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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I’ve been really disappointed with my third graders writing.  He isn’t capitalizing proper names, leaving spaces between words and not using punctuation.  He teacher makes no corrections for these things.  Shouldn’t she correct these mistakes do he learns the correct way to write?  I’m very disappointed with the lack of writing instruction.  He has never had any writing home or spelling words for all of third grade!  Is this just me or are others having the same issues in FCPS?[/quote]

It’s just you.

They aren’t going to be churning out serials like Dickens at this age. 
[/quote]

There is no excuse for the teacher not to correct those mistakes. That is first grade stuff! They don’t need to be writing novels but sentence level mechanics should be better than that in third grade. My second grader at Catholic school had trouble with all that last year and it was always corrected. Now he is good other than misspelling tougher words like fascinating. We are coming back to FCPS for third because a younger sibling’s needs cannot be met in Catholic school and this kind of thing makes me nervous. I think math and science will be better in FCPS but I’m expecting language arts to be disappointing. I guess I will have to keep him progressing on these things at home. Ugh. [/quote]

FCPS pacing guide for writing said something about how correcting errors can hurt their feelings. I am not kidding. During student teaching elsewhere we did mark errors in colorful pen. They didn’t use Calkins so they taught spelling, grammar, etc. Came to FCPS where they never had spelling tests and the gifted kids struggled with writing. I corrected errors in attempt to teach the correct way but was told numerous times to stop because it could hurt their feelings.

I am really not kidding. I lasted one year because it hurt my head. Many parents seemed to want things that were normal in the schools I had been in before, but admins and others above me just kept telling me no.

Lurking here, considering going back to teaching. Just want to do it somewhere with a more classical approach to ELA instruction. Anyway, don’t blame the teachers. Complain to those above them. Unless you’re very seasoned, you can’t really get away with just teaching whatever you want and however you want, even if we are talking about safe things like marking corrections or explicit writing instruction. [/quote]

Thank you for explaining. Not surprised at all that admin is the problem. Where do they come up with these things? It’s like someone sees one study, doesn’t bother to look if the data have ever been replicated, and then builds a whole new curriculum out of it and pushes it downward through the school systems. I have a lot of problems with education research. Most of it is very poorly done compared to the sciences, including social sciences, yet changes are always being made based on it.[/quote]

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