Got the news today.
It is wrong on so many levels, that I don’t even know how to begin. This is my 21st year as an Elementary
Principal, and prior to that I was a teacher for six years. I substitute taught for six years, and
taught pre-service teachers as adjunct faculty at Ohio University also for six
years. In other words, I have been
in the educational field for a long time.
What I heard today cuts across everything I know about child development
and what helps and what hurts children.
For YEARS, we have known that the muscles in the eyes
required for focusing on print do not fully develop, particularly for boys
until around age eight. Yet we
expect ALL five year olds to be readers.
For YEARS we have known that a preschool experience is
vitally important for children to be successful in school, and yet, unlike our
global competitors in Europe, we do not offer a free government-supported
preschool opportunity for all children up to age six as they do. For EVERY child!
Completely paid for by the government! Only about half of our children in America make it to a
preschool because it is cost prohibitive for the other half.
For YEARS we have known that retentions harm children and do
not typically help. Study after
study has consistently shown that a retention beyond Kindergarten rarely helps
and most often causes drop-outs later in life.
For YEARS we have known that some children have multiple
learning interferences that we call disabilities and we provide them with
additional support and resources.
Good things have come from the No Child Left Behind Act in that we no
longer separate our learning disabled students and instead offer them an equal
education with supports, but they are called disabilities for a reason.
We expect all children to make one year’s growth in one
year’s time. Except our children
with disabilities. We have to make
them grow way MORE than one year’s growth in order to catch them up. So let’s see how this makes sense – our
brightest and best grow one year.
Those that need multiple repetitions and variations, and most likely a
slower pace to catch on have to double or triple the expectation of those
without disabilities. In other
words, the disabled students have to do two to three times MORE than those who
are not disabled. Its not Rocket
Science, here folks!
Now it seems this is not enough. Our legislators have created the Third Grade Reading
Guarantee and they don’t seem to know or care about what children need.
If a child is not able to read in Grades K-3 according to standard,
teachers are to create a RIMP – a reading improvement plan, which is a rather
detailed document showing what interventions and supports are in place to help
students catch up. Students, often
where Kindergarten is their very first schooling experience, are labeled within
the first 30 days of school as in danger of failing. Teachers must make sure parents are aware and they and the
parents have to sign the document so that we know that they understand their
child could be retained in Third Grade if he/she doesn’t catch up.
But the news today caused me to write this. Now, even students with learning
disabilities will be retained in third grade if they do not pass the state
test. Even if our learning
disabled students make a whole year’s growth in one year’s time, this is not
enough to “close the gap.” Somehow
the legislators believe retaining an eight or nine year old who already is
well-aware that they are not keeping up with the rest will fix things. Let’s ensure our struggling learners
feel most like failures by failing them in Third Grade.
Should we scare them more about the test?
Maybe we should learn from Finland – the world’s finest
educational system by all standards.
They do NO formalized testing until students are at least twelve years
of age. If our teachers were able
to actually TEACH and not spend the entire first quarter testing, maybe we
could close the gap for more.
Weighing the pig over and over does not make it grow fat. Testing our kids does NOT help them
become readers either.
Is anyone willing to stand up to our legislators and say
enough is enough?
