Mixture, Streaming and Inclusion: The Different Presence of Three Ways of Grouping Students in Spanish Schools.

Author(s):

Rosa Valls(presenting / submitting)Silvia Molina(presenting)Pilar Álvarez Cifuentes

Conference:

ECER 2012

Network:

05. Children and Youth at Risk and Urban Education

Format:

Paper

Session Information

05 SES 06 A, Urban Education & Children and Youth at Risk

Parallel Paper Session

Time:

2012-09-19

15:30-17:00

Room:

ESI 2 - Aula 6

Chair:

Sofia Marques da Silva

Contribution

This paper shows the results of the quantitative study conducted under the research Project MIXSTRIN. Ways of grouping students together and how this is related to success at school: Mixture, Streaming and Inclusion(National Plan of research and development of Spain. Ministry of Education and Science 2008-2011). This project starts from the results obtained in the integrated research project of the 6th Framework Programme of the European Commission INCLUD-ED, Strategies for Inclusion and Social Cohesion in Europe from Education (2006-2011), which has the objective to identify the educational practices that favour the educational success and social cohesion and those, that on the contrary, lead to school failure and social exclusion.

One result of the first study of the INCLUD-ED project is the classification of three ways of grouping children, which are accompanied by different educational results: mixture, streaming and inclusion. Mixture includes all the students in a group, usually heterogeneous with regards to the educational level, in a traditional classroom and with one teacher. This practice presents multiple difficulties to respond to an increasing diverse student body with different sociocultural backgrounds. Streaming is a second type of grouping that has been defined by the European Commission (2006) as the curricula adaptation to different groups of children with regards to their performance within the same school. It often entails grouping students according to their performance and including additional human resources. Nevertheless, scientific literature has pointed out the negative effects of streaming both in the quality as well as the equity of education. Third, inclusion is an alternative of the prior two options with educational practices that provide a satisfactory answer to the students diversity, contributing not only to the opportunities but to the results and the school success of all. It mainly consists of maintaining heterogeneous groups of students and reorganising human resources to support students in inclusive settings.

The main objective of MIXTRIN is to identify to what extent the different ways of grouping students (mixture, streaming and inclusion) are being used in Spain and the way each of them influence students’ academic outcomes. Although there is evidence enough that streaming is a widespread practice in Europe (Mullis, Martín, González & Chrostowski, 2004; OCDE, 2007), to date no scientific research had studied before the level of application of these ways of students’ grouping in Spain. Similarly, although several international studies highlight the negative impact that it has on students (Braddock & Slavin, 1992; Chorzempa & Graham, 2006; Zimmer, 2003), the results of implementing these practices in schools in Spain had neither been addressed by research. This lack of scientific evidences is especially important since steaming practices are popular in Spain and have even been recognised by the legislation in education. Other educational reforms abolished streaming by law years ago, this is the case of Finland, where streaming was forbidden by law on the 80s. While Finland is the European country with better results in PISA 2009 (OCDE, 2010), Spain achieves scores significantly below the OECD mean in the same survey.

Method

Within the quantitative study of MIXTRIN, two questionnaires were designed, one for primary schools and one for secondary schools. The items of the questionnaires were distributed on 5 thematic parts, including questions on the organisation of students in different classes and within classes, supports outside the regular classroom, individualised adaptations of the curriculum, activities for extending the learning time, and choice of subjects. The responses to these questions served to identify the grouping practices implemented in each school. Also a section on demographic data of the school was included. Overall, the questionnaires included 39 questions in the version for primary education and 43 for secondary. The population object of study was the public schools of primary and secondary education in Spain. Two sub-samples were extracted (one for primary and another for secondary). The questionnaire was filled in the educational centres by means of an electronic application addressed to the school principals. A final response of 366 primary centres and 316 secondary centres was achieved. The analysis of the data collected allowed identifying the greater or lesser extent to which each form of grouping students are implemented and which of them are representative of the reality of grouping practices in Spain.

Expected Outcomes

Mixture does not appear significantly in primary schools, and in secondary only one third of the centres implement it. On the contrary, as regards streaming, both primary and secondary schools group students according to the level of attainment in different classrooms and within classrooms; while in the first case the percentage of secondary schools double that of primary schools, in the second case both percentages are similar. These data are outstanding in the light of previous research that proved that in low level groups students receive less stimulation to think critically (Chorzempa & Graham, 2006) and lose the positive effect of high performing peers (Zimmer, 2003). But it is also outstanding because in both primary and secondary schools the learning objectives are achieved to a further extent in the groups containing students who already had a higher previous level of attainment. As regards inclusion, it is more frequent in primary than in secondary schools, however, in both cases they appear in non-compulsory contents of the curriculum (optional subjects) and outside the school time, minimising the opportunities that all students can benefit from it.

References

Braddock, J.H. & Slavin, R.E. (1992). Why ability grouping must end: Achieving Excellence and Equity in American Education. Baltimore, MD: Center for Research on Effective Schooling for Disadvantaged Students. Chorzempa, B. F. & Graham, S. (2006). Primary-Grade Teachers' Use of within-Class Ability Grouping in Reading. Journal of Educational Psychology. vol. 98 num. 3 pp. 529-541. Comisión Europea. (2006). Eficiencia y equidad en los sistemas europeos de educación y formación. Bruselas, 8/9/2006, COM(2006) 481 final. SEC (2006) 1096. http://eur-lex.europa.eu/smartapi/cgi/sga_doc?smartapi!celexplus!prod!DocNumber&lg=es&type_doc=COMfinal&an_doc=2006&nu_doc=481 INCLUD-ED Project. Strategies for inclusion and social cohesion in Europe from education. 2006-2011. 6th Framework Programme. Citizens and Governance in a Knowledge-based Society. CIT4-CT-2006-028603. Directorate-General for Research, European Commission. Mullis, I.V.S., Martin, M.O., Gonzalez, E.J., & Chrostowski, S.J. (2004). TIMSS 2003 International Mathematics Report. Chestnut Hill, MA: TIMSS & PIRLS International Study Center, Boston College. OCDE. (2007). PISA 2006 Science Competencies for Tomorrow's World. Results form PISA 2006. http://www.oecd.org/document/2/0,3343,en_32252351_32236191_39718850_1_1_1_1,00.html OCDE. (2010). PISA 2009 Results: What Students Know and Can Do. Student performance in reading, mathematics and science. Volume I. http://www.oecd.org/document/61/0,3746,en_32252351_46584327_46567613_1_1_1_1,00.html Zimmer, R. (2003). A New Twist in the Educational Tracking Debate. Economics of Education Review, 22(3), 307.

Author Information

Rosa Valls (presenting / submitting)

Universitat de Barcelona, Spain

Silvia Molina (presenting)

Universitat Rovira i Virgili

Pilar Álvarez Cifuentes

University of Barcelona

BARCELONA

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