How quickly can MCPS fix the curriculum nightmare?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Kids who have been subjected to a failing curriculum have a woefully deficient education, and we don’t trust them to really fix it, considering the same exact people are choosing and implementing the new curriculum. Admitting there’s a problem isn’t enough.

Then you need to get off the MD Public Schools forum and homeschool your child while you apply your child to private schools. If MCPS's current curriculum is terrible, and MCPS's new curriculum will also be terrible, then you should not keep your child in MCPS for even one more day!

[Anonymous]

Curriculum is not terrible. Implementation is terrible. Lack of textbook is terrible. Don't believe me? If you have a middle schooler in 6th grade - check out what they were "supposed" to do in 6th grade in English, and ask them what they really did in school. I hope the link below works - its a 51 page document. http://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/curriculum/english/



https://docs.google.com/document/d/1hp34QYZ4HO34bxekQY5MQslhD9IzvX_QdPAAIBRxbAM/edit?usp=sharing

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Kids who have been subjected to a failing curriculum have a woefully deficient education, and we don’t trust them to really fix it, considering the same exact people are choosing and implementing the new curriculum. Admitting there’s a problem isn’t enough.

Then you need to get off the MD Public Schools forum and homeschool your child while you apply your child to private schools. If MCPS's current curriculum is terrible, and MCPS's new curriculum will also be terrible, then you should not keep your child in MCPS for even one more day!

Are you saying it’s not terrible?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Curriculum is not terrible. Implementation is terrible. Lack of textbook is terrible. Don't believe me? If you have a middle schooler in 6th grade - check out what they were "supposed" to do in 6th grade in English, and ask them what they really did in school. I hope the link below works - its a 51 page document. http://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/curriculum/english/



https://docs.google.com/document/d/1hp34QYZ4HO34bxekQY5MQslhD9IzvX_QdPAAIBRxbAM/edit?usp=sharing

I didn't read through the entire document but those texts seem pretty low for 6th grade. My son read 3 of them in 4th grade.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Realistically. If I have a 12 year old, should I start looking at private school?
But IS THERE ANYTHING that we parents can do to get the ball moving faster?
Young minds don't have time for them to strategize and plan forever.

No.

Or rather, yes, if that's what you want to do.

(Really, I don't understand this sudden outbreak of "MCPS-ruined-my-children's-future-and-we-must-now-all-flee-at-once" posts. Did your child start MCPS in kindergarten? What have you been doing between then and now?)

From the writing style, a lot of them seem to be from the same person (the one who posted this AM about how MCPS ruined her son’s education).

I feel bad for her. She sounds desperate. I think in one post she said her son is failing. If her kid is really struggling, she may have an impulse to blame it all on the curriculum. I mean, there are definitely problems with the curriculum, but most kids aren’t failing. So something must be going on that’s making her hysterical.

She details some of it in the “MCPS failed my child” post. But she’s posting everywhere about the disastrous nature of MCPS and she sounds on the edge. She’s in the private school forum, the VA schools forum. I haven’t checked but she’s probably in the food and restaurants forum complaining about how MCPS is making her food taste bad.

Lol.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Realistically. If I have a 12 year old, should I start looking at private school?
But IS THERE ANYTHING that we parents can do to get the ball moving faster?
Young minds don't have time for them to strategize and plan forever.

No.

Or rather, yes, if that's what you want to do.

(Really, I don't understand this sudden outbreak of "MCPS-ruined-my-children's-future-and-we-must-now-all-flee-at-once" posts. Did your child start MCPS in kindergarten? What have you been doing between then and now?)

From the writing style, a lot of them seem to be from the same person (the one who posted this AM about how MCPS ruined her son’s education).

Totally agree.

Do you really think one person could generate this much upset? The audit is real and it’s scathing. Stop living in denial.

OP here. Not the same person. That said, I was in denial and was proud of the MCPS system. Then I started to see the mess as my child went up in grades. Then I said, "nah, they must know what they are doing". But by 6th grade I (along with other parents) got scared. Then the report. Now, I wonder why I didn't listen to my instincts.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Kids who have been subjected to a failing curriculum have a woefully deficient education, and we don’t trust them to really fix it, considering the same exact people are choosing and implementing the new curriculum. Admitting there’s a problem isn’t enough.

Then you need to get off the MD Public Schools forum and homeschool your child while you apply your child to private schools. If MCPS's current curriculum is terrible, and MCPS's new curriculum will also be terrible, then you should not keep your child in MCPS for even one more day!

Are you saying it’s not terrible?

Are you saying the new curriculum that has not been chosen yet will be terrible?

[Anonymous]

OP here. ANY textbook would be better than 2.0 worksheets. If I could have a textbook next year, I could work with that book with DC instead of running to online resources and buying supplemental books.

[Anonymous]

Absolutely not the same person. I am pretty sure the one who posted in VA and private boards have a child going to K this fall. The other poster has a child in the 7th grade. So at least two posters.

Frankly , I don’t see why anyone would laugh at another parent who is concerned by a scathing indictment of MCPS ‘s curriculum. The OPs of these thread are rightly anxious and discussions on these boards can be a good way to hash out ideas on advocating for our children. If you are very happy, you could ignore these threads. Don’t laugh at your fellow parents.

[Anonymous]

I am a parent who has posted on this forum for years. Regardless of what MCPS was doing - pre 2.0 and during 2.0 - we have always bought textbooks for Math, Science and Foreign language for all the grades for all my kids, I am surprised that people did not do that, Mcgraw Hill, Houghton Mifflin, pearson, prentice hall, glencoe. There are textbooks galore. Pick one, any one textbook and teach that to your kid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here. ANY textbook would be better than 2.0 worksheets. If I could have a textbook next year, I could work with that book with DC instead of running to online resources and buying supplemental books.

Do they actually have official worksheets? We have not gotten anything that actually looks official but we only have a handful returned. Agree, text books would be nice, especially if they are allowed home.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here. ANY textbook would be better than 2.0 worksheets. If I could have a textbook next year, I could work with that book with DC instead of running to online resources and buying supplemental books.

Do they actually have official worksheets? We have not gotten anything that actually looks official but we only have a handful returned. Agree, text books would be nice, especially if they are allowed home.

The funny thing is that when common core came along, many textbook writers already had like 95% of the common core content. All they needed to do was add a few things and take out a few things. They did just that very quickly. So my question is, why did MCPS not simply buy those books.
I am saddened that $10M was spent on a consultation that would not have been necessary if the county had just bought a curriculum.
I am also disappointed about MCPS' arrogance.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am a parent who has posted on this forum for years. Regardless of what MCPS was doing - pre 2.0 and during 2.0 - we have always bought textbooks for Math, Science and Foreign language for all the grades for all my kids, I am surprised that people did not do that, Mcgraw Hill, Houghton Mifflin, pearson, prentice hall, glencoe. There are textbooks galore. Pick one, any one textbook and teach that to your kid.

My parents didn't do that for my sister and me in the 90s, and they definitely valued education. I don't remember having any academic supplementation at all. We definitely did extracurriculars (music, mostly, for us, just based on our interests), but no textbook work outside of school.

Have things changed so drastically that this is now a given?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a parent who has posted on this forum for years. Regardless of what MCPS was doing - pre 2.0 and during 2.0 - we have always bought textbooks for Math, Science and Foreign language for all the grades for all my kids, I am surprised that people did not do that, Mcgraw Hill, Houghton Mifflin, pearson, prentice hall, glencoe. There are textbooks galore. Pick one, any one textbook and teach that to your kid.

My parents didn't do that for my sister and me in the 90s, and they definitely valued education. I don't remember having any academic supplementation at all. We definitely did extracurriculars (music, mostly, for us, just based on our interests), but no textbook work outside of school.

Have things changed so drastically that this is now a given?

I don't know anybody who does this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here. ANY textbook would be better than 2.0 worksheets. If I could have a textbook next year, I could work with that book with DC instead of running to online resources and buying supplemental books.

Do they actually have official worksheets? We have not gotten anything that actually looks official but we only have a handful returned. Agree, text books would be nice, especially if they are allowed home.

The funny thing is that when common core came along, many textbook writers already had like 95% of the common core content. All they needed to do was add a few things and take out a few things. They did just that very quickly. So my question is, why did MCPS not simply buy those books.
I am saddened that $10M was spent on a consultation that would not have been necessary if the county had just bought a curriculum.
I am also disappointed about MCPS' arrogance.

This. My sister is a teacher in another state (MA) and thought the transition to meet the Common Core standards was pretty smooth because her district just made minor adjustments (rather than rewriting the entire curriculum).