Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Flexible and made to last.

Meet the Other Phone.
Flexible and made to last.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
Secondary education

Connect with other parents whose children are starting secondary school on this forum.

Original poster

Any teachers here? Do mixed ability classes work?

260 replies

SpoonsAndForks · 21/07/2018 09:02

I need to hurry up and decide whether my DS takes up his state school place for September or stays on at his private school.

His state school has mixed ability classes for all subjects apart from maths and English.

I'd like to know (especially from teachers) how this works with 32 children of very different ability. Is it really possible to differentiate and offer the right amount of challenge for each child?

How does it work in language classes where some children have already had 2 years lessons on the language and others are beginners?

Do the more academic kids suffer and end up not reaching their full potential or can they still fly academically?

OP posts:
cantkeepawayforever · 22/07/2018 08:22

I meant as a parent - which do you regard as 'necessary' for your high ability child?

cantkeepawayforever · 22/07/2018 08:23

As in, you want your child to be taught efficiently. Does that mean setted Art>? Setted Drama? Setted English? Setted languages? Up to / from what age?

Pengggwn · 22/07/2018 08:24

cantkeepawayforever

All of them.

cantkeepawayforever · 22/07/2018 08:24

And is the 'lack of efficiency' due to slower coverage of the curriculum by the teacher OR behaviour which dilutes teacher attention for the more compliant??

cantkeepawayforever · 22/07/2018 08:25

So you would be an absolute supporter of grammar schools, which create the 'ultimate top set'?

cantkeepawayforever · 22/07/2018 08:27

What if you have a 'spiky' HA child? So top set Maths, middle set English, bottom set drama and art, top set games? Top set Music, bottom set DT?

Or do you only support sets because your child would be in all the top sets?

cantkeepawayforever · 22/07/2018 08:29

(I have an extremely spiky able child, and an across the board able child. Both have thrived in a 'partially setted' comp as described in an earlier post. I don't think that fully setted, or grammars, are necessary for either of them, and would have been damaging for the spiky one.)

Biologifemini · 22/07/2018 08:32

I was at a mixed ability comp and I really didn’t like it.
Personally I felt the teachers time was spent too much on discipline and dealing with bickering and unecessary diagreements.
I am not a teacher though so probably not the best person to ask.

Pengggwn · 22/07/2018 08:34

cantkeepawayforever

Obviously if I had a child who was HA in a small group of subjects, it would only make a big difference to them in those subjects.

And my child is 1, so I have no idea.

Pengggwn · 22/07/2018 08:35

And is the 'lack of efficiency' due to slower coverage of the curriculum by the teacher OR behaviour which dilutes teacher attention for the more compliant??

It's all of it. Higher ability sets tend to be comprised of the most engaged and willing learners. That's obviously going to make for faster coverage of content.

MaisyPops · 22/07/2018 08:36

Teach to the top and support those who need it works well.
This is how I teach mixed ability and it works well (still don't like 2-9 GCSE classes. I think a loose grouping is better at KS4)

I don't like mixed ability when it's 'pitch to the middle, then give lower ability a yellow worksheet and a list of sentence starters and then give the more able students an orange sheet'.
Aim high for all and provide support for those who need it (but be prepared that some bright students who are used to the idea of being on the golden table at primary will hate this because it doesn't make it obvious to the whole class who the 'smart' children are.) I've had able students feed back that they didn't like everyone doing thr same work. It was a challenging literary essay that could have been given to Y11.

Some children, and parents, are fixated on this idea of the status of 'being seen to be smart'. It's a very fixed mindset where it's all about having the right set number on your timetable, being seen to sit at the top table in class, being seen to finish work early, being seen to have the difficult worksheet, being seen to get 100%. Those children tend to lack resilience, can't cope with failure, tend to blame the teacher if they don't get 100% because obviously they are bright so if they didn't get high marks it's the teacher's fault. The parent will come to parents' evening and want to know less about their child's talents and weaknesses and more about where they sit in the class and how they compare to their peers.

The reality is that learning should be a challenge, a classroom that is so overtly differentiated creates a hierarchy of ability which can demoralize and lower expectations for some, a child shouldn't be getting 100% all the time because if they are the work is too easy.

Not all higher ability students are like that, but it's a trend among highly able students.

cantkeepawayforever · 22/07/2018 08:38

Pengggwn BUT if the consequence of your child being in a set for their high ability in their high ability subject meant that they were in a low ability set - with perhaps attendant disruption, concentration of demotivated children or those from chaotic homes - in their low ability subjects, is the perceived 'positive' impact of the high sets worth the attendant negative effect in their low ability subjects?

(See previous posts on grammar schools - their perceived 'success' is always at the expense of those in the secondary moderns)

maryrosa · 22/07/2018 08:39

'As a teacher, I will tell you that mixed ability benefits the students overall and, because it tends to benefit the students who are already disadvantaged by lower ability and - linked to that - social disadvantage, it is the moral thing to do.'

I applaud this. The ethos of state schools is less about pupils competing with each other and more about them accommodating each other. The true satisfaction of my job is seeing the children understand and support each other and ultimately learn to get along with people from all walks of life. This has given my own kids a kind of social confidence that can't be gained by top grades. An able child will do well in any school. Send your child to the state school and in year 11 if his grades aren't what you had hoped, you could always get him a private tutor.

Pengggwn · 22/07/2018 08:42

Pengggwn BUT if the consequence of your child being in a set for their high ability in their high ability subject meant that they were in a low ability set - with perhaps attendant disruption, concentration of demotivated children or those from chaotic homes - in their low ability subjects, is the perceived 'positive' impact of the high sets worth the attendant negative effect in their low ability subjects

That is a wholly subjective judgements and dependent on the individual child.

DamsonPie · 22/07/2018 08:48

I agree with Pengggwyn. Mixed ability classes benefit the least able to the detriment of the most able. Everyone is dragged up/down to average. As a teacher you end up focusing your efforts on those who most need help and ignoring the capable students because they can achieve an acceptable result without your help. Bright kids do better when they’re grouped together and not distracted or held back by the less bright.

MaisyPops · 22/07/2018 08:50

Pengggwn
It's a valid question.
When people sing the praises of setting it is almost always because:

  1. Their child will be in the 'right' type of groups, away from children who the parents wouldn't want in their child's class
  2. The school offers specialist support for struggling students in a smaller nurture group setting and that suits their child's needs

Nobody ever says 'I love setting. I have an average middle ability child who is hard working but finds English tough. What I really want for them is to go into a lower set of 28 where half the class are struggling but hardworking and the other half are the students who have been persistently disruptive throughout ks3 and now are in a lower group. I love the idea of my child being in a class where they might have a strong teacher, but they might not. If they have a strong teacher then the teacher will maintain order in the classroom but still have to spend too much time dragging the disruptive and disaffected through at the expense of others who could really do with the help. If they get a middling to weaker teacher then it's half a lesson lost each day trying to crowd control poor behaviour. But i don't mind. It's important that the bright children don't have to mix with the likes of my DC'.

cantkeepawayforever · 22/07/2018 08:54

Penggwyn,

Which is subjective? Your assertion that the bright child will do better in high sets is objective, but my contention that that comes at their expense if they are in low sets in another subject is subjective?

(It's obviously clearer if it is a single spiky child. It is perhaps more usual that the advantage works for the more able children, the disadvantage for the less able...)

I find it interesting that, locally, Progress8 was highest for the most able in the comprehensive which sets least, and lowest in some of the grammars..they did even out a bit last year, when Proghress8 was rigged to favour progress of the most able by there being higher 'steps' between the grades at higher levels. Will be interesting to see what happens this year, when the steps are all equalised again by numerical grades.

Pengggwn · 22/07/2018 09:08

Bright kids do better when they’re grouped together and not distracted or held back by the less bright

Yup, I think they do. As a teacher, however, I have to support what is best for more children. As a parent I would be Blush

Pengggwn · 22/07/2018 09:10

MaisyPops

Exactly. It's like the old adage that Americans don't worry about the poor because they all think, one day, they will be rich. Parents are hard-wired to imagine their child to be bright, and therefore to believe, when their child is young, that they will one day be in top sets. When their child starts to struggle, they start to think setting might be unfair on said children. It's completely understandable!

cantkeepawayforever · 22/07/2018 09:14

Pengggwyn,

So you think it would be fine for (spiky) DS to be distracted and held back by the less bright in his weaker subjects, because he would not be distracted and held back in his stronger ones??

As a parent, I love it that mixed ability teaching in many subjects throughout secondary, with only the core 3 (Maths, English, Science) in sets has acually meant that his spiky profile has smoothed out without noticeably sacrificing performance in his 'high ability' subjects. His best marks were mostly in non-set subjects, and I would NOT have predicted that for him at 11.

cantkeepawayforever · 22/07/2018 09:16

It does seem really odd that you, as a teacher, believe all bright children to be 'uniformly bright across the board'. As a primary teacher who teaches all children all subjects, I would say that is rather rarer than the reverse.

Pengggwn · 22/07/2018 09:32

cantkeepawayforever

Where did I say bright children were 'uniformly bright across the board'? Obviously some children are better at some subjects than others.

Pengggwn · 22/07/2018 09:33

So you think it would be fine for (spiky) DS to be distracted and held back by the less bright in his weaker subjects, because he would not be distracted and held back in his stronger ones??

I made no statement of the kind. I said that is a subjective, parental decision.

whitemarble · 22/07/2018 09:36

In my personal experience if your child is high achieving avoid mixed ability classes, they will be bored and/or bullied.

I agree entirely with pengggwan, mixed ability may well be the 'moral' thing to do for all children but as a parent I want the right school and education for my DC and I believe very strongly in setting, grammar schools etc. It's about finding the right school for your DC, for some DC that might be the school with excellent support for SEN pupils, for other DC it might be the one with excellent sports facilities etc etc. Differences should be recognised and made the most of, not ignored in the aim of mediocrity.

I'm surprised that a number of posters think it's normal to find lessons too easy at taster days - that to me would be an indication that they teach to the middle/bottom of the class and would concern me for my DC.

OP what about other things, what does the state school offer in terms of science for example - do they do the separate sciences? If it's only double award (which sounds quite likely if they don't set) then along with the setting issue I would definitely stick with the private school (assuming you can afford it).

cantkeepawayforever · 22/07/2018 09:37

It can't be a parental decision - at least unless a parent has a choice of setted and non-setted secondary schools, which locally is rare because of over-subscription.

I can't say 'I want DS to not be setted, but DD to be setted', because they attend the only school they are in catchment for.... that's not a choice i have available to me?