So what do you think about ability grouping in public schools?

[wildeyed]

I think it is a good idea, and if it is executed properly, it seems to benefit students across the spectrum. But I was at gymnastics the other day talking to a mom who forced her child's teacher to do away with in-class ability groupings because she was mad that her child wasn't in the highest group. She seemed to think her child's self-esteem was damaged by this. My kid is always in the highest ability grouping in school, so I specifically look for out of school activities where she will struggle and occasionally fail, on the grounds that struggle and occasional failure are necessary for good character development. I don't think I would mind if she was in a slower track at school, provided she was challenged by the curriculum and had the ability to work into a higher track if she applied herself.

This other woman's child is a much more gifted athlete than my child, yet I don't force her daughter to work at my daughter's slower athletic pace. Why should my kid be forced to work slowly to accommodate hers in an academic setting? I try to teach the idea that some people are better AT doing certain things, but never better THAN another person.

Can I get some other perspectives on this? Maybe there is something I am missing.

Here is an interesting article on ability grouping if anyone is interested.

Montgomery School's New Take On Ability Grouping Yields Results

By Daniel de Vise
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, November 4, 2007; A01

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/03/AR2007110301167_3.html?sid=ST2007110301386

In a notebook on her desk at Rock View Elementary School, Principal Patsy
Roberson keeps tabs on every student: red for those who have failed to
attain proficiency on Maryland's statewide exam, an asterisk for students
learning English and squares for black or Hispanic children whose scores
place them "in the gap."

Roberson and the Rock View faculty are having remarkable success lifting
children out of that gap, the achievement gap that separates poor and
minority children from other students and represents one of public
education's most intractable problems.

They have done it with an unusual approach. The Kensington school's 497
students are grouped into classrooms according to reading and math ability
for more than half of the instructional day.

[tigereye]

1. I seem to remember having a reading class that involved move at your

own pace (granted this was in the 70s) - and that was good for me, since I tended to be "above" the pack in reading since I was a young kid. I also was in accelerated classes in math and reading in junior high/high school and this worked for me as well. But I always wondered if basing those classes on test scores given once was really fair to all the kids in the school. I'm sure many kids could have benefitted from advanced classes and there was almost an elitist cast to that kind of class grouping. :shrug:

That being said, kids do learn at their own level and pace, and it also seems unfair to make kids who have achieved mastery of whatever material stop and repeat the same concepts simply because others have not mastered it. That's why peer learning makes a lot of sense to me (Montessori-ish perhaps) so that kids who have mastered material can benefit their peers and improve their mastery by teaching or helping those who have not. It probably helps them to understand concepts better and also teaches some compassion.

I don't know - it's a pretty complex issue. The public school disctrict where I live was court-created to decrease racial disparity and lack of resources, and they simply did away with accelerated classes, from what I was told. I have also read that even kids who may not look on paper/testing like they are able to understand more complex concepts or algebra say, or other areas, can learn that material when it it taught well - I forget the name of the math professor who wrote a book about that....

good question - thanks for making me think...

[wildeyed]

2. I was grouped into remedial classes due to undiagnosed LD's,

but I don't believe that the class groupings that were inherently bad. The problem was poor identification practices and lack of knowledge about LD.

What I have been learning recently is that not only is it unfair to kids who have already mastered material to be forced to repeat it, it can be very damaging to them if it goes on long enough. The children become bored and frustrated and then either act up or tune out to the learning process. It seems to be hardest on the high achieving/low income students. This article doesn't specifically say that ability grouping would fix the problem, but it does indicate that there is one, and that, properly implemented, ability grouping is not elitist, at least in the sense that it only benefits high income students.

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1661701,00.html

First, the good news: it turns out, millions of kids from low-income families are acing standardized tests. According to the first nationwide analysis of high-achieving students based on income, more than 1 million K-12 students who qualify for free or reduced-price lunches rank in the top quartile. Expand the category to include children whose families make less than the median U.S. income, and the total rises to 3.4 million--more than the entire population of Iowa. Now the bad news: nearly half of lower-income students in the top tier in reading fall out of it by fifth grade. As economically disadvantaged brainiacs get older, 25% of them drop ranks in math in high school, and 41% don't finish college. "We're losing them at every stage in education," says Joshua Wyner, executive vice president of the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation, which wrote the report with public-policy development firm Civic Enterprises.

This is an interesting article about ability grouping in the public schools. The system this school is using appears to benefit both the high achievers *and* the kids who are struggling.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/03/AR2007110301167.html?sid=ST2007110301386

In a notebook on her desk at Rock View Elementary School, Principal Patsy Roberson keeps tabs on every student: red for those who have failed to attain proficiency on Maryland's statewide exam, an asterisk for students learning English and squares for black or Hispanic children whose scores place them "in the gap."

Roberson and the Rock View faculty are having remarkable success lifting children out of that gap, the achievement gap that separates poor and minority children from other students and represents one of public education's most intractable problems.

They have done it with an unusual approach. The Kensington school's 497 students are grouped into classrooms according to reading and math ability for more than half of the instructional day.

[Ms. Toad]

3. At lower levels - bad idea

For lower levels (through early middle school) – bad idea.

Once placed in a group, it is too hard to move from one group to another as abilities mature.

Our school system starts grouping reading in 1st grade and math in 2nd. My daughter was initially placed in the highest reading group (based on an untimed comprehension test), and quickly started struggling because her pace and tracking ability were different from her peers in that group. She was (appropriately – to the extent grouping is appropriate) moved to the middle level reading group.

Within a year, her pace and tracking picked up dramatically. The school didn't notice, but I pushed for her to be tested again. It took six months, or so for me to get her retested. She scored 100% on the placement exam and was moved back to the highest level reading group. By that time (approximately a year after she was placed in the middle group), the highest level reading group was already a full year ahead of the middle group – in other words, they had covered two years’ worth of material in the time it took the middle level group to cover one years’ material. Had I not pushed for testing when I did, and the acceleration continued at the same rate, it is unlikely that she would have been able to make the transition by the time the school got around to recognizing and retesting.

She is now on track (1/4 of the way through her senior year) to being the valedictorian, an opportunity she would not have had but for two facts: (1) her abilities changed early in the process and (2) I noticed the change and pushed to have her re-evaluated at a time when it was still possible for her to catch up to the advanced group. The AP English, without which one cannot be valedictorian because of grade weighting, is made up of the kids who were either placed in that reading group in 1st grade, or who were able to bridge the ever increasing gap and move there at some future time. First and second grade is way too early to be deciding who will have the opportunity to have the highest GPA in senior year (and have the opportunity to attend the best colleges, get the best jobs, and all those things that being valedictorian – or close behind – make so much easier).

Abilities in the early years develop at very different paces. Mathematical abilities are generally even slower to develop than reading for many students (~9th or 10th grade for some spatial and reasoning skills). There is tremendous variation in development across the board – and all early grouping creates the problem my daughter potentially faced – once grouped, it is nearly impossible to change tracks unless the change is made very shortly after the initial placement.

There are a number of ways to address students who are moving more quickly at the age/grade level when everyone is still learning the same subjects (through middle school). Creative teachers find ways to involve some of the faster students in instruction – tutoring classmates (or tutoring in a lower level class if there would be too much stigma attached to tutoring peers), creating special presentations for the class covering the material covered by everyone but from a different perspective or specialty viewpoint (discovering basic geometric structures in nature, for example). The diversion of faster students into special interest projects leaves more time for the slower students to master skills, without boring the faster students to death. I am not saying this is the easiest thing in the world – as a former math teacher (as well as a parent) I recognize the additional challenges teaching students with varying abilities presents. I do, however, believe it is critical to avoid early grouping.

[silverlib]

4. Connectivity...

Something that isn't mentioned much in education. But, as a mother or three girls, 38, 36, and 19 respectively - I have been through the ropes of public education.

I don't have any data to back this up - but my oldest accelerated in school - everything came easy and the second struggled. The third one coasted (and still coasts)as a free spirit - grades and learning affected by the mood. Three very different scenarios. The first one struggled through college, as she has never really had to work at good grades. The second one excelled in college - she had learned how to study through her struggles. The third one is a current college free spirit - gets by and learns only what she feels is important in society - the results are still out on this one.

But my point is that the first one would have done well to be a groups not only where there were those that struggled, but to connect to these students and work with them. As stated previously, I don't have any links, but I know that it has been proven that children learn better at times through other children. The children who teach retain and learn how others learn (which helps them learn how to study). The second daughter, under this concept, would have had the benefit of perhaps grasping the lesson a little bit sooner. The third - well she could have benefited from both sides of the spectrum.

This can work in sports as well as any learning environment. The challenge for gifted and talented and those that aren't is to fit into society. I'm not saying, by any means, that there should not be more learning challenges available for those who learn faster, but this can be done by adding special projects and expanded opportunities within the classroom which includes students at all levels of learning curves.

The end result is a teacher and student to career and technology administrator, a physical therapist, and a potential social worker. The goal is success for all and I think it is better done with connectivity.

Just my own experience - and everyone's is different

[wildeyed]

5. Montessori and other multi-age systems encourage the older/more

advanced students to participate in teaching the younger kids. I think in small doses this is good and probably boosts long-term retention of information. However, it is not fair to designate the high-ability child as an unpaid teaching assistant in a regular classroom.

As far as your personal experience, your oldest wasn't accelerated enough if she never experienced challenge until college. There is plenty of research about this. Highly (and please note there are many levels of giftedness) gifted students do best in special GT classrooms. The curriculum moves at a more appropriate pace and they are challenged simply by being around others with similar abilities. In a regular classroom, these kids are under challenged and either become social misfits, or learn to disguise their abilities in order to fit in with the other students. Neither of these options are good or healthy options, or helps the GT student to fit into society better in the longterm, IMO. Here is an article that deals with the fallacies associated with ability grouping.

http://www.hoagiesgifted.org/eric/e607.html

Your middle child probably had some stealth LD issues. Many kids get better at dealing with these as they get older, even without intervention, and LD's tend to be less obvious in college level work which is more about content and creative thinking and less about rote memory and presentation (ie. handwriting, spelling, etc.)

The youngest is probably gifted, too, but not as achievement oriented. Which is fine. The world need dreamers, and many of these kids are intrinsically motivated to achieve in areas that interest them, and school just isn't in that category.

The challenge for gifted and talented and those that aren't is to fit into society. I'm not saying, by any means, that there should not be more learning challenges available for those who learn faster, but this can be done by adding special projects and expanded opportunities within the classroom which includes students at all levels of learning curves.

I think this can be too much stress on the teacher and with the NCLB legislation that only cares about getting low achieving students to grade level, it is unlikely to happen much.

In addition, I don't believe it can be done with my oldest. She is working three grade levels ahead of her peers and is mostly self-taught. God know what wold happen if an adult actually took the time to teach her something. Acceleration and ability grouping are the only things that can come close to challenging her. And she deserves the same appropriate, challenging curriculum that other kids get, or, like your daughter, she is at extreme risk of never learning study skills or how to be a good loser or any of those important things that kids need to learn.

Read the second article from my previous post. It sites an example of how ability grouping is being used to increase the achievement of the lowest achieving students while meeting the needs of the highest. Cool stuff.

[silverlib]

6. Thank you for your response...

I certainly agree with you in some areas. One of the issues that is not addressed is what happened in most schools when this was tried in the past - It happened in the 50's when I was in elementary school and was still going on the 60's. Children in my school were separated according to achievement test scores and grades. The tenured and successful teachers were given the option to choose their positions and inevitably, with the exception of one dear and ostracized Quaker woman, all chose the higher level students, leaving the slower students to the new teachers or the lower performing teachers. Although I was in the excelling classes, my liberal school board father argued that the lower achievers needed the higher achieving teachers. Retention is difficult if teachers are stuck where they do not want to be, so the exceptional remained with the exceptional and the teachers were just as segregated as the students. Most parents of the gifted fought the other way and were/still more vocal and participatory in their child's education. This was why this separation was eventually stopped, and if my memory serves me well, it was stopped by the courts. I think I question how this can be avoided.

Children working together in a learning/teaching atmosphere do not represent what I consider a teacher's aide. Teaching is a learning experience, for both children and adults. Of course, my idea of a teacher's aide is a much needed support position for copying, grade entry, attendance data, etc.

My oldest certainly "never learned study skills." She just didn't require them to make the grades in high school. Yet, she was able to learn them - just later than most and she says this final struggle later in college certainly helps her be a better teacher now. If she knew that I complained that she didn't get these skills early on, she would remind me of this.

And my concern for all students is that social skills are of significant importance - the connectivity to all levels. Success is more easily obtained when we work for the success of others around us, whether in work or school. I do agree in excelled programs in certain areas at the secondary level - math and science in particular and perhaps English.

Social skills and connectivity should not be overlooked in relationship to learning. The NCLB program is a disaster - and now our education system is failing at all levels. I really feel the objective of the R party is to get education off the federal plate - not guaranteed in the Constitution - a good ol' Ron Paul libertarian stand for sure - just like Social Security. So first, we have to get our leaders to support education and bring us up to a competitive level in the global sense. Perhaps when the desire is there, the best way can be found to achieve this goal.

Thanks again for your well thought out post and the link. I have just glanced at the link and will look at it more in depth. At first glance, it says cluster "at least part of the day" which leads me to believe the preference would be for more of the day. but I'll read it more thoroughly before making any further judgment.