Why iReady testing for kids in AAP?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My 5yh grade AAP kid took iready and came in at end of 5th grade for math BUT only end of 4th grade for reading, which would be fine for Gen. Ed since it's beginning of the 5th grade year but isn't fine for AAP. So clearly some kids need it. Now we, her parents, know as does her teacher.

All we received were scores. How is everyone identifying at or below grade level, end of this grade, beginning of that grade?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My 5yh grade AAP kid took iready and came in at end of 5th grade for math BUT only end of 4th grade for reading, which would be fine for Gen. Ed since it's beginning of the 5th grade year but isn't fine for AAP. So clearly some kids need it. Now we, her parents, know as does her teacher.

All we received were scores. How is everyone identifying at or below grade level, end of this grade, beginning of that grade?

Last year I got a print out sheet that had graph with bands with ranges for beginning / on / above grade level. Honestly the score meant nothing to me.
This year I only got the percentiles of my kids’ scores which I found to be more helpful.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My 5yh grade AAP kid took iready and came in at end of 5th grade for math BUT only end of 4th grade for reading, which would be fine for Gen. Ed since it's beginning of the 5th grade year but isn't fine for AAP. So clearly some kids need it. Now we, her parents, know as does her teacher.

All we received were scores. How is everyone identifying at or below grade level, end of this grade, beginning of that grade?

https://www.esboces.org/cms/lib/NY01914091/Centricity/Domain/533/iready-placement-tables-2018-2019.pdf

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
There are always 1-2 2E students in every class, more often than not, those kids really do belong in the program. In the past few years, AAP has been watered down; the curriculum is less rigorous and is not challenging enough for the students that belong. It's really a shame.

That's my experience with the program. In my kid's 5th grade AAP math class, maybe 5 kids already know all of the material and are bored out of their minds, another 5 catch on very quickly, another 10 are at least bright enough to handle accelerated math, and about 10 are completely out of their depth. The class ends up moving at the pace of the bottom 10 kids, who honestly do not in any way belong in accelerated math. The top kids spend the year twiddling their thumbs and learning nothing. If the bottom group of kids returned to regular math, where they belong, the top kids might actually have their needs met by AAP math.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
There are always 1-2 2E students in every class, more often than not, those kids really do belong in the program. In the past few years, AAP has been watered down; the curriculum is less rigorous and is not challenging enough for the students that belong. It's really a shame.

That's my experience with the program. In my kid's 5th grade AAP math class, maybe 5 kids already know all of the material and are bored out of their minds, another 5 catch on very quickly, another 10 are at least bright enough to handle accelerated math, and about 10 are completely out of their depth. The class ends up moving at the pace of the bottom 10 kids, who honestly do not in any way belong in accelerated math. The top kids spend the year twiddling their thumbs and learning nothing. If the bottom group of kids returned to regular math, where they belong, the top kids might actually have their needs met by AAP math.

Many AAP centers differentiate by 5th grade--for instance with those top 5 laying groundwork for a track to complete algebra in 6th grade, the next 15 algebra in 7th grade, and the remainder on track for algebra in 8th grade. Some centers allow for even more acceleration for a few math-advanced kids such as algebra in 5th. But I don't agree that math should be the main marker of AAP. Some of those advanced math kids might be dragging down the depth of thinking in social studies, language arts--preventing advanced students from getting the kinds of writing supports that would advance their thinking, and discussion of more advanced texts. It's not as obvious or as easily documented as math, but it happens.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
Many AAP centers differentiate by 5th grade--for instance with those top 5 laying groundwork for a track to complete algebra in 6th grade, the next 15 algebra in 7th grade, and the remainder on track for algebra in 8th grade. Some centers allow for even more acceleration for a few math-advanced kids such as algebra in 5th. But I don't agree that math should be the main marker of AAP. Some of those advanced math kids might be dragging down the depth of thinking in social studies, language arts--preventing advanced students from getting the kinds of writing supports that would advance their thinking, and discussion of more advanced texts. It's not as obvious or as easily documented as math, but it happens.

Perhaps an excellent teacher could juggle that level of differentiation. At the end of the day, though, the teacher will need to get those bottom kids able to pass the 6th grade math SOL. So, those students require most of the teacher's time and somewhat set the pace for everyone else. I agree that the same problems exist for the other subjects. Even in AAP the teacher will spend the bulk of language arts time working with the kids who are at or below grade level, and not the kids multiple years above grade level. There are a lot of kids at a gen-ed level in at least one subject who are placed in AAP and then slow the class down for all of the kids gifted in that area.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My 5yh grade AAP kid took iready and came in at end of 5th grade for math BUT only end of 4th grade for reading, which would be fine for Gen. Ed since it's beginning of the 5th grade year but isn't fine for AAP. So clearly some kids need it. Now we, her parents, know as does her teacher.

All we received were scores. How is everyone identifying at or below grade level, end of this grade, beginning of that grade?

My theory is that the test doesn't test above grade level, so the ceiling is "end of 4th grade" for a 4th grader.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My 5yh grade AAP kid took iready and came in at end of 5th grade for math BUT only end of 4th grade for reading, which would be fine for Gen. Ed since it's beginning of the 5th grade year but isn't fine for AAP. So clearly some kids need it. Now we, her parents, know as does her teacher.

All we received were scores. How is everyone identifying at or below grade level, end of this grade, beginning of that grade?

My theory is that the test doesn't test above grade level, so the ceiling is "end of 4th grade" for a 4th grader.

DP. I’ve receiced above grade level results for my child fwiw.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My 5yh grade AAP kid took iready and came in at end of 5th grade for math BUT only end of 4th grade for reading, which would be fine for Gen. Ed since it's beginning of the 5th grade year but isn't fine for AAP. So clearly some kids need it. Now we, her parents, know as does her teacher.

All we received were scores. How is everyone identifying at or below grade level, end of this grade, beginning of that grade?

My theory is that the test doesn't test above grade level, so the ceiling is "end of 4th grade" for a 4th grader.

The ceiling is 3 grades above grade level.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I was told my AAP student only had to take the iready once this year - at the beginning of the year.
That was fine with me.

I hope so. D.C. took it and placed in the range of end of year score expectations. Not sure what that tells you as was already identified and placed in AAP

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Many AAP centers differentiate by 5th grade--for instance with those top 5 laying groundwork for a track to complete algebra in 6th grade, the next 15 algebra in 7th grade, and the remainder on track for algebra in 8th grade. Some centers allow for even more acceleration for a few math-advanced kids such as algebra in 5th. But I don't agree that math should be the main marker of AAP. Some of those advanced math kids might be dragging down the depth of thinking in social studies, language arts--preventing advanced students from getting the kinds of writing supports that would advance their thinking, and discussion of more advanced texts. It's not as obvious or as easily documented as math, but it happens.

Perhaps an excellent teacher could juggle that level of differentiation. At the end of the day, though, the teacher will need to get those bottom kids able to pass the 6th grade math SOL. So, those students require most of the teacher's time and somewhat set the pace for everyone else. I agree that the same problems exist for the other subjects. Even in AAP the teacher will spend the bulk of language arts time working with the kids who are at or below grade level, and not the kids multiple years above grade level. There are a lot of kids at a gen-ed level in at least one subject who are placed in AAP and then slow the class down for all of the kids gifted in that area.

No, for our center they pool the highest AAP kids (just a handful )into a separate group that is highly accelerated and then there's the next accelerated group that is on track to take Algebra 7H in 6th or 7th grade. One teacher teaches this group until the highly accelerated go on to the middle school for Algebra 7 (either 5th or 6th grade). They have a specially arranged first period, but parents have to figure out transportation--it's on a block schedule so it's alternating days and the timing is earlier than ES. The remainder group is on track to take Algebra 7H in 7th grade, but based on Iowa scores/SOLs in 6th grade there is often further differentiation to provide support for kids to plan to take it in 7th vs 8th. It's not one teacher doing this, rather pull-outs for the advanced, classes at the MS and regrouping for smaller differentiation.