Reply to Curriculum 2.0

Forum Index » Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS)

Reply to "Curriculum 2.0"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote]To the PP: Many folks criticized MCPS in the past for pushing kids along too quickly with math without teaching a solid foundation of the basics. So while a kid might be able to rattle off a few multiplication facts, they might not really understand the concept. That's one of the reasons they began 2.0. And my point is that even with 2.0, kids are still being challenged appropriately (ie: my first grade nephew who is doing 2nd grade math).[/quote]

I disagree on both fronts. Curriculum 2.0 is about raising the MSA test scores. The only assessment that accelerated kids were moving to quickly was from analyzing the standardized test results across the populations. Curriculum 2.0 tries to address this by significantly increasing the amount of repetition across all levels in hopes to raise test scores. The removal of acceleration is about money and test scores. Differenting in class requires teacher aides (costs money) or splits the teacher's focus. Without differention, the teacher can focus solely on bringing everyone up to the bar that the MSA requires.

As long as the MSA is upheld as the only valid measurement of a teacher's success, the principal's success, and the school district's success then there is no incentive to do anything beyond focus on ways to raise the overall test scores. It does not matter if your child is challenged or not. Basic economic and human behavior shows that people will put their resources toward what propogates their own survival.

I don't think that constant repetition is going to raise test scores in higher achieving students. It may raise some test scores for kids toward the bottom and middle as the teacher's attention would not be split. However, I suspect that MCPOS will find that repetition alone doesn't solve their initial problem. Many kids toward the bottom need more than just repetition and repeated instruction at the large group level. They need more individualized attention which 2.0 still doesn't address in any meaningful way. High achieving kids do worse with more repetition rather than better. You also have the dynamic that many high achieving kids may not test well as they speed through answers and make careless mistkaes. No amount of repetition or going slow is going to solve that issue, its about the fit between the test format and the individual being assessed. [/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