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Reply to "New to Private School World, Need Advice – Rising 4th Grader"

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]OP here. Ok thanks everyone. I really appreciate the responses.

Serious question then - why private school if they don’t differentiate any better than public?

He’s in a Spanish immersion school, which we hoped would help enrich him a bit… and it has. But with Covid learning interruption they are still doing kindergarten level Spanish in third grade. He picks up languages very quickly so it’s another thing that’s now way too easy for him.

He’s a normal kid.  He doesn’t want to take extra schooling on weekends or after school. He wants to ride bikes with friends and play with legos - and I value those things for him too.  I do understand there are other ways he can learn to overcome a challenge - he’s been interested in starting guitar lessons, etc. - but there is a uniqueness to the school environment, and with the sheer amount of time spent there, I was hoping to find a place where he could actually be challenged regularly.

Thanks for the feedback though.  Back to the drawing board I guess! [/quote]

Do you have an option to switch out of Spanish immersion (since it sounds like he's not really getting Spanish) to another school or track? If so I might explore with the school whether that program would offer any additional opportunities for differentiation. In my experience there's less differentiation in the language immersion programs because 1) the teachers are already juggling an extra load with the language component, and 2) they think the language itself is sufficiently challenging and place a lower priority on additional differentiation.

As for why private, there are so many reasons. We love the smaller classes, the focus on outdoor time and activities, and the more developmentally appropriate instruction, particularly in the lower school. We've found teachers vary widely in terms of their ability to differentiate - first grade was amazing, second was mostly remote and there was no differentiation (or challenge) at all, and third has been a mixed bag. That said, from talking with friends whose kids are in public school they get even less differentiation and less challenge. Most friends with kids who started in public made it to around the point you are at and moved them to private. No one felt like it was a perfect solution, but most felt it was better.[/quote]

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