Regular classes vs AAP

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kids were not in AAP. They are now in high school and doing better than a lot of the kids who left their elementary school for the center AAP school. It’s not the be all end all.

Totally agree with you - but the point is that AAP shouldn't exist at all. The division and resentment it creates in elementary school is ridiculous and unnecessary. Flexible groupings is the way to go, as described in earlier posts.

Agree that flexible grouping is the way to go in elementary school.

But starting in middle school FCPS needs to allow for differentiation of ability by offering advanced math, science, foreign language course etc., taught by qualified teachers.

Instead of closing the gap by lowering the bar, each child should have an opportunity to reach their full potential.

Unfortunately , that will widen the achievement gap between the strongest and weakest student. But again the goal of public education must be to have every child reach their full potential, whatever that potential is, not to achieve equitable outcomes.

What you've just described *is* flexible grouping. One of the groups - for all core subjects - would be advanced/gifted. And kids would be able to cycle into and out of each level, as needed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kids were not in AAP. They are now in high school and doing better than a lot of the kids who left their elementary school for the center AAP school. It’s not the be all end all.

Totally agree with you - but the point is that AAP shouldn't exist at all. The division and resentment it creates in elementary school is ridiculous and unnecessary. Flexible groupings is the way to go, as described in earlier posts.

Agree that flexible grouping is the way to go in elementary school.

But starting in middle school FCPS needs to allow for differentiation of ability by offering advanced math, science, foreign language course etc., taught by qualified teachers.

Instead of closing the gap by lowering the bar, each child should have an opportunity to reach their full potential.

Unfortunately , that will widen the achievement gap between the strongest and weakest student. But again the goal of public education must be to have every child reach their full potential, whatever that potential is, not to achieve equitable outcomes.

Flexible grouping is all well and good as long as the kids aren't in the same class. I've only seen one teacher out of the many ES teachers my kids have had who could actually ability group within a classroom with any level of effectiveness. Excellent, even award winning teachers don't necessarily manage it. They have too much other junk to deal with.

You have to let different teachers teach the different groups. Sure, move kids around within tracks, but don't expect the same poor teacher to handle all of the tracks.

And as PPs keep saying, gifted education is mandated by the state. You can remove AAP and bring back GT or something, but you have to have something.

This is exactly what was just described, upthread. Each teacher in a team would take one level - so Teacher A would take advanced math kids, for example, while Teacher B would teach the middle group, etc. etc. for all subjects. No one is saying one teacher would have to differentiate all the different groups in his/her classroom. Refer to 22:50.

[Anonymous]

But nobody wants to teach the slow classes that most likely contain many of the troublemakers. Even in MS and up, teachers get a mix of Gen Ed, honors, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:But nobody wants to teach the slow classes that most likely contain many of the troublemakers. Even in MS and up, teachers get a mix of Gen Ed, honors, etc.

And that could be made more fair by giving Teacher A the advanced math kids, but the remedial language arts kids, Teacher B the advanced LA kids but the remedial math kids, etc. So that no one teacher is stuck teaching one level or the other.

[Anonymous]

Don’t worry OP, AAP will most likely go away. It will give the school board great please to get rid of it in the name of equity.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:All the AAP hate absolutely tells me it’s the right answer for my AAP kid.

Imagine trying to claim FCPS is pumping millions and millions of dollars and logistics challenges, and overhead into an advanced learning infrastructure that is really just some extra math….

Love this forum.

DP. FCPS doesn't spend millions on AAP but I agree that the hostility towards academically gifted kids makes AAP the right place for some kids to escape to, including mine.

The only reason there is hostility towards AAP kids is because this system exists, PP. If there wasn't such a huge differentiation, it it wasn't such a competitive process, there wouldn't be any hate. There was absolutely no hatred for children in the gifted program and children who were grouped into different language arts and math programs according to ability in the school system we moved here from. AAP is very different.

+1
I grew up in FCPS when there was an actual GT program - very tiny and very selective. No one was resentful of the few kids who were chosen to participate because it was obvious they *needed* a gifted learning environment. All the rest of the kids - from extremely bright to bright to average to below average - were in flexible groupings depending on their abilities. It worked for everyone and there was no HUGE group of yellow-bellied Sneetches vs another HUGE group of non-yellow-bellied Sneetches.

Our FCPS school is doing this - they call it the cluster model - and most families that were eligible to leave for the AAP center left to go there, and it is much better without an AAP program (there is still accelerated math, kids are grouped according to ability). I think all schools should go back to this way of doing things.

No, it was called tracking and is inequitable. Most of the impoverished and new arrivals at our Title 1 school would end up in the lower groups.

You mean to tell me that you believe that grouping kids by ability is problematic? That allowing Teachers to focus on a group of kids at the same general level and focus their attention on each group is problematic? Do you understand how ridiculous that sounds? How is placing kids in a classroom with 5 different levels, forcing the Teacher to divide their time and attention between 5 different groups, a good idea? The Teacher has to spend most of their time with the kids who are struggling so they kids who are ahead or are on level are left to do their own work with little to no guidance.

Is that fair because the kids who are on level or ahead get bored and end up slowing down so that the kids who are below grade level can catch them?

All kids deserve an education. We need to stop sacrificing kids who are on grade level or ahead in the name of maintaining optics that make people happy. The impoverished kids at any school need to be in classes that help them get to grade level without holding back the kids on grade level. Inclusion has not worked to close the education gap, it has only gotten larger. The education gap was increasing before COVID, COVID made it worse, but inclusion was failing before COVID. So we need to try something else.

I don’t think you understand. We need to take crates away from tall kids so short kids can see the baseball game.

The inclusive classroom isn’t working. The kids who start behind are continuing to fall behind. Maintaining this system is only hurting the kids who are on or ahead of grade level. It has not helped the kids who started behind. If you are so blind as to to see that the current paradigm is not doing anything to help the kids who start behind then I don’t know what to say to you.

Right, so why is it that we are separating out so-called advanced kids? Please explain to me how that benefits the kids who are behind??

It only benefits a handful of minority kids who are truly advanced and mostly upper middle class white and asian families who can afford tutoring and test prep. That's literally it.

Tracking benefits kids by meeting them at their level. LIV kids in their own class mean that the Teachers can meet the needs of those kids. It also means that a Teacher in a Gen Ed class does not need to prepare lesson plans for 7 groups of kids, only 4-5. If we used a real tracking system, Teachers would only have to meet the needs of 2-3 groups of kids instead of 5 groups.

But we won’t place kids into classes based on ability all around because we know that the kids in the lower tracks will be lower SES kids, typically Black and Hispanic, while kids in the middle track will be middle class kids that are of all colors, and higher track kids are more likely to middle income to higher income kids that are predominately White and Asian. We are petrified of that optic.

So we have a watered down advanced track that is predominately White and Asian and lump everyone else into one classroom in the name of inclusivity. The LIV class does not serve it’s intended purpose because parents prep kids on the tests to score higher because they are desperate to get their kids out of the Gen Ed classes. They are desperate to get their kids out of Gen Ed classrooms because Teachers are teaching to kids who are 2-3 years below grade level, kids on grade level, and a few kids who are ahead. Now the LIV class inclides kids who are 2-3 ahead and kids who are a year ahead in one area, which waters down that track. But that is still better then the Gen Ed classroom that is focused ont he kids who are 2-3 years behind.

The Teachers don’t have the time to teach to all the different groups. The kids who are far behind keep falling further behind. The kids on grade level do ok, some fall a bit behind some move a bit ahead. The kids who are ahead continue to be ahead because their parents are doing things at home or putting the kid in educational enrichment outside of school.

The current system doesn’t work. It doesn’t work for the kids behind or the kids who are ahead. But keep talking about removing crates so the kids without crates can see and pretending like the current “solution” is working.

I hate to say this, but the key to avoiding this situation is to buy a house zoned for an ES with very little SES diversity. There are a few. My kids go to an AAP center school with little diversity. One is in 4th grade Gen Ed, the other too young for AAP. I strongly suspect that the 4th grade Gen Ed classes are grouped by ability, for multiple reasons. Because there is little diversity in the first place, there are no bad optics created by doing this. The demographic makeup is similar across the classes.

Plenty of people in our ES have the money for private school. We are relatively poor compared to the other neighborhoods that feed into it. Some people do opt for private from middle school onward. I didn't fully grasp this what made our school "good" when we moved in with a baby and a preschooler, and just went by word of mouth. But I am realizing that most people probably like our ES because it is immune to some of the issues people are complaining about here.

We're also at a center school with low SES diversity and I also have had the hunch that my DC's 2nd grade classes are grouped by ability.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My kids were not in AAP. They are now in high school and doing better than a lot of the kids who left their elementary school for the center AAP school. It’s not the be all end all.

That's not surprising, especially considering that AAP is so watered down now that the objective standards (test scores) have been lowered in favor of teacher's ratings (which, according to the AAP equity report, favor students with lower test scores). I attended the old form of AAP (GT) in the 1990's, and the program was pretty rigorous and accommodated maybe 5% of the kids. What I see my DD doing in the same grade in AAP is pretty lame, to be honest. But her base school just missed the metric for Title I, so she would likely be ignored there. (Teachers there need to focus on children who might not otherwise pass the SOLs.)

If you are in a high SES school, your kid might be fine, especially since it's just grades 3-6.

Likewise, you are a parent who has the time or resources to supplement (I am a single mom with several kids so I cannot), you can do better than AAP by hiring a tutor or devoting time at home. Time can be an issue because the kids are in school for a large part of the day and if that's just child care/play group, it's a time suck that isn't getting used for an appropriate education. We do pay taxes toward the public schools, so one would think they should educate all kids, not just those in danger of failing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The state of Virginia has a law that gifted services must be offered. It's on the continuum of special education.

Sure - then a real GT program should be brought back for the very small minority of kids who are actually in need of gifted education. AAP is not gifted education.

AAP for 20% of the kids is just FCPS gaming the state regulation in the interests of its equity push. But it will continue for the years since the same group just got reelected.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The state of Virginia has a law that gifted services must be offered. It's on the continuum of special education.

Sure - then a real GT program should be brought back for the very small minority of kids who are actually in need of gifted education. AAP is not gifted education.

AAP for 20% of the kids is just FCPS gaming the state regulation in the interests of its equity push. But it will continue for the years since the same group just got reelected.

Yep. AAP for the masses rather than GT for the very select few is FCPS's version of "equity."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kids were not in AAP. They are now in high school and doing better than a lot of the kids who left their elementary school for the center AAP school. It’s not the be all end all.

Totally agree with you - but the point is that AAP shouldn't exist at all. The division and resentment it creates in elementary school is ridiculous and unnecessary. Flexible groupings is the way to go, as described in earlier posts.

Agree that flexible grouping is the way to go in elementary school.

But starting in middle school FCPS needs to allow for differentiation of ability by offering advanced math, science, foreign language course etc., taught by qualified teachers.

Instead of closing the gap by lowering the bar, each child should have an opportunity to reach their full potential.

Unfortunately , that will widen the achievement gap between the strongest and weakest student. But again the goal of public education must be to have every child reach their full potential, whatever that potential is, not to achieve equitable outcomes.

Flexible grouping is all well and good as long as the kids aren't in the same class. I've only seen one teacher out of the many ES teachers my kids have had who could actually ability group within a classroom with any level of effectiveness. Excellent, even award winning teachers don't necessarily manage it. They have too much other junk to deal with.

You have to let different teachers teach the different groups. Sure, move kids around within tracks, but don't expect the same poor teacher to handle all of the tracks.

And as PPs keep saying, gifted education is mandated by the state. You can remove AAP and bring back GT or something, but you have to have something.

I don't think you understand what flexible grouping is - children switch classrooms/teachers to be grouped with similar students for a subject matter. This happened when I was in elementary school in the late 80s. I would switch to a different teacher's room for for my math group.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kids were not in AAP. They are now in high school and doing better than a lot of the kids who left their elementary school for the center AAP school. It’s not the be all end all.

Totally agree with you - but the point is that AAP shouldn't exist at all. The division and resentment it creates in elementary school is ridiculous and unnecessary. Flexible groupings is the way to go, as described in earlier posts.

Agree that flexible grouping is the way to go in elementary school.

But starting in middle school FCPS needs to allow for differentiation of ability by offering advanced math, science, foreign language course etc., taught by qualified teachers.

Instead of closing the gap by lowering the bar, each child should have an opportunity to reach their full potential.

Unfortunately , that will widen the achievement gap between the strongest and weakest student. But again the goal of public education must be to have every child reach their full potential, whatever that potential is, not to achieve equitable outcomes.

Flexible grouping is all well and good as long as the kids aren't in the same class. I've only seen one teacher out of the many ES teachers my kids have had who could actually ability group within a classroom with any level of effectiveness. Excellent, even award winning teachers don't necessarily manage it. They have too much other junk to deal with.

You have to let different teachers teach the different groups. Sure, move kids around within tracks, but don't expect the same poor teacher to handle all of the tracks.

And as PPs keep saying, gifted education is mandated by the state. You can remove AAP and bring back GT or something, but you have to have something.

I don't think you understand what flexible grouping is - children switch classrooms/teachers to be grouped with similar students for a subject matter. This happened when I was in elementary school in the late 80s. I would switch to a different teacher's room for for my math group.

It also depends on how the grades needs are. Currently my grade has three teachers. Our current break down is 25 percent above, 5 percent on, 70 percent below.

It varies year/year. This year is probably the lowest group of kids I have seen in my career.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kids were not in AAP. They are now in high school and doing better than a lot of the kids who left their elementary school for the center AAP school. It’s not the be all end all.

Totally agree with you - but the point is that AAP shouldn't exist at all. The division and resentment it creates in elementary school is ridiculous and unnecessary. Flexible groupings is the way to go, as described in earlier posts.

Agree that flexible grouping is the way to go in elementary school.

But starting in middle school FCPS needs to allow for differentiation of ability by offering advanced math, science, foreign language course etc., taught by qualified teachers.

Instead of closing the gap by lowering the bar, each child should have an opportunity to reach their full potential.

Unfortunately , that will widen the achievement gap between the strongest and weakest student. But again the goal of public education must be to have every child reach their full potential, whatever that potential is, not to achieve equitable outcomes.

Flexible grouping is all well and good as long as the kids aren't in the same class. I've only seen one teacher out of the many ES teachers my kids have had who could actually ability group within a classroom with any level of effectiveness. Excellent, even award winning teachers don't necessarily manage it. They have too much other junk to deal with.

You have to let different teachers teach the different groups. Sure, move kids around within tracks, but don't expect the same poor teacher to handle all of the tracks.

And as PPs keep saying, gifted education is mandated by the state. You can remove AAP and bring back GT or something, but you have to have something.

I don't think you understand what flexible grouping is - children switch classrooms/teachers to be grouped with similar students for a subject matter. This happened when I was in elementary school in the late 80s. I would switch to a different teacher's room for for my math group.

It also depends on how the grades needs are. Currently my grade has three teachers. Our current break down is 25 percent above, 5 percent on, 70 percent below.

It varies year/year. This year is probably the lowest group of kids I have seen in my career.

Ours was most like this except 5% were above, 20% on grade, 70% below and 5% Sped (as in needing one on one supports).

[Anonymous]

Dp. It really sounds as if there is wide variation in AAP implementation, between/among the various FCPS ESs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kids were not in AAP. They are now in high school and doing better than a lot of the kids who left their elementary school for the center AAP school. It’s not the be all end all.

Totally agree with you - but the point is that AAP shouldn't exist at all. The division and resentment it creates in elementary school is ridiculous and unnecessary. Flexible groupings is the way to go, as described in earlier posts.

Agree that flexible grouping is the way to go in elementary school.

But starting in middle school FCPS needs to allow for differentiation of ability by offering advanced math, science, foreign language course etc., taught by qualified teachers.

Instead of closing the gap by lowering the bar, each child should have an opportunity to reach their full potential.

Unfortunately , that will widen the achievement gap between the strongest and weakest student. But again the goal of public education must be to have every child reach their full potential, whatever that potential is, not to achieve equitable outcomes.

Flexible grouping is all well and good as long as the kids aren't in the same class. I've only seen one teacher out of the many ES teachers my kids have had who could actually ability group within a classroom with any level of effectiveness. Excellent, even award winning teachers don't necessarily manage it. They have too much other junk to deal with.

You have to let different teachers teach the different groups. Sure, move kids around within tracks, but don't expect the same poor teacher to handle all of the tracks.

And as PPs keep saying, gifted education is mandated by the state. You can remove AAP and bring back GT or something, but you have to have something.

I don't think you understand what flexible grouping is - children switch classrooms/teachers to be grouped with similar students for a subject matter. This happened when I was in elementary school in the late 80s. I would switch to a different teacher's room for for my math group.

+1
Same here, and it worked fine. Many/most kids are advanced in some subjects but not in others. This allows all kids to learn in the best way possible without dividing into two huge groups for everything.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Don’t worry OP, AAP will most likely go away. It will give the school board great please to get rid of it in the name of equity.

DOE/VA law requires that FCPS have gifted education.

It doesn't have to be a separate program, so they could make AAP go away, but they have to offer something.