London schools failing to teach pupils the three Rs

Barking & Dagenham - Havering

Hillingdon - Westminster

Borough performance table & the best and worst schools

It comes as secondary school league tables published today by the Evening Standard (see above) show that grammars dominate the top positions, while many of Tony Blair's flagship city academies are to be found at the bottom.

The tables show that dozens of London comprehensives failed to hit a crucial government target last year. This was to ensure at least 50 per cent of their 14-yearolds achieved Level 5, as the minimum standard of their age is known, in all three national curriculum test subjects.

In three boroughs - Haringey, Southwark and Wandsworth - as many as 40 per cent of schools failed to reach this "floor target".

Wandsworth's schools have a good reputation and a council spokesman said the borough was dragged down by the performance of one school, John Paul II, which has been officially failed by education watchdog Ofsted.

A further six boroughs saw up to 30 per cent of secondary schools miss that target in the Key Stage 3 tests, as those taken by 14-year-olds are called. In all, 18 of London's 32 authorities saw at least 10 per cent of their schools under-perform according to this measure.

Haringey's results were dragged down by schools including White Hart Lane in Tottenham, which was the worst-scoring comprehensive in London last year for 14-year-olds' results.

At White Hart Lane, just 27 per cent of pupils reached Level 5 in English, 35 per cent in maths and 29 per cent in science last year. The school became famous when it ditched parallel lessons taught in Turkish, introduced to accelerate the progress of pupils who speak little English.

The Academy at Peckham was the fifth worst school in London at Key Stage 3 last year, while Knights Academy in Lewisham was 14th from bottom, the West London Academy in Ealing 28th.

At the other end of the scale, Chislehurst and Sidcup Grammar School in Bexley was celebrating success as London's best school for 14-year-olds' results.

The school's head Dr Joe Vitagliano said the school tried to "embed" the three Rs in every subject in the first three years, while educating the "whole child" at the same time.

Nationally, attainment in English fell back, with 73 per cent of 14-year-olds reaching the standard expected of their age, down from 74 per cent in 2005.

The national maths score rose three points to 77 per cent, and there was a twopoint improvement in science, up to 72 per cent.