Interesting conversation with public school 10th grader......

[Pam L in Mid Tenn]

I'm training a new employee at work.  During our training time I asked her some questions about herself.... general conversation to get to know her better.

 

She is a 10th grader at a prestigious local public high school. I asked her what she was studying in English class.  She said, "This nine-weeks we are doing debate. It's hard."

 

I said, "What about literature, grammar, writing?"

 

She said, "We did literature the first nine weeks and grammar and writing will be in the spring semester."

 

"What did you do in literature?"

 

"We read some short stories in the textbook. But some were long stories not short."  (I'm not aware of a literature genre known as Long Stories. :) )

 

I asked, "How were you graded?"

 

"Vocab tests on words from the story."

 

"Did you write anything?"

 

"We had to write one paper on one story."

 

So, it seems that in nine weeks time "some" literature was read, presumably discussed in class, some vocab tests were given, and one paper was written.  I'll be interested in further conversations. :)  I'm always interested in how much or how little is actually covered in classrooms. :)

[G5052]

Yes, every school is different of course.  Teachers sometimes have to cut corners to keep their load reasonable too.

 

But I've had similar conversations.  The honors English class where the grade is based on discussion and vocabulary, AP Latin class that didn't follow the AP syllabus at all, and the Algebra class that rarely assigns homework.

 

I'm thankful that our circumstances allow me to expect more.

[Jean in Newcastle]

These kinds of conversations actually make me feel better.  I worry so much that I'm not doing enough at times.  I do think there is a basic core of what should be covered and I do meet that but sometimes I worry that even that isn't enough.  When I see that some schools don't even meet that basic core and it still seems to be "ok" then it puts a little bit of pressure off of me to be perfect.  

[MBM]

My son's freshman and sophomore honors English classes involved a lot of literary analysis. Students in honors English are expected to know vocabulary, grammar, plot, setting, etc., so those things are not discussed much in class.

 

IIRC, my son read about eight novels each year as well as poems, nonfiction pieces (a lot of philosophy) and plays. At the end of the last quarter, each honors class performed a full Shakespeare play (Henry V and Richard III for my son's classes).

 

Students get many writing assignments which make up 50% of their grade. They are also required to keep all written English assignments all four years.

 

This year my son is a junior and is taking AP Language and Composition which he thinks is much easier.

[Matryoshka]

I have two ps 10th graders, and an 11th grader (exchange student).  The 10th graders are in honors, the 11th grader isn't.

 

They are all reading multiple (5-7) full novels and a full Shakespeare play (the honors classes are hoping for two Shakespeare plays, time permitting), in addition to shorter works and poetry.  I do wish they wrote even more (seems like more writing is done in history classes), but the two 10th graders did just finish their first essays this year, on Huck Finn.  They are doing Sadlier-Oxford for vocab.  Grammar at this point is not taught as a separate subject, I don't think - writing is also not a separate unit but in context of literary analysis (which irks my literal-minded kid who hates literary analysis).

 

Do I think I could do even more with them at home?  You betcha.  But not all schools are as lame as the one mentioned in the OP, by a long shot.  Well over 90% of the students here who take AP classes score between 3-5 on the AP tests (and all students who take the class are required to take the tests).  I admit to being horrified at some of the stories I read here, but it's not the case everywhere.

[LaughingCat]

Long Stories:  a perfectly adequate description of the categories of Novella and Novelette

Sometimes lately I think they need to add a new category of "Long Novel", something like Novelitis :lol:

[mathmarm]

I'm training a new employee at work.  During our training time I asked her some questions about herself.... general conversation to get to know her better.

 

She is a 10th grader at a prestigious local public high school. I asked her what she was studying in English class.  She said, "This nine-weeks we are doing debate. It's hard."

 

I said, "What about literature, grammar, writing?"

 

She said, "We did literature the first nine weeks and grammar and writing will be in the spring semester."

I've always wondered at "English" class, why does it last so long? I had English from 6th-12th grade. It was ridiculous, at what point do you have the grammar that you need?

"What did you do in literature?"

Also, I gather that the girl is in "English" not "Literature" (Aren't they distinct classes?)

"We read some short stories in the textbook. But some were long stories not short."  (I'm not aware of a literature genre known as Long Stories. :) )

Not everyone has the word 'Novella' in their active vocabulary. I didn't until a while ago, and I'm quite 'educated'. Plus, where is the line drawn for short story vs novella? Is there an official line for a novels word count?

 

I asked, "How were you graded?"

 

"Vocab tests on words from the story."

 

"Did you write anything?"

 

"We had to write one paper on one story."

That may be accurate or not. Kids are notorious for the "School was fine" response.  They give the minimal detail, minimal reply.

So, it seems that in nine weeks time "some" literature was read, presumably discussed in class, some vocab tests were given, and one paper was written.  I'll be interested in further conversations. :)  I'm always interested in how much or how little is actually covered in classrooms. :)

 

Plus, as a former HS teacher, I feel obligated to point out that just because kids take away the bare minimum, doesn't mean that's all the teacher lectured on, discussed, assigned, showed them or had them do. You just can't force kids to learn or engage. You can't. You could have a guest lecturer from any Ivy League school of your choice come to a HS (without making a big ado about it) for a term, and I bet you that they'd have roughly the same response if the kids don't care to begin with. I'm sure Feynmann failed students in his time...

 

[Pawz4me]

My ninth grader is in an honors English I class.  So far they've read Fahrenheit 451, To Kill a Mockingbird and Of Mice and Men (and I'm pretty sure there was one more novel in there, but I can't remember what it was).  They had multiple writing assignments for each novel.  They've also read excerpts from several other works of literature and done a unit of poetry, with plenty of analysis and writing assignments for those.  They just completed the first half of the semester, so at this pace they'll cover at least six complete novels before the semester ends in mid-December.  They don't do much grammar, though.

[MysteryJen]

I think discussions like this highlight our biggest problems in high school education. Excellent public/private schools are doing 2x or 3x the work of average/low performing public schools. This is a giant gap over the four years of school.  No matter how good teachers are, if their class can only move at a certain pace, they can only move at that pace. Maybe it is better for that class to read 2 great novels slowly and thoroughly than 6 or more where many of the students are reduced to using cliff notes just to keep up. And that goes for our individual homeschools as well. My ds1 could easily read twice what my dd1 can do. But just volume does not make a great English/literature course

 

We live in a poorer area but know many people in more affluent cities. The difference in education is stark.  The classes might be both called AP, and a syllabus approved, but the actual getting through the material is not happening.  This is an inequality that is especially bitter because it seems that these educational opportunities are equal. But they are not.

 

 

[BakersDozen]

 

 

My ninth grader is in an honors English I class.  So far they've read Fahrenheit 451, To Kill a Mockingbird and Of Mice and Men (and I'm pretty sure there was one more novel in there, but I can't remember what it was).  They had multiple writing assignments for each novel.  They've also read excerpts from several other works of literature and done a unit of poetry, with plenty of analysis and writing assignments for those.  They just completed the first half of the semester, so at this pace they'll cover at least six complete novels before the semester ends in mid-December.  They don't do much grammar, though.

This is similar to what we do every year/semester yet I never thought to categorize their work as honors. To me it was just English/Literature and the work done simply that which is normally required for high school.  Maybe I need to rethink their transcripts now...

[Julie in MN]

Pam, the public schools in my area are EXACTLY like that.  Granted, this is a poor school district.  But even the honors courses basically just do more worksheet on the same material.  They try to do 2 classics in the 4 years of high school -- Romeo & Juliet, and the Odyssey.  Those involve extensive worksheets taking students through the entire plot (and a prose translation that I don't care for).  Basic grammar and vocab is covered every year because, well, it's still needed by a lot of the kids.

 

It doesn't mean the kids are all doomed, my son did well in college, but it does mean that they don't get (and don't know they don't get) half the common references in everything from speeches to video games.  They can't participate in some of what I consider our cultural conversation.  But they do find stuff to do & to talk about.  And some will be like me, still picking things up as adults (no grammar in the early 70s "relevant" generation, either).   :)

 

Julie

 

 

[goldberry]

Long Stories:  a perfectly adequate description of the categories of Novella and Novelette

Sometimes lately I think they need to add a new category of "Long Novel", something like Novelitis :lol:

 

I don't think my DD would know the word novella to use.

 

I agree there needs to be a word for unbearably-long-and-tedious novel....noveldrum?

[MysteryJen]

Well, some schools are already exceeding the Common Core standards and others are struggling to keep up. What I see is the cumulative effect of being in a poor/underperforming district.  Kids come in behind (and none are red-shirted because parents need the free child care help) and despite best efforts stay a little bit behind every year. In the affluent district I am most familiar with, kids come in already reading (and most are red-shirted) with huge parental support and pushing and every year they outdistance the kids in my home district.

A common curriculum is not going to solve that problem.  I do think that it will help some, but there will still be huge gaps between those groups.  To the point where the hs grads in my district are really just ready for community college or need remedial help at 4 year institutions, and freshman in the affluent district could probably navigate college classes decently.

 

I have a hard time accepting that level of inequality in our society, but I don't know what the solution is.

[Pam L in Mid Tenn]

Yes, the variety of what is actually taught in a course called "English" is tremendous!

And my intent in posting was to bring out how vastly different the content of a course on a transcript can be.

 

In our conversation the first thing that struck me was that "debate" was part of the content in "English 2".

Yes, teens will give minimal answers.  

"What did you do at school today?" .... "Nothing."

 

Our conversation was a more detailed than my actual quoted post.

She wasn't talking about a novella.... but rather that some of the stories were long and boring.... as opposed to the ones that were short and boring. :)

 

We as home schoolers sometimes need to know that we are doing just fine.  That even in classrooms teachers and students are not covering EVERYTHING in great detail.

 

More later.... I have to take my son to speech/debate club. Shall I count this afternoon as English? LOL :)

 

[ThatHomeschoolDad]

I had a Junior SAT kid who said she read The Odyssey in class.  "Awesome," I said.  "Yeah, we spent about a week on it."

 

*****RECORD SCRATCH*****

 

A week.

 

To read and digest and analyze The Odyssey.

 

The one by Homer?

 

We are so doomed.

 

There is a bumper sticker out there, maybe on Cafe Press, that says "Someday, maybe my homeschooler will hire your honor student"  I'm tempted...I really am.

[G5052]

Well, some schools are already exceeding the Common Core standards and others are struggling to keep up. What I see is the cumulative effect of being in a poor/underperforming district.  Kids come in behind (and none are red-shirted because parents need the free child care help) and despite best efforts stay a little bit behind every year. In the affluent district I am most familiar with, kids come in already reading (and most are red-shirted) with huge parental support and pushing and every year they outdistance the kids in my home district.

A common curriculum is not going to solve that problem.  I do think that it will help some, but there will still be huge gaps between those groups.  To the point where the hs grads in my district are really just ready for community college or need remedial help at 4 year institutions, and freshman in the affluent district could probably navigate college classes decently.

 

I have a hard time accepting that level of inequality in our society, but I don't know what the solution is.

 

Yes, that's very much the case here.  Over 2/3 of the county high school graduates that attend the community college where I work need remedial math and/or English.  Among graduates from the next county who went to the closest high school (15-20 minutes away), less than 1/4 need remedial math and/or English.  There are obviously wide, wide differences.

[Julie in MN]

And this is what baffles me in terms of why people get mad about the idea behind common core.  Why should this vary so much from place to place?  Some kids seem to be getting short changed.

 

Even with my oldest having gone to the terrible public school, I'm one who doesn't agree with common core.  My kids' public school teachers had a variety of styles and methods, and I found they did best when they taught they way that "they" taught best, even if it wasn't the way "I" would choose.   My oldest got what he needed and moved on; he's now working and taking Master's degree courses, so the school didn't ruin him.  Yes, lots of kids from our high school go nowhere, and it's hard to keep that from influencing my kids.  But those kids have parents who didn't go anywhere fantastic, either, and that's okay.  We need all kinds of folks, and if their family is happy, then what difference does it make?  Some adults in my extended family actually look at college as a place paid for by the taxes of laborers in order to allow young adults to read literature for years on end, or something like that...  We don't have to all be the same.

 

I might go for a common core that only focused on teaching kids to read/write and do basic mathematics until they get it, with poor ability or behavior resulting in continued education rather than setting kids aside as the class moves on.  I mean, today's teachers are expected to teach dozens of things that have nothing to do with those 2 core subjects.  But even so, it would probably end up with what I'd consider typical American poor choices as for the best developmental ages to teach those core subjects, more reasons to "move on to the next thing," etc.  I don't see anything new emerging.

 

I think the problem with public schools is that we have 50 million kids who each have a right to be in the same classrooms, and the right to continue to be there for 13 years.  That's really isn't something the rest of the world has to deal with.  It affects the realistic goals that can be achieved. 

 

Sorry to digress on the common core thing,

Julie

[lewelma]

 

IIRC, my son read about eight novels each year as well as poems, nonfiction pieces (a lot of philosophy) and plays. At the end of the last quarter, each honors class performed a full Shakespeare play (Henry V and Richard III for my son's classes).

 

 

What nonfiction pieces did he read? 

Long Stories:  a perfectly adequate description of the categories of Novella and Novelette

Sometimes lately I think they need to add a new category of "Long Novel", something like Novelitis :lol:

 

I believe the adjective you are looking for is "Russian" :-)

[Nscribe]

I see and hear such a range of what the expectations are for teens in public school and otherwise that I can see why colleges place such value in what they can compare and qualify. 

 

 

[LaughingCat]

Based on the Hugo Awards definitions

The short story is less than 7500 words = 4-16 pages

The novelette is between 7,500 and 17,500 words = 16-70 pages

The novella is between 17,500 and 40,000 words = 70- 160 pages

A novel is above 40,000 words = 160+ pages

 

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows = 791 pages or 197,651 words - novelitis  (or noveldrum)

Anna Karenina  356,645 words - novelussion

 

Page counts calculated from googling: "In the days of the typewriter, a double-spaced page with 1-inch margins would hold an average of 250 words. So you could assume that since 4 pages = 1000 words, 240 pages = 60,000 words, which was the typical length for most mainstream and mystery novels."

 

(I must admit, I read a number of stories that were in that well-known teen literature category of "long and boring" when I was in high school myself )

 

 

 

 

[mommaduck]

I had a Junior SAT kid who said she read The Odyssey in class.  "Awesome," I said.  "Yeah, we spent about a week on it."

 

*****RECORD SCRATCH*****

 

A week.

 

To read and digest and analyze The Odyssey.

 

The one by Homer?

 

We are so doomed.

 

There is a bumper sticker out there, maybe on Cafe Press, that says "Someday, maybe my homeschooler will hire your honor student"  I'm tempted...I really am.

I NEED to look for that bumpersticker!

So, it seems that in nine weeks time "some" literature was read, presumably discussed in class, some vocab tests were given, and one paper was written.  I'll be interested in further conversations. :)  I'm always interested in how much or how little is actually covered in classrooms. :)

 

Of course, you can't win for trying.  There was a very heated thread here a while back about an elite public charter school in New York City that required 40-50 pages of reading per night, and people here were apoplectic about the overloading of homework on young children, and "no time to be a kid", and etc. etc.

[BlsdMama]

Of course, you can't win for trying. There was a very heated thread here a while back about an elite public charter school in New York City that required 40-50 pages of reading per night, and people here were apoplectic about the overloading of homework on young children, and "no time to be a kid", and etc. etc.

Come on now, we know the only ones doing it right are those of us who homeschool a la TWTM. ;) (Said tongue in cheek.)

[goldberry]

Many of the parents that are college educated homeschool or choose private school, so the gap widens.

If they really cared about society, they would keep their kids in public school! Selfish elitists!  :rolleyes:

 

 (Yes, I'm kidding, in case the eyeroll wasn't clear enough.....I'm not college educated myself, BTW...)

[MBM]

What nonfiction pieces did he read? 

 

Looking through my son's sophomore basket of English papers (I rarely look through his stuff), I found the following which includes more than nonfiction. 

 

Main readings for sophomore year:

Pride and Prejudice, Lord of the Flies, Beowulf, Grendel, Frankenstein, Oliver Twist, Richard III

 

Some of the first quarter supplemental authors:

 

Plato, Hegel, Hobbes, Freud, Foucault, Arendt, Sartre, de Beauvoir, Greek myths of Medusa, Medea, Cyclops, Theseus, Kronos, biblical myths of Revelation, Cain, Leviticus, Isaiah . . . and more

 

Some of the third quarter supplemental authors:

 

Burke, Marx, Engels, Nietzche, Freud, Arendt, Sartre, Kierkegaard, de Beauvoir

 

Others:

 

Wordsworth, Shelley, Wollstonecraft, Coleridge, Bryon, Austen, Darwin, Henry James, Kipling, Bronte, George Eliot, Oscar Wilde, Yeats, Conrad, T.S. Eliot, Woolf, Beckett, Joyce

 

An example of in-class essay (they usually wrote one every 2-3 weeks in addition to at-home papers): The American author F. Scott Fitzgerald once wrote, “That is part of the beauty of all literature. You discover that your longings are universal longings, that you’re not lonely and isolated from anyone. You belong.†From your independent study of the history of Brit Lit and using specific authors and titles to support your claim(s), identify how the Romantics, Victorians and Modernists would respond to Fitzgerald’s essential idea.

 

The Shakespeare play is the highlight for many of the kids. They perform an adaptation at the school's theater onstage. Here is a sample from my son's sophomore year when they performed Richard III.

 

Act I, Scene I: "Al Capone"

Act I, Scene II: "Nobility and the French Revolution"

Act I, Scene IV: "Interrogation During the Cold Way"

Act III, Scenes II and IV: "Classroom Oppression"

 

In summer my son's teacher takes a group of kids from this high school to study Shakespeare with scholars and actors in London, Oxford and Stratford. My son has no interest in doing that but I would like to go!

 

Homeschoolers can probably do even better because you can work one-on-one with your student, but some schools are doing a pretty good job as well.

 

 

**************

All freshman here study The Odyssey for about 4 weeks or so.  I can't remember exactly how long. It's taught at three levels. The school also offers free classes at night to parents who want to study along with their kids.

[EKS]

I was absolutely completely astounded when I put my then 10th grader in a "rigorous" private school (pre-IB no less) and they only read two thin books during the whole semester--two books that no one has ever heard of!  No short stories, no poetry, no plays.  They wrote two papers--one 1-2 pager and another 4ish pager.  In history that same semester, they didn't have a single reading or writing assignment!  The teacher had them watch movies half the time (that is not an exaggeration).

 

That was when I realized that what I was having him do was well beyond adequate.

[Kareni]

There is a bumper sticker out there, maybe on Cafe Press, that says "Someday, maybe my homeschooler will hire your honor student"  I'm tempted...I really am.

 

This may be the one you're thinking of.  (Dangle that preposition!)

 

Regards,

Kareni

[Santi]

I looked at the choices offered routinely at a private school a famous musician's child attends in the LA area. I realized then that the wealthy do not make their children waste their time in school. They seem to understand the relationship between time and money.

Do you mean waste time as in waste time not learning, or you think they consider learning a waste of time?

[lewelma]

Looking through my son's sophomore basket of English papers (I rarely look through his stuff), I found the following which includes more than nonfiction. 

 

Thank you so much for typing all that out! It is very helpful.

 

Ruth in NZ

[Laura Corin]

And this is what baffles me in terms of why people get mad about the idea behind common core.  Why should this vary so much from place to place?  Some kids seem to be getting short changed.

 

Yes.  From the outside, it seems.... odd that there is no standard as to what an education in English (or anything else) involves.  I don't think that the UK system is perfect, but all school pupils take subject-based national 'high school' exams that at least allow for some kind of comparison.

 

FWIW, British universities have no interest in US students' transcripts - why rely on a particular school's 'A' when it could be different from the 'A' down the street?  It's national exams only for overseas applicants.

 

L

[Laura Corin]

 

I think the problem with public schools is that we have 50 million kids who each have a right to be in the same classrooms, and the right to continue to be there for 13 years.  That's really isn't something the rest of the world has to deal with.  It affects the realistic goals that can be achieved. 

 

 

How is this different from other countries, except as regards scale?

 

L

[MysteryJen]

Laura, I don't think it is different except that US schools have never been nationalized.  Even within states, the districts are usually under local control.  This means thousands of districts are all setting curriculum, testing, teacher qualifications, etc. So this leads to a lot of conversations that go like:

"That district is terrible. But mine is doing a good job."

I hear that same conversation about high schools within my district, "so and so high school is just awful.  My kid's high school is doing a good job."

 

While sometimes that attitude is true, it is the same attitude that is getting in the way of seriously talking about reform.  A national exit exam would be great for homeschoolers (sort of, at least to prove that we are comparable to our ps counterparts), but it would be disastrous for many districts.  How to explain that your graduates could not pass the national exam?  Better not to have one in some minds. Better to just tweak the curriculum and continue along the same drifting path.

 

Even on a board as invested in education as this one, I doubt we could easily agree on what a freshman English class should contain. And then make a pass/fail test on that content.

[Tsuga]

How utterly depressing. My neighbor teaches 10th grade English, gifted and general education, and they read two novels (international) the first month, and they have to write long essays as well as turn in a daily journal of words they themselves identify, not to mention projects on content to demonstrate understanding and ability to think critically about the text, as well as tests on content. I know because I asked. :)

 

My own 10th grade was at an "average" school but we read a novel a month, and we had spelling and grammar at the same time, plus a project for each novel.

 

On the other hand, my own state apparently scored above both Finland and Singapore in TIMSS tests so... we might not be Massachussetts but our schools aren't failing, either.

[Nscribe]

Laura:  One of the best analogies is to think of the EU.  America with each of the states and the federal system is really like what it would be to have a "system" that covered the entire EU.  It would be like Germany agreeing to allow the ed system in France to prevail for all, or the Polish system to be the same as the Finish.  Texas and California, could not be more different in some real ways that impact ed policy.  NY and MS .... TN and MA....  Even the British Isles as relatively small as they are have a somewhat distinct Scottish state system vs. Englands and so forth. 

[ThatHomeschoolDad]

Laura, I don't think it is different except that US schools have never been nationalized.  Even within states, the districts are usually under local control.  This means thousands of districts are all setting curriculum, testing, teacher qualifications, etc. So this leads to a lot of conversations that go like:

"That district is terrible. But mine is doing a good job."

 

Case in point -- New Jersey has 603 school districts.  603.  Check out a map to see exactly how big this state is.  See that big long state just to our west?  Starts with a P?  They only have about 200 more than we do.

 

This is not the way to run a railroad.

[Laura Corin]

Case in point -- New Jersey has 603 school districts.  603.  Check out a map to see exactly how big this state is.  See that big long state just to our west?  Starts with a P?  They only have about 200 more than we do.

 

This is not the way to run a railroad.

 

I understand about the fragmentation of the US system.  Julie seemed to be talking about something else, maybe that only the US gave the right to be in the same classrooms and continue there for 13 years.  I think she might be talking about specialisation 'excluding' some children in some countries' systems, but that's certainly not the case in all countries apart from the US.  In Scotland, for example, there is no division within schools - high schools cater for all levels of academic ability and offer free education to age 18 - although one can enter university at 17 if one wants.

 

Julie said:

 

I think the problem with public schools is that we have 50 million kids who each have a right to be in the same classrooms, and the right to continue to be there for 13 years.  That's really isn't something the rest of the world has to deal with.  It affects the realistic goals that can be achieved. 

 

L

[Julie in MN]

I understand about the fragmentation of the US system.  Julie seemed to be talking about something else, maybe that only the US gave the right to be in the same classrooms and continue there for 13 years.  I think she might be talking about specialisation 'excluding' some children in some countries' systems, but that's certainly not the case in all countries apart from the US.  In Scotland, for example, there is no division within schools - high schools cater for all levels of academic ability and offer free education to age 18 - although one can enter university at 17 if one wants.

 

 

Hi Laura,

It's cool to have your expertise in the conversation. 

 

I was talking about meeting the needs of 50 million kids being difficult on MANY fronts.

 

- Like someone mentioned, it would be like getting the entire EU to agree on one textbook for literature or history, etc.  They just dont all see the value of the same things.

 

- Geography itself also means there are so many individual situations that one group couldn't possibly force everyone into the same pigeon hole.  We have kids in remote parts of Alaska and the Ozarks and the desert, who can't get teachers to teach come there and these things, or must spend a large part of the budget transporting kids some 2-3 hours each way to school.  We have kids in ghettos who can't keep textbooks on the shelves (my own dd had things stolen off her desk in class and SHE was supposed to pay to replace it if she wanted to study for a test, but of course many kids won't pay and don't care if their report card is held back, and soon there are no texts).  And it isn't just one area of the country that must be considered, it's thousands of individualized situations.

 

- And yes, requiring every student to sit in the same class is, I feel, different than the rest of the world.  You can correct me if I'm wrong, Laura, but I have heard that kids in other nations (not just Europe) are not forced into classrooms even if they bite people (my youngest had a biter paired with him because he was a good "role model"), or swear at the teacher, or eat the crayons and glue, or speak no English, or disrobe in class when other students egg them on due to social handicaps.  I've seen these things as a roommother and wondered how the teacher ever did ANYthing.  Sometimes kids are sent to the office or home, where they watch TV, and return the next day or after 3 days, while the teacher must teach the next lesson even tho the student wasn't there while suspended and no homework is ever turned in.  I realize all nations have difficulties, but my impression is that teachers have a little more power and students have a little less in the way of "rights."  Again, correct me if I'm wrong.

 

Julie

[Laura Corin]

 

- And yes, requiring every student to sit in the same class is, I feel, different than the rest of the world.  You can correct me if I'm wrong, Laura, but I have heard that kids in other nations (not just Europe) are not forced into classrooms even if they bite people (my youngest had a biter paired with him because he was a good "role model"), or swear at the teacher, or eat the crayons and glue, or speak no English, or disrobe in class when other students egg them on due to social handicaps.  I've seen these things as a roommother and wondered how the teacher ever did ANYthing.  Sometimes kids are sent to the office or home, where they watch TV, and return the next day or after 3 days, while the teacher must teach the next lesson even tho the student wasn't there while suspended and no homework is ever turned in.  I realize all nations have difficulties, but my impression is that teachers have a little more power and students have a little less in the way of "rights."  Again, correct me if I'm wrong.

 

Julie

 

Children can be 'excluded' from school in the UK, but it's not an easy process - my father used to work as a school governor in a rough district, so I know a little about it.  Children who are excluded either return to the same school or are put into some kind of special school for children with behavioural difficulties.  But, as I say, the vast majority of difficult children stay in the same school.

 

It sometimes seems as if the US is described as a place with uniquely difficult educational problems.  It's impossible, I believe, to compare societies in any detail, because fact gathering will be based on local criteria (what counts as disadvantaged, for example).  It's worth remembering, however, that one in three Londoners were born in a foreign country.  The borough that hosted the Olympics had more languages in its local schools than were spoken in the athletes' village.  I'm not saying that immigration is a bad thing - I relish the diversity that it brings and I think it offers an economic benefit - but you can imagine that it offers severe educational challenge.  At the other end of the spectrum, there are Scottish islands with no secondary school, where children have to board at government schools on the mainland from age 12 in order to get an education.

 

An interesting report I heard about a primary school (taking children from 4/5) in central London.  One of the first things they do is to take the children to the park across the road.  A sizeable proportion of children have never been to that or any park.  It's a safe place to go - my sister takes her baby there - but the idea of going to a park is not a cultural norm for the parents of all the children.  The teachers have to deal with the fall-out in terms of cooped-up behaviour, lack of motor skills and, yes, rickets.

 

Regards

 

L

[MysteryJen]

I do think that the rest of the world is dealing with many of the same problems (immigrants, poverty, special needs) that the US deals with. And doing a better job in many, if not most cases. But here, the sheer numbers collide with our fragmentation. Funding for many districts, including my state, is primarily done with property taxes. So some districts are wealthy and some are very poor. Not coincidentally, the poor districts tend to be urban (or very rural) with a high percentage of their students classified as disadvantaged.  So the most needy get the least.  

 

My dd1's swim friends all go to a very good high school in a very affluent district (extremely high property values). They have textbooks provided for every class, up to date lab equipment, new uniforms for choirs, bands, sports, etc.

At the school we are zoned for, no class (not even their college prep courses) can take home their textbooks. There are not enough to go around, nor $$ to replace them. Everything is old, and what is not is paid for by parent booster clubs who have limited fundraising capacity. The parents accept that this is what public education is for them.

 

Unlike the rich high school. For example, the hs girls swim team takes a 6 day "training" trip to a warm state. All girls (80 or more) are provided with tech suits ($200 or more apiece). And the parents see this as normal. For them, this is public education. It is really like a private school.

 

 

[Laura Corin]

Funding for many districts, including my state, is primarily done with property taxes. So some districts are wealthy and some are very poor. Not coincidentally, the poor districts tend to be urban (or very rural) with a high percentage of their students classified as disadvantaged.  So the most needy get the least.  

 

 

 

I'm assuming that there are very different SAT scores in the different districts.  How is this reported and how do people feel about it?

 

L

[MysteryJen]

Well, in the two districts I am most familiar with (and know the scores): My zoned high school has an average ACT composite of 18.  The best hs in the same district has a 21.

 

The high school in the wealthy district has an average ACT composite score of 26.  The three other high schools in that district average between 24-26. These numbers are collected by the state (all hs juniors take the ACT) and are available to view on the state website.

 

I think that most people don't think about it at all. The parents I know in the wealthy district are practically oblivious to the extent of their privilege and the poorer district, the parents are simply more consumed with paying bills and staying afloat.  Outrage over inequality is exhausting and in terms of education, practically useless. Hence the rise of charters in my district and people killing themselves to get kids into Catholic schools.

 

ETA: In the wealthy district, parents are usually appalled by the "low" ACT score (done cold, and without prep) and then do multiple prep classes for the ACT.  Scores are raised pretty high.  I personally know someone who went from a 26 to a 31. So ACT scores collected on a second test would be considerably higher for the wealthy district and probably nearly identical for the poorer one.

[Julie in MN]

Children can be 'excluded' from school in the UK, but it's not an easy process - my father used to work as a school governor in a rough district, so I know a little about it.  Children who are excluded either return to the same school or are put into some kind of special school for children with behavioural difficulties.  But, as I say, the vast majority of difficult children stay in the same school.

 

It sometimes seems as if the US is described as a place with uniquely difficult educational problems.  It's impossible, I believe, to compare societies in any detail, because fact gathering will be based on local criteria (what counts as disadvantaged, for example).  It's worth remembering, however, that one in three Londoners were born in a foreign country.  The borough that hosted the Olympics had more languages in its local schools than were spoken in the athletes' village.  I'm not saying that immigration is a bad thing - I relish the diversity that it brings and I think it offers an economic benefit - but you can imagine that it offers severe educational challenge.  At the other end of the spectrum, there are Scottish islands with no secondary school, where children have to board at government schools on the mainland from age 12 in order to get an education.

 

An interesting report I heard about a primary school (taking children from 4/5) in central London.  One of the first things they do is to take the children to the park across the road.  A sizeable proportion of children have never been to that or any park.  It's a safe place to go - my sister takes her baby there - but the idea of going to a park is not a cultural norm for the parents of all the children.  The teachers have to deal with the fall-out in terms of cooped-up behaviour, lack of motor skills and, yes, rickets.

 

Regards

 

L

 

Laura,

I find it fascinating to hear about local circumstances around the globe, thank you.

 

It sounds like London is similar to NYC these days, where also about 1 in 3 was born in another country.  Interestingly, even here in lil ol Minnesota, a cold climate that one would think nobody would want to immigrate to, we have more Somalians than any other place outside of Somalia.  And here's a quote pulled from our state's MN 20/20 website -- hard to believe this is about a fairly rural and unaccessible state:

 

Of the major languages spoken in the state, Somali saw a hike of 461 percent with 1,897 students in 1998-99 to 10,637 in 2008-09. Spanish saw a 186 percent rise, moving from 12,391 to 35,387 students. Hmong grew 17 percent, from 18,775 to 21,886.

 

Most of the new languages come from Africa. These include the East African languages of Anuak, Berber, Hausa, Oromo, Rundi, Sotho, Yao, Nuer and Malagasy; and Kamba, Luba, Wolof, Yoruba, Luganda and Ndelbele from West Africa. New languages from the American continents include Pampa, Garifuna and Haitian Creole. Asian languages Tibetan, Tongan, Kazakh and Uzbek are also new to Minnesota schools. Students have also brought the European languages of Bulgarian, Albanian, Ossetian, Belorussian, Macedonian and Maltese.

 

Anyways, that's just for trivia :)   Language isn't all that new of an issue -- one of my grandfathers grew up speaking only German.  His parents disowned him for wanting to go to high school instead of farm, so he moved to his godparents' home and finished school.  ETA: Money variation isn't a new issue, either, and some of those little schoolhouses of old did just fine.

 

There are just so many situations that I feel it's unrealistic, and sometimes ridiculous, to expect we can lay out an educational plan for everyone unless it is limited to math & reading/writing, worked on exclusively and continually.  Even if you took a group of 50 million kids who all spoke the same language and were the same color and had the same income, I just don't see them all having the same educational interest, needs, or goals.

 

Maybe I'm pessimistic, but I see those of us against an overarching government-instituted plan as being realists -- expecting the same thing from 50 million kids just.won't.happen, and will cause more difficulty and more time not spent on the children.  I guess we need dreamers and realists both?

 

Julie

[MBM]

Funding doesn't necessarily improve academics, although students do need the essentials like text books. Some public schools in areas of poverty and crime have received a lot of money and resources yet the students have not improved much. Paul Tough's book How Children Succeed explores what is preventing kids from succeeding academically and ways of overcoming the problems that they face. Here is a link to his book on Amazon. The first review does a good job summarizing the main points, but I'd recommend reading the whole thing.

 

http://www.amazon.com/How-Children-Succeed-Curiosity-Character/dp/0544104404

 

I thought this little blip from the New York Times was an apt description, too.

 

“Illuminates the extremes of American childhood: for rich kids, a safety net drawn so tight it’s a harness; for poor kids, almost nothing to break their fall.â€

[Laura Corin]

 

There are just so many situations that I feel it's unrealistic, and sometimes ridiculous, to expect we can lay out an educational plan for everyone unless it is limited math & reading/writing, worked on exclusively and continually.  Even if you took a group of 50 million kids who all spoke the same language and were the same color and had the same income, I just don't see them all having the same educational interest, needs, or goals.

 

 

What I worry about, I suppose, is low expectations.  If everyone is taught the same material, then there is some expectation that they can achieve it.  If people are told that this is the material for their district, their school, their social group, it sounds caring and individual, but perhaps it puts more barriers in the way.  Is it better to have an equal standard, which may encourage aspiration, but leaves some unable to achieve it?  Or is it better to have differential goals?

 

I waver on this, looking at my family.  I trod a standard academic path and went to university.  The younger of my two brothers did well at school until he was sixteen, less well for the next two years, managed to get into university, then dropped out after a year.  Almost a decade later, he went back into education and has had a good career.  Having studied academic subjects, he found it easy to go back into education.  My eldest brother was also put into academic subjects by his school - probably because his parents were middle class and educated - and he failed exam after exam.  He managed to scrape into university but dropped out and has worked at dead-end jobs ever since.  He was practical with his hands, and would have made a good joiner or plumber.  Would it have been better for him to be diverted away from academic subjects?  

 

L

[MysteryJen]

Hi Margaret, we are both in Colorado.  What I see here is that state funding/ federal money is being used to level the playing field.  With the School Finance Act, all school districts are theoretically equal, with a combination of state money/property taxes and the state determining funding levels.  All districts get state money. But districts can ask voters for an override to increase the funding and that is solely done through property taxes. High property values that have stayed stable through the recession are resulting in additional funding and reserves for some districts. And for others, the only funding they have is SFA money. Despite the language of equality, that is not the actual result.

 

When the state started equalizing the funding across the state, parents in some districts just found other ways to get what they wanted. Fund raising is epidemic in affluent districts.

Not so much in mine.

 

 

 

[Matryoshka]

I don't understand--in CO, wealthy districts don't get state funding and poorer districts do, so the funding is that same across the board. Is this not true for other states? And they claim time and time again, that $10,000 a kid isn't enough!

 

Nope.  Here in MA it's almost all from property taxes, so wealthy towns have tons more to spend than poor ones.

 

Cambridge (home of MIT and Harvard) appears to top the list at over $26K/kid.  Lowest district is a bit over $9K, with the average being about $13K.

[MysteryJen]

Wow. That is quite a disparity in MA!

 

Laura raises some really interesting questions...I have to run for afternoon practices, but I will be thinking about that.

[Laura Corin]

In the UK, the schools with the greatest levels of deprivation get the most funding.  More privileged schools will have a bit extra from fund raising, but that's the basic idea.

 

I wonder if outcomes are better with this pattern of spending?  Or not.

 

L

[Laura Corin]

In the US, school districts with 35%+ poverty  receive add'l money from the federal gov't to aid instruction and fund drop out prevention programs - Title 1 is the popular name.

 

It's very hard though for schools in the 25-34.99% poverty range. 

 

That doesn't seem fair.  the UK system works all the way through from most to least deprivation, with funding to match.  

 

L