Talk:Educational stage

More international!
I added some information I've found about British systems, but I know there's a lot more variety out there even just in the English-speaking world. This article needs a lot of work in this regard. /blahedo (t) 20:53, 7 February 2006 (UTC)


 * Seconded. I also added subheadings to further encourage this. N Nuri 06:59, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

Correspondence between British and North American numbering
I just reverted some edits that claim that British "Reception" corresponds to North American "1st grade" and "year 11" to "12th grade". This contradicts everything I've been able to find on the subject, including the very concise table linked from the main page, which says that 1st grade is "year 2" and 12th grade "year 13". While it depends to some extent on location and circumstance, most Americans start school at Kindergarten at age 5, turning 6 some time during the school year or the following summer; their 12th grade/grade 12 year sees them turning 18. If it is not the case that these descriptions correspond best to "year 1" and "year 13" respectively, please cite your sources here. /blahedo (t) 21:51, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

Differences in UK Schools
The system in Scotland is NOT the same as in England / Wales - in Scotland you have Primary School (ages 5 to 12, referred to as "primary 1" to "primary 7") and Secondary (12 to 16/18, referred to as "1st year" to "6th year". Some drop out at age 16, making "4th year" their last year at school).

I know this as someone who has been throught the Scottish education system, but cannot provide citations, so I do not feel it appropriate to edit the article.

StuartCarter 15:55, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

Differences in UK Schools
The system in Scotland is NOT the same as in England / Wales - in Scotland you have Pruimary School (ages 5 to 12, referred to as "primary 1" to "primary 7") and Secondary (12 to 16/18, referred to as "1st year" to "6th year". Some drop out at 16, making "4th year" their last year at school).

I know this as someone who has been throught the Scottish education system, but cannot provide citations, so I do not feel it appropriate to edit the article.

StuartCarter 15:55, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

more countries
added some countries. Made some reference to France, but I don't really know about it. also put alphabetical order so US is now at the bottom. 203.218.86.162 07:35, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

Kindergarten
I don't know if this goes on in the US or other parts of Canada, but in Ontario kindergarten is divided into JKG (Junior Kindergarten) and SKG (Senior Kindergarten) and people usually start kindergarten at 4. Do you think it should be seperate on the chart?

Better explanations required
This article needs a lot of work. Could people provide better explanations of the systems in their own countries, bearing in mind that people in other countries are not familiar with the local terminology. For example, I cannot make any sense of the American/Canadian grade system. There seem to be wide variations in ages within grades. Do different US states have different systems? Do you have to reach a certain level of education before you go up to the next grade or is the system purely based on age? Dahliarose 11:34, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

Rename page?
I wonder if it might be best to rename this article "Educational years or stages" rather than grade level. America and Canada seem to be the only countries which use the grade system which rather makes a nonsense of the title. Dahliarose 22:35, 14 June 2007 (UTC)


 * I totally agree with you. In fact that's the first time I ever agreed with you.  Grade level does sound to US-centric.  (MrsMacMan 22:43, 14 June 2007 (UTC))

Survey

 * Feel free to state your position on the renaming proposal by beginning a new line in this section with  or  , then sign your comment with  . Since polling is not a substitute for discussion, please explain your reasons, taking into account Wikipedia's naming conventions.


 * Support - as nominator. It might be best to rename this article "Educational stages" rather than grade level.  America and Canada seem to be the only countries which use the grade system which rather makes a nonsense of the title.  I have listed this page on Requested moves. -- (MrsMacMan 22:51, 14 June 2007 (UTC))
 * Support. "Educational progression", perhaps? As a Canuck I only dealt with grades, but seeing as they only seem to be used here and the US, changing to a more neutral title would help counter bias. -- Sig Pig  |SEND - OVER 02:40, 15 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Support as per my original suggestion. Dahliarose 08:36, 15 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Support – "Educational stages" is my pick, both to avoid North American bias and apply a term that has more clarity. It would be helpful to learn more opinions of those in other countries. &mdash;Adavidb 22:37, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

Discussion

 * Any additional comments: ←(MrsMacMan 22:46, 14 June 2007 (UTC))

Sixth forms, etc, in the UK
Would anyone apart from User:Tafkam mind if I reverted to the table which included old-style names for the UK grades?

Tafkam says "There was (and is) no consistency in the use of old form names" but I think that misses the point. Many people are still familiar with the old names and they persist in the naming of 'sixth form' colleges. They may be inconsistent but many official educational grades are inconsistent (the Scottish system, for example). We shouldn't report what we'd like to see, but what is actually used. I know many parents who are baffled by 'Year 8' but who understand 'Second form'.

Ewen (talk) 19:05, 6 June 2009 (UTC)


 * There could well be a case for explaining the old naming system elsewhere, but this page is a summary of the current situation around the world and I think it will only confuse matters if the old-style names are used as well. In any case, I'm not sure that they can be "translated" in quite such a simplified way as I believe that there were differences in the names used in say private schools, where you find upper fourth and lower fourth, etc. As a parent I've found that I've had to get used to the new-style names whether I like them or not! Dahliarose (talk) 23:01, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

Apologies for my rather direct edit, but as Dahliarose rightly says, the old system is not as simple as people tend to presume. Of course, one knows the system that applied in one's own school, but these were different, not only in three-tier, but in all areas. There is some mention of a lower/upper system at Education_in_England. Also, the article is about the current systems in place - the age ranges are likely to be much more useful in identifying what each year group represents, rather than trying to link it to an inconsistent system that has been largely phased out for the best part of 20 years since the National Curriculum arrived. Tafkam (talk) 23:43, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

Ordinal vs. Cardinal in the United States
While I don't have much to cite unfortunately, I would argue that the preference for the use of ordinal numbers for grades in the US is not as universal as this article describes.

Try looking through the Common Core website, going through assessment sites of state education departments, or even many school website staff listings and it is not uncommon to see "Grade 3", "Grade 4", etc used in more formal contexts.

More importantly though, there is at least one US region I know that even embraces the use of cardinal numbers in everyday speech. I am an ESL public school teacher in Vermont and can tell you that Vermonters use cardinal numbers for grades here probably just as much if not more than ordinal numbers. Similar to the Canadian style, it is quite common to hear people refer to a child being in "grade 3" or "grade 4", for example. I was very surprised to hear this when I moved here from Colorado two years ago as it struck me as very formal sounding but I have now grown accustomed to it and have even caught myself using it on occasion.

The question then is how wide-spread is this, and that I am not sure of. I did some informal research with Google by visiting a bunch of random classroom pages from states on the Canadian border and then in New England to check for the prevalence of using ordinal numbers and found that it was especially prominent in Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine. I didn't find much usage of this outside of these three states though I did not do exhaustive research.

If anybody can find any actual research to back this up, I would love to see it. I personally haven't had much luck but I will keep looking.

Lastly, for fun, here's an example of one of the pages from Falmouth, Maine that I found: http://stilesgrade5.weebly.com/. Here's the parent link: http://www.falmouthschools.org/_/index.cfm?sidebar=320&center=345&rightnav=334. It says "Welcome to Grade 5!" at the top, which is likely striking to the average American outside of this region as it probably sounds odd or overly formal.

Tm orion (talk) 20:04, 29 May 2014 (UTC)

External links modified
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 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20090206053830/http://www.education.alberta.ca/media/832568/guidetoed.pdf to http://www.education.alberta.ca/media/832568/guidetoed.pdf

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Tables
It might be a good idea to standardize the format of the tables. I'd be happy to help, but I don't know what the best format would be. Pvirgiliusmaro (talk) 21:42, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

External links modified
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 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20090227065324/http://www.ed.gov.nl.ca/edu/sp/pcdbgl.htm to http://www.ed.gov.nl.ca/edu/sp/pcdbgl.htm
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20121120023228/http://www.ece.gov.nt.ca/Divisions/kindergarten_g12/curriculum/Elementary_Junior_Secondary_School_Handbook/Elementary_Junior_Secondary_School_Handbook.htm to http://www.ece.gov.nt.ca/Divisions/kindergarten_g12/curriculum/Elementary_Junior_Secondary_School_Handbook/Elementary_Junior_Secondary_School_Handbook.htm
 * Added tag to http://www.sasked.gov.sk.ca/branches/curr/index.shtml
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Repeats on the article
The article has repeats of several countries. Can someone look into this issue? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 35.2.69.34 (talk) 22:32, 7 November 2019 (UTC)


 * The duplicate sections are removed. —ADavidB 09:57, 8 November 2019 (UTC)

Complete restructuring
I propose four major changes to the article, in descending order of importance.
 * 1. All country tables follow this standardized column order (which could be reused in other wikipedia projects and as a template on each Education in X article):
 * Local language (Main level | Grade) | English language equivalent (Main level | Grade) | ISCED 2011 level | Age range | Obligatory | Note.
 * Local language and English language equivalent would be the top row, and Main level and Grade would be nested within these.
 * Obliatory takes a single response set. I suggest Yes/No/Depends.
 * All non-grade specific notes would go to the paragraph above the table.
 * The table title would inlink to the Education in X-article. Any other information such as "valid from YYYY" is moved to the paragraph. If there is a noteworthy transition, another (temporary) table can be kept of the old system.
 * I would also be open for exemptions to Canada's provinces.
 * Additional standardized information for a handful of countries, e.g. "Final exam" in the table for England, Wales and Northern Ireland can be added at the furthest right-side.
 * However, I would split the Free-paying independent schools part of the latter table into a new table, so that each system has its own table. It is not unnecessary much repetition of information given the size of the article.
 * 2. The article introduction only needs a reference to International Standard Classification of Education, which is humanity's best effort at standardizing these descriptions. Nothing else is needed. The 2-stage system and 3-stage system columns in the introductory table are not in line with ISCED 2011, and are clearly written from a particular country perspective (*cough, US). I struggly to see any other information in the introduction worth keeping that is not better elaborated in the ISCED article. Though I could be open for a copy of the original ISCED table.
 * 3. Article title is changed to "Educational stages by country", as this is what it currently is.
 * 4. Heading Alternative school structures is renamed International schools and placed at the bottom. There may be alternative school structures that is only relevant for a single country. Sudbury schools is more an example of an international school system. Later we can expect Montessori, Waldorf, etc to be added. Sda030 (talk) 20:36, 15 February 2022 (UTC)