Grammar Schools...... would you like to see a return?

I’m not sure why you think you wouldn’t have got a decent education without a grammar school system.

My three children all went to the local comprehensive in an area that didn’t have grammar schools and got excellent education that suited their different abilities and inclinations.

Without the 11+ and the grammar school system I would never have got a decent education. Now everyone is thrown into the melting pot with no opportunity for a better education, unless you are filthy rich of course. How many of the tory “elite” go to the local comp? Not many if any. Names down for Eton at birth. They don’t care what the rest of society do.

It is a myth that you can have grammar schools and comprehensive schools in the same area as grammar schools will cream off the most academically able, reducing the so-called comprehensives to secondary moderns.

How often do you here people campaigning to bring back secondary moderns?

That may well be true, muse, but does not take account of the majority of children who either don't live in an area where this is even an option, or who are young for their school year, or who 'come into their own' aged 12 or 13. They don't even get a chance in the lottery for a place.

A score in an 11+ exam is not a guarantee of a grammar school place. As far as I am aware there is not a definitive cut off point. It depends on how many places there are and what the demand is.

TES: Demand for grammars '50% more than places available'

In 2019, for every 15 children whose first choice of secondary school was a grammar, only around 10 places were on offer, according to research published by the Department for Education (DfE). So they are selected from results of 11+ exam. Regardless of their score, compared with other years, 5 will not get a place.

What happens in a year when it's a baby boom year and say 30 children want the 10 places? 20 don't get one, regardless of their score.

What happens in a low birth rate year when there are only 10 children who want the 10 places? All get a place.

This is such an unfair system.

Current figures: DfE research reveals shortfall of 11,959 places in grammar schools last year based on first preferences listed by parents.

We live in a selective area. Both my GC attend the local grammar school, where I went in the 60’s, and their father in the 80’s.

I was shocked at how many of their peers were tutored to get through the 11+, and was glad DS and DIL felt that wasn’t the way to go, if they passed it was down to them, not coached and then maybe struggle later.

Our local secondary modern is over-subscribed. Having said that, ‘passing’ the 11+ is still very highly prized round here.

The only way for education to be fair is for all children to be educated in the same schools, or at least in the same systems, with the same resources going to them all.

'Creaming off' brighter or better off children (not that it is always possible to tell who is bright at the age of 11) is setting up a system of disadvantage, as is allowing those who can afford it (and whose politics allow) to pay to buy their children out of the system altogether.

Couple that with the class system in this country, which equates wealth and privilege with merit, and it is clear why we have a government of people who can point to their degrees from elite universities as 'evidence of their intelligence', whilst others will never know what their potential may have been.

There's no doubt that grammar schools in the 50's and 60's contributed greatly to social mobility. I lived in Birmingham and pupils came from different areas of the city whereas now there are only the King Edward Foundation grammar schools and tbh they tend to draw kids from middle class homes or those with very high aspirations for their children's education and the ability to pay for coaching as without it a child, however bright, won't stand much of a chance of getting a high enough score. The comps draw from the local neighbourhood and sadly too often those in middle class areas perform well and those in more disadvantaged areas do less well. Obviously there are exceptions so I am talking generally but I think there probably is less social mobility.
I now live in a rural area, our local comprehensive draws from the local area and is over subscribed but although it does reflect the local population, parents do move to the area to secure a school place for their children and it serves them very well academically. Unsurprisingly, middle class kids still tend to do better. Whatever system we have some parents will use it to gain advantage for their children so perhaps the answer is to keep working to improve all schools?

I went to a grammar school. 4 of our 5 sons went to a grammar school. However I think a well streamed comprehensive with movement as appropriate between the streams is the best idea. No child should be made to feel a failure at 11.

I went to a girls Grammar School. In my day passing the 11+ meant Grammar School and failing it meant Secondary Modern. I think education is best served when streaming is applied and schools have similar ability students in their classes. It takes a good teacher faced with a class of 30 pupils, some very able, most average and some with needs to ensure every one of them gets something from the lesson.

Chardy I take your point about streaming and setting. Like I said I've never worked in education so I don't know the right thing to call it - but I agree with you.

Grandma70s yes there were different teachers. There were about 2,000 pupils at the school and they all needed teachers all the time so I'd never thought that the number of teachers was an issue. Class sizes were about 25-30, if I recall. If there were eight English streams, you needed 8 teachers.

Although in sixth year science classes there were about 6 - 8 of us and we got amazing teaching. For first year Chemistry I had a level of knowledge that was way above the other people at Uni - not because I'm particularly clever but because the teacher was getting us ready for Uni.

Doodle dog totally agree with you I went to secondary modern then it went comprehensive. No qualifications told to get out and get a job this was 1972. I returned to education and gained a degree and diplomas as a mature student.
My dc both went to the same school as me I encouraged them to do well with their natural abilities. They both have been successful my daughter went to university she is an artist. My son went to college and works for a bespoke design company. It’s best to encourage natural ability rather than focus on the best schooling.
I know and hear too many parents going to extremes moving house living beyond their means to get their children in certain schools. It’s too much pressure on young adults especially now when there are so little opportunities.

Alegrias1 - were there different teachers for the different streams? The brightest need very intellectual teachers, the lower streams need a different kind of teaching. This is what puzzles me about the idea that streaming solves everything. Can schools afford so many teachers?

A couple of points.
You can't have grammars and comprehensives - it's grammars and sec mods (no matter what they call them)
A lot of able pupils are at the bottom of a grammar and carry that 'failure' with them through adulthood. Likewise those who missed out a by a bit, also feel like failures. (That's an awful lot of able kids)
Most of pupils who get into grammars in 2020s are heavily coached (possibly for 2+ years)
Lastly 'streaming' is pupils being put into inflexible bands, they have all their lessons with the same people - pupils might be in a middle stream, very good at English, weak at French, with pupils who are weak at English, excellent atFrench. 'Setting' means a pupil can be top set for English, bottom set for French.

My children went to a comprehensive school which offered them an academic education as good as any grammar school.

By definition, grammar schools and comprehensives can't co-exist.

This is a really difficult question. There is no denying grammar school were (mostly) excellent for the 25% who went to them, but choosing who should go on the basis of one exam doesn’t seem very fair.

I went to a selective independent school, as do my grandchildren. My own children went a comprehensive because I was going through an idealistic phase and thought ‘levelling up’ was a good idea. (I didn’t think of levelling down.) They did very well, but they have had a lot of catching up to do since, particularly in cultural things.

One of the problems is that academic children need a different kind of teaching from the less academic. My father taught French and German in a grammar school, and was good at it. When he retired he did a bit of teaching at a comprehensive, and found it a difficult experience. He just wasn’t used to mixed ability teaching, or to children who weren’t reasonably clever.

As you may be able to tell, I am muddled about the whole question. I do know I am glad that my grandchildren aren’t at a comprehensive, at least not where they live in London. One conversation with a friend always sticks in my mind. She had come to my school on a scholarship from a very uneducated background. I was making the standard woolly liberal remarks criticising the grammar school system, and she said, quite sharply, “It’s all right for you with your background. What about me?” It is true that our school (which wasn’t actually a grammar school but had similar or higher standards) completely transformed her life.

Maths, not Match!

I'm in Scotland so I don't have direct experience of the Grammar School system and I've never worked in education. It seems to me that separating children at age 11 and basing their future life chances on an assessment done that early is not the right thing to do.

I went to a large secondary school where all subjects were streamed. If you were good at Match but not so good at English you went into the relevant stream for each one - you could be in Steam A for Maths and Stream G for English. So you got the level of teaching that was right for you and nobody got left out.

Its probably a utopian dream but I think all schools should be run that way

I don't care how much people say that a two tier system is 'equal but different', it won't be. Look at the number of posts on here in which people mention that they went to grammar school, even though it was 50+ years ago.

I agree that the system was/is good for those who went, which was the point of them - to separate people at the age of 11 into 'academic' and otherwise, and educated accordingly. It perpetuated the class system, was skewed in favour of boys, and caused splits in families when siblings were given different life chances. For those who didn't go, the system was less good.

There is already a huge amount of snobbery surrounding education in this country (again, as can be seen on GN every time the subject comes up). Even degrees are divided by which University awarded them, which subject they are and so on, and it is very clear that a lot of people sneer at those who are perceived to have 'lesser' qualifications, even though there is no universal standard to compare one against another - it comes down to snobbery and prejudice.

Doing this to 11 year olds whilst pretending that it is for their own good is cruel, and does not take account of the different rates at which children develop, or of the impossibility of making the entrance exam 'fair', and will doom those children to a lifetime of people looking down on their qualifications, however hard they have worked for them, and regardless of how well they could have performed if they had been given different chances.

For the record, the grammar/secondary modern system had been abolished in my area by the time I was 11, so I didn't take an 11+.

Yes, my daughter went to the Grammar School, passed her 11+ and went on to University.
My ex husband and I were not wealthy or affluent, and if there was not Grammar Schools because of her ability it would have mean't many hours overtime for both of us, no holiday, and possibly giving up the car. Due to the Grammar system I did not have to do that.

I think the system works and in our case we were very happy. This system does not work for all children, my son did not go, and did not want too.

It worked for us and also for alot of parents who could not afford a private education.

We know so much more now about brain development, that pigeonholing children at eleven years old ought to be seen as the ridiculous and shortsighted idea that it is.

We live in a grammar school area, where house prices are inflated for that reason. People move into the area because of the schools - there are some very good primaries, too.

I know for a fact that a good many children were (and probably still are) privately coached for the 11 plus, which obviously disadvantages those children whose parents can’t afford it or aren’t interested.

We were living abroad until dd1 was 10, so coming up to senior school age. Before we were back for good, she’d been entered for exams for a couple of independent junior schools, and in at least one such exam she was bemused by the verbal reasoning paper, having never seen such a thing before.
She failed that exam.

At the time, the 11 plus consisted solely of VR papers, and after she’d failed we were told by a friend of MiL, who ran a private prep school, that experience with VR was not needed - the tests were designed to ‘show the child’s potential’.

Naturally both we and MiL were distinctly hacked off at the implication that dd’s potential was lacking!

At the school she started in the September - just one term before the 11 plus - they practised VR every day. In the beginning dd’s scores were around 45%, but by the end of that term, after so much practice, they’d risen to 90% +.

She passed the 11 plus.
So it was clearly rubbish that practice was not needed.

I’m in two minds about grammar schools really. If some schools and some parents don’t provide the necessary practice, it’s hardly a level playing field.

I did hear not long ago that one of the local grammars (we have a boys’ and a girls’) had ditched VR for the 11 plus and was using old fashioned maths and English papers instead. This was because many new pupils who’d scored very highly in the VR papers, could barely write a coherent sentence, so they were having to provide remedial English lessons.

Peasblossom I think it’s unlikely our granddaughter will attend the grammar school, our daughter and SIL are unlikely to be living in the area when it comes to making that choice.

We used to live in an area with a reputable grammar school but it was near impossible to get in, parents paid for tuition from the age of about 8 and there were many grandparents who gave their addresses to guarantee their grandchildren the opportunity.

One of our children attended the VI form and did very well much to the chagrin of some of our neighbours?.

henetha

The Grammar School which I went to in Torquay in the 1940/1950's is still there, thankfully. And long may it remain.
I firmly believe in the possibility of a different school for some pupils. We are not all the same.

But we should all be offered equal opportunity.