Ability Grouping: The Future of Education

Have you ever been in a class that you found boring? Ok, I guess everyone has, but have you ever been in a class that you found too easy, or way too hard? You find yourself staring at the clock as it ticks by, screaming for it to hurry up as the teacher drones on about something you’ve known for years— or something you’ve never heard of! Your head aches, and you let out a pained groan. Either you make it through the next 30 minutes of pain and suffering, or you die of boredom. Honestly, that second option might be looking better.

The anecdote above may seem like a bit of an exaggeration, but it is a sad reality for millions of students across Australia. According to the Guardian, 40% of students across Australia are either struggling to keep up with, or aren’t keeping up with, their classmates. That’s roughly 1612287 students, which shows the sheer scale of this problem.

However, there’s a clear solution: make year groups based on ability, rather than age.

Consider how much easier it would be on teachers, not having to adjust their teaching strategies to fit every single student. This would help to remove some of the pressure placed on teachers, 62% of whom— according to The Conversation— are currently suffering from a mental health condition. Indeed, having to make a different set of activities for every student based on their own level can be incredibly draining. Having different classes for students with distinct levels of academic ability means that teachers have less to worry about, as they would have one rough level for their whole class. This would mean that they would only have to create one lesson plan, lessening the impossible workload.

Ability grouping would also benefit the wellbeing of students. 40% of Australian students struggle in school. This leads to 29 percent of students taking at least one (unexplained) day off every two weeks. I see evidence of the connection between these two statistics every day: boys messing around in class, trying to hide their struggles, or skiving off so that they don’t have to do the test that they know they’ll fail. It’s not that they’re bad kids, it’s just that they don’t want to be embarrassed— a very normal human reaction. If assignments could be tailored to fit the abilities of a certain group of students, it would be a win-win. Teachers wouldn’t have to spend the whole lesson helping four or five boys, and students would be able to do the work assigned to them without having to be ashamed with their result. Having classes based on ability would be a win for both teachers and students.

Finally, grouping based on ability would allow students to work at their own pace. Students with a similar academic level usually have the same working pace. This means that students don’t have to adjust their learning strategies to the pace of the class, and teachers don’t have to worry about kids finishing all their work early, or struggling to finish it by the bell. According to Teach-nology, ability grouping “helps in placing similar students in one classroom or group... it helps in increasing the pace of advancement of the study skills of the students at higher levels of ability.” Ability grouping also allows certain groups slow down their pace to accommodate for their needs. This evidence shows that ability grouping lets students work at a rate suited to them.

Now, let’s see what ability grouping would look like in practice. Picture this: you’re a teacher standing at the front of your classroom, looking out at your students. Instead of groaning as you were forced into 50 minutes of torture, you smile. You’re doing a lesson on opinion pieces, and your teacher seems to be explaining the assignment in a way that makes it seem understandable. As you begin your assignment, you feel prepared, and excited about the work ahead. At long last, you aren’t bored or confused in class. The people around you are happy, too. They are finally with other students at their level, so they aren’t frustrated by a slow pace or embarrassed by struggling to keep up.

We may have grouped students by age for a long time, but it’s time for a change. In order to create a brighter future, it is crucial that we push students to do their best. There are urgent problems plaguing the world, and we need to raise intelligent, inquisitive children to solve them. The current school system is flawed and obsolete. It’s time to change the rules of the game. It’s time to move to ability grouping.

A persuasive piece