Our public schools need reform, is SOTW the key?!

[Elizabeth87]

I am a homeschool mother of 4 and have taken on leadership positions in my community, including our local public schools for the last 7 years. I am sure I will run for school board soon within the next few years. I dream of how much better students and families would be served if elementary schools adopted the SOTW so that an entire school building could dedicate themselves to cultural & historical themes, parents could choose to purchase materials and follow along, select read alouds or audio books from the SOTW suggested books and crafts & activities could be merged into the gymnasium for monumental fun and learning. Am I out of my mind or would this be a public school reform worth fighting for?!

[Kiara.I]

It would be interesting. I don't think it's "the" key, but it could certainly be fun.

Will it line up with your local state standards for socials? I would guess not. So you'd basically be asking the school district to add a completely new course, on top of what they're already trying to juggle. Is it worthwhile? Sure. Will it be easy? Probably not.

[Elizabeth87]

Your right, not "the" key 😉 Our local school district sets our own standards, our state has standards but we aren't obligated to follow them, it would be part of a school reform that needs to happen... it would allow faculty to be creative together while learning the same topics but teaching at different levels 

[Clemsondana]

I've been thinking about the same things.  We used SOTW as a resource but not a plan, but I'd be fine with something like that, or core knowledge, or really anything less haphazard than what kids get now.  Based on worksheets that I've helped kids with, the main purpose of the history and science seems to be having kids learn vocabulary words like photosynthesis or having them learn close reading rather than having them understand simple, age-appropriate concepts like the water cycle or that plants get energy from the sun and the whole 'we breathe out CO2, plants use it to make food and release O2 for use to breathe' from my childhood.  I liked Core Knowlege's yearly geography refresher and the fact that it covered 1-2 modern countries every year.  I think it's cool for kids to eat Japanese food and watch a video of how lunch is done in a Japanese school or see a traditional house.  I love showing 'the same, but done differently' around the world.  

I'd also like a greater focus on reading underserved kids books with a rich vocabulary, explaining words as they go.  I've written elsewhere about my struggles this summer, teaching phonics to kids who couldn't figure out CVC words because they didn't have the vocabulary to know what words like 'tan' meant.  They would be better off having a rich vocabulary of everyday words than being able to define photosynthesis in elementary school.  I promise that they can know nothing about it and still understand it pretty well by the end of a high school class if they're used to thinking and haven't already given up.  🙂

My other recent hangup is about special ed.  I was talking to a science teacher from the high school and I found out that our special ed kids do the exact same science curriculum, but they have twice as long.  We have block schedules, and they do each class for a whole year...so, 2 hrs a day of biology.  She said that it's frustrating, and at the end they still don't really understand it.  Of course they don't - advanced, academically motivated kids can struggle to really understand glycolysis or transcription, and many average kids just get the gist of it.  This is one class that we both teach, so we sometimes compare notes.  🙂  But, I"m putting together an agriculture-based class for my middle schooler next year.  It will have some hands-on work like soil pH testing, some labs like measuring and graphing number or timing of sprouting, some generalized learning - life cycle of different plants, basic botany, pollinators, insect and fungal pests and their treatment, and some hands-on planting and picking.  My high schooler is interested and will do more (and use a textbook at times) and we'll turn it into a 1/2 credit elective.  Why couldn't those kids, and other kids, too, take a practical but still informative science class?  I've never been one to believe that we should only teach kids stuff that they'll directly use (When will I ever use this? is not a convincing argument!) but there are limits.  Everybody should learn biology, but exactly what parts can vary.  Rather than being 'the kid who didn't understand biology' it would be great to have a bunch of kids who can say 'Oh, that's tomato blight' or 'We should have clover to help attract bees'.  

I think that this is part of my general issue with passing kids along who don't know what their transcript says that they know.  I would rather a kid just graduate with business math, or algebra 1, and agricultural biology and practical geology, than to have them have a transcript that implies that they know Alg 2 and the current state standards, which is molecular biology, when they don't actually know those subjects.  

[Not_a_Number]

If you want meaningful school reform, what you probably want is better teachers 😉 . Otherwise you're shuffling the same deck of crappy cards. 

[Elizabeth87]

I follow our schools pretty closely and I think a majority of our local teachers are pretty good, there are some bad eggs though, our issues stem from failed administrators and school boards... 

I wonder if giving teachers the SOTW as a "spine" curriculum would inspire teachers creativity and empower parents to pursue read alouds, recipes or other methods outside schools... I can imagine how awesome it would be for entire schools of 500+ students and faculties to be deforating hallways and classrooms like ancient Egypt or China, classrooms could deligate out crafts/activities so students can engage in each special event over a 5 day school week 🙂

I shared this idea with a principal and she loved it and said yes - I'm looking for negatives 🤔

In my pursuit of figuring out how to reform out local education disaster I found this interesting clip... 

 

[Not_a_Number]

1 minute ago, Elizabeth87 said:

I wonder if giving teachers the SOTW as a "spine" curriculum would inspire teachers creativity and empower parents to pursue read alouds, recipes or other methods outside schools...

Just so you know, parents on average will not do things. The kids whose parents already do a lot with them are fine as is. So you have to build up reforms that do NOT count on the parents. 

[Porridge]

33 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said:

Just so you know, parents on average will not do things. The kids whose parents already do a lot with them are fine as is. So you have to build up reforms that do NOT count on the parents. 

Agree. Most parents I know would not want the burden of taking on these extra things at home after school.

[Sneezyone]

5 hours ago, Elizabeth87 said:

I am a homeschool mother of 4 and have taken on leadership positions in my community, including our local public schools for the last 7 years. I am sure I will run for school board soon within the next few years. I dream of how much better students and families would be served if elementary schools adopted the SOTW so that an entire school building could dedicate themselves to cultural & historical themes, parents could choose to purchase materials and follow along, select read alouds or audio books from the SOTW suggested books and crafts & activities could be merged into the gymnasium for monumental fun and learning. Am I out of my mind or would this be a public school reform worth fighting for?!

SOTW isn’t secular and presents many biblical stories as fact. That may get a pass depending on where you live but it only takes one parent or child to complain. I used those resources as a homeschooler but wouldn’t be comfy receiving them from a public school. Do teachers in your district not offer these kinds of unit studies? In my kids’ elementary schools they did. Perhaps you could encourage the school or district professional development coordinator to plan workshops/digital ways to share their units? Better yet, have the teachers in the schools/district communicated to you what *they* want/need?

My experience with local school boards is that they do not get into the minutiae of classroom instruction the way you describe. They set policy/goals and adjudicate disputes. They adopt textbooks from a list of approved, state-aligned resources. They hire a superintendent to run day to day affairs. They evaluate progress toward those goals (based on research and data provided by district staff). Public schools are also supposed to be largely free for the users. Unless these suggestions are coupled with significant fundraising that makes the additional/recommended resources accessible for all students, I’m not sure how this could work.

Edited December 30, 2020 by Sneezyone

[Hilltopmom]

(Public school special Ed teacher here)

The are lots of reasons public schools don’t do much for Science & Social: time is my biggest one (I have 30 minutes a day, last year it was right after recess when kids were also going out for speech services, using the restroom, taking off winter gear, etc). I have a Biology degree and we are a family of historical re enactors... I certainly have the interest and ability to teach those subjects well, but not the time. 
The state mandates our curriculum content and with state testing in math & ELA yearly, districts are motivated to spend most of their time on those subjects. 
I’m not going to get into all the rest of it. Teachers would agree with you about wanting to teach more science & history. Oh and what we do teach we pay for all curriculum and supplies out of our own pockets- we are not provided ELA, science or social curriculum even though we do have state standards we need to teach. Curriculum is expensive, money is tight, & it all goes to buying math books in my district.

As far as special Ed at the high school level, yes, more life skills level classes would be great, like we used to offer. however, the state sets graduation requirements and decided to push the "college for all" idea so now everyone needs to take the same college prep classes to get a diploma.   It's ridiculous and inappropriate & every special ed teacher and student knows it.

I love SOTW but would not feel comfortable adopting it for a public school- it’s not secular.

A seat on the school board would not really give you the option for making change you are looking to make. Local school boards make hiring decisions, school calendar, etc. Perhaps start calling your state government.

Edited December 30, 2020 by Hilltopmom

[Ausmumof3]

I love story of the world and would love more people to be exposed to it but I wouldn’t want to see it mandated I don’t think.  Just as a good option amongst others.

[frogger]

12 hours ago, Elizabeth87 said:

I follow our schools pretty closely and I think a majority of our local teachers are pretty good, there are some bad eggs though, our issues stem from failed administrators and school boards... 

I wonder if giving teachers the SOTW as a "spine" curriculum would inspire teachers creativity and empower parents to pursue read alouds, recipes or other methods outside schools... I can imagine how awesome it would be for entire schools of 500+ students and faculties to be deforating hallways and classrooms like ancient Egypt or China, classrooms could deligate out crafts/activities so students can engage in each special event over a 5 day school week 🙂

I shared this idea with a principal and she loved it and said yes - I'm looking for negatives 🤔

In my pursuit of figuring out how to reform out local education disaster I found this interesting clip... 

 

 

I liked some of the ideas this guy proposed. As a homeschool teacher and a tutor of other children I have a strong aversion to having 10 zillion mandates and every second of my time scheduled out by administrators. If I could have my way, we would pay more and focus on hiring great teachers and then give them more freedom and get the politicians out of the whole mess. 

I don't have the skills to translate that freedom and flexibility to 30 kids though.  My biggest class was about 15 kids (can't quite remember) and it wasn't a skills class like reading or math but a subject class. It does seem that having kids grouped by skill level not age would help with that.  I was put in a resource room for my dyslexia mid year in third grade and got out of it at the end of 5th because the fabulous teacher really helped me. Then I was put in the gifted program in 8th grade. The point being I don't mean setting kids in tracks forever but being able to target a certain skill is helpful.

 

I can think of a lot of things that would make schooling better but seldom is it the book or curriculum first and foremost. 

[frogger]

I just have to add, there were a lot of books/ideas that I was super excited about that got a big "meh" from my kids. 🤣

[Xahm]

Have you read Hirsch's work and what Core Knowledge schools are doing? That might be interesting to you to see what has actually been done with a roughly similar idea.

I've got lots of big ideas as well. Pre-K and Kindergarten should be half day with optional free extended day for parents who need child care. This should be play-based education with an emphasis on developing vocabulary, social and self-care skills, and school citizenship things like taking turns. There should be lots of play, read alouds, and experiences like filling bird feeders with seed and placing then outside the windows. First grade should start major phonics work and math with specialized teachers (at least until education universities change majorly and start graduating teachers who can easily teach both). There should be dynamic skill grouping, allowing kids to change groups every few weeks as needed. There should still be lots of read alouds and recess. My hope would be that starting properly with phonics and good math education would allow the vast majority of students to have reading fully mastered by third grade, giving time for more social studies and science in the upper elementary years. So much time is spent on test prep, especially in high-stakes testing years (I think 3rd, 5th, and 8th around here), that those years are essentially wasted in many ways. Kids don't need to drill "what words indicate the main idea of a passage" if they can easily read the passage and understand its meaning.

My ideas about middle, high, and college are more divergent, and I'm already off topic.

[Not_a_Number]

4 hours ago, frogger said:

If I could have my way, we would pay more and focus on hiring great teachers and then give them more freedom and get the politicians out of the whole mess. 

I'm with you on that. I think you can't mandate away the fact that while some teachers are really awesome, some really aren't due to the career being really demanding and not particularly lucrative. 

I'm not against some loose nationalization of standards, though. And I think having an investment in a more standardized CURRICULUM (that is, a set of textbooks that all work really well together) could pay off. 

[frogger]

2 hours ago, Not_a_Number said:

I'm with you on that. I think you can't mandate away the fact that while some teachers are really awesome, some really aren't due to the career being really demanding and not particularly lucrative. 

I'm not against some loose nationalization of standards, though. And I think having an investment in a more standardized CURRICULUM (that is, a set of textbooks that all work really well together) could pay off. 

I can't imagine being a kid who moves a lot! Now that half the states use common core which mixes or integrates math topics and the other half uses the old Algebra, Geometry etc sequence. How are you supposed to move between those. 😳

[Not_a_Number]

1 minute ago, frogger said:

I can't imagine being a kid who moves a lot! Now that half the states use common core which mixes or integrates math topics and the other half uses the old Algebra, Geometry etc sequence. How are you supposed to move between those. 😳

Oh, man. One would wind up hopelessly lost. 

This discussion does remind me of this xkcd though, lol: 

https://xkcd.com/927/

[goldenecho]

Do you have a planned curriculum for science?   I love combining science and history and would love to help you brainstorm how science could be tied to history, at least in some places.  

 

[goldenecho]

On 12/29/2020 at 8:51 PM, JHLWTM said:

Agree. Most parents I know would not want the burden of taking on these extra things at home after school.

While I in general agree with this, I think most parents have experienced "covid homeschooling/distance learning" at this point, which forced them to be more involved, and you might find more parents being willing or even demanding to be more involved now.

I was one of those who never wanted to homeschool until I needed to.   Two of my kids were always in public school, and my third went back to public school for a couple years before I was homeschooling him again due to covid and him not doing well with distance learning. 

Him going back the 2nd time was a totally different experience.   Before I didn't know how to help him, and felt annoyed and sort of put on the spot when the teacher did ask for my advice.   I didn't know how to be involved or where he was or should be academically.   Once I had homeschooled him and he was back in school, I wanted to stay involved.   I knew so much better what he needed.   I knew when things weren't working.   And oh my word I understood the homework and what the teacher wanted from it and had a good sense of when I could tweak it to make it better help my son.

Many parents don't have the time to get involved, so no, I wouldn't rely on it, but others want to be involved but just don't understand how.  I think more will now.   And there are ways that teachers can make it easy for them.

Like, in homeschool we practiced math by playing learning games, and that worked just as well as a worksheet with a bunch of math problems on it.   Imagine giving kids the choice to "do this worksheet OR play this game with your mom, dad, or another adult and have them sign off that they did it with you."  

[kristin0713]

Not only is SOTW not secular, it is not "Social Studies", which is a curriculum requirement for public schools.  

We have always cycled through history SOTW style (sometimes using SOTW, sometimes using other resources) and it has proven to be a very enriching way to study history in our homeschool.  But I don't think public schools will ever go back to teaching history in that way in the elementary and middle school grades.  

On 12/29/2020 at 11:51 PM, JHLWTM said:

Agree. Most parents I know would not want the burden of taking on these extra things at home after school.

 

^^ also agree with this.  If the extra things were built in as projects and homework, yes, they would be enriching.  But public school parents are just not like us homeschoolers who will prioritize historical fiction read-alouds, field trips, recipes, and projects all year that match up to the history sequence.  And if my kids were in public school, I probably wouldn't, either, given the amount of time needed to complete homework and go to after school activities and have dinner and get to bed early enough. 

[Clemsondana]

I agree with those who say that public school parents are unlikely to want projects  I find that I didn't appreciate projects sent home from church for my kids because I'd have to budget time or find supplies.  I can't imagine that people who are away from their kids for most of the day want to have their time with their kids full of extra projects.  I may be extreme in this, though - one of the big perks of homeschooling for me is that I don't have to do crafty projects.  My kids don't particularly like them.  We are huge museum fans, though.

[Shoeless]

Story of the World isn't secular. 

Just like there isnt a magic curriculum that will solve every homeschool problem, SOTW isn't going to be the key that turns a failing school district around. 

[Monica_in_Switzerland]

2nd vote that OP reads a few books by E.D. Hirsch and goes form there.  Content rich education is already being discussed and implemented, I would not attempt to reinvent the wheel.  I also love SOTW, but do not think it is a good PS fit.  

[Miss Tick]

21 hours ago, Monica_in_Switzerland said:

2nd vote that OP reads a few books by E.D. Hirsch and goes form there.  Content rich education is already being discussed and implemented, I would not attempt to reinvent the wheel.  I also love SOTW, but do not think it is a good PS fit.  

Yes, or The Knowledge Gap by Natalie Wexler It looks at schools implementing (or not) some of Hirsch's approach.

Edited January 5, 2021 by SusanC
la idioma equivocado

[Frances]

On 12/29/2020 at 9:47 PM, Sneezyone said:

SOTW isn’t secular and presents many biblical stories as fact. That may get a pass depending on where you live but it only takes one parent or child to complain. I used those resources as a homeschooler but wouldn’t be comfy receiving them from a public school. Do teachers in your district not offer these kinds of unit studies? In my kids’ elementary schools they did. Perhaps you could encourage the school or district professional development coordinator to plan workshops/digital ways to share their units? Better yet, have the teachers in the schools/district communicated to you what *they* want/need?

My experience with local school boards is that they do not get into the minutiae of classroom instruction the way you describe. They set policy/goals and adjudicate disputes. They adopt textbooks from a list of approved, state-aligned resources. They hire a superintendent to run day to day affairs. They evaluate progress toward those goals (based on research and data provided by district staff). Public schools are also supposed to be largely free for the users. Unless these suggestions are coupled with significant fundraising that makes the additional/recommended resources accessible for all students, I’m not sure how this could work.

Your last paragraph is so true. Our school board for a large district with a 70% of kids eligible for free and reduced lunch has been embroiled in lots of controversy the last few years. According to school district employees we know, at least some of it stems from school board members not understanding their role when they run and win. We have an award winning superintendent that many fear will leave due to the toxic school board. On many levels, things have gotten so bad a local legislator plans to introduce a bill to expand the size of the board and have some members appointed by the governor. The make-up of the board doesn’t remotely reflect the student population (40% Hispanic and the board has never had a Hispanic member). Some of the current members have been linked to white supremacy and the primary campaign funding for the majority comes from anti-abortion groups.

Edited January 5, 2021 by Frances

[Frances]

On 12/29/2020 at 8:15 PM, Elizabeth87 said:

I follow our schools pretty closely and I think a majority of our local teachers are pretty good, there are some bad eggs though, our issues stem from failed administrators and school boards... 

I wonder if giving teachers the SOTW as a "spine" curriculum would inspire teachers creativity and empower parents to pursue read alouds, recipes or other methods outside schools... I can imagine how awesome it would be for entire schools of 500+ students and faculties to be deforating hallways and classrooms like ancient Egypt or China, classrooms could deligate out crafts/activities so students can engage in each special event over a 5 day school week 🙂

I shared this idea with a principal and she loved it and said yes - I'm looking for negatives 🤔

In my pursuit of figuring out how to reform out local education disaster I found this interesting clip... 

 

My sons attended a charter middle school for one semester that basically did this. Social studies and language arts was a combined class and everyone took art which integrated with the topic from that class and the combined class also involved lots of hands on projects. While the test scores for the school were quite high, I think that primarily was due to who chose to be in the lottery for the school and the small class sizes. I was actually not very impressed, as it seemed to me they did very little reading or writing compared to what we did at home. There was lots of emphasis on group work with basically no teaching of skills to make that successful or a learning experience. I also thought they should be laying more of a foundation in drawing and other art skills, rather than just doing things that went along with the current unit study. While some of the projects looked neat, I didn’t see much actual increase in any basic reading, writing, public speaking, or working in groups skills.

[Sneezyone]

20 minutes ago, Frances said:

Your last paragraph is so true. Our school board for a large district with a 70% of kids eligible for free and reduced lunch has been embroiled in lots of controversy the last few years. According to school district employees we know, at least some of it stems from school board members not understanding their role when they run and win. We have an award winning superintendent that many fear will leave due to the toxic school board. On many levels, things have gotten so bad a local legislator plans to introduce a bill to expand the size of the board and have some members appointed by the government. The make-up of the board doesn’t remotely reflect the student population (40% Hispanic and the board has never had a Hispanic member). Some of the current members have been linked to white supremacy and the primary campaign funding for the majority comes from anti-abortion groups.

I was trying to be kind, lol, but you got to the crux of the matter for me. I find it problematic when people who have not entrusted their children to the public schools that they wish to change/reform engage in policy making for the ‘benefit’ of people and systems they’re not necessarily familiar with. I don’t think all board members need to have kids in public school at any given time but I certainly believe they need to have some contemporary experience with a variety of grade levels and academic delivery models in public schools and know what a board of directors is intended to do.

Edited January 5, 2021 by Sneezyone

[Ellie]

On 12/29/2020 at 10:51 PM, JHLWTM said:

Most parents I know would not want the burden of taking on these extra things at home after school.

And also some parents might feel that their children have been in school all day, and when they get home they just want to play (although many schools also send home mountains of homework, so there's not much time for play, anyway, and so not much time for the parents to do anything extra).

[Shoeless]

On 12/29/2020 at 10:51 PM, JHLWTM said:

Agree. Most parents I know would not want the burden of taking on these extra things at home after school.

There would have been absolutely no way I could have taken on that amount of extra stuff if I stayed a working mother. There are only so many hours in the day. 

[barnwife]

I'm going to say "no" because my kids (and I) hate SOTW. Sorry, SWB, it's just not our cup of tea. I wanted to love it, but reading through vol. 1 was just drudgery for us. That being said, it's probably still better for most kids than the textbooks usually used in elementary classrooms. 

Ditto pp saying parents aren't going to do all kinds of RA, projects, whatever to support it in school. If they aren't doing that with what's being done now, a new curriculum isn't going to change that. 

[2_girls_mommy]

I second the others that say look into the Core Knowledge Sequence.  It is already designed for schools.  I do think SOTW is ok for public schools. In fact, one of my sisters used it for 6th grade social studies when she taught.  There are public school lesson plans and tests designed somewhere out there for that.  She wasn't even aware that SOTW was a homeschool text, and she had never seen the A.G.  She just happened to see the set on my bookshelf, and we got to talking about it.  We usually don't have any curricula in common.    So I don't see anything wrong with using it in schools.  I do know that growing up in the gifted classes, we had plenty of take home projects.  That was just part of our school.  I was in full time gifted classes for a few years, on a trial of that system.  Other years in elementary it was just pull out enrichment.  But especially in the years I had the full time class, we had tons of projects at home.  I remember them very fondly.  I don't know about how others feel about them. They were just my norm.  

But Core Knowledge is already designed for schools and has the content wanted, so look into that.  Certainly, using CK and SOTW together can be a good fit.  I do it at home and have for the entirety of our homeschool  (I am in year 14 or 15 of homeschooling now??) 

[Not_a_Number]

35 minutes ago, barnwife said:

I'm going to say "no" because my kids (and I) hate SOTW. Sorry, SWB, it's just not our cup of tea. I wanted to love it, but reading through vol. 1 was just drudgery for us.

Ooooh, you too?! I see so few people on here say that. What did you mind about it? 

[barnwife]

11 hours ago, Not_a_Number said:

Ooooh, you too?! I see so few people on here say that. What did you mind about it? 

You know, that's really hard to put my finger on. The short, easy answer is that the story just didn't draw us in. Every time I picked it up, we had a hard time remembering what we'd read/where we were. It just didn't captivate us. I know some people don't like the jumping around and prefer to do early history region by region. That may also have played a part. However, we switched to a different series with a similar concept that we love, so who knows?

I just know that I dreaded SOTW time and realized my kids did too. And given that I like to RA (generally), and my kids love RA (at this point, basically all of our HS that isn't writing or maths is done as RA because we like them so) SOTW just wasn't for us.

[Not_a_Number]

2 hours ago, barnwife said:

You know, that's really hard to put my finger on. The short, easy answer is that the story just didn't draw us in. Every time I picked it up, we had a hard time remembering what we'd read/where we were. It just didn't captivate us. I know some people don't like the jumping around and prefer to do early history region by region. That may also have played a part. However, we switched to a different series with a similar concept that we love, so who knows?

Yeah, we didn’t enjoy it, either. It felt too... simple, maybe? And we couldn’t remember anything at all. 

What series did you switch to, if you don’t mind me asking?
 

2 hours ago, barnwife said:

I just know that I dreaded SOTW time and realized my kids did too. And given that I like to RA (generally), and my kids love RA (at this point, basically all of our HS that isn't writing or maths is done as RA because we like them so) SOTW just wasn't for us.

We’ve been doing lots of reading aloud too — everything but math and language is done that way right now. So it wasn’t the method that was the issue for us, either... we just didn’t get hooked or have fun with it. And the kids were never excited for it.

[Porridge]

@Not_a_Number have you seen the Usborne Time Traveler book? Your kids might enjoy it. It’s more like a picture book, but it’sa fun way to learn ancient and Medieval history

[Not_a_Number]

27 minutes ago, JHLWTM said:

@Not_a_Number have you seen the Usborne Time Traveler book? Your kids might enjoy it. It’s more like a picture book, but it’sa fun way to learn ancient and Medieval history

They are both far more into fiction than non-fiction... so far, we've had the best luck with things that make it funny, like Horrible Histories, and also with things more like historical fiction.

(I figure that if we're just doing exposure, it's OK to do something that's the opposite of rigorous, lol. But then I'm really not a history buff.) 

[barnwife]

1 hour ago, Not_a_Number said:

What series did you switch to, if you don’t mind me asking?
 

Not at all. We switched to TAN's Story of Civilization. I will say that this series is definitely not for everyone, as it's from a Catholic perspective. I will say for anyone who looks at it, the audio version is excellent. And generally my kids don't like audio books. But this one they ask for over and over. 

[City Mouse]

Reforms need to go way deeper than a specific curriculum. No matter how good you think a particular curriculum is, forcing a change from one curriculum to another just continues the same problems. The good teachers (and there are or were many,good, educated creative public school teachers) need the freedom and respect to teach their students with the methods and curriculum that work best for them.

Edited January 7, 2021 by City Mouse

[MamaSprout]

11 hours ago, Enigma6 said:

Public schools would be better served by adopting the Core Knowledge Sequence in full. It is already designed for schools.

And it is "free": https://www.coreknowledge.org/curriculum/

Engage NY for math and LA: https://www.engageny.org/

[LadyLemon]

A comment on schools, most schools/districts have tons of resources, a new resource is not the answer.

I read an article on a school district that did a reform that really was helping students. I have lost the article sorry. 

The school placed all all students in same size random K class and at the end of the year had a test on reading and math or on first day of the next year. In grade 1 all students were placed in class based on the test scores. The classes with the lowest test scores had the fewest students as low as 10 kids along with more experienced teachers and highest scores the most students  with a max of 30 students.  This helped all students and all students received instruction at their level instead of the teaching at the middle 80%-50%. The school continued with the testing and classes based on the testing until middle school. Five years into this system all students are doing better, there are still kids ahead but no student is behind in 8th grade. This district had 200-400 students per grade. The district also did things to help in middle and high school. In middle school a study hall for all students with ability to go to any teacher when needing help as well as longer school days with more recess of 90 minutes. Recess was added for k-10 grades with something added for the 90 minutes for 11 and 12th. Recess not watched by teachers and teacher having that time as real breaks so not answering emails, meetings or any other school tasks. The school district needed a lot more people for this to work and buy in from all in the community.

The answer they found was smaller class for students needing help and uniform classes in skill level. Problems with this answer, discrimination this didn't look at race and the lowest scoring class didn't properly reflect the schools racial make up and cost for more personal for watching students as well as more teachers. There are things we know help, the question is are they legal and are they acceptable to the community. Other things we know help single sex schools, having real consequences tied to testing like getting a driving permit, and other giant changes. 

Small changes like resources be they SOTW or chrombooks pre each student are not magic fixes. We need big changes but big changes are very hard to do.

Edited January 11, 2021 by LadyLemon
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