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I think changing students in classes is fine, provided there is ample opportunity to socialise outside of that. In the UK, schools are largely given free reign

I think changing students in classes is fine, provided there is ample opportunity to socialise outside of that. In the UK, schools are largely given free reign on how they organise their day but I was lucky enough to go to a school that provisioned for two 30 minute breaks, morning and afternoon, and one 90 minute one for lunch. This definitely isn't the case everywhere mind. Our school also confiscated smart-phones at the beginning of the school day, so all we could do was play sports and card games. Most of my friends now are still those I went to school with, which wasn't strange for me until I went to university and found out that most of my friends there don't talk to any of their friends from school anymore. Out of the 150 people in my year, I still regularly see maybe 40 of them. Within that group everyone has been wildly successful and I put that almost entirely down to the time we got every day to build our social skills. Time spent playing football or rugby on the fields, running around the woods behind our school playing catch and bulldog, trying to find places to wrestle and fight in secret, sitting in classrooms playing card games, or messing around in the music rooms with instruments we couldn't play. They're probably my fondest memories and it baffles me that not only is more time not given to it, but time is spent trying to take that away! It did nothing to stunt our learning, and I'd argue it enhanced it. Most of my friends are in postgraduate education, went to Oxbridge or another Russel group university, and were straight-A children at school. A kid shouldn't be expected to effectively work a 9-5 job (let's not even get started on the ridiculous start times some have to go through, fighting their biological circadian rhythm), with an hour off to rush through lunch before getting thrown back in to classroom. It's no wonder teachers often describe teaching as riot control. A school shouldn't just be a place to learn academics. That puts way too much onus on parents to provide socialisation themselves; meaning children with bad parents, or those that can't afford to send their kids to extra-curricular clubs and sports teams, get left behind and form cracks in a working society.

JacKTrocinskI 7y ago
That sounds like an amazing experience, I wish my school had been more like that. My high school had a student body of 3000+, we had police stationed at the school, and there were actual riots. I went to one of the better public high school in California by the way, I can not imagine what happens in L.A. or the valley.
- Aromasin 7y ago
  It was great in hindsight. Sadly the school is a vastly different place than it was 10 years ago when I went. The new headmaster has traded play time for school time, but it's had the opposite effect he's intended by decimating their grades. We used to come in the top 20 state schools in the country for overall achievement, but now they're barely reaching the top 100. He of course blames too many video games at home for that, and not his changes to the schedule... Sadly the US way is certainly the way UK schools seem to be going. As much as I hate saying it, I can't imagine sending my child to a state school anymore. I won't be surprised if the class divide widens even more as wealthy parents start sending their children to private schools or home schooling them.
  - Angostura 7y ago
    All is not lost, my daughters go to a bog standard Comprehensive in East London (not an Academy or anything) and they are having a great time. Luchtimes are rushed, but you get the impression that the teachers actually like the kids and are interested in them - the atmosphere is really great. Pretty good grades, and an emphasis on educating the whole child.
rezeroed 7y ago
You're giving no credit to the teaching aspect. I went to a school that sounds a lot like yours, but the teachers were terrible, and I'm not aware of anyone becoming wildly successful. Some fairly successful. Glad you enjoyed it, but I think you're giving it too much credit.
- Aromasin 7y ago
  I'm of the opinion that the teaching there was decisively average. I had a few that were good, and some that were bad, but no outliers for sure. I've had teachers at college (British high-school) for my A-levels that were incredible or awful in comparison, so I do have a somewhat decent frame of reference at least. My secondary school teachers followed the curriculum, worked from the textbooks, and that's about it. We certainly had as many terrible teachers as great ones, if not more. Don't get me wrong, I'm not dismissing that teaching quality as the number one factor - I just think that socialisation time for developing children is vastly understated in its importance.
  - thom 7y ago
    Apologies for nosing in your LinkedIn profile, but I was curious and you link it in your profile. You went to a selective grammar school with pretty small class sizes, rated good or outstanding by Ofsted the entire time you were there. I feel these are perhaps confounding variables here (but certainly not ones you should feel bad about!)
    - Aromasin 7y ago
      You and 18 others it seems! I knew putting a link there was a bad idea haha. Yes I certainly was fortunate, but again I don't believe the teaching was especially stellar. From experience working with schools at the moment both grammar and comprehensive, who are mostly in the satisfactory to good Ofsted category, my teachers were no better or worse than those I work with now. Although smaller classroom sizes definitely made a massive difference. I'm still of the opinion though that the social element we were exposed to is what distinguished the school compared to that of similar institutes though.

JacKTrocinskI 7y ago

That sounds like an amazing experience, I wish my school had been more like that. My high school had a student body of 3000+, we had police stationed at the school, and there were actual riots. I went to one of the better public high school in California by the way, I can not imagine what happens in L.A. or the valley.

Aromasin 7y ago
It was great in hindsight. Sadly the school is a vastly different place than it was 10 years ago when I went. The new headmaster has traded play time for school time, but it's had the opposite effect he's intended by decimating their grades. We used to come in the top 20 state schools in the country for overall achievement, but now they're barely reaching the top 100. He of course blames too many video games at home for that, and not his changes to the schedule... Sadly the US way is certainly the way UK schools seem to be going. As much as I hate saying it, I can't imagine sending my child to a state school anymore. I won't be surprised if the class divide widens even more as wealthy parents start sending their children to private schools or home schooling them.
- Angostura 7y ago
  All is not lost, my daughters go to a bog standard Comprehensive in East London (not an Academy or anything) and they are having a great time. Luchtimes are rushed, but you get the impression that the teachers actually like the kids and are interested in them - the atmosphere is really great. Pretty good grades, and an emphasis on educating the whole child.

rezeroed 7y ago

You're giving no credit to the teaching aspect. I went to a school that sounds a lot like yours, but the teachers were terrible, and I'm not aware of anyone becoming wildly successful. Some fairly successful. Glad you enjoyed it, but I think you're giving it too much credit.

Aromasin 7y ago
I'm of the opinion that the teaching there was decisively average. I had a few that were good, and some that were bad, but no outliers for sure. I've had teachers at college (British high-school) for my A-levels that were incredible or awful in comparison, so I do have a somewhat decent frame of reference at least. My secondary school teachers followed the curriculum, worked from the textbooks, and that's about it. We certainly had as many terrible teachers as great ones, if not more. Don't get me wrong, I'm not dismissing that teaching quality as the number one factor - I just think that socialisation time for developing children is vastly understated in its importance.
- thom 7y ago
  Apologies for nosing in your LinkedIn profile, but I was curious and you link it in your profile. You went to a selective grammar school with pretty small class sizes, rated good or outstanding by Ofsted the entire time you were there. I feel these are perhaps confounding variables here (but certainly not ones you should feel bad about!)
  - Aromasin 7y ago
    You and 18 others it seems! I knew putting a link there was a bad idea haha. Yes I certainly was fortunate, but again I don't believe the teaching was especially stellar. From experience working with schools at the moment both grammar and comprehensive, who are mostly in the satisfactory to good Ofsted category, my teachers were no better or worse than those I work with now. Although smaller classroom sizes definitely made a massive difference. I'm still of the opinion though that the social element we were exposed to is what distinguished the school compared to that of similar institutes though.