Screens/Tech in Schools: iReady

[Anonymous]

There's been a lot of conversation on these forums recently about use of screens in DCPS and Charters. Here's a concrete thing you can do. iReady is up for renewal. You can read an open letter about why it's terrible here: https://schoolsbeyondscreensdc.substack.com/p/i-ready-disapproval?r=181scs&utm_campaign=post&utm=&triedRedirect=true

E-mail your council member using this template: https://docs.google.com/document/d/19xVcDEw5gm2CGm4kNuqnjUyl0ws4I7eaHsXrpbZesWc/edit?tab=t.0

And, if you want to go further, you can submit written testimony here (today is the final day): https://docs.google.com/document/d/19xVcDEw5gm2CGm4kNuqnjUyl0ws4I7eaHsXrpbZesWc/edit?tab=t.0

[Anonymous]

One thing to keep in mind: At least for middle school, online math *homework* is useful because it gives immediate feedback, explanation, and examples (even on complicated stuff). That's better than a student turning in an assignment on paper and then learning days later that he didn't know what he was doing.

So, yes, I agree to get rid of the use of ALL of this stuff in the classroom with the teacher, but I would leave room for math homework online.

So if not i-Ready, there are alternatives, but which one?

[Anonymous]

Im very anti-screen and chose a lowtech middle school (BASIS). however, i kind of feel like iReady was the one actually useful thing they did in their DCPS elementary school, since it allows kids to work on their own level. My kids genuinely learned some math through iReady.

[Anonymous]

Hmm, i watched my kid do iready and it didn't let him go back and work through mistakes? it was also not possible for teachers to pull up past assignment to see where he was making mistakes and needed help. Seemed like a black hole of information. IXL and Khan academy are both better. iready also doesn't let you quickly answer and forces you to sit through animations.

[Anonymous]

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/education/iready-school-software-faces-parent-teacher-student-fury-rcna342850

[Anonymous]

Every kid is different.

My oldest I felt got good repetition and practice with IReady. Helped a little and didn't hurt.

My younger seemed to get worse everytime she went on, but if you had her do the same problems on paper she would get them right. Her brain just seems to shut off when she looks at a screen. Affects her test scores too.

As with everything we have gone to the extreme with screens. There is likely a sweet spot between lugging Chromebooks home every day to complete all schoolwork/testing to never using an educational app. But society doesn't seem to do reasonable nowadays.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Hmm, i watched my kid do iready and it didn't let him go back and work through mistakes? it was also not possible for teachers to pull up past assignment to see where he was making mistakes and needed help. Seemed like a black hole of information. IXL and Khan academy are both better. iready also doesn't let you quickly answer and forces you to sit through animations.

Delta Math is decent.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Hmm, i watched my kid do iready and it didn't let him go back and work through mistakes? it was also not possible for teachers to pull up past assignment to see where he was making mistakes and needed help. Seemed like a black hole of information. IXL and Khan academy are both better. iready also doesn't let you quickly answer and forces you to sit through animations.

all this

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hmm, i watched my kid do iready and it didn't let him go back and work through mistakes? it was also not possible for teachers to pull up past assignment to see where he was making mistakes and needed help. Seemed like a black hole of information. IXL and Khan academy are both better. iready also doesn't let you quickly answer and forces you to sit through animations.

all this

On the teacher dash board we can see how they did on the quiz and theoretically troubleshoot with them. Realistically it’s only when the program flags them as red for missing two consecutive lessons. Otherwise it’s just on autopilot.

[Anonymous]

I think Edtech is very useful for differentiation and use at home to some extent. It should not replace in-class lessons from teachers in the vast majority of cases (e.g., I'm fine with lab simulations when the real experiments are inaccessible, but obviously that's an outlier example use case).

I actually think the problem is not iready (although I'm all for making sure we're using the best available Edtech and/or asking Edtech companies to make the changes -- like going back to see incorrect answers -- we'd like to see), but how DCPS came to over-rely on it to teach on grade level core curriculum in the first instance. That should not be what it's for.

[Anonymous]

Also, just to add that of all the digital platforms used by my Dcps middle school, Iready is the only one that actively teaches remedial skills. Delta math is sort of up to the teacher but typically follows grade level content, Zearn pretty strictly follows the grade level content. All of them have weaknesses though and are probably overused

[Anonymous]

iready was never designed to give student feedback it’s for instructional feedback, so using it for that isn’t what it was created for.

So is it better than giving teacher more time or hiring another person? Look into why they are being sued.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Also, just to add that of all the digital platforms used by my Dcps middle school, Iready is the only one that actively teaches remedial skills. Delta math is sort of up to the teacher but typically follows grade level content, Zearn pretty strictly follows the grade level content. All of them have weaknesses though and are probably overused

But iReady doesn’t align with grade level content taught in DCPS. Kids are tested on stuff they aren’t learning in class. So what’s the point?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Also, just to add that of all the digital platforms used by my Dcps middle school, Iready is the only one that actively teaches remedial skills. Delta math is sort of up to the teacher but typically follows grade level content, Zearn pretty strictly follows the grade level content. All of them have weaknesses though and are probably overused

Zearn is *painful*. My kids hated it most of all.