Did you get a report card for your MCPS Elementary School kid yet?

[Anonymous]

*kids'

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No ES grades all year for my third grader who is going to an HGC in the fall.

I have heard this from a few people, and as the parent of a rising third grader, I find it comforting. Our school does not seem to give out ES in academic areas, and we were concerned that DS's straight P grades would be compared and found lacking when up against those whose schools are generous with ES.

[Anonymous]

I am just sad when I look at my child's report card. Only for the simple fact that I miss the traditional A,B,C,D. I don't care what his grades are as I don't understand them at all. I just know he improved from the start of school until he ended, through my own observations.

[Anonymous]

This report card is meaningless. Not even written comments from the teacher.

[Anonymous]

All Ps but one I. Except for the one I, this report card tells me nothing. Shameful. Bring back the comments.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:according to my kid's report cards my K -er is reading at the same level as my second grader, which is ridiculously inaccurate.

I understand that the "reading" level is computed with comprehension questions on age-appropriate content, not merely decoding text. So maybe your Kindergartener scored well for comprehension that day and your second grader did not.

My second grader, who reads grown up books, has wonderful expression and fluency and decodes exceptionally well for his age, scored just below grade-level because he has trouble understanding or responding to comprehension questions. Even though he can correctly understand the books he reads! So this summer I decided we were going to work on reading and verbal comprehension. He has no problems with these that I can see per his summer workbooks, so I have no idea how they got his grade!

I also think this grading system is very murky.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:according to my kid's report cards my K -er is reading at the same level as my second grader, which is ridiculously inaccurate.

I understand that the "reading" level is computed with comprehension questions on age-appropriate content, not merely decoding text. So maybe your Kindergartener scored well for comprehension that day and your second grader did not.

My second grader, who reads grown up books, has wonderful expression and fluency and decodes exceptionally well for his age, scored just below grade-level because he has trouble understanding or responding to comprehension questions. Even though he can correctly understand the books he reads! So this summer I decided we were going to work on reading and verbal comprehension. He has no problems with these that I can see per his summer workbooks, so I have no idea how they got his grade!

I also think this grading system is very murky.

I think this is a common issue with string readers in second and third grade. They comprehend all the facts in the book, but the comprehension questions are more abstract with the more challenging books. So they have to understand an abstract question, figure out the answer, and put it in writing. Lots of kids struggle with it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This report card is meaningless. Not even written comments from the teacher.

I agree. My DD is only in K, but her report card has all P's on it. No comments. I assume that back when A-D was used it wasn't in K, but still. I cannot tell a thing from this report card. It just shows me what to expect for the future, which is basically a lack of information about what my child actually learned in school. I wpnder if I will ever get used to this system.

[Anonymous]

I am a PP whose child got all Ps. I have a good idea of what that means, because I saw lots of graded work brought home. I saw that getting only a couple of questions wrong out of ten or leaving out a couple of details meant an I on any given assignment. So, the grades were not a surprise to me, and I do have a good idea of the material covered this year. I still don't like the report cards though because I think the amount of information parents receive is totally dependent on the teacher. I know other families in our same school who never saw their children's graded work during the school year.
Did other posters receive a good amount of graded work throughout the year, or was our teacher a renegade?

[Anonymous]

My 2nd grader got all ps except for an I in reading and music? I don't understand either, especially reading, since his reading level is above grade level. Also, the learning skills section is possibly the dumbest thing ever. Synthesis? He is demonstrating in synthesis?

Do we really need grades in specials?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No ES grades all year for my third grader who is going to an HGC in the fall.

+ 1

[Anonymous]

We did receive a lot of graded work back over the year in our class so the slate of Ps was not surprising but doesn't reflect the differences in my child's relative strengths. At Q3, I did ask for, and received, written comments from the teacher. But I think the report cards do a disservice to families who don't ask for comments.

[Anonymous]

I believe that the reading level is based on M-class testing, which consists of a leveled reader and then written questions. Seems the key is providing a lot of details from the story. My son struggled with this a long time even though he started K at level 16+. I think the breakthrough was when he finally stopped hating to write and took the time to fully answer the questions on the test.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:according to my kid's report cards my K -er is reading at the same level as my second grader, which is ridiculously inaccurate.

I understand that the "reading" level is computed with comprehension questions on age-appropriate content, not merely decoding text. So maybe your Kindergartener scored well for comprehension that day and your second grader did not.

My second grader, who reads grown up books, has wonderful expression and fluency and decodes exceptionally well for his age, scored just below grade-level because he has trouble understanding or responding to comprehension questions. Even though he can correctly understand the books he reads! So this summer I decided we were going to work on reading and verbal comprehension. He has no problems with these that I can see per his summer workbooks, so I have no idea how they got his grade!

I also think this grading system is very murky.

I think one issue for younger children is that they are not necessarily reading for comprehension if the are not interested in the book. They also may not understand the seriousness of the exercise, be shy or think its a game. It will all hash out in the end.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This report card is meaningless. Not even written comments from the teacher.

I agree. My DD is only in K, but her report card has all P's on it. No comments. I assume that back when A-D was used it wasn't in K, but still. I cannot tell a thing from this report card. It just shows me what to expect for the future, which is basically a lack of information about what my child actually learned in school. I wpnder if I will ever get used to this system.

I'm the parent of a child who just finished 3rd grade. For grades K-2, we had O (Outstanding), S (Satisfactory), N (Needs improvement). I think there was also an "I" (Incomplete) grade, but we never got that. ABCD started in 3rd grade, but this year we had the 2.0 report card. We got very few comments in grades 1-2, even though there was a separate teacher form for comments. We did get comments in K.

No comments this year.

If I were in your situation, I'd take comfort that your child's teachers will have already been using the 2.0 grading scheme for a couple of years before your daughter gets to that grade. We've been the guinea pig the last two years (2011-12 as roll-out in 2nd grade with the old report card and this past year as roll-out in the 3rd grade with the new report card).