kitchen table math, the sequel: coming soon to a district near you --

Sunday, March 4, 2007

coming soon to a district near you --

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8 comments:

nbosch said...

Our district had it and ditched it--it's an expensive model.

March 4, 2007 at 2:09 PM
Instructivist said...

One element of this model (I prefer to call it the psychiatric ward model) is something called an Advisory. It sounds good in theory but is just a big time-waster in practice. Students congregate from different homerooms first thing in the morming and are supposed to talk about their troubles and pour out their souls in public and receive advice from teachers who don't know them. A type of group therapy sessions. None of this was happening with the case I am familiar with. Too much reluctance. Instead, there was a desperate effort to kill time with some activities.

March 4, 2007 at 2:42 PM
Catherine Johnson said...

hi, nbosch!

What happened?

Can you tell us more??

March 4, 2007 at 5:05 PM
Catherine Johnson said...

Advisory. It sounds good in theory but is just a big time-waster in practice. Students congregate from different homerooms first thing in the morming and are supposed to talk about their troubles and pour out their souls in public and receive advice from teachers who don't know them

yes, that's a major idea here -- they want to shave 10 minutes off lunchtime so the kids have 10 minutes in the morning to discuss their troubles. (Help! Mom and dad drink and drug too much!)

Naturally every single parent in the district opposes this (though some parents think homeroom would be a good idea, which I can imagine would be true if we were talking about homeroom).

So then the rationale became: we need 10 minutes in a room together in the morning to hear all the announcements.

March 4, 2007 at 5:08 PM
Forty-two said...

The middle school I attended (92-95) was based on the middle school model. It was brand-new, and we were the first 6th grade class. Some of the "middle school-y" things I remember:

*no gifted/honors classes past the state-mandated 6th grade (although they did at least offer high school algebra and physical science in 8th grade). The theory was that mixing the gifted students with the other students would cause the entire class to rise up and perform at a higher level. I don't think they ever said, "and everyone will be gifted," but that was what was implied. The result was, predictably, the exact opposite. When my sister attended four years later, they had added honors classes for at least the 8th grade.

*integrated classes. We had STS (Science, Technology, and Social Studies) in 7th grade. This was meant to be taught in one giant block, but my class was too big (twice as many students than any other class) to manage that, so we had three separate classes that were still supposed to integrate the subjects and have lots of interdisciplinary projects. There was some of that, but mostly, it was just three separate classes. Very disappointing after all the hype. I don't think my sister had STS, either.

*block scheduling in 7th and 8th grade.

*"Pods." They subdivided each class into pods of ~100 students that had the same set of teachers (each pod had the same english teacher, the same math teacher, etc.). This was supposed to create a more family-like atmosphere, and allow kids to have more familar faces in their classes. Geographically, each pod had its own hall.

I mostly enjoyed my time there, but I read 2-3 books each day during class, and my friends and I competed for 100s on our report cards - challenging it wasn't.

March 5, 2007 at 6:40 AM
Catherine Johnson said...

I read 2-3 books each day during class

?????

whoa

Our kids are lucky if they read 2 to 3 books a year.

March 5, 2007 at 12:30 PM
Catherine Johnson said...

I read 2-3 books each day during class

?????

whoa

Our kids are lucky if they read 2 to 3 books a year.

March 5, 2007 at 12:30 PM
Catherine Johnson said...

The middle school principal had a plan to hire another Earth Science teacher but not offer any more Earth Science courses.

He was going to hire a second Earth Science teacher just so he could have two "teams" (probably akin to "pods.")

The community was supposed to pony up for a whole new teacher just to put ourselves in compliance with the middle school model.

He proposed this in the wake of a bond defeat.

March 5, 2007 at 12:32 PM

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