How do private schools manage to get through everything?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My experience (with one in private and one in public) is that private covers less number of topics but the topics it covers are deeper and better developed.

Public school moves "faster" with more topics covered so way more exposure, but less advanced on the topics.

Just as an example less writing assignements in private but the writing assignments that are assigned go through several drafts, lots of re-writing, peer review, teacher review etc, so it seems like less work but it results in a way better product.

But there are pros and cons - felt like my public school kid got exposed to more and had more opportunities for better variety of classes.

My private school kid has an interest that he developed too late to get more classes because he didn't know he liked it and now there are no more classes.

We have the same rub. We want to use the adolescent years to exposure students to many things so they can find their passions, strengths and weaknesses, as well as make educated citizens on a variety of subjects, then pick and choose for electives in high school and majors in college. Instead k-8 teachers are doing significant picking and choosing what to teach within each foundational subject.

What? My kids transferred to private in middle school (6th grade). They are getting a much wider variety of classes now vs if they had stayed in public. In addition to the basic academic classes (language arts, math, sconce, social studies, etc) they are REQUIRED to take

Foreign language
Drama
Art
Music (basic, choir or instrumental)
Dance
Technology
Study skills
Regular PE and required participation on sports teams

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My son’s private school class is 10 kids. It is insanely easy to cover material when you can basically do small group tutoring all day.

Even so, the teacher won’t have finished the math curriculum by the end of the year :/ Her passion is elsewhere, so they spent extra time on some subjects and less on math, I guess.

What was her passion to teach to?

Science. They've done some really need projects this year, but at the detriment of other things.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm surprised at all these people paying for what sounds like truly terrible private schools!

I have one in public and one in private.
My sense is the biggest difference is class size. Having 25 kids instead of 12 kids in a class truly doubles the time for so many things, from class presentations to just lining up and going to lunch or bathroom breaks.

The public school also seems to do so much more in "small groups" For example, at the private school, they switch classes for math based on ability, so each kid gets 45 minutes of math class. At the public school, there are three math groups. So the hour long math block involves basically three 15 minute "classes" plus wasted time for switching between the groups. So each kid only gets 15ish minutes of true instruction, and then "independent practice" or iready for the rest of the period.

I believe it is a troll or two. If not, joke is on them for continuing to pay for what they see a a substandard education. We have none of those issues with either private school our kids attend.

Yes, this sounds like trolling. Basically saying that they are paying for something that is less valuable than the free public education available, and if that’s the case you should absolutely go to your local public. That has not been our private school experience at all, but if that’s what’s happening for you then definitely leave!

[Anonymous]

Depends on what you mean by "everything"?

Public schools have proscribed standards that must be covered and tested. There is pressure to cover "everything" in the SOL, and sometimes they manage and sometimes they don't.

Private schools do not have this "everything" concept. They plan and cover what they feel is important and necessary to move to the next level and build in flexibility to pivot to something else as needs or interests arise. It is therefore impossible to fail to cover "everything'" because "everything" is whatever they actually covered. Even a course syllabus is intended to be a general and flexible outline of what might be covered -- not a mandate (e.g. the syllabus may suggest a unit on ancient monetary systems, but the teacher may decide to capitalize on the classes interest in current event and switch to the ethics of war or human migration in the modern era).

Sometimes this is 'more' than a parallel public school class, sometime is is 'less' depending on what you are measuring. I don't think there is a meaningful way to measure who is ahead or behind in either case - of what?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm surprised at all these people paying for what sounds like truly terrible private schools!

I have one in public and one in private.
My sense is the biggest difference is class size. Having 25 kids instead of 12 kids in a class truly doubles the time for so many things, from class presentations to just lining up and going to lunch or bathroom breaks.

The public school also seems to do so much more in "small groups" For example, at the private school, they switch classes for math based on ability, so each kid gets 45 minutes of math class. At the public school, there are three math groups. So the hour long math block involves basically three 15 minute "classes" plus wasted time for switching between the groups. So each kid only gets 15ish minutes of true instruction, and then "independent practice" or iready for the rest of the period.

I believe it is a troll or two. If not, joke is on them for continuing to pay for what they see a a substandard education. We have none of those issues with either private school our kids attend.

DP. Jokes on you for not understanding what the PP who you commented to wrote.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My experience (with one in private and one in public) is that private covers less number of topics but the topics it covers are deeper and better developed.

Public school moves "faster" with more topics covered so way more exposure, but less advanced on the topics.

Just as an example less writing assignements in private but the writing assignments that are assigned go through several drafts, lots of re-writing, peer review, teacher review etc, so it seems like less work but it results in a way better product.

But there are pros and cons - felt like my public school kid got exposed to more and had more opportunities for better variety of classes.

My private school kid has an interest that he developed too late to get more classes because he didn't know he liked it and now there are no more classes.

We have the same rub. We want to use the adolescent years to exposure students to many things so they can find their passions, strengths and weaknesses, as well as make educated citizens on a variety of subjects, then pick and choose for electives in high school and majors in college. Instead k-8 teachers are doing significant picking and choosing what to teach within each foundational subject.

What? My kids transferred to private in middle school (6th grade). They are getting a much wider variety of classes now vs if they had stayed in public. In addition to the basic academic classes (language arts, math, sconce, social studies, etc) they are REQUIRED to take

Foreign language
Drama
Art
Music (basic, choir or instrumental)
Dance
Technology
Study skills
Regular PE and required participation on sports teams

And because standardized testing is bad, you will never know how much they are actually learning. Two PEs (assuming dance is separate since it's listed separately), Drama, Art and Music plus technology (whatever that actually is), and study hall would either have to eat an enormous portion of the academic day if each was actually beign taught in the same semester. You listed 8 classes, add in history, English, science, math and you have a 12 class schedule which seems dubious

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Depends on what you mean by "everything"?

Public schools have proscribed standards that must be covered and tested. There is pressure to cover "everything" in the SOL, and sometimes they manage and sometimes they don't.

Private schools do not have this "everything" concept. They plan and cover what they feel is important and necessary to move to the next level and build in flexibility to pivot to something else as needs or interests arise. It is therefore impossible to fail to cover "everything'" because "everything" is whatever they actually covered. Even a course syllabus is intended to be a general and flexible outline of what might be covered -- not a mandate (e.g. the syllabus may suggest a unit on ancient monetary systems, but the teacher may decide to capitalize on the classes interest in current event and switch to the ethics of war or human migration in the modern era).

Sometimes this is 'more' than a parallel public school class, sometime is is 'less' depending on what you are measuring. I don't think there is a meaningful way to measure who is ahead or behind in either case - of what?

We used to have AP test scores to measure whether or not a class covered what the college board thinks is necessary. Public schools still have them

[Anonymous]

No unions?

No standardized test requirements?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Depends on what you mean by "everything"?

Public schools have proscribed standards that must be covered and tested. There is pressure to cover "everything" in the SOL, and sometimes they manage and sometimes they don't.

Private schools do not have this "everything" concept. They plan and cover what they feel is important and necessary to move to the next level and build in flexibility to pivot to something else as needs or interests arise. It is therefore impossible to fail to cover "everything'" because "everything" is whatever they actually covered. Even a course syllabus is intended to be a general and flexible outline of what might be covered -- not a mandate (e.g. the syllabus may suggest a unit on ancient monetary systems, but the teacher may decide to capitalize on the classes interest in current event and switch to the ethics of war or human migration in the modern era).

Sometimes this is 'more' than a parallel public school class, sometime is is 'less' depending on what you are measuring. I don't think there is a meaningful way to measure who is ahead or behind in either case - of what?

We used to have AP test scores to measure whether or not a class covered what the college board thinks is necessary. Public schools still have them

Kids still take them. But also, that is a tiny subset of courses not intended to be a standard high school curriculum. It was intended to be college level work to give a small group of students extra challenge and get them out of intro level course work in college -- which is why there is a standard and why a subset of colleges don't give credit anyway (most still do though). Unfortunately, in some places these courses have become a standard high school curriculum, and that was never intended. My own kid took 11, so I'm not against AP, but it certainly was never meant to be a means of comparing high schools or students to each other.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They can ditch the problematic and dumb kids. They don't have to waste time on stupid state testing that proves nothing other than that the majority of kids in public can't read or write at grade level.

As Op said, and most of us know, the private schools here have about 15-20 less days of school instruction.

And we’d appreciate some level setting and standardized tests at this point. No meaningful feedback to date except On Grade Level, Nationally.
Quite the goal…

My private school lower school kids take the ERBs annually, this year the lowest score for either of them on any section was 90th percentile nationally. If your school isn’t doing this maybe you should do some testing yourself or switch schools, but it’s strange to lump all private schools into this misleading group. We also aren’t missing 15-20 days, as we start classes in August and have over an hour of extra school time every day.

You must not be in the Wash DC area where 95% if the private schools start after Labor Day. Not helpful.

Plus most schools are range from progressive to extremely progressive topics, so kids don’t test well in ERBs or MAP.

Who are these PPs going on about "progressive schools"? What private schools are not teaching the basics? If they don't, WHY on earth do you PAY to send your kids there?

Our kids are in a K-8 Catholic school and get plenty of instruction and do well (high 90s) on any standardized tests they have taken.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Depends on what you mean by "everything"?

Public schools have proscribed standards that must be covered and tested. There is pressure to cover "everything" in the SOL, and sometimes they manage and sometimes they don't.

Private schools do not have this "everything" concept. They plan and cover what they feel is important and necessary to move to the next level and build in flexibility to pivot to something else as needs or interests arise. It is therefore impossible to fail to cover "everything'" because "everything" is whatever they actually covered. Even a course syllabus is intended to be a general and flexible outline of what might be covered -- not a mandate (e.g. the syllabus may suggest a unit on ancient monetary systems, but the teacher may decide to capitalize on the classes interest in current event and switch to the ethics of war or human migration in the modern era).

Sometimes this is 'more' than a parallel public school class, sometime is is 'less' depending on what you are measuring. I don't think there is a meaningful way to measure who is ahead or behind in either case - of what?

We used to have AP test scores to measure whether or not a class covered what the college board thinks is necessary. Public schools still have them

Kids still take them. But also, that is a tiny subset of courses not intended to be a standard high school curriculum. It was intended to be college level work to give a small group of students extra challenge and get them out of intro level course work in college -- which is why there is a standard and why a subset of colleges don't give credit anyway (most still do though). Unfortunately, in some places these courses have become a standard high school curriculum, and that was never intended. My own kid took 11, so I'm not against AP, but it certainly was never meant to be a means of comparing high schools or students to each other.

Meant to be or not, it is a standardized curriculum that ends with a standardized test. It allows you to compare students from privates to Whitman and students from Langley to students from Ohio. You can also take the aggregated scores and compare student bodies and schools. It's not a perfect measure, but it is a measure.

[Anonymous]

Don’t understand why OP thinks privates get through everything. This is far from the truth.

[Anonymous]

I agree that those who have posted about lack-luster experience in private schools should probably rethink that decision.
Our preK-8 private is 8:30-3:15 with recess/PE everyday. The curriculum is more in-depth and thorough than what I've seen when my kids transferred temporarily to public in AAP programs.
The difference may be less tolerance for behavioral issues. Kids are kids and if allowed to mess around and disrupt the lesson, they will do so. Kids with actual learning differences/needs are accommodated as needed, with as little disruption to class time as possible.
Quizzes, tests, group projects, essays, etc. are all hand graded and returned. Once a year standardized testing shows results consistent with each student's daily academic abilities.
It is a high-value school, and I wouldn't settle for less since we're also paying taxes that (rightfully) benefit public schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Don’t understand why OP thinks privates get through everything. This is far from the truth.

To much Joy of Nothing going on at our place. Am paying for private math and reading assessments in June. Had the worst teacher of our private school tenure.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I agree that those who have posted about lack-luster experience in private schools should probably rethink that decision.
Our preK-8 private is 8:30-3:15 with recess/PE everyday. The curriculum is more in-depth and thorough than what I've seen when my kids transferred temporarily to public in AAP programs.
The difference may be less tolerance for behavioral issues. Kids are kids and if allowed to mess around and disrupt the lesson, they will do so. Kids with actual learning differences/needs are accommodated as needed, with as little disruption to class time as possible.
Quizzes, tests, group projects, essays, etc. are all hand graded and returned. Once a year standardized testing shows results consistent with each student's daily academic abilities.
It is a high-value school, and I wouldn't settle for less since we're also paying taxes that (rightfully) benefit public schools.

We are at a top 5 school in all the DMV area. It is lackluster and am highly skeptical that yours is better.