The implementation of the Education Act (1944) stated that a requirement of Local Education Authorities was to provide secondary schools the ability
‘....to afford all pupils opportunities for education......in view of their different ages, abilities and aptitudes, (Mortimer & Blackstone, 1982, p.94).
With this in mind I am to explore equal opportunities within the English department within my setting. As a micro study I will use baseline data of Gifted and Talented (G and T) students including: whether they are in receipt of free school meals (fsm); on the Special Educational Needs Register (SEN Reg) and their Cognitive Ability Test (CAT) average scoring to inform my hypothesis that Gifted and Talented students with these profiles are not achieving in line with their Gifted and Talented peers. G and T students who appear on the SEN Register have a range of issues including Dyslexia, Behaviour, Emotional and Social Difficulties and Autism, however, are either gifted and/or talented across subjects or specifically in English. Although Boaler writes ‘...schools pay more attention to potential high achievers than other students’ (Boaler, 1997, p.576), I question whether in fact this is the case with high achieving working class students as (DCSF, 2007), states ‘ Pupils not eligible for free school meals perform better than those who are eligible for free school meals in each Key Stage’.
Mixed ability teaching in the English department is common practice therefore placing a range of abilities together. Even within mixed ability classes there appears to be a degree of setting. The sets within the mixed ability class are determined by academic achievements usually through summative assessment such as end of unit tests, written assignments and the use of baseline data such as CAT scores, supposedly a fair way of gauging ability. However these are inaccessible to some learners therefore maybe being an inaccurate representation of their true ability. Research by Gillborn (1997) shows consistently setting a child according to perceived ability does not deliver a net improvement in attainment. With this in mind why are schools continuing to set according to perceived ability and does this prove that ‘setting and streaming created and maintained inequalities, particularly for working class students’ (Boaler, 1997, p.575)? There appear to be a number of working class G and T students in my setting, yet, due to external factors contributing to a lack of engagement often they are placed in lower ability sets. Are we then reinforcing a culture of low aspirations for potential first generation university students?
Out of one hundred and thirty four Gifted and Talented students, forty three receive free school meals and forty one are on the Special Educational Needs Register. Students with these profiles have an average CAT score in the range of 117. A focus on reasoning abilities identifies pupils who may not be found through an analysis of solely curriculum related attainments. CAT also provides a measure of a pupil’s abilities against the national average (120), not just in relation to their peers within the school. Within my setting Gifted and Talented students are highlighted as being in the top 10% of students relative to the cohort of students admitted.
The use of students being on the SEN Reg and fsm as empirical evidence to suggest possible inequality of opportunity could be classed as an unrealistic indicator however with only 15.2% of fsm students in comparison to 43.3% nfsm achieving 5 or more A* - C GCSE grades including English and Maths across East Sussex (DCSF, 2008) this data could be perceived as indicative of attainment according to social class. Moreover, ‘a lack of consensus over social class classifications has made research on education and social class difficult’ (Gazeley & Dunne, 2005, p.2). This may suggest that some families who would be eligible for fsm may not actually be in receipt of them. Yet studying the demographics of the school with the three main areas of catchment being those of significant socio –economic disadvantage I would believe that free school meals and SEN would be an accurate indicator. In fact I had to choose carefully ten Gifted and Talented students who were not fsm, SEN and possibly lived in an area with indicators of affluent, working, two parent families.
I chose ten students who are in receipt of free school meals and ten students who are not to complete a questionnaire (Appendix 2). Out of the twenty students chosen nine are on the SEN Reg. I informed them that they could complete the questionnaire anonymously, however to ensure a fair representation if they were in agreement to place their name on the questionnaire that would be useful to my study. The students completed the questionnaire during mentor time, a twenty minute session after mid morning break. The students were in a large group seated at individual tables. I explained the purpose of completing the questionnaire and offered to read the statements if they wished, all decided to work independently, putting their hands up if they needed assistance. The first statement ‘Education is important to me’ rendered a mixed response with seven students stating they strongly agree, interestingly six of these are students are not entitled to free school meals. Eleven students agreed with the statement with the responses being from a combination of fsm and non free school meals (nfsm). Out of the remaining categories: unsure, disagree and strongly disagree, three students were unsure again these were eligible for fsm and are placed on the SEN Reg.
The second statement ‘how well do you think you are doing in English?’ was added to the questionnaire to ascertain how many of the twenty students were aware of what they needed to do in order to make progress. The results are shown in a bar chart as below:
When asked what aspects of English they do not like there was a mixed response: ‘I don’t like it when we do really high standard things’, ‘I don’t like writing unnecessary things over and over again’, ‘the writing and reading’ (this was mentioned twelve times), ‘the writing’, two students stated ‘poetry, four stated they liked everything about English. Having looked at the data for the twelve students who stated they did not like the reading and writing seven are entitled to fsm and eight are on the SEN Reg. This has made me think about the accessibility of the English curriculum in comparison to the potential ability of these students and whether by expecting high achieving students to predominantly utilise reading and writing skills whether we are negating our responsibility to provide equal opportunities for all.
In conclusion by studying the responses from this micro study it suggests that ‘working class’ students achieve below average in contrast to their ‘middle class’ peers. Is this as Gazeley and Dunne (2005) suggest that teachers have lower expectations of working class students? I have explored the use of fsm data to investigate possible reasons for under achievement of G and T students however I now question if this is a realistic indicator as ‘FSM is a measure of household income deprivation, specifically benefit dependence, rather than occupational status’ (DfES, 2006, p.13). There are likely to be a number of families who are eligible for free school meals who may not actually claim for them including a number of middle class families who may have been made redundant or have ill health. There are so many other factors to consider when looking at empirical evidence which may affect a student’s engagement, motivation and self esteem, therefore why are schools so data driven and does this detract from delivering positive, engaging lessons which enable students to make progress?
‘Without a system-wide approach to nurturing giftedness and talent, system-wide underachievement occurs with this being most pronounced amongst minority populations’ (CSFC, 2010, p.16)
From this study I would recommend that the English department explore alternative ways of highlighting pupils who are Gifted and Talented without relying solely on the use of data which could be deemed unreliable. Also, a number of students suggested that they did not like writing, yet, when looking at pupils work little evidence of marking was present. To implement an agreed format to feedback to pupils and their parents may increase motivation to present work in the written form. Pupils need to clearly know where they are at and what they need to do in order to make progress. Furthermore, teachers should consider a variety of resources suited to the needs of the more able which may excite, engage and motivate them to want to learn as
‘providing for Gifted and talented pupils in our schools is a question of equity – as with all other pupils, they have a right to an education that is suited to their particular needs and abilities’ (DCSF, 2010, p.7).
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References
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