RIP DC Schools
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Anonymous
I like that approach. I don't mind them hiring special teachers though. |
Anonymous
Likely only because the teachers modified the curriculum. There’s also a great free reading curriculum from Great Minds but we aren’t allowed to use it. Have to use DCPS designed unit plans that require hours of modification just to make sense. There is a pilot so hopefully in a few years... |
Anonymous
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Mediocrity for all. No standards, no rigor for certain high schools. No baseline proficiency to take honors classes in honors for all. Everyone can play, come on in.
Now let’s take some of the PTO money in helping the schools and funnel it to the corrupt, incompetent central office. I’m sure it will be gone down the black hole there. You really can’t get a better set of incompetent people to bring down what is already the embarrassingly low academic school system that is DCPS. When you think the bar can’t get lower, it does. |
Anonymous
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I had forgotten about Honors For All!
What happened to Deal for all? |
Anonymous
I hope there's no social studies. 2nd graders should be learning their letters along with numbers. The only stories they need to hear come from children's books. |
Anonymous
Np: Glad you aren’t an educator, PP. That’s not how learning works. |
Anonymous
| What’s the deal with social studies? Which curriculum is dc piloting? |
Anonymous
Lol. If kids don't know their letter and numbers long before second grade, we have big problems. |
Anonymous
How do you know? Learning US Government in 2nd grade in not age-appropriate. |
Anonymous
As we have less time we’ve switched from teaching “social studies” to teaching “history and government.” It’s “integrated” into language arts reading instruction. Kids no longer get time to learn maps skills, community rights and responsibilities, continents, countries, states, etc. It may be mentioned but isn’t explicitly taught like we likely had growing up. |
Anonymous
Huh? Of course it is. They learn basics, like that the Constitution is the document that sets up our government and that the Capitol (you know, that big building right over there...) is where laws get made. In their daily lives, children in DC encounter a lot more manifestations of government — federal and local (tax dollars pay for schools and for garbage service!) than they do farm animals! (how many DC kids have actually heard a cow moo?) For the “letters and numbers” poster, reading requires general knowledge of the world around you. That knowledge gives you context and vocabulary. A kid will never get past reading about farm animals if they don’t have a broad enough base of knowledge for other reading to make sense. In any event |
Anonymous
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The problem is that DC, like virtually every other school district, has adopted Common Core.
There are no standards for elementary social studies. It does NOT mean that districts can't require or introduce it. As a PP said, these concepts are supposed to be worked into the reading curriculum. http://www.corestandards.org/ELA-Literacy/RH/introduction/ |
Anonymous
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I've seen some ignorant and lazy threads on DCUM, but this one takes the cake. What a ridiculous collection of misunderstood, made-up and taken out of context nonsense.
There's plenty to complain about in DCPS, but this generalized bitching based on no information is absurd. |
Anonymous
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To clarify a few things mentioned:
1. Social studies standards: DC has social studies standards for PK-12th grade. They were last revised and adopted in 2006, but the DC State Board of Education has a working group exploring whether to update the standards. The social studies standards primarily include the disciplines of history, civics/government, geography, and economics. 2. Social studies curriculum: DCPS provides a social studies curriculum for Kindergarten through 5th grade that has been developed in collaboration between teachers and the central office. This curriculum provides guidance to teachers/schools on how to use the DC state social studies standards to organize the year into units of study, with recommendations for assessments, lessons, and resources to support teaching. Teachers have had opportunities to learn about the curriculum since it rolled out in 2017-2018 and they can access detailed Unit Guides with linked resources via the Canvas learning management system that houses all DCPS curriculum. Parents can check out the Parent Curriculum Guides to learn more about the DCPS curriculum for social studies and other content areas by clicking here: https://dcps.dc.gov/publication/parent-curriculum-guides 3. Social studies scheduling: DCPS guidance for elementary grades requires that social studies be taught to all students beginning in Kindergarten. The guidance has recently shifted to include more separate time for social studies (and science) beginning in Kindergarten and separate from an ELA block given that research increasingly points to the importance of knowledge-building for reading comprehension. In grades K-2, students in DCPS are required to receive English/Language Arts (120 minutes/day), Math (75 minutes/day), Science (45 minutes/day, for the equivalent of at least one semester), social studies (45 minutes/day, for the equivalent of at least one semester). For grades 3-5, students in DCPS are required to receive English/Language Arts (90 minutes/day), Math (90 minutes/day), Science (30 minutes/day for the full year), social studies (45 minutes/day, for the full year). While social studies and science topics are often addressed in the ELA units and literacy practices are integrated into science and SS instruction, they are supposed to be taught separately given the different instructional methods and curriculum for each discipline. Teachers and principals can often clarify questions about the schedule, standards, and curriculum, or more information can be found on the DCPS website. |
Anonymous
Thank you for posting this. At my ES school we just wrapped up the first part of a Social Studies Inquiry Group where we had a few representatives from each grade dig into the units on Canvas and try to identify the themes we can align through the grades. Starting in January after break we're building lesson plans to try out in the Spring and then hopefully roll out more in 2020/21. |