How do you supplement if public school education not meeting student's needs?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have 2 ES kids so we are not quite there. After reading all of this damming information about ELA at Deal MS, I hope something changes. I guess the teachers need to demand students read the entire book. One book a term is far from demanding. Now that parents know, they too should be on top of their kids and also demanding they read the books required.

Might I suggest taking your concerns to the people at DCPS headquarters who spent so much time and money developing this sorry excuse for a curriculum?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The comments about Deal ELA are discouraging. I am a teacher and it is not that difficult to craft a decent and thematic or otherwise integrated course of study in these subject areas (reading, writing, vocabulary, grammar etc). Ugh.

I also find they’re a bit misleading: even in virtual 7th grade last year, my kid’s ELA class read four books as a group (same as in-person 6th grade) and many many short stories (especially for the sci-fi unit) and nonfiction writing, and they did all kinds of writing of more than a paragraph, which they were also required to quite frequently for history last year (invent your own religion, talk about sociopolitical aspects of ancient civilizations etc.) Additionally, there’s the National History Day project for which research is required; in my kid’s case, reading two nonfiction books and a series of articles. Some of the experience, as always, depends on the teacher and the student. It was really easy to do nothing and make up work all summer but that isn’t on the teachers, but on DCPS which sets that policy.

In terms of the language, though, I can’t fathom why my kid got an A in French when he’s clearly not all that proficient after two years, and his pronunciation is painfully bad. That seems like grade inflation to me.

I do think American schools in general simply do not teach grammar at all and that’s been going on for a while. I studied a foreign language in college and I had a good understanding of English grammar, which made learning grammar in another language much easier.

My Deal 8th grader last year did not read a single book. There were none assigned. The kids read a few online passages (less than 5 pages each) in Canvas. That was it. She/He never got under a 98% in any quarter. I know because I followed along closely last year and we just bought the books for private 9th grade (7 of them) and she/he discussed at length how little she/he read last year. I like Deal and I love public school but the ELA is not good. She/he is coming out way ahead in math but is barely able to write, even as a very top A student.

Well, I guess 8th grade is different (as we will find out this year) but I saw my son reading yes, actual books for school. One of them was Call of the Wild, which fostered a lively debate of whether they should keep it on the curriculum, one was Roald Dahl’s Boy, which they read partially together in class and partially finished at home, and one was Nelba Marquez-Greene’s account of the integration of Little Rock High School. As I said earlier, the final unit was sci-fi and they read stories by Ray Bradbury and other more recent ones. I also know this because I was sitting in the same room with him during virtual school, so my experience is obviously very different to yours. There was a lot of writing as well because I kept having to show him how to upload things into Canvas to submit. He’s also done the summer reading - two books off a list - every year including this one.

[Anonymous]

There’s another question hanging out there, if you can only choose 4 anchor texts per grade, what is the rationale for these four?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There’s another question hanging out there, if you can only choose 4 anchor texts per grade, what is the rationale for these four?

First get them to read entire books and then you can go down that rabbit hole. If they dont read the entire book then your question is moot.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The comments about Deal ELA are discouraging. I am a teacher and it is not that difficult to craft a decent and thematic or otherwise integrated course of study in these subject areas (reading, writing, vocabulary, grammar etc). Ugh.

I also find they’re a bit misleading: even in virtual 7th grade last year, my kid’s ELA class read four books as a group (same as in-person 6th grade) and many many short stories (especially for the sci-fi unit) and nonfiction writing, and they did all kinds of writing of more than a paragraph, which they were also required to quite frequently for history last year (invent your own religion, talk about sociopolitical aspects of ancient civilizations etc.) Additionally, there’s the National History Day project for which research is required; in my kid’s case, reading two nonfiction books and a series of articles. Some of the experience, as always, depends on the teacher and the student. It was really easy to do nothing and make up work all summer but that isn’t on the teachers, but on DCPS which sets that policy.

In terms of the language, though, I can’t fathom why my kid got an A in French when he’s clearly not all that proficient after two years, and his pronunciation is painfully bad. That seems like grade inflation to me.

I do think American schools in general simply do not teach grammar at all and that’s been going on for a while. I studied a foreign language in college and I had a good understanding of English grammar, which made learning grammar in another language much easier.

My Deal 8th grader last year did not read a single book. There were none assigned. The kids read a few online passages (less than 5 pages each) in Canvas. That was it. She/He never got under a 98% in any quarter. I know because I followed along closely last year and we just bought the books for private 9th grade (7 of them) and she/he discussed at length how little she/he read last year. I like Deal and I love public school but the ELA is not good. She/he is coming out way ahead in math but is barely able to write, even as a very top A student.

Well, I guess 8th grade is different (as we will find out this year) but I saw my son reading yes, actual books for school. One of them was Call of the Wild, which fostered a lively debate of whether they should keep it on the curriculum, one was Roald Dahl’s Boy, which they read partially together in class and partially finished at home, and one was Nelba Marquez-Greene’s account of the integration of Little Rock High School. As I said earlier, the final unit was sci-fi and they read stories by Ray Bradbury and other more recent ones. I also know this because I was sitting in the same room with him during virtual school, so my experience is obviously very different to yours. There was a lot of writing as well because I kept having to show him how to upload things into Canvas to submit. He’s also done the summer reading - two books off a list - every year including this one.

Did they read the entirety of the books you mentioned? It's not quite clear and while I wouldn't have thought to ask that last week...

[Anonymous]

This thread has good resources for supplementation, especially lower grades.
dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/716481.page

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have 2 ES kids so we are not quite there. After reading all of this damming information about ELA at Deal MS, I hope something changes. I guess the teachers need to demand students read the entire book. One book a term is far from demanding. Now that parents know, they too should be on top of their kids and also demanding they read the books required.

Might I suggest taking your concerns to the people at DCPS headquarters who spent so much time and money developing this sorry excuse for a curriculum?

But what do we say? It seems so absurd to ask whether interacting with a book means reading the entire thing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have 2 ES kids so we are not quite there. After reading all of this damming information about ELA at Deal MS, I hope something changes. I guess the teachers need to demand students read the entire book. One book a term is far from demanding. Now that parents know, they too should be on top of their kids and also demanding they read the books required.

Might I suggest taking your concerns to the people at DCPS headquarters who spent so much time and money developing this sorry excuse for a curriculum?

But what do we say? It seems so absurd to ask whether interacting with a book means reading the entire thing.

And do you know for sure that the teacher didn't tell kids to read the book? Between movies, cliffsnotes, the internet, etc.- kids have dozens of way to cut corners. They did it in the past and they are doing it now. A teacher can assign the book- but they can't guarantee that the kids will actually read it. Unless they read it in class together. And perhaps that is where they do the 1-2 chapters- with the rest being expected of the students at home. (Not saying this is true- but it is possible)

[Anonymous]

I would start here

Why are you only requiring 4 anchor texts per year?
What is the rationale for these choices?
Why are you only assigning excerpts of each book?
Do you consider this ELA curriculum to be sufficiently challenging?
Is this curriculum something you would choose for your own child?
How does this ELA curriculum compare with charter and independent schools in this area?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This thread has good resources for supplementation, especially lower grades.
dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/716481.page

OP here - thanks for this extensive list. I look forward to exploring it.

[Anonymous]

We had a different experience at Deal in both ELA and Spanish (pre-COVID). Our kids tested into level 3 Spanish after taking Spanish II in the regular Spanish track at Deal (I will add that there was one parent who complained a lot about the teaching and Spanish curriculum, but DS said her son sat in the back goofing off every class and did no work -- which is how I know some kids are great at bamboozling their moms).

In ELA, every week we got a detailed summary of all the books and short stories and poems and essays and they were reading and comparing and writing about and using for interesting projects. There was one anchor novel per advisory, supplemented by thoughtful works in other writing formats, including film and works of art.

Here are some examples from Deal weekly emails 6th grade:

English:

Last week, we read Tuck Everlasting chapters 15-25, continued our exploration of theme, and practiced writing a thesis about theme. This week we will finish Tuck Everlasting and complete the Anchor Writing Task, which is to write a multi-paragraph essay comparing Tuck
Everlasting to "Eleven," a short story by Sandra Cisneros.


Here are some excerpts from Deal emails 7th grade (not in succession):

English (Ms. ____):

Next week in English we will begin reading the book Warriors Don't Cry by Melba Patillo Beals. Beals' memoir about her experiences as one of The Little Rock Nine won a Congressional Gold Medal.

English (Ms. ____):
Next week students will be finishing an activity where they will be comparing and contrasting the author's point of view in two texts.

English (Ms. _____):
Next week in English students will wrap up their Literature Circle books. On Tuesday and Wednesday students will present their Reader's Theatre scenes. This presentation will count for their first IB Task grade for advisory 4.

[note here that Literature Circle is a text that is not one of the 4 anchor texts; in every grade they studied books beyond the anchor texts]

"English (Ms. _____):
Next week in English, students will have the Reading Inventory test on Monday and Tuesday. In addition, students will present and hand in their Hero's Journey and Enrichment Projects on Friday, June 9. Please make sure that you remind your child to find and return any books that we have used in English this year. Titles include: Warriors Don't Cry, The Ear, The Eye and The Arm, Boy ​and The Call of the Wild. "

If people are claiming their kids read no book in three years at Deal, sounds like a COVID problem or a kid problem, maybe?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I would start here

Why are you only requiring 4 anchor texts per year?
What is the rationale for these choices?
Why are you only assigning excerpts of each book?
Do you consider this ELA curriculum to be sufficiently challenging?
Is this curriculum something you would choose for your own child?
How does this ELA curriculum compare with charter and independent schools in this area?

in the abstract some of those choices make sense- an entire year on 4 seminal texts (especially something with layers like Moby Dick or that defines an archetype like the Odyssey) makes a ton of sense. What doesn't make sense if focusing on 4 and then barely reading them let alone concentrating on them

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We had a different experience at Deal in both ELA and Spanish (pre-COVID). Our kids tested into level 3 Spanish after taking Spanish II in the regular Spanish track at Deal (I will add that there was one parent who complained a lot about the teaching and Spanish curriculum, but DS said her son sat in the back goofing off every class and did no work -- which is how I know some kids are great at bamboozling their moms).

In ELA, every week we got a detailed summary of all the books and short stories and poems and essays and they were reading and comparing and writing about and using for interesting projects. There was one anchor novel per advisory, supplemented by thoughtful works in other writing formats, including film and works of art.

Here are some examples from Deal weekly emails 6th grade:

English:

Last week, we read Tuck Everlasting chapters 15-25, continued our exploration of theme, and practiced writing a thesis about theme. This week we will finish Tuck Everlasting and complete the Anchor Writing Task, which is to write a multi-paragraph essay comparing Tuck
Everlasting to "Eleven," a short story by Sandra Cisneros.


Here are some excerpts from Deal emails 7th grade (not in succession):

English (Ms. ____):

Next week in English we will begin reading the book Warriors Don't Cry by Melba Patillo Beals. Beals' memoir about her experiences as one of The Little Rock Nine won a Congressional Gold Medal.

English (Ms. ____):
Next week students will be finishing an activity where they will be comparing and contrasting the author's point of view in two texts.

English (Ms. _____):
Next week in English students will wrap up their Literature Circle books. On Tuesday and Wednesday students will present their Reader's Theatre scenes. This presentation will count for their first IB Task grade for advisory 4.

[note here that Literature Circle is a text that is not one of the 4 anchor texts; in every grade they studied books beyond the anchor texts]

"English (Ms. _____):
Next week in English, students will have the Reading Inventory test on Monday and Tuesday. In addition, students will present and hand in their Hero's Journey and Enrichment Projects on Friday, June 9. Please make sure that you remind your child to find and return any books that we have used in English this year. Titles include: Warriors Don't Cry, The Ear, The Eye and The Arm, Boy ​and The Call of the Wild. "

If people are claiming their kids read no book in three years at Deal, sounds like a COVID problem or a kid problem, maybe?

Not to ovwrly parse and your point about kids bamboozling parents is true BUT only one of those emails implied that an entire book was being read.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would start here

Why are you only requiring 4 anchor texts per year?
What is the rationale for these choices?
Why are you only assigning excerpts of each book?
Do you consider this ELA curriculum to be sufficiently challenging?
Is this curriculum something you would choose for your own child?
How does this ELA curriculum compare with charter and independent schools in this area?

in the abstract some of those choices make sense- an entire year on 4 seminal texts (especially something with layers like Moby Dick or that defines an archetype like the Odyssey) makes a ton of sense. What doesn't make sense if focusing on 4 and then barely reading them let alone concentrating on them

there is nothing comparable to Virgil or Melville on the list of anchor texts. I would hardly call Tuck Everlasting or Inside Out and Back Again seminal.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We had a different experience at Deal in both ELA and Spanish (pre-COVID). Our kids tested into level 3 Spanish after taking Spanish II in the regular Spanish track at Deal (I will add that there was one parent who complained a lot about the teaching and Spanish curriculum, but DS said her son sat in the back goofing off every class and did no work -- which is how I know some kids are great at bamboozling their moms).

In ELA, every week we got a detailed summary of all the books and short stories and poems and essays and they were reading and comparing and writing about and using for interesting projects. There was one anchor novel per advisory, supplemented by thoughtful works in other writing formats, including film and works of art.

Here are some examples from Deal weekly emails 6th grade:

English:

Last week, we read Tuck Everlasting chapters 15-25, continued our exploration of theme, and practiced writing a thesis about theme. This week we will finish Tuck Everlasting and complete the Anchor Writing Task, which is to write a multi-paragraph essay comparing Tuck
Everlasting to "Eleven," a short story by Sandra Cisneros.


Here are some excerpts from Deal emails 7th grade (not in succession):

English (Ms. ____):

Next week in English we will begin reading the book Warriors Don't Cry by Melba Patillo Beals. Beals' memoir about her experiences as one of The Little Rock Nine won a Congressional Gold Medal.

English (Ms. ____):
Next week students will be finishing an activity where they will be comparing and contrasting the author's point of view in two texts.

English (Ms. _____):
Next week in English students will wrap up their Literature Circle books. On Tuesday and Wednesday students will present their Reader's Theatre scenes. This presentation will count for their first IB Task grade for advisory 4.

[note here that Literature Circle is a text that is not one of the 4 anchor texts; in every grade they studied books beyond the anchor texts]

"English (Ms. _____):
Next week in English, students will have the Reading Inventory test on Monday and Tuesday. In addition, students will present and hand in their Hero's Journey and Enrichment Projects on Friday, June 9. Please make sure that you remind your child to find and return any books that we have used in English this year. Titles include: Warriors Don't Cry, The Ear, The Eye and The Arm, Boy ​and The Call of the Wild. "

If people are claiming their kids read no book in three years at Deal, sounds like a COVID problem or a kid problem, maybe?

Similar experience here. We also had links to reading calendars in the newsletters (broken down by what would be read in class and what was expected hw reading). Although, admittedly, my kid said there were not many consequences for not doing the reading.