Grammar vs Non-Grammar.

[Delectable]

Everyone I speak to about schools speak highly of Grammars. They move house for Grammars and speak proudly of their children's Grammars.

I watched an Episode of Yes Minister and when asked why the govt abolish Grammars Sir Humphrey the civil servant said it's so the govt didn't have to pay Grammar teachers more for the results they got compared to other schools so it was presented as an "all teachers are remunerated fairly" scenario.

So I've been wondering why did the govt ban the creation of new grammars??

My biggest fear for my daughter with SEN, who i likely to end up in lower sets to match her work level, is then having to put up with the disruptive children who don't want to learn.

All our children deserve a calm learning environment, not just the top 10%.

We live in a grammar area (v average bit of a nice, but average town). We put DD in for 11plus because our catchment comp gets great results but is one of those almost military style academies with incredibly strict rules and very harsh punishments. The grammar seemed more chilled out in comparison .

@Reallycantbesarsed

All of my children went to Grammar school and I can honestly say that their education was fantastic. They were at school with other children that wanted to learn so there wasn’t the peer pressure to mess about in the classroom.

What about the children who want to learn and find learning difficult? Should they be the ones who end up in classes with pressure to mess around, even though a peaceful learning environment is probably more important for their learning?

The most disruptive child in DS's form in his comprehensive school is also in top sets for everything, so would probably be at a grammar school if we had them here.

Of course they're good, that really isn't the point. The point is that they only benefit a tiny proportion of children, while at the same time ensuring the vast majority get an inferior education. Why is that something to be aimed at or encouraged?

Exactly. DD received an excellent education in a very good comprehensive school. She achieved sterling GCSE and A level results and is now studying a STEM degree at a well regarded RG university.

No parent is going to come on here and say they regret sending their DC to a grammar school are they? However, what they fail to realise is that "comprehensive" schools in grammar school areas just don't have the same calibre of students as those in non grammar school areas because the grammar schools cream off the best pupils.

They write off comprehensive schools because they just don't know how good a good comprehensive can be. It would be interesting how the Progress 8 or value added scores compare between a grammar school and a proper comprehensive school. (Are these measures stilll used these days?)

I'm really glad we have no grammar schools in our LA.

I work in a (leafy) comprehensive and my children all attend a SSGS. Our P8 scores are about the same - well above average, though Att8 is higher at the grammar. Many of the children attending my school have siblings in my children's school. The %FSM is very similar.
It seems overall that the behaviour in the classroom is better at my school. Perhaps that is because my school is a girls'only school.

DialsMavis.... I wonder if we are in the same area.... we prefer the grammars less strict approach and less homework!
FSM so very much lower .

No parent is going to come on here and say they regret sending their DC to a grammar school are they? However, what they fail to realise is that "comprehensive" schools in grammar school areas just don't have the same calibre of students as those in non grammar school areas because the grammar schools cream off the best pupils.

Quite. If you live in an area where the grammar schools take 25-30% of the cohort, then the schools that are left really can't be called comprehensives at all – hence @rampantivy's speech marks. They are secondary moderns, they don't like to call them that any more, but that is what they are.

We were fortunate that an excellent head teacher turned our local secondary modern from a really struggling school into an OK one just around the time DD went to it, but it still struggled to support children who were aiming to take academic subjects for A level and go on to university.

I know people who have regretted it but we aren't in a 25% area. (More like 10% from our school). A lot of competitive people togethrr (or pushy parents) can make it a harder environment to be in.

In a 25% grammar area, it's a brave parent who's got a really academic child and decides to send them to a secondary modern. I knew lots of parents who said they were going to do this when their kids were young, and only one of them actually did it (and they went to the 'comprehensive' high achieving faith school). As someone said upthread, a secondary modern in a full grammar area might well struggle to support a very able child. There's also subject choice to consider. Mine's turned out to be a linguist, now doing two MFL plus Latin at GCSE, and will want to continue on that path. If we'd gone for the secondary modern on principle, he'd have had the option of Spanish only, and that only up to GCSE. I'm not 100% comfortable with the grammar school system, but I'm afraid I just wasn't going to make that choice for him.

@thing47

No parent is going to come on here and say they regret sending their DC to a grammar school are they? However, what they fail to realise is that "comprehensive" schools in grammar school areas just don't have the same calibre of students as those in non grammar school areas because the grammar schools cream off the best pupils.

Quite. If you live in an area where the grammar schools take 25-30% of the cohort, then the schools that are left really can't be called comprehensives at all – hence @rampantivy's speech marks. They are secondary moderns, they don't like to call them that any more, but that is what they are.

We were fortunate that an excellent head teacher turned our local secondary modern from a really struggling school into an OK one just around the time DD went to it, but it still struggled to support children who were aiming to take academic subjects for A level and go on to university.

Scroll back a page, I said exactly that. I always knew it wasn’t the best choice for DS.

One of the reasons the grammar system is unfair has been demonstrated by DD. She failed the 11+ for 2 different areas and also the 11+ style test for a super selective grammar. She went to a comprehensive. On arrîval there in y7, she scored very highly in all the tests they did in week 1 and in fact scored the highest in her year for maths. She did her GCSEs and got all 8s and 9s, for her A-Levels she got 4xA*. In other words, DD was actually good enough to be top end of grammar school, yet failed the 11+.

There are always a few DC where 11 plus doesn’t work. However in a 11 plus LA, there are more places available and she almost certainly would have got in.

As for an area being 25% to grammars: this for my grammar LA is false. Where there are greater numbers of highly educated professional parents, it’s nearer 35%. In the north of the county it’s less than 20%. Many DC from out of the county get places at the 4 grammars in the northern area. Some schools rarely get a single child to any of them.

I would say some secondary modern schools are very good. They do, after all, have 30% high achieving children in them so they get plenty to university. It’s also possible to change a schools at 12 and definitely at 6th form. A highly academic child should probably move for 6th form.

All our grammars are outstanding. Obviously quite old reports but progress 8s are pretty good. Some of the secondary midterms are less good

I have a theory about social mobility and grammars. I think in my day the grammars definitely provided social mobility in my county. Schools had farm workers children mixing with farmers’ children. DCs of council road workers mixed with the DCs of the chief officers. My reasoning is that social mobility has happened! The DC I went to grammar school with have all escaped being working class. They are now middle class and so are their DC. Their DC are likely to go to the grammars or do very well at a secondary modern. Which, incidentally, have better results than a good many comps. The children who I know who went to our local sec all did really well. Better than some in the grammars!

@dizzydizzydizzy

One of the reasons the grammar system is unfair has been demonstrated by DD. She failed the 11+ for 2 different areas and also the 11+ style test for a super selective grammar. She went to a comprehensive. On arrîval there in y7, she scored very highly in all the tests they did in week 1 and in fact scored the highest in her year for maths. She did her GCSEs and got all 8s and 9s, for her A-Levels she got 4xA*. In other words, DD was actually good enough to be top end of grammar school, yet failed the 11+.

And thereby proved, with her excellent results, that children do not need segregating into a different school in a different building in order to succeed!

Yes, you can change schools at sixth form, but in some regards that's already too late. If you want to do two MFL or classical languages at A level/degree level, it's very challenging to do that if you haven't already done them at GCSE. Not impossible, but challenging.

I’m often surprised how relatively badly children at grammar schools do, bearing their selective intake.

@greatestsnowonearth

Yes, you can change schools at sixth form, but in some regards that's already too late. If you want to do two MFL or classical languages at A level/degree level, it's very challenging to do that if you haven't already done them at GCSE. Not impossible, but challenging.

My DD did 2 languages for GCSE at our local comp (all comp system). She could also have done Latin as a twilight subject had she a mind to.

We ran away form a grammar area at the tail end of primary school and the children went to a local comp. It was a deprived rural area so not the leafy comp of MN myth. But both our DC got all A stars at GCSE and at A level and one went to Cambridge and the other to Durham (and now works in an academic job in a university). So clearly they were good enough for grammar. But the whole thing didn't sit well for us. It's divisive. And if I'm honest, even with their future grades and potential I couldn't be sure our DC would have passed the 11 plus without tutoring (which we weren't going to do!).
profoundly disagree with selective education at that age

Grammar schools can be the best environment for some children. It's certainly true that there are some kids who do brilliantly in non-selective schools but that's not always true.

What is true is that the lower ability kids benefit hugely from having the brighter kids in the same school as them, so it does the greatest good for the greatest number to have a comprehensive system and it is the job of politicians to do what is the greatest good for the greatest number, as far as possible and in line with party policy and voter demands.

Parents are not obliged to do the greatest good for the greatest number, their responsibility is to do the best for their own child. So if a parent feels their child will be better off in a selective school and can be confident that their child will get in, of course they will be in favour.

But for every child in a selective grammar there are 4 children who are going to a school that is incrementally a less good environment for those children for every high-ability child that is sent elsewhere. You can't be in favour of grammars without also being in favour of the often extremely troubled schools that have a higher concentration of difficult pupils because the ones who are easier to teach are all elsewhere.

One of my DC was decidedly average at school - inner city comprehensive - but still ended up at an RG university where she got a first. There is no way she would have passed the 11+, if it had been an option where we live. It begs the question, what is the point of grammars?

@BuanoKubiamVej no, parents aren't obliged. But we do live in this thing called society, which we all have a stake in. I loved living in an area where everyone went to the same school. and therefore had a stake in this massive great institution sitting in the middle of it. it meant my children knew the sons and daughters of agricultural workers, fishermen, doctors, travellers and just about everyone else... but those are some of the kids they played and socialised with. I think that makes for a more cohesive and less divisive society.

Absolutely, and I'm not using this as an argument to defend grammars. I'm explaining (justifying, I suppose) why parents who live in grammar school areas continue to choose them, even when they appreciate the failures of the system. There are lots of comprehensives that do a great job of supporting academic children, and I would very happily send my DC to one - but I think there are very few secondary moderns that do - unsurprisingly, given that the vast majority of the most able top 25% have been creamed off by the grammars (and a sizeable chunk of the medium able have either found god and squeezed into the faith schools, or fled into the private sector). What I'm trying to say is that it's easy for parents to say they wouldn't send their bright child to a grammar school until they're faced with the reality of not doing so in a full grammar area.

My experience would suggest that a lot of 'leafy area' comprehensives seem to operate 'set systems' which basically mark out the grammar school equivalent cohort as 'top dogs' from the off. So what's the difference between that and a grammar school? And they get the super 'enriching' experiences that one would think available to all in a comprehensive school setting!

I agree greatest. DS wanted to go to the GS, passed the 11 plus (no tutoring) and wanted to go there. I had reservations, he can be very sensitive to pressure. He isn't an all rounder and excels at one half of the curriculum.

That is absolutely fine for him because he wants to go in a certain direction. But it isn't fine for him at GS because his self esteem has taken a bit of a battering.

He's a good, bright kid with dyslexia, the GS's accommodation/provision for dyslexia has been very very poor indeed.

The fact that other children can't access the school sticks in my throat.

Other good local secondaries are out of catchment with a £1,000 a year bus fare and two hours added to the day. The nearest alternative is a very strict academy that wouldn't have suited him either.

An all round comprehensive would have been a fabulous choice to have had in the mix.

I personally don’t have a problem with selective education in theory - it happens at some point - whether 11, post gcse or at uni. Probably most people who are anti-grammar would be ok with selective 6th-form - as kids have had more time to develop - and by this point in U.K., the curriculum is more focused on 3-4 specialist subjects. So probably selective 6th form is a better route to go down. Also, older kids can travel longer distances- so you could get more specialist 6th forms which focus on specific subjects (eg sciences or arts/humanities/languages or vocational subjects).

@NewModelArmyMayhem18

My experience would suggest that a lot of 'leafy area' comprehensives seem to operate 'set systems' which basically mark out the grammar school equivalent cohort as 'top dogs' from the off. So what's the difference between that and a grammar school? And they get the super 'enriching' experiences that one would think available to all in a comprehensive school setting!

My experience is that they mix in PE and the other non-set subjects like art and drama - where the academic 'top dogs' learn a useful lesson: that some kids aren't the best at book learning but are blimmin good at the more practical or creative subjects. Of course birds of a feather flock together, but they all get a useful early lesson that people have different strengths, and they're all valid