[Oz-gifted] RE: Ability grouping

[mal at melbpc.org.au]

There is a way to do it and my daughter's school (at which I am a teacher 
until the end of this year) is doing it. It does help that we only have 
40 kids at the school and 4 core teachers (going to 25 kids and 2 core 
teachers next year). This year, the lower and middle groups did literacy 
and numeracy at the same time to allow kids to move between the groups 
for both subjects. Within our two groups, we then differentiated the 
curriulum to cater for each individual child. Next year, we are going a 
step further (due to the decreased number of students) and the whole 
school will be doing litearcy and numeracy at the same time. Children can 
then move wherever they need to be according to their ability. We also do 
this for sport with the more capable younger children going with the 
higher abiltiy group for sport, while some of the older, less capable 
children still do a PMP program to work on their gross motor skills.

This is particular important to me as my daughter is almost 7 adn in a 
mainstream school would be in year 1. In this set up, she is doign year 
3/4 literacy with the concepts being age-appropriate (by this I mean that 
we have found books that have the higher level vocab she needs, but the 
story lines are appropraite for a 6 year old. She isn't being forced to 
grow up faster by reading more mature books). She is also doign year 2/3 
maths and is ablt to advance at her own pace. We are about to start 
whiole school assessments to determine exactly where each child is 
compared to the CSF II (Victorian) in both litearcy and numeracy and will 
do that again at the start of next year to assist with the groupings.

I realise this cannot be achieved in larger schools without it being a 
logistical nightmare, but if you really want this set up, theere are 
schools around that can do it.

Kirsten

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