Anonymous wrote:Honestly, we just need to go back to leveled classes- a high, medium, low situation. It’s the only was kids who need acceleration are going to get it.

And yet they are doing exactly the opposite.

Honestly, we just need to go back to leveled classes- a high, medium, low situation. It’s the only was kids who need acceleration are going to get it.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:MCPS presented the solution as subject-specific (Math or ELA) grade acceleration. I.e., 3rd graders in need of ELA acceleration beyond the enrichment groupings go to 4th grade classroom for the block.

Among others, challenges include:

-- need for schedule alignment of subject teaching blocks across grades (difficult to manage with need to distribute specials and the like)

-- social/emotional mechanics among kids of different ages in the same class (on top of the social mechanics of differentiation among the students within the grade) and age-related maturity differences in student-teacher interactions

-- scheduling for MCAP/other standardized test schedules, if tied to grade of enrollment vs. grade of instruction, and

-- arranging for transport to/from MS at appropriately synchronized times for elementary students when their acceleration need requires access to middle school classes.

Some of these problems exist to one extent or another/have parallels within the current paradigm (and just about any differentiation paradigm, for that matter). Success, reiterated by the Superintendent as measured by school average MCAP scores, will depend largely on how the system resources/trains teachers, identifies/places students and engages/communicates with caregivers, all of which will be made more difficult with the budget under-funding, relative to MCPS plan/BOE request, the County Council is set to present.

When did they say this? Do you have a link/timestamp? All I heard them say is that acceleration will be delivered through cluster grouping in mixed-level classrooms moving forward.

During Laura Stewart's questions, a bit after the 2h50m mark of the currently posted meeting on YouTube, Niki Porter talked about not taking away Algebra (which would have to be delivered as thevnew Integrated Algebra 1) in 7th and mentioning "some even earlier" -- probably not wanting explicitly to recognize the practice of Algebra in 6th due to the questions over system-wide equity if related discussion went down the rabbit hole of "how," evidencing that it currently is employed regularly at some schools in cohort, sparingly at other schools by individual exception and not at all at yet other schools where such exceptions are dissuaded or denied by local school administrators (though laborious appeal proceedings might be employed).

Immediately after that, Sheila Berlinger followed with talk about employment of "course advancement" (maxxing out at about 5% of the student body). That's moving Xth graders to the X+1th classroom for the subject. Stewart included this as "advance highly ready students" among her list of things she summarized MCPS would be expecting of teachers, a list to which MCPS agreed.

A few years back, that course advancement also was the top step in the graphic representation of enrichment/acceleration with the full adoption of Eureka. It appears that in removing the 3-years-in-2 of "Compacted" Math 4/5 & 5/6, supplanting that with the more sparingly utilized course advancement, they are expecting to reserve such full-grade acceleration to those "truly ready." It will be important for them to devise clear criteria (not based upon percentile within a school or even district-wide cohort, but upon measures consistent with understanding and capability; mentioned was getting a 4/highest on the MCAP as indicative of having mastered the content of a grade level, but the schedule for that might not be amenable to timely placement at the beginning of a school year), equitable identification paradigms (especially given wealth-related access to outside enrichment) and measures for ensuring all schools adhere to them.

They are not going to make any changes. The Board isn't going to vote on this. Principals are now implementing this.

Sign up for RSM, AoPS, or other acceleration and enrichment now.

Anonymous wrote:MCPS presented the solution as subject-specific (Math or ELA) grade acceleration. I.e., 3rd graders in need of ELA acceleration beyond the enrichment groupings go to 4th grade classroom for the block.

Among others, challenges include:

-- need for schedule alignment of subject teaching blocks across grades (difficult to manage with need to distribute specials and the like)

-- social/emotional mechanics among kids of different ages in the same class (on top of the social mechanics of differentiation among the students within the grade) and age-related maturity differences in student-teacher interactions

-- scheduling for MCAP/other standardized test schedules, if tied to grade of enrollment vs. grade of instruction, and

-- arranging for transport to/from MS at appropriately synchronized times for elementary students when their acceleration need requires access to middle school classes.

Some of these problems exist to one extent or another/have parallels within the current paradigm (and just about any differentiation paradigm, for that matter). Success, reiterated by the Superintendent as measured by school average MCAP scores, will depend largely on how the system resources/trains teachers, identifies/places students and engages/communicates with caregivers, all of which will be made more difficult with the budget under-funding, relative to MCPS plan/BOE request, the County Council is set to present.

This is not what MCPS is planning to do. They aren't going to send 3rd graders to 4th grade. They are going to have a small group within a 3rd grade class that receives acceleration. Which of course won't happen, because a teacher can't teach two different classes at the same time, not across over 100 MCPS elementary schools. They have a hard enough teaching the grade-level class.

Sign the petition
https://www.change.org/p/support-of-dedicated-cohorted-math-acceleration-and-equitable-access-to-advanced-math?recruiter=429029050&recruited_by_id=eeed1d50-8d82-11e5-a86f-c71ea2e42e97&utm_source=share_petition&utm_campaign=psf_promote_or_share&utm_term=petition_dashboard&utm_medium=copylink&share_id=DKn5PdVG9b

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:MCPS presented the solution as subject-specific (Math or ELA) grade acceleration. I.e., 3rd graders in need of ELA acceleration beyond the enrichment groupings go to 4th grade classroom for the block.

Among others, challenges include:

-- need for schedule alignment of subject teaching blocks across grades (difficult to manage with need to distribute specials and the like)

-- social/emotional mechanics among kids of different ages in the same class (on top of the social mechanics of differentiation among the students within the grade) and age-related maturity differences in student-teacher interactions

-- scheduling for MCAP/other standardized test schedules, if tied to grade of enrollment vs. grade of instruction, and

-- arranging for transport to/from MS at appropriately synchronized times for elementary students when their acceleration need requires access to middle school classes.

Some of these problems exist to one extent or another/have parallels within the current paradigm (and just about any differentiation paradigm, for that matter). Success, reiterated by the Superintendent as measured by school average MCAP scores, will depend largely on how the system resources/trains teachers, identifies/places students and engages/communicates with caregivers, all of which will be made more difficult with the budget under-funding, relative to MCPS plan/BOE request, the County Council is set to present.

When did they say this? Do you have a link/timestamp? All I heard them say is that acceleration will be delivered through cluster grouping in mixed-level classrooms moving forward.

+1 was thinking of advocating for this but thought it would be a fight not a policy or something that has ever been indicated by MCPS

Khan Academy for homework and test into whatever the advanced class offering is in middle school. Sorted.

Advanced learners don't need a teacher who knows the material less well than Khan video lecturer and ChatGPT

Anonymous wrote:MCPS presented the solution as subject-specific (Math or ELA) grade acceleration. I.e., 3rd graders in need of ELA acceleration beyond the enrichment groupings go to 4th grade classroom for the block.

Among others, challenges include:

-- need for schedule alignment of subject teaching blocks across grades (difficult to manage with need to distribute specials and the like)

-- social/emotional mechanics among kids of different ages in the same class (on top of the social mechanics of differentiation among the students within the grade) and age-related maturity differences in student-teacher interactions

-- scheduling for MCAP/other standardized test schedules, if tied to grade of enrollment vs. grade of instruction, and

-- arranging for transport to/from MS at appropriately synchronized times for elementary students when their acceleration need requires access to middle school classes.

Some of these problems exist to one extent or another/have parallels within the current paradigm (and just about any differentiation paradigm, for that matter). Success, reiterated by the Superintendent as measured by school average MCAP scores, will depend largely on how the system resources/trains teachers, identifies/places students and engages/communicates with caregivers, all of which will be made more difficult with the budget under-funding, relative to MCPS plan/BOE request, the County Council is set to present.

When did they say this? Do you have a link/timestamp? All I heard them say is that acceleration will be delivered through cluster grouping in mixed-level classrooms moving forward.

MCPS presented the solution as subject-specific (Math or ELA) grade acceleration. I.e., 3rd graders in need of ELA acceleration beyond the enrichment groupings go to 4th grade classroom for the block.

Among others, challenges include:

-- need for schedule alignment of subject teaching blocks across grades (difficult to manage with need to distribute specials and the like)

-- social/emotional mechanics among kids of different ages in the same class (on top of the social mechanics of differentiation among the students within the grade) and age-related maturity differences in student-teacher interactions

-- scheduling for MCAP/other standardized test schedules, if tied to grade of enrollment vs. grade of instruction, and

-- arranging for transport to/from MS at appropriately synchronized times for elementary students when their acceleration need requires access to middle school classes.

Some of these problems exist to one extent or another/have parallels within the current paradigm (and just about any differentiation paradigm, for that matter). Success, reiterated by the Superintendent as measured by school average MCAP scores, will depend largely on how the system resources/trains teachers, identifies/places students and engages/communicates with caregivers, all of which will be made more difficult with the budget under-funding, relative to MCPS plan/BOE request, the County Council is set to present.

I support the existence of a math specialist at all elementary schools! That's great news, if it happens. My beef with elementary, when my kids were that age, was that teachers for the most part did not have a STEM background, and taught math really badly. I think this situation, which is very common in the lower grades, partly explains why children have such difficulties with math later on. When the basics aren't explained properly, how can we expect children to understand the rest?

I supplemented with extra math, taught by me, all throughout my kids' elementary years. My kid with dyscalculia (a specific learning disability in math) was then tutored in high school as well, and he made it to AP Calc BC. My other kid did not need any extra tutoring and is in Calc BC as a 10th grader, having benefited from a placement in Algebra 1 in 6th grade.

I really hope the math specialist thing will work out!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So I don't think there is any chance MCPS is going to keep compacted math with the same broad eligibility it currently has-- they are probably right that currently there are too many kids in it for whom it's not a good fit (and what they really need is just some real enrichment and challenge at the regular pace )

But assuming there are only 5-10% of kids who really need acceleration, that's only like 5-10ish kids per grade in most schools (less in some.) Which is too small for cohorted classes. I am guessing it is this reality that led them to this solution of cluster grouping.

If we want to fight against this, I think we need to come up with a feasible strategy for how to make math acceleration work for 5-10 kids per grade, one that is affordable in tight budget times. What could that strategy be?

MCPS wants to add elementary math specialists to all elementary schools starting the year after next, right? If that goes ahead, could they spend half their time teaching the accelerated courses and the other half doing the coaching/support of other teachers that they're supposed to be there for?

There is no regulation or curriculum for the specialist to instruct accelerated materials, and the result is also hard to be evaluated or monitored, so this is really a case-by-case experience that depends heavily on the teacher. How to make this process standardized and trackable/accountable? And once you allow this to happen, the statistics of demographic composition will reveal inequity. Then CO will shut it down.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So I don't think there is any chance MCPS is going to keep compacted math with the same broad eligibility it currently has-- they are probably right that currently there are too many kids in it for whom it's not a good fit (and what they really need is just some real enrichment and challenge at the regular pace )

But assuming there are only 5-10% of kids who really need acceleration, that's only like 5-10ish kids per grade in most schools (less in some.) Which is too small for cohorted classes. I am guessing it is this reality that led them to this solution of cluster grouping.

If we want to fight against this, I think we need to come up with a feasible strategy for how to make math acceleration work for 5-10 kids per grade, one that is affordable in tight budget times. What could that strategy be?

MCPS wants to add elementary math specialists to all elementary schools starting the year after next, right? If that goes ahead, could they spend half their time teaching the accelerated courses and the other half doing the coaching/support of other teachers that they're supposed to be there for?

My friend who is now an ES AP did this exact thing around 10 years ago. I don’t know if teaching was .5 of his math content specialist job but he did teach smaller groups of students for enrichment/acceleration. I’m not sure if he also taught groups of struggling math students.

Anonymous wrote:So I don't think there is any chance MCPS is going to keep compacted math with the same broad eligibility it currently has-- they are probably right that currently there are too many kids in it for whom it's not a good fit (and what they really need is just some real enrichment and challenge at the regular pace )

But assuming there are only 5-10% of kids who really need acceleration, that's only like 5-10ish kids per grade in most schools (less in some.) Which is too small for cohorted classes. I am guessing it is this reality that led them to this solution of cluster grouping.

If we want to fight against this, I think we need to come up with a feasible strategy for how to make math acceleration work for 5-10 kids per grade, one that is affordable in tight budget times. What could that strategy be?

MCPS wants to add elementary math specialists to all elementary schools starting the year after next, right? If that goes ahead, could they spend half their time teaching the accelerated courses and the other half doing the coaching/support of other teachers that they're supposed to be there for?

So I don't think there is any chance MCPS is going to keep compacted math with the same broad eligibility it currently has-- they are probably right that currently there are too many kids in it for whom it's not a good fit (and what they really need is just some real enrichment and challenge at the regular pace )

But assuming there are only 5-10% of kids who really need acceleration, that's only like 5-10ish kids per grade in most schools (less in some.) Which is too small for cohorted classes. I am guessing it is this reality that led them to this solution of cluster grouping.

If we want to fight against this, I think we need to come up with a feasible strategy for how to make math acceleration work for 5-10 kids per grade, one that is affordable in tight budget times. What could that strategy be?