Reply to Melanie Meren's FB post about the calendar

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Reply to "Melanie Meren's FB post about the calendar"

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Speaking only for ES, not MS/HS

The 2026-2027 calendar is terrible for teachers. I think it needs to be revisited not to increase the number of 5 days weeks, but to reduce them and provide more planning time.

As PPs have said, the ES pacing guides’ content level is such that the actual instruction for each week can be conducted over 1-2 days.  There are few exceptions to this, but as a norm, the amount of content covered each week is pretty low.  (I would challenge parents who think the instruction is going at a faster
pace to sub for a day.) At least at the ES level, kids simply are not missing out on academic instruction when schools are closed for a religious holiday, teacher workdays or snow.

The issue is obviously that ES is childcare for many families. So closing schools for teacher workdays or early release is a burden on families.  I do not know how to solve this issue.

But families should not be fretting that their kids are behind academically due to the calendar.  
[/quote]

There is not much *new* material, but a lot of elementary material requires repetition and a lot of practice to make it automatic, like times tables, adding and subtracting within 20, phonics, etc, so the rest 3-4 days still matter. Especially since there is no homework.[/quote]

For kids who truly need lots of repetition, the morning exercises on their laptop.  This practice is now done online, not from teacher instruction.  But many students do not require weeks of repetitive exercises to gain mastery.

Honest question - have you ever spent time in a classroom? If not, I would encourage you to sign up to sub. Or at least look at the pacing guides for your child’s grade. It’s very clear that the content does not require five full days of instruction. [/quote]

Morning exercises on their laptop? ST Math? Sorry, if that's the plan, teachers need less time for planning not more.  [/quote]

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