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Post by luke on May 17, 2006 7:09:41 GMT -5
Wife's pissed off at the school counselor, who does scheduling. The plan this year was to put all the resource/special ed kids in a class by themselves for reading. By some moronic state and federal laws, you can't do this anymore, but if you put some of the borderline kids in with them, it's perfectly fine.
But the counselor is concerned that parents will call her up, not to mention just too lazy to sort something like that out. And hey, "Our reading test scores are just fine."
The whole point of it is to benefit all the kids. It's one thing in math or science, where you either get it or you don't, but literature is all about comprehension. You completely fuck the gifted kids if you dumb down the reading material for the resource kids, and you completely fuck the resource kids if you up the reading material to challenge even the middle kids. It's ridiculous.
The school will still probably manage to separate the kids so much as possible, but the counselor is being a big hassle.
In that line, also, she's got this one kid who quit trying half way through the schoolyear. Started answering, "Durr..." to anything he gets asked in class, and why? Because he's going into the G.E.D. program, and he won't be able to play sports unless he's in special ed. So his fucking coach told him to act stupid in all his classes so he'll get put in special ed.
Naturally, when the kid gets all F's, all of his teachers got forms to put him in special ed. But they all wrote, "He doesn't try because he wants to play sports next year, even though he is fully capable." So now this kid's just failing, the teachers are fighting to make sure he doesn't get put in special ed, and the coach is a complete goddamn scumbag. Some of the teachers have yelled at him for doing this shit, but I think that should be automatic grounds for a firing.
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Post by rockkid on May 17, 2006 7:15:19 GMT -5
You bet it should!
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Post by rockysigman on May 17, 2006 7:30:49 GMT -5
Seriously. What a supreme asshole.
If that kid isn't a world class athlete, than all he's doing by trying to get that kid placed in special ed is fucking up the rest of his life by trying to get him branded as something that he isn't. I mean, I guess that's not that big a deal...
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Post by luke on May 17, 2006 7:42:51 GMT -5
See, the coach obviously doesn't care about the kid or his future as an athlete or otherwise, he just wants to win junior high football games. Which makes him a sad, pathetic man.
BTW, did you know that if you're classified as "challenged" in reading, you get to have your driver's ed test read aloud at the DMV? At least in this state.
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Post by rockkid on May 17, 2006 7:44:24 GMT -5
Not to mention a throw back to the 50’s
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Post by dolly on May 17, 2006 10:19:09 GMT -5
There really are some totally unprofessional people in teaching, and no matter where in the world the school, the same shit goes on.
Regarding pitching at the right level - it's a really tough balancing act. You have to virtually deliver three lessons in one (joe average, brainy brenda, and dumb dan) - then, if you have special ed needs in your class, you have to factor all that in too, and if you have english as an additional language? it's really hard work - but we all do our best -and sometimes we even pull it off, managing to scaffold the little laggards, whilst allowing our gifted to shine.
But when people undermine the efforts that teachers to that extent (and there are teachers I work with guilty of similar disgraces) it can all go tits up.
Even headmasters aren't immune. We have a kid who is in a chair, and who has missed so much through extended hospital stays that he hasn't a hope in hell of passing anything. But can he go into the special ed class and take a year late? No. Because he will screw up our league tables. And as the top school in the city, we just can't have that.
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Post by phil on May 17, 2006 10:31:36 GMT -5
Brainy Brenda should be enrolled to help Dumb Dan ...
All the Average Joes get to watch the tits up ... !
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Post by dolly on May 17, 2006 10:37:25 GMT -5
I think I'll be staying off the vino at the prom tonight otherwise it will be Miss B that goes 'tits up'. Don't want to be popping out of my dress now!
On happier news - I just got an interview for the job that I really want. It's on Wednesday. I'm already having kittens!!! Agh! Excited!
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Post by Fuzznuts on May 17, 2006 10:42:12 GMT -5
Woot!
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Post by dolly on May 17, 2006 10:49:03 GMT -5
Woot?
Is that an exclamation of rejoicing on my behalf? If so, thank you kind sir.
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Post by luke on May 17, 2006 10:58:33 GMT -5
Brainy Brenda should be enrolled to help Dumb Dan ... All the Average Joes get to watch the tits up ... ! This is sorta part of the problem, Phil. The philosophy is, "Put Dumb Dan in the class with Brainy Brenda, and Dumb Dan will be forced to excel." WRONG. It doesn't work this way at all. Brains are not all created equal. What ends up happening is that Dumb Dan is incapable of keeping up with Brainy Brenda, so the entire classroom, made up mostly of Average Joes- has to slow down to keep up pace with Dumb Dan. This leads to a bored, unchallenged Brainy Brenda, an Average Joe who makes straight A's because the curriculum is so down, and a Dumb Dan who ends up falling behind anyway. And then what happens? Dumb Dan fails anyway, so teachers are forced to dumb down the curriculum even more. Why don't Brainy Brenda's or Average Joe's parents complain? Because their kids are making straight A's, so why should they care? Meanwhile, their kids are getting shit for education, all becauase a minority of dumb kids are holding back the entire curriculum. Put the dumb kids in their own classes, maybe throw in a few Average Joes, and you can turn F students into C students. Put the Average Joes in their own classes, maybe throw in a few Brainy Brendas, and you can turn C students into A students. Spend more money and resources on the Brainy Brendas than any of these other kids, and you can turn the A students into the cure for cancer. Throw a bunch of Dumb Dans in classes with Brainy Brendas, though, and you're making everyone all the stupider for it. No one excels. This is common fucking sense, but the enabling government just can't see it, and the U.S.- and I guess the U.K., I can only assume Canada or whoever else, continues to fall behind the world's up and comers. ... Whew. That was intense. Thanks for the generic names, dolly, it was an inspiration. And oh yeah, I also meant to point out how hilarious it is to me to think about a bunch of little white English kids scribbling rap lyrics in their notebooks. Oh man. |
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Post by luke on May 17, 2006 11:00:21 GMT -5
That was far from an assault on what Phil was saying...no problem with kids helping each other. I just sorta used it as a springboard.
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Post by dolly on May 17, 2006 11:14:12 GMT -5
No probs Luke - though how terribly un-PC of me. Ah hey ho to all this PC bullshit.
What you say is correct Luke (about all the kids mixed into one)- but think about my subject where it's a chosen option. That means, that maybe 70 kids choose to take Business/Economics/Leisure & tourism/whatever other dumb vocational subject is terendy this month
We can't set those kids - even if we could identify the Brenda's from the Dan's and Joe's, we can't lump them together (damn shame) as they all have different timetables. Brenda and Dan might be at polar opposite ends of the ability spectrum, but they both chose Design Tech and Music, therefore - you're in the same Business Class and lump it.
Therefore, for those of us who don't teach 'non-option - eg compulsory' subjects, we get what we're given, and it comes as it lands (bit like my mother's 'home' cooking then).
So yeah - in theory take the dumbos out so the bright kids don't get held back - but it's not always practical. Of course, when there are genuine educational needs to be taken into account, then that's when SENCO should be involved.
It does really piss me off though if I've had an observation on a tough area of the curriculum, that I have to dumb-down (sorry, approach in a way that will draw on the kids (limited) experiences) and I've managed it, and hey - everyone enjoyed the lesson inthe process. Then the observer says "but what did you do to make sure that your G&T kids were "appropriately challenged"? I'm not afraid of the extra workload, by any means - but it gets ridiculous at a certain point.
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Post by dolly on May 17, 2006 11:15:04 GMT -5
Whew, lengthy rant.  |
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Post by luke on May 17, 2006 11:20:38 GMT -5
I can definitely see the difference for electives. It's the core curriculum stuff that I think should be divided up. It's impossible to draw lines in something like the arts or foreign language or even some business class that kids choose to take. But reading, science, math...this is where you need to take a different approach. So yeah, Dolly, you're destined to a big mess, I guess. I know what you mean about observation. They're concerned that the G&T kids are being pushed and the resource kids are being catered to, and you can't really do that all at once. So much politics watering down education, though, it's sick. |
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