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| Time out for both of you! Come back when you can be civil. |
| Montessori does all of this. Teaches kids in mixed classrooms at different levels. I'm still not sure why the more traditional public schools can't do this as well. |
| Ummmm.....I have seen the kids who graduate from Montessori. Often huge gaps in their skills and remediation necessary. |
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I have a child in montessori, and I supplement at home. I am teaching DC how to read and basic number sense. I realize that in early childhood education it may be easier to fill in where the school leave voids, but we do what we have to do as parents. I personally will be seeking more from DC's school as he gets older. I think what I like most about montessori is the school culture that many schools lack and is ultimately their downfall. I wouldn't say that Montessori is the end-all be-all, but it is doing something right.
But on the subject of tracking, I hope that as my son gets into upper elementary that his school will offer tracking wherever that may be. |
| I can't fathom how differentiated education could ever possibly work. In DC, you will likely have for example 10-year-old 5th graders who range in capabilities from reading at a high school level to kids who can barely read at all. And in this idea of "differentiation", the teacher is expected to challenge, stimulate and keep ALL the kids going. The kids reading at a high school level will already be bored out of their skulls, daydreaming, and potentially acting out and getting in trouble, the barely literate ones will be struggling to keep up and likewise will probably be acting out in frustration, and given their need to keep up, the classroom will gravitate to the lowest common denominator, and you then lose the interest and attention of the kids who actually are at a 5th grade level. I cannot imagine any viable way for any teacher to actually spin all those plates and make it all work. I see "differentiation" as little more than politics and economics, a way to consolidate and put more on teachers in some idea of saving money, as opposed to actually being a viable educational approach. |
In other words, you're like the kid who can't be fooled, and is the first to point out that the Emperor has no clothes. Sometimes being right is intellectually painful. |