I don't think you can go without streaming at the high school level, and I'm skeptical of whether it's a good idea even at the middle school level. Kids' ability levels vary so widely that you simply cannot present the same curriculum to all students and meet all those students' needs. Streaming allows each class to include students of a less varied range of ability levels, and IMO, while some individualization will still be necessary (especially if students have to be in the same stream for every subject), the lower degree of variation in ability will most likely make it possible to present some lessons and administer some tests to the whole class. That can't be done in middle school and high school classes that include kids of all ability levels without failing to meet the needs of students in the highest and lowest ranges of ability.
Look at what happened when grade nine was destreamed under the NDP in Ontario. The material was made less difficult in order to cater to the lowest common denominator among non-special ed students. Smart kids in those classes were bored out of their minds. In my experience, that's the usual result of a non-streamed setting--the teacher presents material at a difficulty level that most of the class can grasp, which means it's too easy for the smartest half of the class and too hard for the few least able students.
I don't buy that all or almost all students are able to learn, say, calculus. If all students are streamed into a setting where calculus is taught, there are two possibilities. One is that you'll have what happened at the beginning of the transition to the new curriculum in Ontario, when there wasn't a low-end special ed stream and grade 9 applied math was harder than the previous grade 9 destreamed had been--kids drop out because they can't do the work. The other is that because many of the kids can't handle the material, the class will gradually be dumbed down until nobody gets to do calculus at all, and the smart kids who could have done it aren't prepared for university.
I do think that the recent advances in differentiated instruction are a very good thing, but it's just not plausible to me that it can be the best thing to keep kids who need completely different curricula in the same classroom.
no subject
Look at what happened when grade nine was destreamed under the NDP in Ontario. The material was made less difficult in order to cater to the lowest common denominator among non-special ed students. Smart kids in those classes were bored out of their minds. In my experience, that's the usual result of a non-streamed setting--the teacher presents material at a difficulty level that most of the class can grasp, which means it's too easy for the smartest half of the class and too hard for the few least able students.
I don't buy that all or almost all students are able to learn, say, calculus. If all students are streamed into a setting where calculus is taught, there are two possibilities. One is that you'll have what happened at the beginning of the transition to the new curriculum in Ontario, when there wasn't a low-end special ed stream and grade 9 applied math was harder than the previous grade 9 destreamed had been--kids drop out because they can't do the work. The other is that because many of the kids can't handle the material, the class will gradually be dumbed down until nobody gets to do calculus at all, and the smart kids who could have done it aren't prepared for university.
I do think that the recent advances in differentiated instruction are a very good thing, but it's just not plausible to me that it can be the best thing to keep kids who need completely different curricula in the same classroom.