Anonymous wrote:Pros: great community, superb teachers, great location and building, large outside space with nature center and playground.
Solid academics, very good art and music programs, Chinese teaching adapted to each kid, public school (free!) with bus service (not free) from Capitol Hill, Georgetown, Mt Pleasant and U street, great after school programs (including sports, chess, Chinese song and dances,...) at a reasonable price.

Cons: Not super strong in STEM, no American history so far (but Chinese history was done a bit). No American flag nor pledge of allegiance as far as we know (a bit of patriotism would not hurt.) A large emphasis on testing even at the K level.
Awful communication with management (they seem to have an insider circle and the rest of us is ignored).

Net result: Happy with the school as there are many more pros than cons -- We supplement at home for math/science and some world/US history.

Great school.

Good luck to everyone applying!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:how high are they?

~80% proficient. DC CAS standards are not exactly high...

Anonymous wrote:how high are they?

Anonymous wrote:Upper grade kid: very inconsistent math program. My DC had huge gaps that seemed to be passed along that caught up with her this year. Some kids are fine, but we relied on just what the school taught. I had a hunch because she just wasn't working on the same things I did at that age, but hey I'm not a teacher so what do I know about math teaching sequences-- especially with the common core and all that. Unfortunately, that was wrong.
Once we figured out the problem and how deep the deficits were we got a tutor. Three months of intense work and she is now on track. Here is an example to help you: they never taught times tables when it typically happens so the teacher the following year assumed it had been done and moved on to things like area and perimeter, long division, etc. like they knew them. It was not just my daughter either. Some kids had learned them along the way but the ones who didn't pick them up on their own were at a deficit.

Anonymous wrote:SOPA and CIRCLE are legit. My DC has a tutor, but the school would not have a way to report it, because how would they know? We don't go around telling everyone, but yes we are glad to high level scores on the tests. There are children in DC's class with Chinese-speaking parents, and we don't mind paying to ¨keep up with the Wangs.¨

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The school has to come up with their own assessments for Chinese. It causes problems. Last year, there were a bunch of kids in 1st grade stuck at level "c" in Chinese bc the standard they were using according the school was too difficult.

So this yr for second, they came up with another standard: the current independent reading benchmark is "b" for Chinese whatever that means.

These assessments are essentially meaningless. It's best to ask the Chinese teacher whether your child is where they should be in reading and writing. Some teachers are more forthcoming than others.

This is the bubble class though, right? Aren't they the hardest class since the first one? Yet, the ones after them are better?

It is almost an argument against expansion.

Anonymous wrote:The school has to come up with their own assessments for Chinese. It causes problems. Last year, there were a bunch of kids in 1st grade stuck at level "c" in Chinese bc the standard they were using according the school was too difficult.

So this yr for second, they came up with another standard: the current independent reading benchmark is "b" for Chinese whatever that means.

These assessments are essentially meaningless. It's best to ask the Chinese teacher whether your child is where they should be in reading and writing. Some teachers are more forthcoming than others.