Renee I have always admired your posts and understand your passion for teaching but I want to give you some food for thought. IF we measure growth using not just standardized tests but also classroom based assessments and observations...we still HAVE to try to move the kids that are this far behind, at least a year and preferable more. If we don't at least make a year's progress they get further and further behind. Now, I would argue that we need to help policy makers understand how to measure that growth (measure it using a value added model that looks at a kid's growth from year to year rather than whether or not they have met an arbitrary grade level benchmark), but we as teachers MUST try to help our learning disabled kids reach the same standards or we are cheating them. Do you remember the story of the middle school teacher who got a class list and next to the names was a number....130, 158, 120 etc. She thought, WOW, these kids are so bright, I must have the gifted class. She taught the class like they were gifted and after the standardized test results came back for the year, the administration came to her, wondering what she had done to get this group of slow learners to achieve so well. Turns out the numbers after the names were locker numbers, not IQ scores! If we believe that because kids are in supplemental instruction that they can't learn, then they won't. I know you are passionate about good teaching and instruction. Just think about this a bit...my job as reading specialist is to run those supplemental programs. If I believed that my kids couldn't catch up, then what is the point of my job and what chance do they stand of ever starting to bridge that gap??? While I HATE much of what NCLB does...and while I HATE the misuse of testing and accountability, the good thing is that at last, we can't ignore the needs of these special learners. While we must go to great lengths to help them achieve...don't they deserve that from us? The best thing about the comprehension strategies is that they require thinking at high levels...ALL kids deserve that, including those that are disabled or otherwise low-achieving. Jennifer Maryland
> child's reading level up a year plus more..... as that is what the > supplemental instruction was supposed to be providing.... This is absolutely, completely, utterly absurd. It comes from the viewpoint that children are vessels to be filled, and if you just fill the vessel faster, it will fill up sooner. That's not education. That's physics. If a student were able to progress like this, he/she wouldn't be behind in the first place. Who thinks this stuff up, anyhow? Renee ************************************** Get a sneak peek of the all-new AOL at http://discover.aol.com/memed/aolcom30tour _______________________________________________ Mosaic mailing list [email protected] To unsubscribe or modify your membership please go to http://literacyworkshop.org/mailman/options/mosaic_literacyworkshop.org. Search the MOSAIC archives at http://snipurl.com/MosaicArchive.
