Bottom set in English

[Awcw1234]

Just looking for some advice.

My daughter has just started Y8. She is dyslexic but just about managed to meet expectations in her SATs (well almost… scaled score of 99) with the support of a private dyslexia tutor. In Y7, English wasn’t set but in Y8 there are 4 x set ones, 5 x set twos and 4 x set threes (large school).

My daughter has been put in one of the set 3 classes. I have been in touch with the Head of English as I was unsure as to why she has been placed in this set. She is exceptionally well behaved (not a single bad lesson score in Y7) and she has scored average in all her assessment, hit her targets and nothing has been raised to me as a concern.

Naturally, I have concerns about set 3 such as behavioural issues and her not reaching her full potential due to the content being taught. I have however been reassured that all pupils follow the same curriculum and she will be challenged.

The Head of English feels like set 3 is the correct class for my daughter. She will be able to get more support as there are only 16 children in the class. Apparently she has been placed in a class with calm children who although are chatty at times, are keen to do well.

She has suggested giving it a two week trial to see how she gets on. She is happy to move up her to set 2 but unfortunately due to timetable clashes, the only class she can be moved to has 28 children with lots of children with challenging behaviour.

My concern is the that by staying in the bottom sets, she will struggle to get out of them and she won’t be pushed to meet her full potential (I’m not expecting miracles but I would like her to score at least a 4!).

What would you do? 😟

What a nasty comment! I’m just being a Mum wanting the best for my child whether that be in the bottom set, middle set or top set. I just want her in the set that is best for her.
For the record, I wasn’t in any top sets at all 🙄

Is there an LSA in your dd's class?
I think being in a class of 16 will be more beneficial for her than struggling in a class on 28 where teacher support is spread more thinly.

It's nonsense that bottom sets are set up to fail. You can and do get learners who improve and move up sets.

Yes, because it depends why they need a nurture group. Autistic kids may need a smaller class size but be high achieving. You can’t just dismiss a low set as ‘a bit thick and low achieving’. Sometimes the low set is where the best support is for different needs.

@cloudbabies please don't. A lot of comments are from people with very little experience of schools.

Yes. I’ve taught numerous children over the years in bottom sets who achieve pass grades.

The school’s setting is interesting as they’ve only divided into three ability sets and chosen to have multiple bands of these rather than fewer bands with more sets (e.g. two bands of sets 1-5, just as an example). This is largely good in my opinion as they’re likely deliberately keeping the groupings quite broad brush and not separating by ability too much at this early stage (although those with complex needs may struggle).

This approach probably does make it true that they did the same work as Set 2. The level of challenge drawn out through work may be a different matter and depend on the teacher and the children.

So much comes down to the teacher - get a good teacher in Set 3 and a weaker one in Set 2 and they may actually get more challenge in Set 3. It totally depends on the teacher and, to an extent, the students.

Keep a close eye on it, keep talking to her about what she’s learning and keep providing the extra support for as long as you can and it seems beneficial.

My experience?

A parent whose experience is not unique and which is supported by the large amount of publicly available research and reports. I have referenced some of them above. My experience is with an adversarial, bureaucratic and slow system that so many of the reports reference. So forgive me if I don’t mince my words about a system which consumed a considerable amount of my time and energy before I saw the light and secured targeted external help.

The outward face of the system appears empathetic, but ultimately it is often bureaucratic and impotent. Good intentions and sympathetic words very often do not translate into confidence or access to decent post 16 and/or post 18 options.

Sure a child can resit, but have you actually looked at the pass rates for Maths and English resits. 20-30% last time I looked.

If you believe the evidence points to a different conclusion, I would be happy to see your sources.

The teacher and the behaviour of the class that matter more than the set.

Never feel shame for being in a lower set. I think of the education system as an obstacle that many children especially those whose brains work a little differently have to overcome to get to the good stuff.

Her dyslexia tutor (who works in both secondary and primary schools) has unfortunately put doubts in my head as she said they are pretty much set up to fail in the bottom sets

Think about it logically. Why would a school “set up” any student “to fail” when their achievement rates go into the league tables and Ofsted results? That would be very silly of them, wouldn’t it?

Frankly, I’d be looking for a less daft tutor.

The bigger picture is surely that every child is given the opportunity to reach their potential, whether that is a 4 with pride or a 6. Agree on the confidence being important, along with resilience and a worth ethic.

She can get a grade 4 pass at college.
If you look at the stats, the OP’s DD’s best chance of a grade 4 is whilst she is still at school. Post 16 GCSE Maths and English resit stats are poor.

I'm an English Teacher and I've just had a pupil in my set 3 achieve a grade 8 in both Lang and Lit at GCSE. Remember English is not tiered, every pupil sits the same paper regardless of set, so technically they all have the same chances to some degree. I think a smaller class will be beneficial for her and I would put your trust in the Head of English - she will have spent a long time sorting the sets and chosing what she believes is the right class for each pupil given the evidence she has in front of her. I also think the tutor is unprofessional for making comments and putting doubts in your mind. She doesn't know how the department operates, why they make those choices or what the lessons are like - she doesn't work there.

This is very true, particularly when sets are broad-brush top/middle/ bottom. The tutor sounds a bit dim and unlikely to have much experience with KS4.

Apart from the fairly obvious that it's also in the school's interest to get a child that was so close to the expected standard that it was down to getting 24 marks instead of 25 to a 5 (and seeing as one mark more would have had a 5 at GCSE as the minimum standard?

The process of groupings - and, as I said, they are not necessarily grouped in high/mid/low, it is often high/others/others or all/all/need TA support for some children/finds a large class difficult or allocating a dyslexia specialist - is something that takes extended planning.

The sort of things that are taken into account include assessment data from Y7, behaviour, KS2 data, CAT4 data, SEND, physical access, the number of TAs available, external tutoring or internal intervention support and their availability, how the timetable bands, blocks and clusters are set and how this cascades to the individual classes.

The En block will usually determine the groupings for similar subjects such as Drama, History & RE, sometimes MFL (but not always when there are two languages on offer), the Ma block at KS3 determines Science, IT & often Geography, then there are other blocks from which the PSHE, PE, Art, Food, Music and other classes are derived from.

You also have to take into account working patterns of staff, classroom maximum sizes, access requirements, equipment, physical location (to avoid having 340 of 1600 kids having to sprint from one end of the site to the other and up and down 5 flights of stairs during lesson changeovers whilst staff have to ping pong across the site in the opposite direction), particular specialisms and every pastoral requirement - there could be students who must not be in classes together, ones that need additional EAL support who are going to be helped more by being in a class with an EAL specialist to work with them (or will have a separate reallocation), part time/dual registered students who need to be able to access more than just English and Maths because they do that at their Hospital School, ensuring that what's offered is financially viable and doesn't mean you need to hire 3 new specialists on the first day of term, etc.

And then you repeat this process for the other 4 years (including sorting the options on the basis of preferences, reserves, ability, staffing, kids not responding, parents putting down Music and Dance and Dance as the reserve when you can't offer both as they are in the same band, parents disagreeing with their child's choice, etc) and two for 6th form. And then create the allocation exports, populate the fields and import them into the MIS (whilst also building the Pastoral Structure and determining whether a straight promotion into the next year is appropriate with a small number of exceptions or manually populating the structure for each of 1600 students).

Chuck in the MIS upgrades, all the other tasks required and it's a massive, massive task made harder by conspiracy theories and people misinterpreting standardised naming conventions and carefully considered decisions made with the interests of the child and their education foremost as 'My child is in the bottom set, they've already been written off/schools are bad'.

I think sounds positive. The smaller class size will mean your DD can get a bit more support if she needs it and if the class is well behaved they could all make good progress. As long as she also has a tutor at home each week who can ensure she is covering the whole curriculum she should be fine.

As someone who wasn’t even placed in the bottom set, I think you should trust the school. I only have nothing but respect and gratitude to my “special” teacher who was an anomaly in my 1989s state education. I was severely dyslexic, but according to my teachers just lazy. I’m glad I had this amazing teacher until the end of year 9 as she gave me a confidence every other teacher was determined to knock out of me. I eventually moved up but I was far more confident and capable by then.

i do understand that teachers can overly hold pupils back, we’ve found this with my DDs, however, I’d still give it time. I think year 8 is a perfect year to se how she goes under the schools guidance, if you think at the end of it she’s been held back you can push for changes in year 9 as this is the results they will work with for GCSEs.

@NorthXNorthWest so

you “don’t trust the professionals” and
you think the teacher “won’t be honest” with the Op.

I take it you’re not happy with the school your child is at?

The HofD will very very much want each child to achieve the highest possible grade they are capable of. Obviously. If nothing else… for the school’s stats!!

So give it, well more than a day. You actually started this thread before your daughter have even had one English class! And it turns out… she bloomin enjoyed it!

@cloudbabies there is a lot of ignorance in this thread. Not helped by the words ‘bottom set’. I hope you don’t take it to heart.

How concerned would you be if she'd been put in set 10 of 14?

Honestly, Id give the trial a go. It sounds like there are spaces in a higher set - but equally id take a class of 16 calm kids over 28 disruptive kids anyday!

Give it to half term and reassess then. She’s got a long way to go yet to GCSE years.
class of 16 sounds like a dream tbh especially vs 28.

imo she is more likely to achieve in the 3rd set of 16 than the rougher 2nd set of 28.

has your daughter done a touch typing course? does she listen to audio books? can she talk about books and text and analyse them? if not, get her touch typing. dyslexic kids can learnt to type with 60+ wpm, audio books help access the depth of text.

As a parent with one DC switching sets from year to year in English, Maths & Science I wouldn't worry.

Despite the switching (we had bottom set a few times) , my DC did well and went on to do A- Level, went to university and has now started a fantastic opportunities graduate job.

Just make sure your DC stays motivated and works hard in order to move up a set by merit not parent demand. The only thing I can advice is to ensure, that when it comes to stating GCSE, your DD is in a position to do the papers that ensure a pass / success. We, for example pushed for triple Science but felt foundation Maths was more suited for our DD.

Have I looked at the results? I'm the director of Sixth form. Your experience is just that, 'your' experience, not fact.

Lets bring selective as well as binary to the party on this thread.

Let’s also ignore the elephant in the room: the child is in Year 8, not Year 12 or 13. Good for you, but being a Director of Sixth Form doesn’t somehow trump the evidence or make you the leading authority on a child’s experience of dyslexia in secondary education. Your job does not invalidate the wide body of publicly available evidence, nor does it turn pervasive, systemic issues, what have been documented repeatedly over many years, into neatly resolved problems that we can now ignore, just because you work/ have a leadership role in a sixth form. I have already acknowledged that some teachers are brilliant, some are middling and some are poor. It's the child that matters.

Let’s also ignore what I actually wrote
I am a parent whose experience is not unique and is supported by a substantial body of publicly available research, reviews and reports on dyslexia, SEND provision and educational outcomes.

Do you think those publicly available reports, produced over a considerable period of time, were commissioned by me or by bad actors with an axe to grind?

My personal experience is anecdotal, but it is neither unique nor specific to dyslexia. That's the point you seem so determined to avoid addressing whilst dismissing my "experience". When the same issues are reported by so many other parents and professionals and are also identified in independent research and national reports, dismissing them as merely my personal experience really doesn’t wash.

The OP asked what people would do. That is what I answered, and I explained why base do my experience and some of the wide body of publicly available information. The OP is free to read the reports and make their own mind up about what they should do.

Your response is exactly why I think respect for “expertise” has to be considered on a case by case basis. You clearly think your job title makes your opinion more credible than the evidence available. It doesn’t. Many children with dyslexia, other SpLD's or even NT never make it as far as sixth form. That's the real issue.

The system is the system, its the substance of individual teachers that has made the greatest difference.

It sounds like she enjoyed the class and a calm class of 16 where she feels confident to ask questions will give her a much better chance of success than a boisterous class of 28 where she doesn’t feel comfortable sticking her hand up. If there are only 3 levels of set anyway they are going to be fairly broad brush in terms of ability.
English isn’t tiered. They all have to cover the same material. If it was Maths, then it’s different matter certainly further up the school where the sets don’t cover the same material. I would give it to the first report/data drop and see how it goes unless your DD is unhappy in the meantime.