Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think our school does it pretty well. Entire grade divided into four groups based on what they need to work on for ELA or math. Some of these are challenge/enrichment groups. They then may change classrooms to meet with their FIT group.

For example, son has Ms. Smith but goes to Ms. Brown for ELA FIT and Ms. Jones for math FIT. Another student might have Ms. Smith and stays with her for ELA FIT and math FIT. It all depends on what the school determines the student needs work on.

Teachers switch which level group they are teaching each marking period, so one teacher doesn't get the reputation among students for being the "smart" FIT teacher and one the "dumb" FIT teacher. Kids can move around each marking period too, so if they were working on a specific skill in ELA and mastered it, they can move out of that FIT group and kids still working on that skill stay in it for the next marking period. Four days a week they do ELA, one a day a week they do math.

What grade? Or do they do this for all grades? This does sound like a good approach.

I believe all grades! But my son is in third.

Anonymous wrote:My son is in first grade and it's been going well! His teacher said the first grade team decided to focus on ELA/reading for the first quarter (maybe longer) to get interventions going for the kids who need it. My son is in the enrichment group and as he didn't need reading support they work on writing. I've seen a huge improvement already and his teacher said he's the only student who regularly uses punctuation and capitalization so far. All the kids rotate to one of the first grade teacher during this time so my son is with a different first grade teacher. We've also just been really lucky with this teacher as she does small groups based on level for ELA and math. During the open house I saw how she differentiated instruction for each group - my son's group read the text aloud in turns independently and then answered written comprehension questions on a worksheet. Another group was working on basic phonics to catch them up.

Does he get the enrichment every day or just once or twice a week?

Kindergarten teacher here-- we regroup (or re-evaluate) every quarter and a little more often closer to the beginning of the year. During our FIT block right now, I have three small groups with my lowest students for 15 mins each. Two paras pull groups of very high students for 30ish min enrichment (5 of my students, more/less from other classes). Our ELD teachers also pull groups at this time.

When students are not in a group they are: finishing the independent follow-up phonics activity (differentiated usually), reading from the class library, or doing a center activity related to our knowledge domains. Right now I have farms, plants, and stories, so the popular ones are farm magnatiles/blocks, puppets to retell stories, coloring pages, puzzles, and leftover crafts from previous lessons that they want to make again. They can also go on chromebooks to play Boost or use Tumblebooks, PebbleGo, Epic, etc but that's not a popular option with my class. The goal is to keep them quiet and productive so my small group can focus, but it's also some less structured time to make choices and be with friends.

After a few years of trial and error, I feel like my team finally has a good routine that works well.

Anonymous wrote:I think our school does it pretty well. Entire grade divided into four groups based on what they need to work on for ELA or math. Some of these are challenge/enrichment groups. They then may change classrooms to meet with their FIT group.

For example, son has Ms. Smith but goes to Ms. Brown for ELA FIT and Ms. Jones for math FIT. Another student might have Ms. Smith and stays with her for ELA FIT and math FIT. It all depends on what the school determines the student needs work on.

Teachers switch which level group they are teaching each marking period, so one teacher doesn't get the reputation among students for being the "smart" FIT teacher and one the "dumb" FIT teacher. Kids can move around each marking period too, so if they were working on a specific skill in ELA and mastered it, they can move out of that FIT group and kids still working on that skill stay in it for the next marking period. Four days a week they do ELA, one a day a week they do math.

What grade? Or do they do this for all grades? This does sound like a good approach.

My son is in first grade and it's been going well! His teacher said the first grade team decided to focus on ELA/reading for the first quarter (maybe longer) to get interventions going for the kids who need it. My son is in the enrichment group and as he didn't need reading support they work on writing. I've seen a huge improvement already and his teacher said he's the only student who regularly uses punctuation and capitalization so far. All the kids rotate to one of the first grade teacher during this time so my son is with a different first grade teacher. We've also just been really lucky with this teacher as she does small groups based on level for ELA and math. During the open house I saw how she differentiated instruction for each group - my son's group read the text aloud in turns independently and then answered written comprehension questions on a worksheet. Another group was working on basic phonics to catch them up.

My 5th grader gets enrich literacy. They read an entire book (!) and she is working in her book report.

I am a specials teacher who does kindergarten fit groups. I work with the above grade level students. There was some changes at the beginning of the year after the kids took map so I'm guessing there might be some movement and groups after the next round of dibels.