Reply to Advice Needed - 1st Grader in MCPS

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]My goal is to make sure my child is being challenged and is learning at school.  This child is extremely good at math, and the current work is too easy.  (That would not be the case for my other DC, btw.)  Yes, I can and will do my best to supplement the work/homework at home during evenings/weekends.  But I do not have experience with this, and I feel like I'll basically be home-schooling my kid in math.  I'm also frustrated because I believe this is the responsibility of her ES.  Moreover, the more DC studies higher-level/challenging math work at home, the easier and easier the work will become at school.

From what I've heard, MCPS will not allow students to participate in a higher level class (i.e., second grade math class), which was allowed prior to MCPS curriculum 2.0.

The reason I am asking about an assessment is: 1) this hopefully will let us (parents, teacher) know whether DC is truly accelerated in math (or other subjects) or on par with peers; and 2) if the answer is yes, help me persuade the school (teacher, principal) to offer DC a level of learning that's more suitable.

Lastly, DC is in the "highest accelerated" group in the class.  Still, the teacher must teach to the lowest common denominator, even in that accelerated group.  I'm not saying my DC is a genius, but if as an example you *knew* that your kid was proficient at a 2nd or 3rd grade level in math, would you really want your DC to sludge through an entire year doing 1st grade math?[/quote]

Sorry OP.  Your note reminds me so much of my frustration when I first moved my child into a "top performing" MCPS ES.  Well, actually, we had one fantastic year (this was the year right before curriculum 2.0 was rolled out.  The kids were challenged, the school allowed kids to go to a different grade for math if they were up to it (that was great), tests were graded and returned, reports on progress happened pretty regularly.  And then…post-curriculum 2.0, it was a disaster.  All the acceleration stopped cold. So, kids who were accelerated the year before were suddenly placed "on grade level" -- which in my DC's case, meant doing work he had done 2-3 years prior.  No differentiation meant the 1 teacher teaching 1 level of math had to attend the the vastly different needs of the 30 kids.  Oh, and for good measure, the tests and quizzes never came home (it was like pulling teeth to get any info about the work or progress of any kind).  Talking to the (also-frustrated) teacher was like talking to a wall b/c despite the teacher-frustrations, they had to toe the party line and talk about things like "creating number sense" and other BS.

Well, in our case, we moved my child to the HGC -- that was a god-send!  Much more rigor and challenge. The MCPS line is that the HGC math is the same as everywhere else, but that's not the case.  The kids are all high achieving and they push each other -- and the teachers are amazing.  And, now, we moved out of the county and are at a private school.  What they've done to the curriculum in MCPS is shameful.  Sadly, we learned, it is impossible to fight MCPS as a parent (or even as a large group of parents).

Wish I had something better to suggest, but maybe consider leaving the system.  Good luck.[/quote]

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