David Cameron is, according to the Telegraph, demanding that secondary schools should split children in to ability groups and that streaming should become a normal part of school for children over the age of eleven years old.
Perhaps David Cameron hasn't visited many secondary schools recently, after all, his Eton experience is hardly typical of a child in the UK, but the vast majority of secondary schools do split children in to streamed ability groups anyway.
In my dealings with high schools in Norwich discussing the transfer of years seven pupils to them, they have all asked what ability stream the children should be placed in. Not a single secondary school has said they do not stream by ability. So why is "Call me Dave" demanding something that already appears to be happening ?
I guess he is desperately trying to shut up his right wingers and those grassroots activists who are upset about his decision not to introduce grammar schools.
To my mind it is New Labour in 1995 all over again. Before they came in to power in 1997 I kept telling people who were excited about the "change" we would see under a Labour government that all they pledged to do was more of the same, no changes, just a smiling Mr Blair instead of that grey Mr Major. Now we are faced with an opposition that sounds new and shiny, but in essence has pledged to do nothing different from Labour. It's all rather depressing.
4 comments:
Are you saying you want him to be radical ? Surely a more radical David Cameron is exactly what you as liberal democrat wouldn't want isn't it ?
Surely he is to be commended for having an evolutionary approach ?
What I was poiting out as that Cemeron is calling for something that already happens. It is like David Cameron calling for tarmac on roads or leaves on trees. It is pointless as it already happens.
I guess the fault lays with those newspapers who treat David Cameron breaking wind as newsworthy.
Nich, do you have any source for more detail on the whole streaming/ setting thing? An A 'stream' and a B stream on their own are not enough _ you need to sub-divide by ability more than that, surely, to get the real benefits. Also, are students being allocated to a stream on the basis of their ability across ALL subjects? - or are there typically different streams for different subject (groups).
My understanding is that most group for different subjects and that each group depends on the subject. For example, if you took my class the one girl would be in the top group for literacy, but bottom for numeracy, so streaming is necessary.
The questions is how would a Grammar school cope with such a child ? Would she fail the 11 plus because of her maths ?
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