kitchen table math, the sequel: parents are free!

Sunday, April 22, 2007

parents are free!

I just noticed this comment on the Post-It note:
Reminds me of the elementary school principal at our school who said, "If parents don't think we're teaching their kids the right things in the curriculum, they should feel free to teach it at home." Oh, thanks for the permission. (And this was before parents could even find any information on the school's curriculum online -- anywhere else.) It IS always worse than you think.
Of course, we here in Irvington still can't find anything about the curriculum online.

School motto:

Irvington Union Free School District
Where policies and practices are shrouded in mystery

4 comments:

SteveH said...

"Of course, we here in Irvington still can't find anything about the curriculum online."

Specific grade-level curricula for lower schools are non-existent. They might produce a document, but it's meaningless. It is not like a syllabus that lists books, methods, testing, homework, and grading. The document might give a framework for meeting state testing requirements, but it never tells you what, exactly, is going on in class.

High schools aren't any better. I should be able to see a syllabus for every course taught. I want to know the textbooks used, the chapters (or material) covered, the homework and testing requirements, and the grading structure.

I don't know if you remember that I tried to get just a list of textbooks used for each math course in high school, but the head of the math department never got them to me, even though she said she would, and after I asked several times. I need to get some student connections.

She was the one who came to our lower school and told them that the problem kids had in high school math had to do with "do-overs" in the lower schools, NOT the curriculum, which is CMP. She is wrong. She knows that there is more to it than that, but she will not publically question the lower school's curriculum.

Catherine Johnson said...

I don't know if you remember that I tried to get just a list of textbooks used for each math course in high school, but the head of the math department never got them to me, even though she said she would, and after I asked several times. I need to get some student connections.

I do indeed remember that, and I agree: you need student connections.

That's how everyone else gets information.

Catherine Johnson said...

She knows that there is more to it than that, but she will not publically question the lower school's curriculum.

profiles in courage

Catherine Johnson said...

What was the do-over problem?