Are you happy with your kid’s English/writing instruction?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here. Upper elementary, looking at middle schools. My kid is doing well. I just am concerned with the writing instruction and the movement to read fewer full books. Looking to see what our options are for moving somewhere else where the public schools do it better or switching to private.

What kind of curriculum are they using? What work is sent home?

3rd grade here and private school is using a very old school basal reader approach with grammar worksheets and “Correct the mistakes” exercises. I don’t love it all, but have to admit that DD’s spelling and writing have improved a lot. Public uses Lucy Calkins based approach and very little writing, no grammar/spelling at all. Very few public schools are still reading full chapter books together.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have a middle school and high schooler, public school. Yes, instruction in writing is practically non existent until AP English.

I don’t understand posts like this. I believe you, but my question is how it’s possible? And how do students suddenly catch up or keep up in 10th or 11th, while also prepping for SATs and writing college apps? Because I’m assuming at least SOME kids are receiving some kind of writing instruction earlier than that (through tutors, better school curriculum, etc), wouldn’t they have a huge leg up?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Public elementary - was not happy, except with the first grade teacher who of her own initiative taught herself how to teach phonics. She was awesome. Other than that, the kids were given sub-standard, non-evidence based language arts instruction.

Private elementary - much happier. The official curriculum is in some ways not much better than public (there's still too much Lucy Calkins influence), but it includes explicit teaching of spelling, grammar, and how to structure a paragraph. There are whole class novels. There are five paragraph essays.

Private middle - quite happy, backfilled a lot of gaps created in public elementary.

But this is the stereotype about public v. private these days, of course. Private will teach your kid to read and write. Public won't. But public high school will generally have better STEM education simply by having higher numbers of kids who are prepared for it, except when compared to the most high achieving, hard-to-get-into privates.

How important is it to have top notch STEM though? I keep hearing AI and international talents are filling in the tech and science sectors. Isn’t it better going forward to have kids competent in Calc level math and Biology/Chem/Physics and be able to write and think critically, versus not being able to read full books or write well but able to code a game or build a robot?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My daughter, in advanced 7th grade English, was told to make an Instagram post about a book she read. NOT HAPPY. Too many powerpoint presentations, not enough essays.

Yikes!

So I wouldn't be happy about the social media piece of this at all but I wouldn't mind the genre and format-switching. I feel like kids end up being resistant to the word "essay" so anytime you mix it up and give them some other format to write in, it helps. For example, writing a series of journal entries about a fictional historical character in order to demonstrate knowledge of historical events.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have a middle school and high schooler, public school. Yes, instruction in writing is practically non existent until AP English.

I don’t understand posts like this. I believe you, but my question is how it’s possible? And how do students suddenly catch up or keep up in 10th or 11th, while also prepping for SATs and writing college apps? Because I’m assuming at least SOME kids are receiving some kind of writing instruction earlier than that (through tutors, better school curriculum, etc), wouldn’t they have a huge leg up?

I don't get it either. If students aren't writing, and they're not reading books, what do they actually do all day?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have a middle school and high schooler, public school. Yes, instruction in writing is practically non existent until AP English.

I don’t understand posts like this. I believe you, but my question is how it’s possible? And how do students suddenly catch up or keep up in 10th or 11th, while also prepping for SATs and writing college apps? Because I’m assuming at least SOME kids are receiving some kind of writing instruction earlier than that (through tutors, better school curriculum, etc), wouldn’t they have a huge leg up?

I don't get it either. If students aren't writing, and they're not reading books, what do they actually do all day?

I know what they do (screens, group "work," SEL, "skills based work and assessments"), but I want to know how does this lead to top high school and college students? My area touts the public high schools as among the top 1000 public high schools in the country, but how can this be true if the kids are on Chromebooks for much of the day and not actually reading full books or writing essays until 10th grade?

[Anonymous]

My kids go to a Spanish language school on the weekends and have been learning about parts of speech, with a focus on nouns. In helping her with her Spanish school homework I discovered that while she knew what a substantivo was in Spanish she did not know what a noun was in English. DCPS 4th grade.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have a middle school and high schooler, public school. Yes, instruction in writing is practically non existent until AP English.

I don’t understand posts like this. I believe you, but my question is how it’s possible? And how do students suddenly catch up or keep up in 10th or 11th, while also prepping for SATs and writing college apps? Because I’m assuming at least SOME kids are receiving some kind of writing instruction earlier than that (through tutors, better school curriculum, etc), wouldn’t they have a huge leg up?

I don't get it either. If students aren't writing, and they're not reading books, what do they actually do all day?

I know what they do (screens, group "work," SEL, "skills based work and assessments"), but I want to know how does this lead to top high school and college students? My area touts the public high schools as among the top 1000 public high schools in the country, but how can this be true if the kids are on Chromebooks for much of the day and not actually reading full books or writing essays until 10th grade?

what school is this? Our kids had to write paragraphs and essays since first grade and onward due to the stupid Calkins writing workshop. Our kids also have to read chapter books in book groups since fourth grade. They also read the boring 2 page passages with SOL questions afterward. So they do get reading and writing, but the writing instruction didn’t become structured and formal until 7th grade. And, they missed learning formal grammar so were not taught parts of speech and sentence diagramming. It’s a hodge podge and poorly taught English. —FCPS parent who has supplemented for a decade

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Public elementary - was not happy, except with the first grade teacher who of her own initiative taught herself how to teach phonics. She was awesome. Other than that, the kids were given sub-standard, non-evidence based language arts instruction.

Private elementary - much happier. The official curriculum is in some ways not much better than public (there's still too much Lucy Calkins influence), but it includes explicit teaching of spelling, grammar, and how to structure a paragraph. There are whole class novels. There are five paragraph essays.

Private middle - quite happy, backfilled a lot of gaps created in public elementary.

But this is the stereotype about public v. private these days, of course. Private will teach your kid to read and write. Public won't. But public high school will generally have better STEM education simply by having higher numbers of kids who are prepared for it, except when compared to the most high achieving, hard-to-get-into privates.

How important is it to have top notch STEM though? I keep hearing AI and international talents are filling in the tech and science sectors. Isn’t it better going forward to have kids competent in Calc level math and Biology/Chem/Physics and be able to write and think critically, versus not being able to read full books or write well but able to code a game or build a robot?

Good question. The skills that give someone an advantage with large language models are literacy and critical thinking not STEM.

That's the huge irony. LLM's (ie: AI) take the STEM out of tech.

[Anonymous]

I am finally thrilled this year (4th grade). The teacher is very old school and experienced, and happens to have been an English major. All the basic fundamentals are finally being covered. Grammar, spelling, reading comprehension, proof reading...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am finally thrilled this year (4th grade). The teacher is very old school and experienced, and happens to have been an English major. All the basic fundamentals are finally being covered. Grammar, spelling, reading comprehension, proof reading...

What school?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have a middle school and high schooler, public school. Yes, instruction in writing is practically non existent until AP English.

I don’t understand posts like this. I believe you, but my question is how it’s possible? And how do students suddenly catch up or keep up in 10th or 11th, while also prepping for SATs and writing college apps? Because I’m assuming at least SOME kids are receiving some kind of writing instruction earlier than that (through tutors, better school curriculum, etc), wouldn’t they have a huge leg up?

I don't get it either. If students aren't writing, and they're not reading books, what do they actually do all day?

They play stupid “educational” games on their Chromebooks

[Anonymous]

They do Lexia on the computer. No formal English like yesteryear.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have a middle school and high schooler, public school. Yes, instruction in writing is practically non existent until AP English.

I don’t understand posts like this. I believe you, but my question is how it’s possible? And how do students suddenly catch up or keep up in 10th or 11th, while also prepping for SATs and writing college apps? Because I’m assuming at least SOME kids are receiving some kind of writing instruction earlier than that (through tutors, better school curriculum, etc), wouldn’t they have a huge leg up?

I don't get it either. If students aren't writing, and they're not reading books, what do they actually do all day?

I know what they do (screens, group "work," SEL, "skills based work and assessments"), but I want to know how does this lead to top high school and college students? My area touts the public high schools as among the top 1000 public high schools in the country, but how can this be true if the kids are on Chromebooks for much of the day and not actually reading full books or writing essays until 10th grade?

what school is this? Our kids had to write paragraphs and essays since first grade and onward due to the stupid Calkins writing workshop. Our kids also have to read chapter books in book groups since fourth grade. They also read the boring 2 page passages with SOL questions afterward. So they do get reading and writing, but the writing instruction didn’t become structured and formal until 7th grade. And, they missed learning formal grammar so were not taught parts of speech and sentence diagramming. It’s a hodge podge and poorly taught English. —FCPS parent who has supplemented for a decade

Sentence diagramming?? I don't think that's been commonly taught in public schools in several decades. Parts of speech they will learn when they learn foreign language.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am finally thrilled this year (4th grade). The teacher is very old school and experienced, and happens to have been an English major. All the basic fundamentals are finally being covered. Grammar, spelling, reading comprehension, proof reading...

How old is the teacher? My worry is that this kind of teacher (old school, traditional, love of English) is dying out. Most teachers teaching K-5 right now were going through college or getting their ED degree in the Balanced Literacy / Workshop + EdTech way of teaching, not grammar, spelling, reading actual books kind of teaching.