Reply to Literacy in DC Public Schools

Forum Index » DC Public and Public Charter Schools

Reply to "Literacy in DC Public Schools"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Fundations is a Science of Reading-aligned curriculum that the Sold a Story podcast would support, FYI. It is explicit phonics instruction intended to be used on a whole class basis — exactly the sort of thing the podcast talks about going on in the Florida classroom she fawns over.[/quote]
Yes - but no one is certified in it.

The school may have purchased the program - but not the next step of getting teachers certified in the program.  They send 1 or 2 people from each school to a DCPS training session that is for 2 days - and those people are supposed to train all the other teachers.[/quote]

OP was criticizing the DCPS curricula from a science of reading/phonics perspective, which is nonsensical. [/quote]

What's nonsensical is 69% of students reading below grade level. In 2015 DCPS was in the news for revamping their curricula to teach dramatically more knowledge. They also were using Fundations to teach phonics (along with guided reading). This was all before "science of reading" became a buzzword and legislation began to pass. Sounds like they had the right evidence-based ingredients to have some success, but that hasn't been the case. Whether it's the curriculum or the teacher training, something isn't adding up. No achievement gaps have closed. [/quote]

I don’t think a persistent achievement gap is a Fundations problem. I think it’s a school attendance problem. [/quote]

OP and others are ascribing the test results to choice of curriculum when in DCPS, the primary problem is getting kids into the classroom and actually engaging with the curriculum on a regular basis. If a child misses 5-8 days a month of kindergarten (which is common in DC), you could have the very best curriculum taught by a literal expert in it and the child would still not be reading at grade level unless they are getting lots of support at home (which a kid missing 25-40% of their school year is not likely getting).

I was actually surprised by how good DCPS's reading curriculum is because based on what I knew of the district, I expected them to be way behind the curve in terms of pedagogy. They aren't. Also, DCPS teachers are, on average, extremely well qualified as compared to other districts. If every student in DCPS was middle or UM class, I think our reading scores would be phenomenal.

I have bigger questions about the math curriculum, and I think kids are not doing enough writing and there is an over-reliance on app-based programs. But those issues would also apply to many of the suburban school districts. If you have a kid without special needs who has good support at home, they will likely do well with DCPS's curriculum. If changes are needed, that's not where they are. Likely [b]we need more outreach/support for at risk kids, additional tutoring resources via after school programs, and a better intervention program that identifies kids who are falling behind and gets them the resources they need. But we actually have all that, it just doesn't always work[/b].[/quote]

All of this, well said. And we don't have enough of it. [/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics