S. Arlington and Mean Kindergarteners

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kids go to a school with barely a 1 percent FARMs rate, and we have seen our share of behavioral problems. The school tells me there is not much they can do when 20% of the kids are diagnosed with some type of learning, attention, or behavior issues (money buys a lot of testing and treatment when the little snowflakes are acting up). I have sympathy, for example, to an autistic child who losses his mind when class lines are not straight, but do I have to accept my kid getting tackled a once a week?

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Which school is this?

http://www.apsva.us/Page/1113
Nottingham or Tuckahoe

[Anonymous]

It could be any school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Umm maybe these kids have only had 20 days of school so far in their lives, while yours has been in schools for what two years?

Ok, so where were these kids for the past 5 years? If they were with a SAHM or nanny, then they were more privileged and therefore there's no excuse for a lack of socialization when they received that level of one on one care. If you're implying they were too poor for preschool, then they were at least in a daycare...and what kind of daycare doesn't teach basic socialization, if for no other reason than to make it so they can manage all their charges without incident?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It could be any school.

Yes - public, private and parochial - all ages! Read the Private/Independent Schools threads on means girls/bullying at schools like National Cathedral and mean moms at parochial schools...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Umm maybe these kids have only had 20 days of school so far in their lives, while yours has been in schools for what two years?

Ok, so where were these kids for the past 5 years? If they were with a SAHM or nanny, then they were more privileged and therefore there's no excuse for a lack of socialization when they received that level of one on one care. If you're implying they were too poor for preschool, then they were at least in a daycare...and what kind of daycare doesn't teach basic socialization, if for no other reason than to make it so they can manage all their charges without incident?

full of ignorant assumptions not worthy of a response.

my last words on this topic - it's unfair to the kids/teachers to write the OP after 20 days of school. but good luck to you.

[Anonymous]

OP, since you asked about Campbell, our child is a K student there and we haven't heard him mention anything like the behavior you are describing. The class has a morning meeting each day during which I believe there can be discussions about peer issues/behavior that arise. The community meetings take place on Friday and the entire school participates, including parents if they wish. The students in my DC's K class created their own rules to govern class behavior, which includes being kind, and the school actively promotes its school-wide code of conduct (at the community meeting all the students recite the code of conduct). I have the impression that the teachers and administration work really hard to build and reinforce a sense of community and strongly emphasize and support kindness and peer mentorship among the students. Our experience is that the older kids look out for the younger ones. So we're extremely happy with our experience at Campbell so far and chose to send our DC there rather than our neighborhood school, which probably would be viewed as statistically more desirable by some of the PPs. We love our experience at Campbell so far, it is a special place in so many great ways.

[Anonymous]

They are at many schools. I es specially have been shocked with the little girls. And the balls they have to say and do things to other kids even when an adult is standing right in front of them listening and watching. I believe an example is set in the home......

[Anonymous]

OP, if you are still here, I hope you can see from the responses that the problem is not unique to South Arlington schools.

If I were you, I would commit to working with my daughter, the teachers, the school counselor, other student(s) and their parents via group counseling with the school counselor (if repeat offenders are involved) through the next few months and see if things start to improve. As a backup plan, in case things don't improve, start to research the other school options you mentioned - conduct tours, ask PTA's to share contact information for parents you can talk to about those schools or attend a PTA meeting, and/or ask here on this forum (take what is useful!), and apply to the schools you feel comfortable with for Fall 2014. Open houses for APS are held in the winter of 2014 but I'm sure principals would be willing to give you a tour. Just be mindful, that the problem your daughter is experiencing now could happen again at another school. I do believe it is less likely to occur in a smaller school (< +/-400 students) or a school with character education or a service learning focus. Also, a PP mentioned Responsive Classroom which is reportedly an excellent program for creating "safe" learning environments. The following schools in APS offer, or are committed to implementing, RC: Campbell, Jamestown, Nottingham, Key Immersion. There may be more. I wish all schools had it! Arlington Traditional School has a character education focus and Key Immersion has a program. Finally, if it gets to down to you pulling the trigger to move to another school, it wouldn't hurt to let the principal know why. She should be made aware of this!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here...WOW, I am stunned at what I'm reading here. Is this thread really trying to tell me that this is simply the expected norm among "poor" and/or Hispanic children?? Are you saying that unless I'm rich enough to afford an elite private school or an $800k home in a posh neighborhood, I should accept and expect that my daughter will be treated with contempt, aggression, and occasionally harmed because that's how parents raise the little toughs in the rough streets of Shirlington?? Come on, there are no poor people in Arlington...the cheapest house you can get here costs twice what my house in Michigan cost, and "poor" families have a higher income than my dad ever pulled in. If this is poverty, visit Detroit people.

Look, I didn't list S. Arlington in the title line as some kind of weird wink-and-a-nod code; I listed it because those are the school systems I'm allowed to choose from (for some reason, N. Arl parents can send their kids to Claremont even though S. Arl parents can't send their kids to Key). Campbell appears to have a warm, nurturing culture with a community meeting every week empowering kids to help shape their own rules...so I wondered if that made a difference in terms of the general social expectations one might expect there. Drew has the Montessori program, and Montessori teaches courtesy and respect from a young age so one might suppose those kids have a higher standard of behavior as well. I wanted to know if these guesses were true based on real parents with real experience there, because otherwise I won't bother considering bumping my kid to a different school if it's all the same.

My son is in kindergarten at a title1 school in fairfax county. He has been very happy there. I helped chaperone a field trip recently and had the opportunity to chat with several of the kids and observe group interactions. The kids were incredibly sweet, respectful, kind, and fun to be around. I am really happy with his class and teacher. For the record, I have also talked to him about bullying and always encourage him to share his school experiences, good and bad, with me. He is pretty forthcoming with info and has never complained of aggressive behavior from classmates.

I'm sorry your child has to deal with this. As a parent, I would find this type of behavior/environment totally unacceptable. I would hope it's not the norm for public schools. for what it's worth, it certainly isn't the norm at my son's school.

[Anonymous]

Parent of a DC in an upper grade at Claremont. This post really surprised me -- in our experience (just ours), the school is really strong in tackling any sort of bullying. Sorry this has been happening.

[Anonymous]

PP at Drew with twins. Our teacher has been fantastic in getting my daughter to vocalize to these kids that she doesn't like what they are telling her. She is very outgoing and bubbly so seeing her struggle with words to tell these older "kinders" (her word, not mine ) that she doesn't appreciate what they are telling her has been hard. But for the last 6 weeks, things at school are much better. I do find it interesting since, parent-teacher conferences with my son's teacher, I found out he is lacking social skills to interact with the older kids. He is one of those kids that pokes at kids to get their attention and now one poor boy can't stand to be around my son. That was a hard pill to swallow! So I am learning from both sides of the problem. But the teachers and principal are very open in communicating my kids' needs and how to help them improve their situations without too much interference from me, obviously appropriate to the fact that they are 4. I hope the OP has had more sucess with classrooms calming down since the begining of the year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote: I have sympathy, for example, to an autistic child who losses his mind when class lines are not straight

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School is an environment where certain norm are expected. If that child can't cope with that, s/he needs a different school. We've swung so far to one side with this that it's unfair to the mainstream children who ARE doing what's reasonable and expected.

[Anonymous]

School is an environment where certain norm are expected. If that child can't cope with that, s/he needs a different school. We've swung so far to one side with this that it's unfair to the mainstream children who ARE doing what's reasonable and expected.

+++++++1000

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Yep. Poor kids should be segregated in schools with other poor kids, where they can hit and pinch each other and never learn anything. Good thing privileged people have no moral obligation to children other than their own and can feel good about removing their kids from these situations. Why try to create a better situation for all by creating a reasonable balance of diversity across all schools, if it might create the tiniest negative impact on your highly-privileged kid?

Spoken by someone who either sends her kid to private school or a public school in a "good"neighborhood.

No, I was being sarcastic. I am white and upper middle class and send my kids to their neighborhood school in South Arlington, which is 22% white and 55% FARMS.

I understand not segregating on purpose, but don't understand sending your kid to a lower quality school if you could better quality one. 55% FARMS kids whatever color they usually = low school readiness overall.

Not sure how many ways people can say this. South Arlington schools are Arlington schools. Going to a "lower quality" Arlington school is like going to the lowest-ranked Ivy, compared to public schools in most of the rest of the country. I'm not worried about the quality of my kids education and if I can help other kids at the school by being active and engaged, so much the better.

Peer education and learning is an immense part of learning. The studies bear it out. Sorry to burst your delusional bubble a 50% FARMS school does not have any relevant apology to an Ivy. This phenomenon of upper middle class kids attending high FARMS school is a new phenomenon in the region borne of gentrification and I think many of these parents are due for rude awakening down the line with respect to both their children's education and social development.

I'm not saying diversity is bad, but 50% poor is not diverse, it is a lopsided, deleterious learning environment for everyone. A don't play the race card, my melanin shade runs brown.

What are you prattling on about? Poor kids and not poor kids have mixed for ages. 50% FARMS is near the average for southern states. My kid goes to a school in S Arlington and he is getting an excellent education both academically and socially.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Yep. Poor kids should be segregated in schools with other poor kids, where they can hit and pinch each other and never learn anything. Good thing privileged people have no moral obligation to children other than their own and can feel good about removing their kids from these situations. Why try to create a better situation for all by creating a reasonable balance of diversity across all schools, if it might create the tiniest negative impact on your highly-privileged kid?

Spoken by someone who either sends her kid to private school or a public school in a "good"neighborhood.

No, I was being sarcastic. I am white and upper middle class and send my kids to their neighborhood school in South Arlington, which is 22% white and 55% FARMS.

I understand not segregating on purpose, but don't understand sending your kid to a lower quality school if you could better quality one. 55% FARMS kids whatever color they usually = low school readiness overall.

Not sure how many ways people can say this. South Arlington schools are Arlington schools. Going to a "lower quality" Arlington school is like going to the lowest-ranked Ivy, compared to public schools in most of the rest of the country. I'm not worried about the quality of my kids education and if I can help other kids at the school by being active and engaged, so much the better.

Peer education and learning is an immense part of learning. The studies bear it out. Sorry to burst your delusional bubble a 50% FARMS school does not have any relevant apology to an Ivy. This phenomenon of upper middle class kids attending high FARMS school is a new phenomenon in the region borne of gentrification and I think many of these parents are due for rude awakening down the line with respect to both their children's education and social development.

I'm not saying diversity is bad, but 50% poor is not diverse, it is a lopsided, deleterious learning environment for everyone. A don't play the race card, my melanin shade runs brown.

What are you prattling on about? Poor kids and not poor kids have mixed for ages. 50% FARMS is near the average for southern states. My kid goes to a school in S Arlington and he is getting an excellent education both academically and socially.

Indeed, and of course, the schools of the south have been the paragon of American public education.....