Is it true that tutored children struggle afterwards?

[mystery]

Eccentric, its hounds like your comprehensive is not comprehensive. Is there another in your area which does not have the top end completely missing? And yes, try the option of getting in to year 8 or, indeed, appealing for year 7 if you have not already done so.

[Amber]

She has been identified as most able because of extremely high CAT scores and has been put on a permanent most able register for her entire school life. She has also been identified individually in most subject.

What is this? I have never heard of this system before - 'permanent most able register for her entire school life'? How can this work? I wonder if this labelling is actually working against your daughter - whether some of the name-calling is because she has been told of this illustrious title and that combined with the differentiated work, which as you say makes her stand out, is having the effect of setting her apart from the others? Sorry if that sounds cruel but I have honestly never come across a school labelling a child in this way. I was jolly glad when the 'Gifted and Talented' register was quietly dropped at my children's primary school after seeing the way it affected some of those placed on it, and indeed their parents, who couldn't resist ensuring that everyone knew of their offspring's manifold talents. (Forgive me if I have misunderstood and she doesn't know of this, and neither do her friends or their parents, in which case disregard the above). Either way, I don't think it is hugely helpful for a school to label a child like this and then expect her to deal with the consequences of feeling herself to be much brighter than everyone else. She is only 11 and as you have said, emotionally not very mature - it is a big label and also a hard one to live up to - children like this often end up underachieving because of the pressure of trying to live up to the title. She needs to be concentrating on what she has in common with the other children and not why she is different if she wants to try and make some friends - she clearly has good social skills if she was popular at primary school. Maybe the school could help with this?

When she took the 11 plus she found the whole experience traumatic. She was terrified at being dropped off at a huge hall with hundreds of other kids she don't know. She is summer born so was not very emotionally mature then.

I think many children find it traumatic because it is a terrible, inhuman process and yes the summer-born ones are younger. Not sure the winter ones like it any better, mind. Two of mine took the 11+; a winter and a summer one, and neither of them was in my view emotionally ready for the type of pressure surrounding the thing.

I say tutoring is OK as long as it is not excessive and people don't over tutor preventing children like my DD who do deserve a place from getting in.

There are many, many children who don't even get the opportunity to sit the 11 plus, who may be almost as bright as or (dare I say it?) even brighter than your daughter. While we insist on segregating children in this way there will always be those who fail to make the cut who 'should have' passed, and, possibly, those who are 'over-tutored' and get in when they maybe are 'less bright' than others.

This is why Catseye is right, I'm afraid:

The sooner Grammars are abolished the better , so people like myself who live in Grammars areas can make real choices, commensurate with our own moral compass and not be forced to wrestle with our principles.

I wish you and your daughter luck, and I hope she manages to gain a place at a school you consider more suitable soon. In the meantime, my best (and well-meaning) advice would be to play down the 'most able' thing, which probably isn't helping her socially, and try and give her really enjoyable and stimulating experiences outside school.

[tiffinboys]

@eccentric:

Do what you feel is right for your Dd.

and as pointed out by other posters, try to give her enjoyable and stimulating experiences outside school, as well. Your DD doesn't need to be in the colony of the Queen Bees and neither herself to become a Queen Bee.
Subtly tell her to ignore bad comments and those who don't want to be her friend, without being bad to them.

[loobylou]

when I say this, I mean a comprehensive with approx 1/3 low achievers 1/3 middle achievers and 1/3 high achievers(God I hate those terms as if a 10yr can be labeled as a low achiever at that ridiculously young age) you could even have a Grammar Stream if it makes you better.

But most "proper" comprehansives do not stream at all and many do not set for anything other than maths. Our local comprehensives are good and are fairly broad in that most people do not sit for the selective schools, including many of the brightest children, because their parents feel that the local schools are good. But there is no setting except for maths. I have no doubt that, had dd gone there, she would be achieving well. But she would not be having the experience she has now which is being pushed academically far beyond what is achievable in even the best mixed ability class. (And I don't mean "pushed" in a bad way - just learning fast and being hugely excited about that learning). Setting would deal with that issue (my dh teaches children who will get straight A*s in the same class as children who can barely write their name - and I'm not exaggerating. I consider him to be a brilliant teacher but he cannot push the top-of-the -class children as far as they could be if there were 30 of them rather than 2) but many comprehensives consider that to be against the spirit of the comprehensive system....

[ToadMum]

Providing for pupils according to their needs is not against the spirit of the comprehensive system but many authorities decided that 'comprehensive' and 'mixed ability' were synonymous. Mercifully, the local comprehensive school which DD found herself given as a 'non-ranked allocation' didn't and she found herself in classes for everything with children of similar ability. And, on the whole, behaviour, for that matter - not that the two necessarily go together.


As an aside, no doubt someone will tell me that my mum must have been the worst teacher going, but she hated mixed ability classes with a passion, regarding them as a good way of selling nearly everyone short. In the latter part of her career, her main role was as a teacher of 'remedial English'. I think her pupils quite liked having someone specifically there for them, in as much as some of them would rather not have been there at all.

[mystery]

It is incredibly hard teaching full spectrum mixed ability at secondary level and moving everyone forwards. Also, iT is pretty hard to be a teacher who is good with all sets.

Some subjects, of course, lend themselves to it better than others.

Think chikdren who can barely read or write or add up in the same class as others who are approaching gcse standard. Not easy.

[penguin]

Not easy at all. And that is what our comprehensive system is. Throw in poor behaviour and poor manners and it is a very wearying struggle. I find it really surprising when people say abolish the grammars so that we can satisfy our moral setting. Chicken and egg I think. Comprehensives need to be brought up to scratch first. Who would move their child from a grammar to comprehensive where maybe 10 mins of the planned maths lesson/activities can be taught because of the various dramas going on in the classroom?

[Amber]

We don't actually have any true comprehensive schools in this country any more, and their introduction is not on the agenda for any political party. A comprehensive school is not an alternative to grammar in an area with grammars. It isn't a free school and it isn't an academy. It isn't somewhere you 'choose' to send your child, because in a truly comprehensive system everyone's child would go there.

A comprehensive does not have to teach everyone in mixed ability classes (though the best-performing education systems -if you believe the OECD - do tend to do this) but it does have to offer the same opportunities to all to succeed and achieve.

As for the 'bad behaviour and manners' thing - sorry, this is nonsense. Anyone who thinks that manners are better in grammar schools, just because they are grammar schools, is deluded, I'm sorry - why do you think this? Are grammar school parents de facto better mannered than anyone else? Of course not - they display the full range of human behaviour like anyone else. If anything they are probably a bit pushier than average! And there is poor behaviour in all schools, grammar included - some of the most shocking things I have heard involve grammar pupils and some of the sweetest children I've taught were in a school in special measures. Demonising 'comprehensives' as little better than ghettos while setting grammar schools up as havens of good manners and fine dining is inaccurate, dangerous and polarises debate in a way which isn't helpful to either 'side', as well as being disingenuous to all the lovely children who don't go to grammar school, and unnecessarily generous to the all the foul-mouthed little horrors who do. Just schools, just kids - being able to pass a test at ten doesn't turn you into a candidate for beatification.

Sorry - off topic. IMHO most children who get into selective schools and are prepared to do the work won't struggle. Whether or not they struggle has to do with a whole heap of other factors around motivation, home life and aptitude, and some of that can also explain whether or not a family chooses to tutor a child heavily.

[Yamin151]

Couldn't I couldn't agree more Amber. One of the reasons for not choosing the GS one of my boys qualified for was what we perceived to be a lack of manners (our issue, I'm not saying it was true across all pupils, far from it) but nevertheless it came across as a school with a lot of mouthy kids who are very bright sparks, a scary combination in my opinion!

[Rob Clark]

I agree with Amber too. I have (had) one DC at a GS and one at an Upper School, nearly finished now. There are a few differences between the schools that I have noted over the years, mostly to do with money and resources, but behaviour and manners certainly aren't one of them!

I appreciate that this is only one person's anecdote, not data, but from my sample of the DC's friends, the idea that all the well-behaved children are in GSs and all the badly behaved ones are elsewhere is pernicious nonsense.