events

Last time I did the Maths Inspiration trip the kids were asking ‘is it just like a maths lesson? Will we need to write stuff down?’. When we got back they were saying ‘that was all right, wasn’t as boring as I thought it was going to be!’. So even the ones who signed up thought it was going to be dull!

I don’t think they can picture maths that isn’t just like their maths lessons.

[cantkeepawayforever]

But this one wasn’t like that. They were in a class several years beyond their age group full of really bright kids and I don’t think they even paid attention most of the time.

Yes, exactly that.

[TalkinPeece]

cantkeep
But the point is that those kids - as per Feynmann - do NOT benefit from being segregated away from everybody else

they benefit from being exposed to things that are NOT easy for them
they benefit from realising that others are not good at things they find easy
they benefit from the social side of being normal at least part of the time

and the flip side of it is that the upper achievement boundary of every other pupil is raised by their presence even if they are oblivious of that bit

[cantkeepawayforever]

Talkin,

Personally, I am completely in favour of comprehensive schooling for all.

However, in the same way as I do not believe that a single child with profound and multiple learning disabilities is necessarily always best placed on their own [in the sense of being the single person with their level f difficulty] in a mainstream comprehensive, I am prepared to be persuaded that there may be a very tiny number of children of genuinely exceptional ability who are not best placed there either.

I am not prepared to be persuaded that 'normally selective' grammar schools are necessary. I am not prepared to be persuaded that 'superselective' grammar schools are necessary. However, I am prepared to listen to arguments that a very small number of children have special educational needs by virtue of their ability, and may benefit [ie may be allowed the choice of - remember that parents can also choose whether or not a child with a disability attends a special school or mainstream school] from a 'Special School'.

I am persuaded that some dancers are best trained at the RBS, rather than in local dance schools, and that some musicians are best trained at the Yehudi Menuhin school. I agree with Noble that high ability academic outreach akin to RBS Junior Associates or music college's Junior Conservatoires could be a better approach for many able children than segregation into separate bricks and mortar schools.

However, I remain prepared to be persuaded that a tiny number of bricks and mortar institutions, with a very small number of particularly-trained teachers, could be required in addition to provision in comprehensive schools if all grammar schools were to be abolished, which I would wholeheartedly support.

[TalkinPeece]

cantkeep
I take your point about White Lodge etc
BUT
the pupils who attend those (and a good friend from my own class at ballet school did) will pretty much certainly follow that vocational route
so allowing them to specialise will not reduce their chances

for things like maths ...
the kids may end up in maths or science or business
maths is not vocational - it is an access subject ; and should be treated as such
hence why I will never accept the need for separate schools for maths early developers

same as those who are incredibly good at writing stories are expected to become novelists, not given segregated schools

[noblegiraffe]

The student I knew who was exceptional at maths was merely very bright in their other subjects and adequately catered for alongside their peers.

Maths, unlike a dance school, doesn’t require particular facilities. I wonder if these exceptional maths students could be enrolled for their maths lessons in an online school set-up, like InterHigh. Then you wouldn’t have to water down the entry requirements simply to fill the class because the students could log on from across the UK. I guess the time of the lessons would need to be after normal school hours.

[cantkeepawayforever]

Isn't it odd how we always end up talking about Maths? Is there genuinely no other academic area in which children are exceptionally able and are seen to need 'different provision' by grammar school etc supporters?

[cantkeepawayforever]

Noble,

As I say, one of the exceptionally able child mathematicians I know had sixth form maths lessons streamed when in Y7 or so, then university lectures accessible online (and a university tutor mentor) after that. Something like InterHigh would be sensible especially for the issue with STEP teaching you mentioned for the 'very very good but not exceptional'.

[noblegiraffe]

I think it’s because like I said before, parents expect maths to be entirely sorted by the school, even if the kid has a real talent in it.
Any other talent and the kid would be doing it out of school.

[TalkinPeece]

That is because Maths is one of the very few subjects (physics and possibly computer design are the others) where clean insights can be deduced
without outside teaching

its what kept Hawking sane for so many years - he could visualise formulae and theorems and test them to destruction in his head

it is therefore possible for a child with the right synapses to self drive many years ahead of teaching

BUT
if those same children are measured at age 35, very few of them are still exceptional - because the average really bright kids have caught up

I strongly recommend reading books by and about Feynmann for insight on this topic

most of the relevant kids are a prodigy rather than a genius

[cantkeepawayforever]

(The sixth form lessons were online because timetabling made it too difficult to organise in terms of 'live attendance')

[cantkeepawayforever]

it is therefore possible for a child with the right synapses to self drive many years ahead of teaching

is it therefore 'acceptable' (educationally speaking) NOT to teach such children within school? In other words, not to provide the teaching / activities that ensure they make the best progress that they are capable of (as you would for children of any other level of ability), because they can 'self drive' and others will 'catch up'?

I feel - as an educator - somewhat uncomfortable with that?

[TalkinPeece]

cantkeep
No, no, no, sorry I was not clear
the fact that in Maths they are miles ahead does not make them any good at French

Schools should try to give those children the best provision they can (much easier in university towns or with access to huge colleges like PSC)
BUT
they should also - in the words of Feynmann - pull them sideways
lots of history and art and PE and geography
because schools are about education, not just some exams

[cantkeepawayforever]

So your feeling is that you should provide as well as you can for their area of strength BUT not design their education wholly around it, and in fact work much harder to provide for their areas of relative weakness in the name of a wider education?

Interesting. I know Feynman was endlessly, polymathically, curious - I remember the story of him playing Samba in Brazil - but to what extent the parents of a very able child mathematician would find 'let's not worry too much about the Maths; let's really push his PE' an acceptable line, I don't know?

I know that even art a primary level, parents of quite able mathematicians focus on 'how their child will be challenged in maths' and get REALLY grumpy if you say 'but what about their English / RE / History / Art?'

[TalkinPeece]

cantkeep
for the lad at DDs college, they made him study languages
he found it hard but it made him a better mathematician
and they made him do sport which he just loathed !

a rounded education crates the greatest minds

if you are presented with a child who is naturally great in one area
the best gain is to stretch them
surely

[TalkinPeece]

PS
I was at school with a person who is now an internationally recognised leader / genius in their field
her parents made her do music and PE -she was good at music, shit at PE
she's still v v boring (was on The life Scientific recently) but has some breadth to her knowledge
that HAS to be the aim

[cantkeepawayforever]

Tallkin,

I genuinely don't know.

If I have a pupil who is capable of being absolutely exceptional in 1 area - let's say Maths, for the purposes of the discussion - is my job as a teacher to ensure that they achieve what they can in that area (because they really might make a genuine contribution to the world's knowledge) OR to make them do PE because it is 'good for them even if they loathe it and will never be any good at it'?

[cantkeepawayforever]

I think it is OK to make every child do 'the basics of everything else' - my mooted 'Special schools for those whose SEN is to be exceptionally able' would be attached to a comprehensive for exactly this reason AS LONG AS you also provide for progress in their area of strength.

I don't think it's right to broaden into areas of weakness / moderate ability at the expense of provision in an area of strength.

[HPFA]

cantkeep I think the argument for superselectives does have some logic behind it - I generally feel much more sympathetic to people arguing that case than those who want a return to 20% grammars. I simply can't see any logic behind that system. I admit I've never engaged with a poster who wanted 20% grammars who didn't give me the impression that they thought, fundamentally, that those who pass the 11+ are somehow "different" from those who don't.

I guess the difference between those with a natural gift for Maths and those for English is Maths doesn't really need maturity? You can't really imagine an eight year old understanding Jane Austen or Middlemarch (obviously there'd be many who could read the actual words) because you just wouldn't get some of the underlying meanings.

[noblegiraffe]

I don't think it's right to broaden into areas of weakness / moderate ability at the expense of provision in an area of strength.

That’s assuming that other areas have nothing to contribute to the person with an area of particular strength, which is obviously wrong. Yes they should do PE, because mens sana in corpore sano. They should do art, literature, music, science and so on for the same reason as other students - to produce well-rounded students, with a knowledge of the world and their place in it. Who knows what their source of inspiration may turn out to be, or what area they finally contribute most to?

[cantkeepawayforever]

That’s assuming that other areas have nothing to contribute to the person with an area of particular strength

No, that's not what I mean.

I am happy that a child with an area of exceptional strength should also be educated in other areas.

HOWEVER, I think this must be AS WELL AS not INSTEAD OF as fully as possible providing for their area of strength, and I would not be happy (as an educator) saying 'but they need a broad education, let's not worry about their area of strength' in the way that Talkin seems to suggest.

[TalkinPeece]

cantkeep
is my job as a teacher to ensure that they achieve what they can in that area
not in isolation no
educate
from the latin "to lead out"

to allow a child to narrow down completely is a fail as an educator

[cantkeepawayforever]

So, in practical terms, I would expect an exceptionally able mathematician to have as many hours of other subjects as other pupils BUT their Maths lessons should be pitched at such a level that they make progress, rather than mark time to allow others to catch up.

Whether that is online streaming of lessons, attending lessons in other years, having a university tutor assigned to them, being taught in a Special School maths unit attached to the comprehensive school where they have most lessons - whatever.