Inspired Teaching - Upper Grades
![[Post New]](/jforum/templates/default/images/icon_minipost_new.gif){kind=icon}
Anonymous
| I'm interested in hearing from parents who has kids in 1st grade and up. How do you like the school and teachers? I know the program is not as structured as other schools, but do you feel the school is strong academically? Do you see this as a long term solution or taking it year by year? Thank you in advance. |
Anonymous
| It is highly structured- just not in an oppressive prison style way. |
Anonymous
| I have a friend with a 4th grader there who loves it. She is definitely keeping her son there through 8th. We are seriously considering it for middle school for our now 3rd grader (based on her recommendation). |
Anonymous
I'm curious to know more about this. I'm genuinely appreciative of IT's teaching philosophy, but wonder how it would successfully transfer to older grades. There's a certain economy of scale in school-wide resources such as science-labs, team-based sports, band/orchestra, etc. at any level. That challenge is amplified when combining an ES with an MS - the student numbers to make them possible simply aren't there. On the other hand, I honestly wonder how the successful-as-MS-charters will do with HS. Latin has proven some success, but I'd like to know more. They've graduated one class. In any event, it's apparently following a traditionally elite private school model. I don't know what to think yet of Basis. Yes, the story in a wealthy suburb in Arizona sounds good, but if it were that easy to transplant success from the suburbs to the city, then who needs Arizona? We've got TJ right here in the DC area, but that won't work in DC. Maybe I'm too much of an old-fashioned private-school student, myself. Well-rounded appeals to me as much as it does to my Ivy. |
Anonymous
If you want all of those bells and whistles, then you need a larger school environment like Deal. IT is a small school with smaller resources and will have limited MS offerings in the beginning. No one knows what the long-term will look like or where the school will be. They're still working out the younger grades. That said, lots of kids don't have the options of Deal, Hardy, Latin, or Basis.
|
Anonymous
Yes, there is Deal but it is the other end of the spectrum, unappealing in different ways. There's got to be something satisfactory between 60 middle-schoolers, and 1,000. |
Anonymous
|
We have a student in the upper grades at IT. Love the school and the teachers. My kid is doing well academically--she as always been at the top of her class, but at IT they do a really great job of working with kids at all levels within the classroom. She is never bored which was an issue at our old school. They integrate a lot of physical activity and movement into the school day, which I think is uncommon but really great for the kids.While we do not know what the middle school years will bring, I trust the school admin is planning for the future and i hope that includes input from current and future parents.
I am not overly concerned with my student missing out on the offerings of a larger middle school...the great thing about living in the city is that there are many opportunities to participate in band and sports activities outside of the school environment. I would prefer the school focus on a strong academic, cultural, and social foundation, which is what I see happening now. |
Anonymous
|
We take it year by year. Need to evaluate
things periodically. |
Anonymous
| Just want to add- I am pre-k parent and was on the fence about staying with IT but after Learning Showcase and seeing all the work of 3rd and 4th grade students, we're planning on staying. So great to see students passionate about school and also so proud of each other. 2cute! |
Anonymous
PP, can you elaborate on what you saw?
|
Anonymous
Also, what made you skeptical about staying? |
Anonymous
|
[quote=Anonymous]I'm interested in hearing from parents who has kids in 1st grade and up. How do you like the school and teachers? I know the program is not as structured as other schools, but do you feel the school is strong academically? Do you see this as a long term solution or taking it year by year? Thank you in advance. [/quote]
We are in our second year and second grade at ITS, and are not going anywhere else. The school was impressive on the first day, and it has continually strengthened ever since. The rigorous child-centered educational model demands far more engaged thinking of both teachers and students than a conventional approach, but it ends up producing a broad, deep, and powerful base of learning. It turns out that giving students more power to shape what they learn and how they learn it actually gives them a much stronger academic environment. Here is one example: The master teacher noticed that, after the donation of some wonderful books about Egypt, kids were showing a strong interest in pyramids and mummies. Although these were not part of the curriculum, the teacher found a way to use these to advance core educational requirements such as reading comprehension, writing, evidentiary investigation, and historical inquiry. The inspiration came from the kids, in using materials that particularly resonated with them. So a Playmobile set was used to jump-start the inquiry process, with each child being given "artifacts" from the set from which to begin to advance historical suppositions. These were then discussed in a class forum with the teacher that felt, with its Socratic approach, openness to insight from all, and challenging exploration of ideas and inferences, far more like a college seminar than a second grade class. Now, after intensive study of the pharaohs and the culture that led to the pyramids, the students are adding hands-on inquiry to their history lesson by attempting to mummify Cornish game hens and prepare sarcophagi for them. Sounds gross, right? As strange as it sounds, the kids have been thrilled by this entire unit, and it has brought the class into a whole new level of focused learning together that they will probably never forget. Our child is bright and creative, but felt very restricted and ostracized in his previous public school, to the point that his whole appreciation for education was jeopardized. After losing the lottery, we thought we were going to have to leave DC. Now at ITS, with full support for his diverse interests, our son is absolutely thriving, gobbling up learning, reading, creating, and growing in all kinds of ways. He is being encouraged to become an expert in everything he cares about-- from the rain forest to world geography, from dinosaurs to ancient Egypt, from Harry Potter to the Wizard of Oz, from writing a book to co-developing a play, and so much more. ITS is helping to turn his entire world into a classroom, so the park becomes a place to learn about community, history, and the environment; books become a gateway to the world; and art (ITS has a phenomenal embedded partnership with the Phillips Collection) becomes a powerful way to integrate cultural understanding, historical learning, and creative expression. ITS is far from perfect. But the amazing thing about the school is how, like what it does with each individual student, it turns its greatest needs into its biggest opportunities for growth. So the school's lack of much green space has provided the impetus for reaching out to all kinds of innovative new programs and partnerships with community parks, gardens, and environmental groups. We are very excited about growing with the school for at least the next six years. |
Anonymous
| PP, sounds likek a good match for your son. Many WofP schools are like this so curious where he was before. |
Anonymous
I'm sorry, but just which WotP schools are like what the PP describes? Sounds incredibly rare. |
Anonymous
| Try Janney, Key, Mann to start with. |