extension maths- would this be over-precious?

[cory]

Speaking as one who spends a considerable amount of work time sitting on the heads of other MNers showing any signs of precious parenting, may I ask your kind indulgence in performing the same task for me if necessary? Or at least to tweak my response so it does not appear over-precious.

Dd is very much enjoying Yr 7; it's just the maths she's a bit unhappy about. To give a bit of background, she missed
c. 50 % of maths tuition in Yr 5 due to junior school's failure to provide disabled access, but then worked tremendously hard in Yr 6 to catch up and keep her place in top set. She managed it, and she had a wonderfully stimulating teacher and really got to enjoy the subject.

She was very ill during SATS week and did not do as well as predicted (5 c instead of b or a- but she was doing the exam in bed, unable to use her hands or lift her head from the pillow). We didn't have a problem with this result, nor did she; we were proud that she had managed it at all.

The problem is that 5 C was clearly not enough to put her in top set in the new school, so she is in the second from the top. Again, this wouldn't in itself be a problem; I don't care particularly about these matters. The problem is the level in this set.

She is not enjoying it because the work is far too easy. She was really loving it in Yr 6 where they were doing Yr 9 work and forced to think all the time. Now she finishes the half hour tests in 10 minutes, gets full marks and has nothing to do for the rest of the time. I have looked at her work and agree that the level is very babyish compared to last year. (have also checked- in my suspicious way!- that she is actually getting the marks she says she is)

I said to her, in my casual manner: 'ah well, if you're doing that well, they'll move you up, what are you fussing about?'. But she explained that the teacher has really low expectations of this group and that several of her friends are also getting full marks- and then there is a group that are really struggling; the teacher seems to think they are all at this level.

The school is probably the best one around, we are very happy with it, so don't want to blow anything out of proportion. Dd is also a sensible character who is not going to go off the rails, stop working and get pregnant at 14 just because she is occasionally bored. So not a big problem, it just seems a bit of a shame that she put in all that work and even started getting interested, and now it all seems a bit wasted to her.

The first natural point of contact is with the Mentor's day in November. (parents evening not until the end of the year)

What would you do, folks? (I'm asking those of you who are secondary teachers in particular).

Would you take this opportunity to meet the maths teacher and ask- well, for what? How can I put it across tactfully that she is not getting stretched?

I obviously can't tell the school how to organise their sets. Would it be OTT to ask if dd may have some extension work? Or if she might at least carry on working in her book when she has finished her task (dd seems to think this would constitute a major infringement of school rules and that I am totally mad to suggest it). I'd be happy to buy more books etc. but would like to speak to the teacher first.

Another thought, maybe dd should take the intitiative? She can't speak to the teacher before or after class as she (dd) is constrained by her disability (gets there lateish and has to leave very early to catch disabled taxi). Could she pass the teacher a note asking for a word? Dd again seems worried that teacher will think her cheeky and rude.

If you were the teacher, how would you like me to approach this in a positive manner?

[yellowvan]

I think you sound very sensitive and supportive and not precious at alll. I think the note passing sounds good, the teacher might well be able to phone you if gettingg to a meeting is hard, and outlining the circumstances of dds SATs would be a good place to start (pos all this info was sent up with the y6 Teacher assessments, but what with the sats muck up, maybe not (you could say)). I don't think it's unreasonable that you should want dd to have appropriate work, and don't think a quiet word clarifying how she carried out her sats, said in the spirit of working as a team with the school, could be construed as anything but supportive.

[magentadreamer]

I don't think it's at all precious of you to want your DD to be stretched abit lot. I personally would ring the school and see if you can speak to her teacher about your concerns. I know at my DD's school they are tested every half term and sets are reshuffled according to the letter we got sent home. You don't think that she was put in set 2 due to access problems do you?

[PrincessPeaHead]

I'm not a teacher, but it strikes me that if you have the exercise books she used last year, and can bring them in to show the level of work she was happily achieving, it is going to make it much more obvious to everyone that she is in the wrong set.

Perhaps if you bring in last years work, this years work, and ask if perhaps you could have a look at the work that this years top set is doing... it is very hard to argue with written evidence like this.

Sounds like it would be a shame not to get her moved up. You can dress it up a bit by saying "I'm sure you weren't aware of how ill she was when she took the SATs... I'm sure based on those marks this is the obvious set for her... but actually if you look at this you'll see that she has covered all of this before..." etc. No blame attributed...!

[MaureenMLove]

Can you put a note in her planner expressing that you would like to speak to the maths teacher? TBH, your OP is so well thought out and phrased, I'd just work from that!

[ecoworrier]

Are you sure the school won't act anyway? At our secondary school, all departments review their setting at least once a term (old-style terms), or sometimes once a new-style term, i.e. every 6 or 7 weeks. They have regular reviews where they pick out pupils who are under- or over-achieving - surely that would be picked up?

Or it may be that set 2 isn't actually that much different to set 1?

Has she done CAT tests yet? They are often used to make sure pupils are achieving at around or above their targeted level. If she is as hot at maths as seems the case, I would have thought it would be picked up in CATs or termly class tests or something.

If you do speak to someone, it sounds like you would approach it very sensibly anyway, so I wouldn't worry about being thought pushy! I would also go for the note in the planner, I'm sure the maths teacher would be happy to ring you.

[roisin]

Tbh I would wait a while and see how things pan out. Most secondaries are highly suspicious of SATs results anyway and prefer to reconsider all setting arrangements once they have done all their assessments.

[cory]

thanks ladies, taking it all on board

[Remotew]

Have they set levels yet? CATS result will show up her potential in maths with the quantative battery.

We had this. DD was in second set for maths in year 7, kept coming top in the many tests they did. They moved her up to top set part way through year 8 if I remember correctly.

I was just about to mention it at parents evening when the teacher said that she was going into top set. She also got level 5 in year 6, didn't ask about the sub level.

They moved her up in English too. I would wait a bit longer and see. Don't leave it too long though as we were told that the work was the same but she needed to catch up a bit.

[cory]

I think I will wait a little bit. No point in rushing things.

She was taken ill halfway through the CATS test as well and had to be sent home (not exam nerves afaik, purely coincidental). The thing is, she is still bright, still needs to do difficult work, but her medical condition means there are gaps in the testing iyswim (though she is meticulous about catching up on the actual work so I don't think there are gaps in her knowledge). My worry is that she will eventually settle for a 'oh well, I'm sick so much so I can't expect anything else' iyswim.

[Blandmum]

Something that I would ask you is
'Will your dd get more, in terms of confidence, self esteem, and time being at the top of set 2, compared to being at the bottom of set 1?'

and this is an honest question not a snide jab.

Some children want the stimulation of the 'chase'. Some will be downhearted if they are not top of the tree.

You know her best. See how things go, and have a word at the next meeting that is timetabled

[SqueakyPop]

I would meet with the maths teacher or form tutor to share your concerns and also to understand the situation from their side.

The problem with groups is that there have to be chldren who just miss out on the higher group. They have to have a cut-off somewhere, and the obvious place at the start of Y7 is to use the Sats tests, as that is the one thing that the majority of children would have done. Everyone knows that they depend on performance on the a particular day, and that some children will have off-days. They still have to be fair to all the other students who did do well.

It can be a blunt instrument, but will place most of the students in the right sets. The school should be doing baseline assessments about now, so will have fresh data to go on. They should be willing to tweak sets based on this (hopefully the timetable is such that multiple maths sets happen at the same time and movement is easy).

I would suggest letting the school work through set adjustments at its own pace. They do not want your daughter to be in the wrong set for her - they want to place her where she will flourish. They should be able to give differentiated work within set.

Definitely make an appt to see the key teachers, because if nothing else it will make your daughter known to them. If they are aware that DD is willing to do extra work on her own, they will probably be very happy to supply appropriate worksheets.

[cory]

Good question MB and I have considered this. Since she worked her way up more or less on her own after being left without tuition in Yr 5, I imagine that she could carry on working her way up from the bottom of top set if she got put there.

Atm what she says is that 'there seems no point when I understand every problem the moment the teacher writes it on the board- there is nothing left for her to explain'.

The problem seems to be that there is such a wide gap in the level of teaching between the top and second sets. This means that those students who were just below the line end up working way below their level of competence. So in this sense being top of the second set is no big deal; it doesn't make her feel good about herself; it just makes her uncomfortable because she is wasting the best part of every lesson staring into space and waiting for permission to get on with the next question.

SO what do you reckon, MB and Squeaky? An appointment, should that be at the Mentor's day in November or before? Don't want to seem pushy.

[Remotew]

Hi Cory just wanted to add that MB's point is valid and DD was worried that she would go from top of second to bottom of top. She believed this until they read out the dreaded SATS results and she was middle in the group, despite not having the top teaching IFYSIM, so that helped. She is more confident now.

Sounds like your DD has done so well against the odds that I'm sure she will keep up with top set if/when they move her up.

[SqueakyPop]

I would do it before, because it sounds like the sets may be diverging, so you don't want the gap to get too big for her to easily make the move later.

[BodenGroupie]

Cory, had a similar situation in last year with dd2 in Y7 (school lost SATS results and wouldn't believe me ). Really regret not acting sooner as she slipped back a lot cos of lack of stimulation - you don't sound pushy at all, just rightly concerned!

[cory]

Thanks a lot everybody. It's a fine line, isn't it?

[SqueakyPop]

What are you thinking of doing, cory?

[cory]

Hard to do anything right atm: dd tells me that the teacher has been absent for the last few lessons "organising something" and that they have been doing word searches to fill in the time .

I think our first port of call will be for dd to contact a friend who is in top set and ask to copy some of her stuff so she can get started on that. Then when teacher is back in class, I may put a note in the planner.

If only I knew for sure when this mentor day is. Dd thinks it may be in October- in which case hardly worth anticipating- but in a letter we had from the school earlier it said November- which is a long way off.

[SqueakyPop]

I'm a Y7 form tutor and I have already met with parents this year to discuss a similar situation. I really didn't mind doing it at all, and it wasn't acrimonious in any way. I didn't feel that my time was imposed on, and I hope the parents didn't think that either.

It is really important that you feel that you are being treated fairly and as individuals.

I explained how our setting worked - that we put them in sets according to their performance in our entrance examination (less than half of our pupils do sats, but the use of a single test is the same type of blunt instrument) - and that we would be reviewing them frequently as we do more testing.

[TheProvincialLady]

Word searches to fill time is very bad and you would be within your rights to complain. There is a syllabus to work through and any teacher should ensure that plans are available to supply teachers etc. This could be your way into a discussion about the level your DD is working at, especially if she doing bloody wordsearches instead of maths.

[SqueakyPop]

Wordsearches in maths classes???

There are loads of good things they could do in the absence of their regular teacher - puzzles, challenges, practice problems.

[cory]

Yes I know, I really was not impressed. Perhaps you are right, this should be the thing that spurs me into action. Wonder if there is a problem with this particular teacher: dd's friend who is in top set is finding the work really hard, so don't think it's the school in general.

[cory]

It is such a contrast to all the other subjects - history, geography etc- where they have really waded in and are making them work.

Am also a bit worried that dd will end up with softer options because of her chronic health problems, 'poor little thing, mustn't stress her out or overload her'. Her record does look worse than it should because she has been absent at a lot of testing occasions- but that doesn't actually mean that she can't do difficult stuff when she's well, or that I don't want her to work extra to make up for what she misses. Since I know that her condition is life-long, I don't want her to be getting into that kind of habit iyswim.