The impact of tracking by attainment on pupil self-confidence over time: demonstrating the accumulative impact of self-fulfilling prophecy |
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| Authors: | Becky Francis Nicole Craig Jeremy Hodgen Becky Taylor Antonina Tereshchenko Paul Connolly |
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| Institution: | 1. Institute of Education, UCL Institute of Education (IOE), London, UK;2. B.Francis@ucl.ac.uk;4. School of Education, Queen’s University Belfast, Belfast, UK;5. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, Lancaster University, Lancaster, England |
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| Abstract: | AbstractThe impact of self-fulfilling prophecy in education, and of attainment grouping on pupil self-perception, remain topics of longstanding debate, with important consequences for social in/justice. Focusing on self-confidence, this article draws on survey responses from 9,059 12-13 year olds who were tracked by subject (‘setting’). They provided survey responses when placed in ‘ability’ sets at the start of their secondary schooling, and again late the following year; enabling analysis of impact over time. After controlling for prior attainment, the gap in general self-confidence between students in the top and bottom sets for mathematics is shown to widen over time, and high set students’ self-confidence in English had also grown significantly; although there was not further widening in the cases of self-confidence in mathematics or in general self-confidence between students in the top and bottom sets for English. Implications of these findings for interventions directed at addressing educational disadvantage are discussed. |
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| Keywords: | Tracking self-confidence social justice social inequality attainment grouping setting |
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