Reply to PSA MCPS math warning

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Not MCPS but FCPS and we have been visiting privates and based on what I see kids doing in private, FCPS is very behind.  In discussing the lack of rigor in Fairfax with a private school admissions officer, I noted that my kids have gotten high marks and are doing fine but that I feel like they can and should be doing more.  She noted 2 things that were noteworthy.  First, all kids coming from public have "good" grades.  And Second, even kids in the Advance Academic Program in Fairfax are behind when they come to the private school.  I wonder if the publics all around here are dumbing it down and I wonder why.  I grew up in public here and it was a good education.  My friend has kids in a county in Florida and I had her send me her kid's work.  It is so much more advanced than ours.   We do lots of "mom-work" at home and hopefully we will be accepted to a good private.  If not, mom-work and tutors are our plan.[/quote]

Can you tell me what grade are your kids? And how are they behind? Don't they all follow the common core/SOL and move at similar pace? I can see a private school gives more solid understanding of math concepts, but actually move faster than public school? Most private school is aiming Algebra for 8th grade, and advanced kids in MCPS and FCPS is 7th grade for algebra.  [/quote]

First grade.  I have fraternal twins and we are seeing how it fails the higher achieving kids (by not offering enough opportunity) and the kids who need a boost (because they don't really give it).  I cannot explain it.  Part of it has to do with our class size I think.  30 per class.  There is also a very low bar.   I never understood the rage against SOLs.  I thought it has to be good to set a minimum standard that all kids should learn.  But now I see that it has become all the teachers try to do.  Nothing more for sure.  So for first graders at our school (with lots of redshirted kids turning 8 in the next few months) the teachers are going for sufficient grasp of addition up to 18.  That is basically 9 plus 9. That is ridiculous.  Privates are going for 19 plus 7 or 17 plus 12 or more.  Our school has this spiraling back thing so they did addition for about 2 weeks at the beginning of the year.  Then they moved on to shapes, and patterns and now they are finally back to addition.  Some kids remember but others don't and it is February (I have one of each)!  In our School, the teachers seem to view the SOL as the goal to achieve rather than the minimum of what to achieve.  So if the kids accomplish what is required by the SOL, they are kind of done and there isn't much room for additional work (even during the "free-time").  For the kids who actually are not meeting the standards, there does not appear to be a plan B. They get the same grades and are just pushed ahead. My kids --who are night and day in terms of ability--get the exact same report cards (including an identical narrative from different teachers) and the same classwork.  And for the language arts, the program is very similar to what I have seen in private but it just doesn't work with 30 kids.  But language arts isn't just my daily five (or shouldn't be).  At our school there is no spelling or word work or phonemic awareness going on though.  I see all of that in private.[/quote]

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