HOW STUDENTS ARE GROUPED
Year 7 & 8
- In Year 7 here are 8 mixed attainment groups (H, O, N, E, T, F, A, and I) and two support groups (S & R) which have less students in them
- In Year 9 here are 9 mixed attainment groups (H, O, N, E, S, T, F, A, and I) and one support group (R) which have less students in them
- In both years there are 12 mixed attainment DT classes. The small class sizes are needed for health and safety purposes. In PE the vast majority of classes are single sex.
Year 9
In Year 9 things get more complicated, students could be in different classes for different subjects. To do this we create three populations – English, Mathematics/Science and MFL. The reason we do this is to allow for some setting by those subjects. For timetabling purposes students are first of all split into two populations, in one is 9H, O, N, E and S, the other is 9T, F, A, I and R. Then the four subjects mentioned can group the students how they want to. It means a student could be in 9H for English, 9E for French, 9O for maths/science. Even if a student is in 9T for all subjects, the other students in the class will vary from subject to subject.
At this point it is worth saying that the evidence for setting students by prior attainment is inconclusive, this is not surprising as the circumstances under which it is studied are different (different ages, different subjects, different countries for example). Due to this we don’t have one policy for how we group students – it is left up to each subject area to decide. The information below explains how each subject does it.
Mathematics/Science
Groups are put together to acknowledge some students may need extra support with their maths and perhaps a slower pace to help them master key concepts, while others need to be extended and stretched further. The majority of students in the year will continue to work in mixed attainment classes as they have in years 7 and 8.
Mixed attainment: 9A, 9E, 9F, 9I, 9N, 9O
Support: 9R, 9S
Higher attaining: 9H, 9T
English
There are 9 mixed attainment groups (H, O, N, E, S, T, F, A, & I) and one support groups (R)
MFL
There are French and German classes in both populations
9H/Ge, 9O/Ge, 9N/Fr, 9E/Fr, 9S/Fr
9T/Ge, 9F/Ge, 9A/Fr, 9I/Fr, 9R/Fr
Attainment is in the order it is written, e.g., students in 9H have higher prior attainment for German than students in 9O.
Other Subjects
There are of course more subjects than the four mentioned, but without getting technical we couldn’t create a timetable which worked if all subjects could set up their own groups. Some subjects use the English classes and some use the mathematics classes
Science/Maths – Geography and Computing
English – Drama, Art, History, RE, PSHE and Music
This means for example, if a student is in 9A for maths they will be in 9A for geography and computing and the rest of the students in the class will be the same.
Year 10 and 11
English
Year 10
There are 9 mixed attainment groups (H, O, N, E, S, T, F, A, & I) and one support groups (R)
Year 11
Mixed attainment groups: A, E, F, I, N, O
Support: R, S
Higher attaining: H, T
Mathematics
Year 10
Mixed attainment groups: O, N, E, F, A, I
Support: S, R
Higher attaining: H, T
Year 11
Mixed attainment groups: O, N, F, A
Support: E, S, I, R
Higher attaining: H, T
Science
Year 10 and 11
Triple Science: X1 and Y1
Combined Science: X2 to X6 (no X6 in Year10) and Y2 to Y6. Groups are setted, e.g., students in X2 have a higher prior attainment than students in X3.
MFL
Year 10 and 11
Groups are setted, e.g., students in Sp1 have a higher prior attainment then students in Sp2
Other subjects
All other subjects are mixed attainment