High schoolers can’t write

[Anonymous]

He needed movement so that's what he got. In his case, yes, he was given what he needed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:He needed movement so that's what he got. In his case, yes, he was given what he needed.

And did he miss instructional time when he was going on these errands?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am actually impressed with my MCPS daughter’s writing skills. I edit writing of adults, including lawyers, in the working world. My senior writes better than most that I see professionally. I don’t know when her writing became so polished. But it is 100% due to MCPS.

DP. We’re all humanities-oriented in our household. My neurodivergent dc doesn’t have strong punctuation skills, but is a solid writer and is skilled at engaging the reader. My neurotypical child is an excellent writer, but in fairness, that dc has attended a humanities magnet in middle school and high school and has had more robust writing assignments. I’ve been surprised by the number of writing assignments and their level of difficulty in upper level world language classes as well.

I’ve known people who were voracious readers, but middling as writers. Reading and writing are taught as though they’re two sides of the same coin, but writing involves a different skill set. The vast majority of adults can read at a far higher level than they can write.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Are students even assigned to read entire books in ES and MS? My neighbor told me her kids have never been expected to read an entire book, only excerpts. WTH? Why?

I don’t think your neighbor knows what she’s talking about. In elementary school they may read excerpts, but kids definitely read whole books in middle school language classes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Are students even assigned to read entire books in ES and MS? My neighbor told me her kids have never been expected to read an entire book, only excerpts. WTH? Why?

I don’t think your neighbor knows what she’s talking about. In elementary school they may read excerpts, but kids definitely read whole books in middle school language classes.

While individual teachers might assign whole books, assigning excerpts from books is a common problem across MCPS in MS and HS.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Are students even assigned to read entire books in ES and MS? My neighbor told me her kids have never been expected to read an entire book, only excerpts. WTH? Why?

I don’t think your neighbor knows what she’s talking about. In elementary school they may read excerpts, but kids definitely read whole books in middle school language classes.

.

Are you talking mcps. Mine have never read more than two books a year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Are students even assigned to read entire books in ES and MS? My neighbor told me her kids have never been expected to read an entire book, only excerpts. WTH? Why?

I don’t think your neighbor knows what she’s talking about. In elementary school they may read excerpts, but kids definitely read whole books in middle school language classes.

While individual teachers might assign whole books, assigning excerpts from books is a common problem across MCPS in MS and HS.

Assigning excerpts isn’t a problem; never assigning entire books would be the problem. Excerpts can be a great way to underscore a particular concept. I have a dc who attended the usual middle school English classes and she read multiple books assigned in their entirety.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Are students even assigned to read entire books in ES and MS? My neighbor told me her kids have never been expected to read an entire book, only excerpts. WTH? Why?

I don’t think your neighbor knows what she’s talking about. In elementary school they may read excerpts, but kids definitely read whole books in middle school language classes.

.

Are you talking mcps. Mine have never read more than two books a year.

So the goalpost moved from “never expected to read an entire book” to “never more than two books a year”? I believe my dc averaged at least twice that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Are students even assigned to read entire books in ES and MS? My neighbor told me her kids have never been expected to read an entire book, only excerpts. WTH? Why?

I don’t think your neighbor knows what she’s talking about. In elementary school they may read excerpts, but kids definitely read whole books in middle school language classes.

.

Are you talking mcps. Mine have never read more than two books a year.

That’s absolutely awful.

My kid’s private school requires rising 3rd graders, for example, to read 4 chapter books over the summer and be ready to discuss them when school starts.

Starting with 3rd grade, summer reading lists need to be signed by the parent and brought into school on the first day.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Are students even assigned to read entire books in ES and MS? My neighbor told me her kids have never been expected to read an entire book, only excerpts. WTH? Why?

I don’t think your neighbor knows what she’s talking about. In elementary school they may read excerpts, but kids definitely read whole books in middle school language classes.

.

Are you talking mcps. Mine have never read more than two books a year.

That’s absolutely awful.

My kid’s private school requires rising 3rd graders, for example, to read 4 chapter books over the summer and be ready to discuss them when school starts.

Starting with 3rd grade, summer reading lists need to be signed by the parent and brought into school on the first day.

MCPS does these things too, but posters are talking about the entire class reading the same book at the same time, completing assignments based on the book, and discussing in class.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When would they have time to provide feedback? 120+ students and one planning period per day. They have to prioritize planning so grading is done on their own time. They are required to use the rubric so that's what they use.

Well, they have to read the essay. They could add a sentence of feedback. It's really not asking that much. And to say you get 2.5/3 on this part of the rubric is not helpful - where did the student miss the mark? And when a student asks for feedback and is told no, the teacher is not performing his or her job at a basic level.

Seriously. When I was in public school in the 90s, I always got feedback on my writing. My teachers had the same number of kids in their classes as MCPS teachers do.

We need to stop making excuses or acting like teachers are dealing with situations that have never ever happened before.

Ask teachers what else they have to do in their planning time that teachers weren't doing when you went to school. Ask them how many of their students need specific accommodations and modifications for every single thing because they have IEPs, 504 plans, EL plans. Ask them how many planning periods they spend in parent meetings or data meetings of whatever BS meeting admin comes up with to justify their positions. My mom was a teacher when you were in school. She had a teacher' guide, textbook, and workbook for every subject she taught in ES. She didn't write lesson plans. That's what the teacher's guide was for. She didn't need to accommodate anyone. She walked in the door 10 minutes before her students and left 15 after. The only grading was weekly spelling tests (I usually graded them because it was fun) and an occasional math or science test. She rarely met with parents. She never had data meetings. She just taught.

In my experience, by secondary school teachers just aren't providing the accomodations they are supposed to be providing. Everyone gets the same thing - take it or leave it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Are students even assigned to read entire books in ES and MS? My neighbor told me her kids have never been expected to read an entire book, only excerpts. WTH? Why?

I don’t think your neighbor knows what she’s talking about. In elementary school they may read excerpts, but kids definitely read whole books in middle school language classes.

.

Are you talking mcps. Mine have never read more than two books a year.

That’s absolutely awful.

My kid’s private school requires rising 3rd graders, for example, to read 4 chapter books over the summer and be ready to discuss them when school starts.

Starting with 3rd grade, summer reading lists need to be signed by the parent and brought into school on the first day.

Same. And they started assigning students to write chapter summaries of one of the required summer reading books before 4th grade. They also had math work on IXL which was a review of the previous year's math plus a preview of the next year.

In 3rd grade, they had cumulative midterms and finals for 2 classes. In 4th, they added two more classes and in 5th, two more classes so by MS, they have six midterms and finals for every class. I believe they were smaller percentages of the final grade in the early grades and something like 25% by 6th grade.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When would they have time to provide feedback? 120+ students and one planning period per day. They have to prioritize planning so grading is done on their own time. They are required to use the rubric so that's what they use.

Well, they have to read the essay. They could add a sentence of feedback. It's really not asking that much. And to say you get 2.5/3 on this part of the rubric is not helpful - where did the student miss the mark? And when a student asks for feedback and is told no, the teacher is not performing his or her job at a basic level.

Seriously. When I was in public school in the 90s, I always got feedback on my writing. My teachers had the same number of kids in their classes as MCPS teachers do.

We need to stop making excuses or acting like teachers are dealing with situations that have never ever happened before.

Ask teachers what else they have to do in their planning time that teachers weren't doing when you went to school. Ask them how many of their students need specific accommodations and modifications for every single thing because they have IEPs, 504 plans, EL plans. Ask them how many planning periods they spend in parent meetings or data meetings of whatever BS meeting admin comes up with to justify their positions. My mom was a teacher when you were in school. She had a teacher' guide, textbook, and workbook for every subject she taught in ES. She didn't write lesson plans. That's what the teacher's guide was for. She didn't need to accommodate anyone. She walked in the door 10 minutes before her students and left 15 after. The only grading was weekly spelling tests (I usually graded them because it was fun) and an occasional math or science test. She rarely met with parents. She never had data meetings. She just taught.

In my experience, by secondary school teachers just aren't providing the accomodations they are supposed to be providing. Everyone gets the same thing - take it or leave it.

We are required to show the modified assignments to admin, parents, etc for each graded assignment. We have to fill out a matrix showing which accommodations were provided for which student. It is extremely time consuming. IMO, central office curriculum people should be creating all of the modified assignments.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Are students even assigned to read entire books in ES and MS? My neighbor told me her kids have never been expected to read an entire book, only excerpts. WTH? Why?

Yes. In MCPS, my kid started novel studies in 3rd grade.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Are students even assigned to read entire books in ES and MS? My neighbor told me her kids have never been expected to read an entire book, only excerpts. WTH? Why?

I don’t think your neighbor knows what she’s talking about. In elementary school they may read excerpts, but kids definitely read whole books in middle school language classes.

.

Are you talking mcps. Mine have never read more than two books a year.

That’s absolutely awful.

My kid’s private school requires rising 3rd graders, for example, to read 4 chapter books over the summer and be ready to discuss them when school starts.

Starting with 3rd grade, summer reading lists need to be signed by the parent and brought into school on the first day.

Same. And they started assigning students to write chapter summaries of one of the required summer reading books before 4th grade. They also had math work on IXL which was a review of the previous year's math plus a preview of the next year.

In 3rd grade, they had cumulative midterms and finals for 2 classes. In 4th, they added two more classes and in 5th, two more classes so by MS, they have six midterms and finals for every class. I believe they were smaller percentages of the final grade in the early grades and something like 25% by 6th grade.

My rising 2nd grader had to read at least 5 books over the summer in addition to 20 minutes of reading per day. She also had to review sight word lists. For math, she had to do a review packet and do IXL work three times a week.