Elementary school rant

[v-girl]

Then we "talk about it from beginning to end" and he narrates a summary to me; I may ask him questions if I want to "check that he was listening to himself read". I can choose a sentence from each book that I feel illustrates a spelling word or grammatical concept we should work on, and he will copy it out. Finally, after every 10 books he can dictate a story to me of his own invention, "so he can read his own stories!"

Now that is a way to build literacy if you ask me. I love that kid.

That is one awesome kid! I want to homeschool him! Ha ha!


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[GrayMatterWife]

Peggy: Got plugged into homeschooling communities here in ATL on Veronica's advice. Found several just googling. Did a lot of research in terms of how I thought I might want to homeschool then just cautiously started... Sorry. No interesting story!!

[BonBon]

Just a quick rant of my own. Our district finally canned Everyday Math due to the new Common Core standards.(yay!!) Now 3rd grader is bringing home worksheets for HW that she can hardly figure out. Today we had a word problem about earnings, profit, and expenses. DD got all hung up on the verbiage and even after me explaining couldn't do it. *sigh* I think that might be overshooting, right? How about Jimmy had 47 balls and gave 23 away. How many does he have left? Same principle, but in terms a 7 year old can understand.

[samssugarmomma]

Omg Bonbon. That's crazy!

We are stuck in 3rd grade estimating. Why have we been estimating for three weeks?

[BonBon]

My sons really are asking me to homeschool them. I can't think of a real reason not to. I have a lot I would like to teach them. I am always trying to cram all this science knowledge about everything from surface tension to electricity into our everyday drives.

Same here! My head is filled with knowledge that's essentially useless unless I pass it on. DS hadn't heard of homeschooling until a community science class this summer, when he found half the class was homeschooled. He asks all.the.time to be homeschooled now, or sent to Montessori. He says he's tired of the "slow kids setting the pace" in the classroom.

DH has nothing against homeschooling, just against *me* homeschooling.

[BonBon]

Omg Bonbon. That's crazy!

We are stuck in 3rd grade estimating. Why have we been estimating for three weeks?

Yes!! The rest of the worksheet is all estimating! I would rather they hammer the math facts than all this focus on estimating. We're using Go Math. You?

ETA: thank you for the confirmation that it's nuts. It's not just me then!

[samssugarmomma]

I will have to check. I actually have no idea what it is off the top of my head.

[samssugarmomma]

It is new this year and common core approved. Gag!

[spotty_dog]

Just a quick rant of my own. Our district finally canned Everyday Math due to the new Common Core standards.(yay!!) Now 3rd grader is bringing home worksheets for HW that she can hardly figure out. Today we had a word problem about earnings, profit, and expenses. DD got all hung up on the verbiage and even after me explaining couldn't do it. *sigh* I think that might be overshooting, right? How about Jimmy had 47 balls and gave 23 away. How many does he have left? Same principle, but in terms a 7 year old can understand.

Argh, sounds like they are trying to tie math to "career readiness" and "practical application". To forestall my I will just leave this here: http://mysite.science.uottawa.ca/mne...artsLament.pdf

[spotty_dog]

Argh, this thread jinxed me! I was feeling smug that my request for a class with no "behavior systems" was honored and my kid didn't have a color system. Well, guess who came home from school today upset because "Everyone in the class clipped up to 'Fabulous', but me and two others are still only on 'Rockin'!" He says the system just started today. I asked him what color Rockin' is. Blue. Sigh.

So I googled behavior clip charts and found this blog: http://teachinginprogress.blogspot.c...ior-chart.html
And this: http://missnightmutters.com/2012/08/...h-a-price.html

[peggyfromwastate]

Thanks so much!!! Loved both of these!

I love the idea of the "take a break" station from the first post. The second post is just so logical... It's amazing. Great posts.

From the second::

If my boss were to hang a chart in the staff lounge, showing which teachers were doing an exceptional job each day, as well as those who were having exceptional-in-a-bad-way days, I would be furious. I would be raging about my privacy, my dignity, my right to be respected by my colleagues for the person I am, and to not be publicly labelled based on any given day. My personal growth is between me and my boss. It has no business being a public display. I don’t know any teacher who would disagree with this. My boss and I have private conversations, plans, and systems to foster my progress.

[spotty_dog]

Yes! I loved both of those! The take-a-break would work so well for my son, and the office analogy described perfectly why I find these systems demeaning.

[Ladybug]

The public school here just switched to Go Math this year too. It's suppose to be similar to Singapore math. Our school started singapore math back when Lucy was in 1st grade. We were very lucky to get in on the beginning of the program and move along with it. It is expectional IMO. However, it's very difficult to pick up in the middle. I have a friend whos seventh grade DD switched to the public school this year and they are two years behind in math compared to our Singapre program. Supposedly they will catch up with the new Go Math program, but the transition is not easy. It's worth the change longterm, but kids (and teachers!) will need a lot of support switching modes.

http://www.learningthings.com/blog/i...-1st-3rd-grade

[samssugarmomma]

Our math book is called 'envision math' Tennessee. It is completely incorporated with the TCAP which has fully adopted common core. In the book, the tests aren't tests, the are 'TCAP prep'. Such crap! And ridiculous because our kids font take the TCAP, we take the IOWA tests.