Year 7 Streaming

[Cbeazley01]

Hi all,

I was wondering if anyone can provide us with some advice to help resolve a very difficult situation.

We live in West Kent and our son passed the Kent 11 plus in Sept 2017.

His score was not high enough for the super selective schools and we did not think the local grammar.

However, we all liked one non-selective school but were in a dilemma as he deserved the opportunity of going to grammar school. After a very impressive Headmaster's talk on an open evening encouraging grammar kids to join them and after reviewing their GCSE results and being informed that they have a grammar stream (although they call it something else) and my son's primary teacher advising us that he would definitely be in the grammar stream we decided to take the plunge and go non selective with the goal of him being in the grammar set.

Our son has settled into his new secondary school really well and making lots of friends.

We did have some initial concerns after only 4 weeks when our son advised us that they his allocated reading band was 3.6 - 5.4 and he thought the book was really easy and not challenging at all (he was reading 25 pages in 20 mins). So I contacted the school to express my concerns and we were advised that the library and english dept had notice some discrepancies on his levels but will reassess before Christmas. We were happy with their response.

He came home two weeks ago to say that he had not made the grammar stream, which we reluctantly accepted. Last week he came home saying he go 90% in a reading test, 95% in Biology and 100% in a History test and he does not feel challenged.

We subsequently arranged to see his Head of Year who advised us that as had came from an Independent school and not done the SAT's test they have no record of his previous academic achievements and therefore cannot be compared to other pupils.

They had been sent his CAT scores (above average) and reading age of 15.06 plus he passed the Local Authority 11 plus.

I have arranged to see the Head but any help or advice would be appreciated.

Reading this with interest as I went to an open evening at a Kent secondary that said why bother going to the Grammar in the next town when you can join our Grammar stream. For what it's worth I think you have a strong argument that a Kent test pass should give automatic entry to the Grammar stream. On a positive note it's not necessarily too late to take up a grammar school place. Contact the school you are interested in and ask them how to apply. Spaces do come up and he did qualify for a place. Good luck!

Apologies for butting in a bit, but this threat has bemused me, because neither of my kids were put in "allocated reading bands" or did "star tests" when they went to Secondary School, so I wondered if somebody would mind explaining about them, and the other tests referred to here (except CATs, both my kids did CATs, although the school refused to tell us what they were - not that I tried very hard, but they certainly weren't forthcoming about it). I didn't know there were reading bands, and books allocated to reading bands. My kids were just encouraged to read books and do book reviews on them. This year (year 8) for this term DD is required to read three books from three different genres (or something like this, they have given them a list of categories). Reading bands was something I associate with KS1.

Maybe encourage him to try hard in class/tests and if appropriate the teachers may up-band him?

Is he finding class work at an appropriate pace? If he needs more interesting things there are some maths challenge/puzzle books on amazon he can do outside. I suppose it’s a hard balance getting kids to try their best and not putting pressure on them.

Surely the main point here is how frequently the school review the DC in each stream and how frequently they move them? If the school frequently review and move DC, then this is a non-issue, as OP's DS simply works to his ability and will be moved to whatever stream is most appropriate. If the school, say, won't move anyone until the end of Y7, there is more of a cause for concern.