Reply to Half-days on Wednesdays!?

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Reply to "Half-days on Wednesdays!?"

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I don't understand the knee jerk rejection of it. Why would you "organize against" this without learning what it is and how it will impact you directly?

I also don't understand the obsession with "hours of instruction". If this year has taught me anything, it is that hours of instruction is a poor proxy for learning, and that kids need a lot more variety in their schedules in order to learn (including breaks and independent study time and opportunities to talk to their classmates in an unstructured way). I feel like a half-day on Wednesdays would be a great opportunity to not only provide teachers with professional development time (which they need and deserve -- who doesn't want their kids' teachers to be growing and improving?), but could also really benefit kids, especially those who need acceleration. But I could also foresee this being an opportunity for non-academic interest groups, literacy tutoring with volunteers, and other enrichment activities. Or just a break from academics to play and be active in aftercare.

Why is everyone automatically assuming this is bad? I don't get it.[/quote]

Is this a serious question? Because I KNOW how it would affect me: it would reduce instructional time and regular routines at exactly the time we need to get those things back. Kids don't need "acceleration" right now (by which I assume you mean remediation, but we're not allowed to say that anymore) - those kids need regular, in-class instruction, possibly LONGER days and a longer school year.  [/quote]

This is spoken like a TFA bot. Do we remember when DCPS tried the longer hours, longer school year pilot. Kids don’t show for the longer year; kids, especially ES, burn out in a longer day. More time does not equal more instruction this isn’t a simple input/output table[/quote]

This! Again, the knee jerk negativity is weird. I would at least want to know more before I “organize against” it. The parents in this thread getting ready to throw a fit over a rumor are precisely why DCPS is such a clunky, ineffective entity. This is a major reason schools have been closed for a year — so many parents are afraid of innovative solutions to problems, and obsessed with maximizing hours in desks listening to teachers talk, which is one of the least effective teaching methods available to us.

I have an elementary kid, I work, my kid doesn’t need remedial acceleration, and I’m open to this idea. I hope the negative nancies don’t kill it before it can be explored.[/quote]

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