Every child should be exposed to rigor in their class. This shouldn’t be new or an APP vs non-AAP thing.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

You realize that the COGAT and NNAT are real measures of cognitive ability, right?
All kids can think outside the box but lateral thinking is correlated to general cognitive ability so the kids with high COGAT/NNAT scores will generally have higher lateral thinking ability.
You sound like you think you have somehow made some fatal error in your child's education. Talk to your AART and ask for their help and advice, there are no "points of no return." If your kid is actually gifted, the AART has no interest in seeing your kid bored and disengaged.

It seems like what this poster was responding to was the arrogance of "obvious that the general education population can not handle the accelerated pace of an accelerated math or advanced English class." and follow-on comments. If you've been following this forum AT ALL you'll know that plenty of VERY high scoring kids don't get into AAP. Not because they're not bright (or arguably brighter than the kids that do get in), but because some other portion of their application wasn't in favor with the admissions board.

That wasn't obvious to me because their post read like a complaint that their kid didn't get in and now they have "banal worksheets" I was just pointing out that there was more than one on-ramp to aap.
I also don't like that there is so much subjectivity to aap process. An eloquent parent can help write a compelling application, an influential parent can get favorable teacher recommendations, and a wealthy parent can simply opt out for private school. IMHO, the COGAT and NNAT scores should be sufficient to determine who gets in as a initial matter and then we should make allowances for special cases.

What this person is highlighting is the difficulty that the children of non-english speaking parents, less educated parents, immigrant parents, etc have in a process like this. Holistic admissions processes are more complex and is another way to direct advantages to people who are plugged in.

Anonymous wrote:

You realize that the COGAT and NNAT are real measures of cognitive ability, right?
All kids can think outside the box but lateral thinking is correlated to general cognitive ability so the kids with high COGAT/NNAT scores will generally have higher lateral thinking ability.
You sound like you think you have somehow made some fatal error in your child's education. Talk to your AART and ask for their help and advice, there are no "points of no return." If your kid is actually gifted, the AART has no interest in seeing your kid bored and disengaged.

It seems like what this poster was responding to was the arrogance of "obvious that the general education population can not handle the accelerated pace of an accelerated math or advanced English class." and follow-on comments. If you've been following this forum AT ALL you'll know that plenty of VERY high scoring kids don't get into AAP. Not because they're not bright (or arguably brighter than the kids that do get in), but because some other portion of their application wasn't in favor with the admissions board.

Anonymous wrote:The Mclean and Langley pyramid ES schools all incorporate Level IV into all classrooms. It has been like this for several years because the majority of kids can do/handle/ embrace the work/challenge. You get to the MS level and Longfellow( maybe cooper as well) has all Honor classes. Twins went through and one was in AAP one in GE. Same level of teaching, same projects, same novels, same tests etc… Math is the only major difference and even then, most take at least Algebra 1 by 8th grade( so 1 year ahead as well as some 2+ years ahead). Once you get to HS it just doesn’t matter. You will sit at graduation and notice the kids who have all of these wonderful accolades. Going to great schools. Soooo many of the kids were not in AAP in ES.

No, not for us. Our Langley pyramid ES loves to tout that Level IV material is being used in all classrooms, but in practice it is based on the teacher's preferences. Our son was new to FCPS in 5th grade. When pressed, neither his GE 5th grade teacher or the AART would confirm that this was happening with any regularity, if at all.

The Mclean and Langley pyramid ES schools all incorporate Level IV into all classrooms. It has been like this for several years because the majority of kids can do/handle/ embrace the work/challenge. You get to the MS level and Longfellow( maybe cooper as well) has all Honor classes. Twins went through and one was in AAP one in GE. Same level of teaching, same projects, same novels, same tests etc… Math is the only major difference and even then, most take at least Algebra 1 by 8th grade( so 1 year ahead as well as some 2+ years ahead). Once you get to HS it just doesn’t matter. You will sit at graduation and notice the kids who have all of these wonderful accolades. Going to great schools. Soooo many of the kids were not in AAP in ES.

YES. Our school is a center school and ALL science and SS are Level IV. ALL GE teachers incorporate many different aspects/programs of Language arts with Level IV as well.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:At our LLIV orientation, the AART noted that they liked having the LLIV program because it allowed them to 'bring' the LIV material to kids who otherwise wouldn't have access to it. This seems a little disingenuous to me, but I'm not in education, so I'm wondering, is there a reason the school couldn't just use the material across all the classrooms if they wanted to, regardless of if there are LIV students in the classroom?

That is the entire thought process behind the cluster method of LLIV. All kids are exposed to the LIV material.

Not really - it's *only* the other kids who are in the classroom(s) with an AAP cluster who are getting the LIV material. I think my question is, if this is a "benefit" of the cluster model, why can't they just use the LIV curriculum in all classrooms, even if there are no LIV students in the room? I feel like they're using this to low key 'guilt' people into picking the local program - a sort of, "see, if you stay you're helping the other kids". But it seems like a false equivalence - they *could* just choose to teach using this curriculum in all classrooms, couldn't they?

No, at our school, ALL of the classes are getting the LLIV curriculum.

DP. At our school, only the Level IV classrooms are getting the Level IV curriculum.