What needs to change for MS for gifted/advanced students?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think more advanced coursework at every school is a lot more important than magnets in middle school. In fact, I'm not even sure I really like the idea of magnet middle schools.

Every time some differentiation is introduced, it quickly becomes a honor for all within a few years, which always ended in watering down and reduction or elimination of challenges. This has been happening over and over again in MCPS in the past 15 years or so.

And the Superintendent, and the BOE are intent on racing to the bottom, with total confidence.

[Anonymous]

The one program that the choice study really praised was the Middle School Magnet Consortium (Parkland Loiederman Argyle). The real strength of it is the 8 period block schedule because advanced students can take more electives (typically language, music, +elective focus) and students who need remedial support can take an additional reading class. The main problem is cost - the equivalent to 5/7 teacher load is 5.5/8. The county really needs to put more money towards that staffing model and fund 5/8 where the teachers have built in staff development in addition to planning and team time. It helps the staff be more responsive to student needs.

While I’m all for keeping kids in their neighborhood school, there is something to be said for letting parents and kids choose their school for focus area or to get away from kids in their elementary. If the county grouped every middle school into clusters of 2 or 3, created a focus, and shifted to the 8 period block, there would be some flexibility to develop programming to meet the needs of all students.

[Anonymous]

Agreed with everyone saying actual acceleration and differentiation. The thing is, this would be SO EASY.

MCPS had actual Advanced English for MS up until just a few years ago. It existed so recently that our home school accidentally used the summer reading handout from that era a year ago, and only later clarified that everyone should do the easier version. The Advanced version was right there! We could all see that it was more rigorous, but the children were only held to the on-level homework.

Similarly, the HIGH curriculum was developed for an advanced cohort, back when MCPS started using peer norming for MS magnet admissions. The explicit promise at that time (which I can still find in Parent Vue) was that kids who would have previously attended the MS magnets would receive an equivalent education at their home school, through the introduction of HIGH and AIM.

Of course, now HIGH is honors for all at most schools, and AIM no longer exists.

The one place I disagree with PPs is about offering advanced math if only 10 kids sign up. That's not a good use of resources, and those kids should do what they've always done and travel to HS for Algebra II or whatever they need.

[Anonymous]

The educational philosophies seem to go in circles. Track -> Mix -> Track -> Mix

I am a GenXer and the advanced students were fully tracked from 6th grade into advanced classes and some tracking started as early as K for kids who came in with high scores. In our rural community, this favored the children of teachers.

Obviously this system had its own set of problems because it labeled the kids at a young age, and movement up and down the tracks was difficult. In the lower grades there was an advanced classroom.

Everyone commenting on DCUM wants what they perceive is best for their kid(s), but the system has to look at the bigger picture.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’d like to see kids staying in their home school. There shoujd be classes at all the schools for all the kids varying levels.

It wouldn’t be possible to staff. I watched one of the MS magnets struggle to staff appropriately for the past three years.

No, this isn’t like specialized HS STEM classes. The exact same 6th, 7th, and 8th grade teachers are completely capable of having different classes where they make the students do more reading and writing.

And I think students at that age know how to self-select for the class that makes the most sense for them.

No, they really aren’t. Which is why the state of Maryland wants all teachers of gifted classes to have specialized training.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The educational philosophies seem to go in circles. Track -> Mix -> Track -> Mix

I am a GenXer and the advanced students were fully tracked from 6th grade into advanced classes and some tracking started as early as K for kids who came in with high scores. In our rural community, this favored the children of teachers.

Obviously this system had its own set of problems because it labeled the kids at a young age, and movement up and down the tracks was difficult. In the lower grades there was an advanced classroom.

Everyone commenting on DCUM wants what they perceive is best for their kid(s), but the system has to look at the bigger picture.

What is that bigger picture? Race to mediocracy? We are already met that goal. What is next? The downward spiral is never ending.

[Anonymous]

For MS I really only believe magnet is needed for those who have no peer group and even then it does need to be a specialized niche program. Just an offering of advance classes that would naturally be available at other schools with a cohort.

The focus for middle school:
-Advance classes at all schools
-Study skills and executive function class for ALL students
- Aligned standards
- Enriching opportunities (in/out of school field trips, projects)
- Social Emotional support and healthy competition
- building critical thinking skills

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’d like to see kids staying in their home school. There shoujd be classes at all the schools for all the kids varying levels.

It wouldn’t be possible to staff. I watched one of the MS magnets struggle to staff appropriately for the past three years.

No, this isn’t like specialized HS STEM classes. The exact same 6th, 7th, and 8th grade teachers are completely capable of having different classes where they make the students do more reading and writing.

And I think students at that age know how to self-select for the class that makes the most sense for them.

No, they really aren’t. Which is why the state of Maryland wants all teachers of gifted classes to have specialized training.

See comment at 7:30. It's not hard.

When you say gifted, maybe you're not talking about true outliers, not just advanced?

What I'm saying (and I think 7:30 seems to agree with) is that it's not that hard to create a class for the 10-20% of students who are higher-skilled and/or want to challenge themselves.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Agreed with everyone saying actual acceleration and differentiation. The thing is, this would be SO EASY.

MCPS had actual Advanced English for MS up until just a few years ago. It existed so recently that our home school accidentally used the summer reading handout from that era a year ago, and only later clarified that everyone should do the easier version. The Advanced version was right there! We could all see that it was more rigorous, but the children were only held to the on-level homework.

Similarly, the HIGH curriculum was developed for an advanced cohort, back when MCPS started using peer norming for MS magnet admissions. The explicit promise at that time (which I can still find in Parent Vue) was that kids who would have previously attended the MS magnets would receive an equivalent education at their home school, through the introduction of HIGH and AIM.

Of course, now HIGH is honors for all at most schools, and AIM no longer exists.

The one place I disagree with PPs is about offering advanced math if only 10 kids sign up. That's not a good use of resources, and those kids should do what they've always done and travel to HS for Algebra II or whatever they need.

This is SO SAD! It's almost funny how stupid it is. But what a shame for our kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Agreed with everyone saying actual acceleration and differentiation. The thing is, this would be SO EASY.

MCPS had actual Advanced English for MS up until just a few years ago. It existed so recently that our home school accidentally used the summer reading handout from that era a year ago, and only later clarified that everyone should do the easier version. The Advanced version was right there! We could all see that it was more rigorous, but the children were only held to the on-level homework.

Similarly, the HIGH curriculum was developed for an advanced cohort, back when MCPS started using peer norming for MS magnet admissions. The explicit promise at that time (which I can still find in Parent Vue) was that kids who would have previously attended the MS magnets would receive an equivalent education at their home school, through the introduction of HIGH and AIM.

Of course, now HIGH is honors for all at most schools, and AIM no longer exists.

The one place I disagree with PPs is about offering advanced math if only 10 kids sign up. That's not a good use of resources, and those kids should do what they've always done and travel to HS for Algebra II or whatever they need.

This is SO SAD! It's almost funny how stupid it is. But what a shame for our kids.

It was so stupid. I made my child do the harder version, and the teacher never even accepted the homework because it was to do a presentation and she had not set aside time for kids to present. So the work my kid did sat in her locker for the entire school year, and then came home on the last day of school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Agreed with everyone saying actual acceleration and differentiation. The thing is, this would be SO EASY.

MCPS had actual Advanced English for MS up until just a few years ago. It existed so recently that our home school accidentally used the summer reading handout from that era a year ago, and only later clarified that everyone should do the easier version. The Advanced version was right there! We could all see that it was more rigorous, but the children were only held to the on-level homework.

Similarly, the HIGH curriculum was developed for an advanced cohort, back when MCPS started using peer norming for MS magnet admissions. The explicit promise at that time (which I can still find in Parent Vue) was that kids who would have previously attended the MS magnets would receive an equivalent education at their home school, through the introduction of HIGH and AIM.

Of course, now HIGH is honors for all at most schools, and AIM no longer exists.

The one place I disagree with PPs is about offering advanced math if only 10 kids sign up. That's not a good use of resources, and those kids should do what they've always done and travel to HS for Algebra II or whatever they need.

Can you say more about the history of advanced English in middle school? In particular, I thought I had heard that there hasn't been real advanced English class in MS in ages, but that there is a course called Advanced English that is not very challenging and that most schools put most kids into ("honors for all"-style.). Is that not the case and there has actually been a rigorous Advanced English class in middle school in recent years that went away? If so, does anyone know the backstory of that (whether getting rid of it was driven by Central Office or by principals, etc)?

[Anonymous]

I have one kids who did a magnet MS and one who did not. The humanities magnet program curriculum was very rigorous and I’m not sure there are enough students at local MS that are willing to make that kind of jump. I remember the first quarter of sixth grade my kid wrote a 10+ page research paper using original sources from the 1800’s. And the grading was difficult too. It’s hard to imagine parents of kids that are smart but not gifted buying into that because there is no long term payoff (eg it doesn’t lead to advanced HS pathways) and it risks lowered grades for higher effort. That is likely to limit the cohort. HIGH is nice but in no way equivalent to the magnet.

I think MS magnets and acceleration only make sense if they lead to HS acceleration. This feels like in some subjects it doesn’t exist until several years in (English/literature). For other subjects advising and placement is inconsistent. For example, any kid that gets straight As at the humanities magnet or in HIGH so be defaulted to the AP history/gov pathway in freshman year. Instead this is unevenly applied at teacher discretion and only families who are in the know get their kids on the right pathway. The progression from MS to HS, outside of math, is where I sense things really fall apart.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have one kids who did a magnet MS and one who did not. The humanities magnet program curriculum was very rigorous and I’m not sure there are enough students at local MS that are willing to make that kind of jump. I remember the first quarter of sixth grade my kid wrote a 10+ page research paper using original sources from the 1800’s. And the grading was difficult too. It’s hard to imagine parents of kids that are smart but not gifted buying into that because there is no long term payoff (eg it doesn’t lead to advanced HS pathways) and it risks lowered grades for higher effort. That is likely to limit the cohort. HIGH is nice but in no way equivalent to the magnet.

I think MS magnets and acceleration only make sense if they lead to HS acceleration. This feels like in some subjects it doesn’t exist until several years in (English/literature). For other subjects advising and placement is inconsistent. For example, any kid that gets straight As at the humanities magnet or in HIGH so be defaulted to the AP history/gov pathway in freshman year. Instead this is unevenly applied at teacher discretion and only families who are in the know get their kids on the right pathway. The progression from MS to HS, outside of math, is where I sense things really fall apart.

I agree at my middle school there may not be a TON of kids capable of handling what you described is going on in a Magnet program but there are plenty of them that could handle a more rigorous workload than is currently being offered. These kids at my school are never writing more than a paragraph at a time it seems and even then, it's usually scaffolded and guided through the use of organizers to basically craft the paragraph for them. I realize this is anecdotal and may not be the case throughout the county but I tend to feel like it's the case more often than not.

[Anonymous]

MCPS won’t listen to you. The WaPo just published on this fact:

https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/1285329.page

If you are the parent of an academically advanced student in Montgomery County, you should send your child to a private school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:MCPS won’t listen to you. The WaPo just published on this fact:

https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/1285329.page

If you are the parent of an academically advanced student in Montgomery County, you should send your child to a private school.

MCPS does not care whatsoever about your academically-advanced child.