MCPS: New ELA curriculum for 2023-2024 school year

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why cant they adopt a good quality curriculum that has already proven to be effective. Why do our kids need to be guinea pigs?

Money baby. After Weist sold MCPS as a testing ground for Curriculum 2.0 your kids will forever more be this - guinea pigs - in exchange for money. If not outright in the contract than as a landing spot for an admin finishing up a 30 year career at MCPS…Benchmark Senior VP for Curriculum has a nice ring to it.

[Anonymous]

My jaw just dropped when I read this. I can't believe they're switching again. I'm not an MCPS employee, but I've been a teacher and administrator in other school districts, and curriculum selection is normally a long process (over a year), followed by a 3+ year implementation process, with extensive PD for teachers, as well as training for coaches and admin to monitor implementation and support teachers as needed. How will any schools and teachers, and therefore students (!), ever see success if they don't commit to anything for longer than a couple years??

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My jaw just dropped when I read this. I can't believe they're switching again. I'm not an MCPS employee, but I've been a teacher and administrator in other school districts, and curriculum selection is normally a long process (over a year), followed by a 3+ year implementation process, with extensive PD for teachers, as well as training for coaches and admin to monitor implementation and support teachers as needed. How will any schools and teachers, and therefore students (!), ever see success if they don't commit to anything for longer than a couple years??

I think in this case, it’s because Benchmark really is that bad. It never should have been chosen.

[Anonymous]

We get these word lists every week : https://www.reallygreatreading.com/blast/supplemental/pdfs/Blast_Heart_Words_by_Unit_v1.pdf
It sounds like the class does a "blast" meeting every morning to review the words. My DD can already read these words so I work with her on spelling them at home. When I visited the classroom I saw some phonics stuff posted on the wall, but I don't know if that was from RGR (it was before I knew about the program). I wonder if the switch to RGR was recent because int he back to school presentation they talked about balanced literacy and dybels. My parent teacher conference is tomorrow so I can ask more.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My DD is in 1st grade and it looks like they just started RGR. I like what they have sent home so far.

What do you get sent home? I know they are doing RGR but it is like a black box, I have no idea what phonics skills they are working on unless I ask the teacher (and I don't want to bug the teacher all the time!).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My jaw just dropped when I read this. I can't believe they're switching again. I'm not an MCPS employee, but I've been a teacher and administrator in other school districts, and curriculum selection is normally a long process (over a year), followed by a 3+ year implementation process, with extensive PD for teachers, as well as training for coaches and admin to monitor implementation and support teachers as needed. How will any schools and teachers, and therefore students (!), ever see success if they don't commit to anything for longer than a couple years??

Bad to constantly change curriculum and bad to waste taxpayer money on bad curriculum

[Anonymous]

This thread is one of the reasons that I really think that an ES teacher would have been a great addition to the Board. I don't know if Coll was a good teacher or not -- I'm not from that school cluster -- but the ES teachers we've had were mostly fantastic (a few that were just okay, and I am aware of one that was pretty bad). I would trust any of those ES teachers (except the one that was bad) more than the people at central office or on the Board. I really feel for these teachers being asked to learn curriculum after curriculum when most of them are pretty flawed.

The should just pay a group of 40 or so ES teachers to work 4 extra weeks over the summer to try out some of these curricula, and then pick the one that they think works best. They need a bottom-up solution to curriculum, not a top-down one.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We get these word lists every week : https://www.reallygreatreading.com/blast/supplemental/pdfs/Blast_Heart_Words_by_Unit_v1.pdf
It sounds like the class does a "blast" meeting every morning to review the words. My DD can already read these words so I work with her on spelling them at home. When I visited the classroom I saw some phonics stuff posted on the wall, but I don't know if that was from RGR (it was before I knew about the program). I wonder if the switch to RGR was recent because int he back to school presentation they talked about balanced literacy and dybels. My parent teacher conference is tomorrow so I can ask more.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My DD is in 1st grade and it looks like they just started RGR. I like what they have sent home so far.

What do you get sent home? I know they are doing RGR but it is like a black box, I have no idea what phonics skills they are working on unless I ask the teacher (and I don't want to bug the teacher all the time!).

Our schools is using really great reading but we don’t get these word lists sent home.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This thread is one of the reasons that I really think that an ES teacher would have been a great addition to the Board. I don't know if Coll was a good teacher or not -- I'm not from that school cluster -- but the ES teachers we've had were mostly fantastic (a few that were just okay, and I am aware of one that was pretty bad). I would trust any of those ES teachers (except the one that was bad) more than the people at central office or on the Board. I really feel for these teachers being asked to learn curriculum after curriculum when most of them are pretty flawed.

The should just pay a group of 40 or so ES teachers to work 4 extra weeks over the summer to try out some of these curricula, and then pick the one that they think works best. They need a bottom-up solution to curriculum, not a top-down one.

Many of the words on this list are decidable. Why are they teaching kids to memorize them as “heart” words?

[Anonymous]

Really Great Reading is based out of Cabin John, MD according to the word list PP shared. Who is getting this kick back? Why does MCPS refuse to partner with ASDEC?!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Really Great Reading is based out of Cabin John, MD according to the word list PP shared. Who is getting this kick back? Why does MCPS refuse to partner with ASDEC?!

I don't know, but I'd take RGR over the new Benchmark any day. I'm extremely concerned that my kindergartner is at a Benchmark pilot school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This thread is one of the reasons that I really think that an ES teacher would have been a great addition to the Board. I don't know if Coll was a good teacher or not -- I'm not from that school cluster -- but the ES teachers we've had were mostly fantastic (a few that were just okay, and I am aware of one that was pretty bad). I would trust any of those ES teachers (except the one that was bad) more than the people at central office or on the Board. I really feel for these teachers being asked to learn curriculum after curriculum when most of them are pretty flawed.

The should just pay a group of 40 or so ES teachers to work 4 extra weeks over the summer to try out some of these curricula, and then pick the one that they think works best. They need a bottom-up solution to curriculum, not a top-down one.

Agree- we are at her former school and although my kids didn't have her, heard nothing but good things about her. She would have brought a viewpoint that is sorely lacking from this board. They don't even know what questions to ask, they just rubber stamp everything MCPS put in front of them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why cant they adopt a good quality curriculum that has already proven to be effective. Why do our kids need to be guinea pigs?

Money baby. After Weist sold MCPS as a testing ground for Curriculum 2.0 your kids will forever more be this - guinea pigs - in exchange for money. If not outright in the contract than as a landing spot for an admin finishing up a 30 year career at MCPS…Benchmark Senior VP for Curriculum has a nice ring to it.

This. MCPS is a corrupt and horribly run school district with zero oversight. Companies are benefitting and employees are benefiting, that’s for sure. But our students are not.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why cant they adopt a good quality curriculum that has already proven to be effective. Why do our kids need to be guinea pigs?

Money baby. After Weist sold MCPS as a testing ground for Curriculum 2.0 your kids will forever more be this - guinea pigs - in exchange for money. If not outright in the contract than as a landing spot for an admin finishing up a 30 year career at MCPS…Benchmark Senior VP for Curriculum has a nice ring to it.

This. MCPS is a corrupt and horribly run school district with zero oversight. Companies are benefitting and employees are benefiting, that’s for sure. But our students are not.

And unfortunately there is nothing we as parents can do..

[Anonymous]

Never been happier to have kids in immersion.

[Anonymous]

I worked with Val Coll at one of the schools where she taught and she was a FANTASTIC teacher.