Q about VA public elementary standards
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Anonymous
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Long story short, our K and 2nd grade kids are enrolled in an elementary school that while is academically ranked mediocre (es we are in one of the "better" ACPS school) has a very strong PTA/community, contributing to a very solid reputation.
We decided to chance elementary (likely moving for middle/high school) knowing that it wasn't a top school but strong enough. Fast forward to today and both our kids are excelling. DD will likely finish (per teacher) at end of first grade reading while DS 2nd grade (per teacher) says is already reading 4th grade and doing 4th grade math (long multiplication). Having both our kids be doing so well is of course great to hear. DS loves school and learning and hey maybe we just are lucky that our kids unlike their parents love academics - hahaha LOL It's true we supplement and spend a lot of time reading, writing, doing math with them and that they both just love to read. However, in the grand scheme of things, we work and aren't exactly pushing academics and are the parents who don't think that going to the top college is a priority (we believe in them finding their own path and working hard at whatever they enjoy whether that is business or the arts). Point is we do not push academics but we are also very conscientious on feeding their knowledge. So now i'm a bit shocked that both my kids are doing this well. And the question is whether they can continue or is ACPS just suck that anywhere else, they would really just be at grade level? My question is - is it ACPS that may have really low standards for grade levels or does the state have the same standards at every school so that while the classwork may differ, the levels by which kids are judged academically is the same. So that if we were to switch to APS for example, they would still test at the higher grade levels? |
Anonymous
| OP here - sorry didn't mention DD is currently K and doing 1st grade math. |
Anonymous
| The state Standards of Learning are the same for each grade level across the state. |
Anonymous
| 1-2 grade levels ahead if pretty standard for UMC kids. I wouldn't consider that excelling around here. |
Anonymous
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Op here- sorry UMC? We are Alexandria VA. What’s UMC? According to our teachers our DD is one of 2 in her clsss of 23 reading this well and DS is one of 2 in class of 18 doing multiplication and the only one doing long multiplication. That being said we recently returned from Speing Break visiting my friends out of state. It happens that’ we all have roughly same aged kids grades K-2. One friends kid goes to a rated 9 great school public and her neighborhood is def rich. Think McLean or Great Falls on steroids where $2M is the poor house lol Anyway her kid in first grade was about where DS is which is considered 4th grade. I kid you not I almost couldn’t believe the vocab words and spelling he was studying. Not saying that’s the pressure level I’d want but this is driving my curiosity on grade level standards.
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Anonymous
| OP, I think that you will find that there can be some variability between school systems in how they assess students or make determinations about placements. The best way for you to understand your children's standing compared to others will be on standardized tests like the Virginia SOLs or on other assessments like the SRI. |
Anonymous
What does this mean? |
Anonymous
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OP you said you spend time supplementing by doing reading, writing and doing math with them, yet then you said you do not push academics. This does not make sense.
UMC means upper middle class. Most NoVa public schools are as good as their demographics. That means it's not "the school" that is so great or so bad, but the outcomes, which are mostly reflecting the demographics of the school population. So your kids will probably (but not guaranteed) be assessed about the same at any NoVa elementary school. |
Anonymous
The state standards are the same, but the more advantaged students tend to skew up so that most children are performing well above grade level in the K-2 grades. A data point, in 2nd grade my DC was diagnosed with dyslexia. He was the only child in the grade of around 75 students (according to the stats) who was not reading at or above grade level in 1st grade. In FCPS, you can see the stats on reading by school and if you look school by school you can see the correlations between income (% of students on free or reduced lunches) and test scores. Income is not the most perfect representation of how much a child has been prepared (eg reading to the child from early age, taking the child to museums, attending preschool...) but it is what we have and works for the most part. That preparation gap grows each year. |
Anonymous
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What the PP meant is that UMC (Upper Middle Class) kids in the DC area tend to perform above grade level because the range of kids in the whole state (or country) is pretty broad. This holds true even in Alexandria, especially in the parts where housing prices approach those of North Arlington or McLean. (I'm looking at you, Rosemont.)
Sounds like your kids are doing fine. They'd probably do similarly in APS or FFX or City of Falls Church. If you're working with them outside of school, you are in fact pushing academics. Which is fine. |
Anonymous
Thank you PP for this clarity. First off, consider that my 2 kids are leading the pack among their classes. This is my concern and is this a red flag in the sense that our neighborhood should be considered UMC. So is this a red flag for our school? Also while we supplement I don’t know that it’s really going to town academically  we read, we have them read, we have them write. K has a diary she likes to write in even. That’s it - DS wants to do multiplication for fun. We spend maybe 10 min together on it. It’s not that I’m suggesting every little doesn’t help but understand it’s not like we are supplementing with a purpose. So hen families rave about APS and rage APCS - what’s it all about if in our example, the case can be made our kids are average in comparison to any upper class family? I’m really ultimately trying to determine if our kids should be in another school district or if everything is fine
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Anonymous
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OP, I don't know of any other 2nd graders in FCPS or at private school who are doing multiplication in any form. I agree that reading 1 year ahead is not that uncommon, but doing math ahead, outside of advanced/compacted math, is not encouraged at most schools.
Your kids are working ahead at your current school, and they'd have to "go back" if you moved to APS now. Whether that's considered a plus or a minus is up to you. |
Anonymous
???, Fall of second grade is when they started on multiplications tables in my DC’s FCPS ES. Now this was 10+ years ago so things may have changed. |
Anonymous
Yes at ours too. No more. |
Anonymous
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I glean that my kindergartener (DC2) is in the top reading group at our mid ranked FCPS school. The reading group books sent home now are DRA 20 / Level K. End of 1st grade here is DRA 16/Level I, I believe.
I have a third grader too, but I don’t recall what 1st grade math is. If you told me what it was, maybe I could tell you whether DC2 is doing it or not. I’m not entirely sure what long multiplication is, but my 3rd grader in AAP did 2-3 digit multiplication this year and it’s accelerated math so it sounds about right that that would be 4th grade math. No prepping here - I don’t teach my kids to read before K. My guess is that ACS is similar to FCPS but I don’t really know - so maybe they would have more similarly performing peers there, idk. |