No Child Gets Ahead...

rayb · Hot Air Balloon

No Child Gets Ahead...

Roper · Senior Bucketkeeper

Okay, Ray, so you started a topic that will draw me out of hibernation. It's been a nice break, and I'm ready to be back anyway.

As much as I dislike some of the provisions of NCLB, I disagree that NCLB is "failing our genuises." Teachers are.

Through gifted and talented programs, almost all schools provide teachers the resources they need to differentiate instruction. A good teacher will adapt instruction for students with challenges and help those students to achieve high expectations. A good teacher will also adapt instructions for gifted and talented students to keep them challenged and achieving at even higher levels. The problem is that most teachers increase the quantity (i.e. extra worksheets) instead of the challenge and quality of instruction for gifted students.

If your children display above-average intelligence or talent in any area, I encourage you to explore the G&T program and request an evaluation for your child. Most programs have deadlines for nomination, so check them out right at the first of the year.

FWIW from Roper, who just finished G&T certification last week smile

rayb · Hot Air Balloon

Coolness I hooked Roper.

Good point, btw, I went through California Public schools and was mostly unchallenged by my education, but once I got into an honors setting, I found that there was still not a lot of personalized learning. I remember not doing that well in that sort of setting...

The problem I have with gifted programs is that every parent thinks their child belongs there, even when they don't. And it's entirely elective. It still only creates three levels of learning... imo... Specialized education is also very expensive...

A part of me thinks that if a child's really gifted, they will be smart enough to get the most out of their education no matter what level of competence. But that's amazingly naive, I know... cuz intelligence is different than wisdom... (I learned this by playing D&D... Wisdom for clerics, Intelligence for Magic Users...)

--Ray

zealia · Profuse Pontificator

Congratulations on your certification, Roper!

I think it is very important for those who are gifted to have the resources and challenges that they need. I think that they can shutdown if they are bored in school.

I had a cousin who taught gifted children for a time. I seem to recall that the largest drawback for her was dealing with their parents.

lundbaek · Profuse Pontificator

After retiring from engineering in Jan 2001, I did substitute school teaching every school day until Sept 2007, minus a year and a half mission. Most every day a different class and subject, including a lot of specal ed., usually a different school in Mesa, Gilbert or Higley, Arizona. And I enjoyed most every day of it. Coming from the manufacturing and construction industries, I was definitely not a trained public school teacher, nor would I want to be full time. But I could bring a different perspective to most classes. If I had to try a second time to get a class to order, it was "All hands, attention on deck!" That worked every time. Most days were great. But I all too often felt certain kids were holding others back, and I felt it was a tremendous disservice to many students to let that continue. I discussed this with several different teachers, and every one felt the same way. They disliked, even hated the NCLB program. With 30 some odd kids/students in a class, although I frequently had smaller clases, it seems to me very difficult to keep the interested students from being disrupted or otherwise held back by the disinterested and disruptive ones, and by those already way behind. A long time ago now, but it seems it was better when certain students were held back a year, even 2 years in some cases I remember.

rayb · Hot Air Balloon

lundie: That's really an interesting insight. Are you saying that we should take disruptive children out of the main classes? How would that work? I've felt a lot of what you've said too... certain kids kinda hold things back... but then isn't there always going to be some child that was holding the class back? even among the geniuses?

I sometimes if there needs to be a class in how to learn in a classroom setting... :)

--Ray

Roper · Senior Bucketkeeper

That's what the first six weeks of Kindergarten are for :) We spend the beginning of the school year helping children engage in class routines and expected behaviors. When one child has behavior is out of control, learning stops for everyone in the class.

Fort Worth School District has alternative campuses for children who have a documented history of unacceptable behavior. The schools are run a lot like military basic training--direct instruction in everything and zero tolerance for bad behavior. It works for most kids who go through the program, and they come back to mainstream classes with a new understanding of acceptable behavior in school.

salesortonscom · Wise and Revered Master

In CA we have alternative schools for the trouble makers but you have to be really, really bad to get put into one of them. I like the military academy concept. I wish they had that option for regular schools also. I would have signed up for it in high school because the distractions and bad behavior would have been less prevelent.

lundbaek · Profuse Pontificator

IMO any kid that repeatedly and knowingly disrupts the learning process for others should be put out of class and made to experience consequences as similar as possible to the consequences he/she would experience in the work place for similar misbehaviour. Certainly in JH and high school. The serious misbehaviour I encountered was deliberately intended to show off by harassing me as a sub, and it was rare. And once in a blue moon there was an obvious and deliberate attempte to provoke me to resort to the "laying on of hands". It was probably easier for me to come down on troublemakers because I was not trying to impress anyone to get a full time teaching job, as most subs were. Once I discovered which classes and subjects I could enjoy the most, I usually limited my jobs to just those classses. Even though I'll be over 70 when we return to Arizona, I may resume subbing for the Mesa district that asked me to return.

I did on occasion accept an assignment in one of the schools especially for students with a history of seriously bad behaviour. In one of those classes was a boy who seemed to not really belong there. He actually did his in-school and home work and was responsive in class. So one day I asked the regular teacher why he was there, and learned he there temporarily for having flushed a lit cherry bomb down a school toilet. On one occasion in the same school I expelled the entire class, called the school cops, and made the kids line up against a fence outside facing the sun. It does take a certain special person to cope with the behaviour cases on an every day basis, and I observed some great teachers amd aids for those kinds of kids.

salesortonscom · Wise and Revered Master

I'd like to get Sheriff Joe Arpaio to start setting up high schools. I think the kids would learn more and the state could save a ton of money.