So over APS
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Anonymous
I used to be fine with APS because I thought that as long as my kids were having a good experience at school, I was happy with it, and I have a high HHI and lots of degrees so my kids will eventually wind up fine. But then I heard what was going on in class and was soooo disappointed with the curriculum. I think the kids should have gone back to school earlier but that wasn’t even my main issue because it was a difficult call to make. But I felt like my kid just wasn’t learning anything from school. Math was okay because DS had a good math teacher but I just cannot stand the idea that my child is spending 7 hours in school learning stuff like captions, and then being expected to write a book (A LITERAL BOOK WITH CHAPTERS AND A TABLE OF CONTENTS AND EVERYTHING) when he had never learned to write a good paragraph. Plus there was no feedback on any of the writing he worked so hard on. I knew that they didn’t learn much science or social studies but I just found the hours and hours of reading and math instruction depressing. Now I get that both things are true: my kid will do fine in life no matter what, and APS curriculum sucks and should be changed. |
Anonymous
Why are you so convinced that your “kid will do fine in life no matter what ....”? I hear that a lot in Arlington. What is it? Delusional thinking? Privilege? Entitlement? The notion that a certain HHI guarantees one a place on top of the hierarchy in the future? All of those things strike me as out of step with equity. |
Anonymous
And though it was once better, it’s not like it was great. |
Anonymous
Usually people that say stuff like this: 1) Have no background in education or child development, but they went to school so they think they know everything 2) Are the type that always find fault complain, no matter what- will never be pleased 3) Want APS to do things like their schools did when they were growing up thirty years ago, like spending a lot of time on penmanship, which I think is pointless nowadays 4) Actually contribute to the problems in APS, because of the inordinate amount of staff time they take up with said complaints. If their kids, who usually hate school, too (surprise) don’t do well, it’s everyone else’s fault. They undermine their teachers and water down the rigor |
Anonymous
The fact that the HHI and income level of parents is highly correlated with how well their children do in life is inequitable, of course, but it is reality. While causation hasn’t been established, there are hundreds of studies that demonstrate the correlation. Just google it. And I don’t mean to say that my kid will do fine literally no matter what; of course if I abuse him or something he will not. But the particulars of his elementary education (homeschool, private school, public school—regardless of the curriculum), will not have a major impact on his long-term success. |
Anonymous
Ooh. This will be interesting. Two bitter souls united in their disdain and criticism of their child’s teachers, the curriculum, and all of APS. However, one brings *parenting* into it. Her kid will be fine, because she’s rich and educated. Getting my popcorn… |
Anonymous
You know, most parents do not have a background in education or child development. Does that really mean we don’t have a right to question the decisions of APS or that our opinions are always suspect? Or is it okay to have an opinion as long as we don’t actually take our concerns to the school? |
Anonymous
Sorry to disappoint, but I have distain for neither APS nor my kids’ teachers. In fact I think their teachers have been amazing and have don’t a great job in spite of the lackluster curriculum APS uses. It is possible to say that kids should learn how to write a good topic sentence before they are asked to write a book without hating the teachers. And again, I don’t really fault APS for how they handled the pandemic. I think that based on the information we had at the time, APS made reasonable choices. But enjoy your popcorn. 
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Anonymous
Yeah, I mean you can find fault, but I’d like to know what you’re basing it off of. The stuff I usually hear is that parents want more homework, when the research doesn’t support it, textbooks, when the teachers are working hard and creating better lessons with the same information, discipline, rigor- but only if their kid does well, and it doesn’t apply to them. Or… they had one mediocre teacher in a system of 2,000, and that makes it all bad. I’m an APS teacher and parent. I’ve worked in other districts. The staff here is excellent, even objectively. I think APS is pretty damn good, so what are you basing your opinions off of? Oh… and some would say this historical year, in which we were affected by an unprecedented global pandemic. That’s not really fair, either. I care about what I do. I care about my kids’ education, which I believe is top-notch, AND I have studied and worked in the field of education for 15 years. |
Anonymous
Maybe I am a little sensitive, but it sounds like less of a curricular issue and maybe a bad choice on the part of the teacher. One bad choice. One of my kids had a not so great teacher last year, but I still think it was good for her, for other reasons. Like you, I didn’t complain. Also… two kids, one mediocre (not awful) teacher in the whole bit- not bad. She needed to work with him. It’s life. For the record, you are right about HHI and income level. Facts are facts. |
Anonymous
AND- I would complain, of course, if something really merited it. But nothing yet. One bad assignment? Probably not |
Anonymous
NP. I'm curious as to why that assignment was so bad. My children are in high school and I think the writing curriculum in APS is crap. So on the surface, writing a complete book sounds like an excellent assignment. To the parent complaining about it, you said your child hadn't learned to write a complete paragraph yet. Was that because none of the students had been taught how to write a paragraph yet - and perhaps they would learn as they worked through the book assignment? Or just that your child hadn't yet mastered writing a paragraph, or a paragraph to your standards and expectations? Did it occur to you that he would get lots of practice at writing paragraphs by writing a book? That writing lots of paragraphs and putting them together in the context of a larger assignment with different parts might be a way to make learning to write more interesting, to apply thinking and creativity and writing skills while further developing those skills? What did the teacher explain about the assignment when you brought your concerns to her? |
Anonymous
Wow, there are a lot of questions there. I will just sum up a response by saying that at the beginning of the year they were harping on students to write sentences (in response to questions about a story they were reading and isolated nonfiction paragraphs) that were at least five words long. That’s it. That’s was the only expectation they had for writing. The very next writing assignment was a book. (The focus of the assignment wasn’t really writing, it was text features. I am of the opinion that it is more important to have instruction on topic sentences than several days of learning what a caption is, but that’s neither here nor there.) It was not just my kid’s class. This was the curriculum for the entire third grade in the school. And I have seen other APS parents complain of the same thing. And this is just one example. During a parent teacher conference for my older child the teacher lamented that they didn’t have enough time to teach times tables so my kid, who hadn’t picked up on it as quickly as others, needed to practice it at home. They spent all the time at school learning how to do multiplication on the number line and with arrays etc. Also as to your point about the wisdom of writing a book before writing a paragraph: I disagree that a kid can kind of just pick up the skill of writing a topic sentence as they go. I think they need specific instruction in that skill. And for my kid, the experience of writing a book before knowing how to write a paragraph was extremely frustrating, and he is no better and writing paragraphs after the assignment. So yeah, it’s not the teacher, it’s the curriculum. |
Anonymous
| (And to be clear, most kids could not do times tables off the top of their head. Even 2s and 3s. They never had time to do drills, so two-digit multiplication was a struggle) |
Anonymous
They prioritize multiplication concepts over fact fluency. Fact fluency is grunt work that IMO is better done at home. Don't worry - 4th grade dives deep into paragraphs. The 3rd grade book was to understand the structure and features of a book. Different concepts. I have issues with APS but not with this stuff... |