My first grader has spelling tests. She is a strong reader but struggles with a lot of the writing.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My first grader can read quite well at this stage (end of the year), but his writing is horrendous. Spelling is ridiculous, and they apparently don't really give spelling tests anymore.

Maybe not at your school, but at our non-W cluster ES, they do. DC had spelling tests in 1st, and a form of a spelling test in 2nd (like "boot" is cvvc category).

I think MCPS does have pretty high writing standards for 1st. We moved from out of state when my other DC was in 2nd, and this DC struggled with the writing because DC was not used to such rigorous writing. DC's reading level was pegged at 2 grades above in previous school, but when we moved here, because DC had trouble with the written part of the reading assessment, DC's reading level was lowered. Luckily, it only took DC a couple of months to go back to the reading level DC should've been at. But, that year was very painful for me to get DC to be better about writing, and I don't mean penmanship.

Do you have a current 1st grader? My older child had spelling tests when she was in first, but my current first grader does not. It was my understanding that this was removed from the MCPS curriculum as of either this year or last year. They still have spelling words, though -- just no quizzes.

This was last year. Last year, I read on this forum of some parents complaining about no spelling tests in mcps, too.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My first grader can read quite well at this stage (end of the year), but his writing is horrendous. Spelling is ridiculous, and they apparently don't really give spelling tests anymore.

Maybe not at your school, but at our non-W cluster ES, they do. DC had spelling tests in 1st, and a form of a spelling test in 2nd (like "boot" is cvvc category).

I think MCPS does have pretty high writing standards for 1st. We moved from out of state when my other DC was in 2nd, and this DC struggled with the writing because DC was not used to such rigorous writing. DC's reading level was pegged at 2 grades above in previous school, but when we moved here, because DC had trouble with the written part of the reading assessment, DC's reading level was lowered. Luckily, it only took DC a couple of months to go back to the reading level DC should've been at. But, that year was very painful for me to get DC to be better about writing, and I don't mean penmanship.

Do you have a current 1st grader? My older child had spelling tests when she was in first, but my current first grader does not. It was my understanding that this was removed from the MCPS curriculum as of either this year or last year. They still have spelling words, though -- just no quizzes.

OP, at the end of kindergarten, a child is on grade level if they're reading at level 4, 5, or 6. At the end of the first marking period of first grade, a child is on grade level if they're reading at 5, 6, or 7.

The difference with private school is perhaps the wider range of abilities. My son struggled with writing, because his ADHD was un-diagnosed at the time, but he was reading way above grade level. However, since writing sentences in response to questions determines your "reading" level, he was never put in the higher reading or spelling group until recently.
So just something to think about. You could have your child write something fun during the summer.

Its a range. On the high end are kids that are writing multi-paragraph stories on college rule paper.

On the low end are kids that struggle to write a sentence.

Definitely being able to write a short paragraph would put a kid somewhere in the middle.

It varies wildly. There will be about 4 reading groups which include 4 spelling groups. Your child will be assessed in the first few weeks and put into the group which challenges but won't overwhelm her.

Same with Math. If she finds it very easy to grasp concepts she will be given more challenging work to complete.

It will be fine - there is a settling in phase for every grade, whether the student has come from outside the school or not.

Anonymous wrote:My first grader can read quite well at this stage (end of the year), but his writing is horrendous. Spelling is ridiculous, and they apparently don't really give spelling tests anymore.

Maybe not at your school, but at our non-W cluster ES, they do. DC had spelling tests in 1st, and a form of a spelling test in 2nd (like "boot" is cvvc category).

I think MCPS does have pretty high writing standards for 1st. We moved from out of state when my other DC was in 2nd, and this DC struggled with the writing because DC was not used to such rigorous writing. DC's reading level was pegged at 2 grades above in previous school, but when we moved here, because DC had trouble with the written part of the reading assessment, DC's reading level was lowered. Luckily, it only took DC a couple of months to go back to the reading level DC should've been at. But, that year was very painful for me to get DC to be better about writing, and I don't mean penmanship.

My first grader can read quite well at this stage (end of the year), but his writing is horrendous. Spelling is ridiculous, and they apparently don't really give spelling tests anymore.

"I like to play basketball because I like to score points and winning is fun"

This would be unexpectedly advanced for a first grader to write independently.

At our MCPS my child does a lot of writing in first grade and reads pretty far above level. School is "easy" for him at this point, and he is lazy about his writing.

His handwriting is very rushed and he doesn't really stretch when writing. For example, he'll hurriedly write "I like basketball it is fun" instead of "I like to play basketball because I like to score points and winning is fun" and I know it wouldn't be difficult to write the later...he just isn't pushed because he's doing fine.

You'll see a whole spectrum, and everyone is mostly doing just fine.

By the start of first grade your child should know how to write letters and be comfortable sounding out words and writing them down. They should know the first 100 sight words from Dolch. The kids can't spell at this point but they should be able to write simple sentences like

I wont to eet sum cookees. (I want to eat some cookies.)

My kid writes like crap--can barely put a sentence together--and the teacher keeps assuring me that it's within the range of what's considered normal for first grade. So I'm sure your kid will be fine. They do a lot of journal writing, so kids can do either a lot of very little. They have sperling words that they are supposed to write in sentences every week or two, and they've had a couple very short "reports" (like writing a few sentences about a national park) for which they get a lot of assistance.

My MCPS first grader does a ton of writing in class. By the end of first, my understanding is that kids are expected to be reading and writing at a level roughly equivalent to the Little Bear books.

For a kid like mine, who can READ much more advanced books, it has been a challenge to get the writing level up to the same level in order to move forward in the leveled reading progression in class.

We're going to MCPS for 1st next year. How well are children expected to write and read by 1st? DC has been in private and doing well according to teachers but we want to make sure she will be at the right level when she starts at her new school.