Reply to 1st grade classes are 30 kids and it's a mess

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]At my child's school, the first grade classes (6 and 7 year olds) are a mess! This is the grade that includes all the kids whose parents didn't want them in virtual kindergarten and weren't able to do private the virtual year, so on top of the huge class sizes, there's a broad range of ages in this class - from the kids who are still 5 with birthdays next week to those that turned 7 halfway through Kindergarten last year. Our principal refused to hire an extra teacher despite the fact that last year's class sizes were also huge (but kindergarteners had an IA to help). It's awful, it's out of control, and there is no support for the poor first grade teachers. Is there anything we can do to petition the principal to hire a new teacher for next year? 30 kids in a first grade class is TOO MANY.[/quote]

DS's first grade class had 32 kids in it 4 years ago. This is not a new thing. [/quote]

And your kid is fine now, right?

OP: what do you think will happen if your kid goes thru the year with a class this size?[/quote]

It's very difficult for the teacher to manage the class. I've heard of at least two instances where she's had to call for backup. She's doing the best she can, but her class was 20 kids last year. [/quote]

THIS is the issue.  The number of kids isn't, on its own, bad.  I had 30 in my elementary classes back in the 80s.  BUT these days, kids with significant issues are mainstreamed which is really hard when the classes are huge.  So 26 kids without issues plus 4 with issues and aides following them around and a classroom designed for 24 kids suddenly has 30 kids, and 5 adults.  It is too many people--literally our kids had to climb around each other to get their seats.  Now, toss in age appropriate antics and teachers who have no authority to punish (Can't send to principal, cant put outside in hall, can't deny recess--literally no arrows in the discipline quiver) and the teachers are just overwhelmed.  And so NO learning happens.  [b]My son practically had PTSD from his first grade at Wolftrap[/b] it was such a crap show.  And that Principal had authority to hire a teacher to have smaller classes and she "decided" not to. She did it year after year and she was recently promoted. That is FCPS.[/quote]

🙄 you throw this in and your whole argument becomes ineffective [/quote]

It wasn't an argument.  It was my experience.

I think your response is telling.  This entire issue isn't about whose arguments are right or wrong.  Its about whether FCPS, with its enormous resources, is doing the best it can for the people it is intended to serve and that is the students.  In my opinion, it is not.  My personal experience was that the teachers were being set up for failure by decisions made above them by people who had actual authority and money to make the teacher's jobs more pleasant and the student's academic environment more conducive to learning.   That is my actual experience and yours may be entirely different and that is fine.  But I am not wrong.  And I am not exaggerating.  When the School's solution was to tell my son (without my permission) to have a play date with a kid who was relentlessly touching him (unaddressed impulse control issues) or writing on his paper or destroying his artwork, and my son had to come home in tears and say he didn't want to play with that kid, and when my son still talks about that years later, I think PTSD isn't too much of a stretch.  But go ahead and pick lint.  It doesn't help your position.  FCPS has some very serious and systemic issues and that is what this entire forum makes plain.[/quote]

This likely had nothing to do with class sizes, FCPS or school or board decisions. I have 3 friends who left 3 different private schools because one kid was a nuisance. And they all had small class sizes, so it’s not just bc Fcps’ teachers have too many others to contend with. Kids like that can be annoying. But that’s not likely bc of class size.  [/quote]

Wrong.  There were 31 kids in the class, 4 were on the spectrum.  One teacher. First year teaching.  Other two classes had 31 and 32. Principal had authority and funding to get another teacher--she actually told us so at back to school night in the cafeteria and explained that she chose not to.  The room was silent.  And it was a mess in large part due to the number of kids.  It wasn't one kid.  It was the whole situation.    Why is there such resistance to this?  Every study on education ever has said that the ideal class size is about 18-20.  And significantly smaller or significantly larger impact the education.  This has been documented over and over.  So please--stop.  Class size was a huge factor and made the other issues so much worse.  Public schools cannot just push out tough children and if those children have issues that require support, public schools are legally obligated to provide it.  None of this was going well for anyone so your "just so" comparisons are inapposite.[/quote]

I appreciate your honesty because Wolftrap is one of those wealthy schools where there is a lot of peer pressure to close ranks and put on a smiling face to keep up appearances and pretend everything is great, which a lot of people will insist upon to defend their real estate values. But the neglect and poor decision-making there is just one example of what’s been happening across FCPS for years, as this school system continues to decline with leadership and a School Board that can always make time to change school names, upend TJ admissions, or devote an entire work session to a silly initiative like the “social justice” academy at Lewis HS, but rarely focuses on overcrowded classrooms or schools.  And, as you point out, the people who could do something about it and choose not to - like the former Wolftrap principal now at Thoreau - end up promoted rather than held accountable.  It’s a shame a school system that was once well run has declined so much. [/quote]

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