Just a quick post.
The girls received their report cards today. Both of them have shown great improvement since last term.
I have concerns that Jaala isn't getting as much attention as she needs to suceed in academics. She is a brilliant little girl, creative and caring, but she is an outside the box girl. She would do much better in a montesori style classroom, and I'm schedualling an interview with her teacher to try and get her on an IPP with heavy focus on math and language skills.
She excells in science and social studies, and music, art and PE, but language and math are difficult for her.
She's also my little la la land girl, and she is easily distracted, she day dreams. Her afternoon teacher has a very chaotic and undiciplined class, and she has a heavy Romanian accent, which I'm sure Jaala misunderstands OFTEN.
I need to sit and contemplate and make a list of what I'd like to see happen for Jaala in this last term, that will propel her forward to the place she needs to be for sucess in grade 3. I have insight into several things I want to see on her IPP but I want to make sure I've taken the time to consider all things connected to her struggle, and several idea's of how to attack that, before I see her teachers next week.
Lei is my sweet little anxious doll. I have a report from her resource teacher that says Lei has climbed from the 30% percentile in September, to the 84% in February. WOW! What an amazing achievement! I'm so proud of her......but the report from her classroom teacher does NOT reflect that improvement.
Why? What is happening in the classroom setting, (as opposed to the one on one or small group setting in resource) that is causing her to lose ground? Or is it that her teacher is not evaluating her fairly? The mark in Lei's reading report last term was NI for needs improvement....well, she improved, A LOT, and the mark this term is still NI for needs improvement. IF it is the case that even after all this time, she still hasn't reached a satisfactory level of grade one March, reading, why are her percentiles so high from her resource testing? Her math, science, social, bible, and music were all very good grades, except the part where they're supposed to read. Reading number words, reading province names etc.
I do homework with them every night possible. That is, not on monday's after they return from their dad, and not on the wednesdays they visit their dad. However the teachers are telling me I need to do more practise with them. WHAT AM I DOING WRONG???????
I literally do not have any more time to dedicate to homework, it is not feasible. They are grade one and grade two, a certain amount of free play time is required for well being. They get maybe 45 mins free play time per day, the rest is homework, supper, bath and bedtime. Where shall I fit more practise?
The only thing I can figure is that it's not the right kind of practise, but it seems to be, they leave the homework sessions being able to preform that which we were working on....why is that not reflected in their school work?
I'm pretty frustrated.
I wish I could take pictures of my little class to show you all how cute they are! I also wish I could take pictures of the backdrop folders I cut, pasted, laminated, folded and stapled. They're AWESOME! They turned out really great.
AND I wish I had a video camera in PE today. We were working on cartwheels as part of our gymnastics unit. One of my little fella's is of east indian heritage, he is WEE little and when it was his turn to cartwheel, he made an X with his body and limbs, THREW himself violently to the side, and made a GREAT rotation for a cartwheel, it looked like it would be perfect!......
but then he dropped his arms.
The poor kid's head was the only point contacting the mat, on his way over and he flopped comically onto his side!
I clapped and cheered for him because he was ALL heart!
Did I mention that my job invigorates and refreshes me?
Oh, Char, I was showing the mom of Lei's friend the pictures you've taken of the girls and family.....she loves loves loves them, and wants you to do school pictures for them. I told her that unfortunately, pictures come with an added plane ticket and lodging fee. :(
Hi there,
ReplyDeletewading in with an opinion.
It sounds like the girls are at a private school. SOMETIMES, but not always, the expectations can be quite high (I taught at several and this was the case. Your girls may be progressing greatly, but maybe not to the (sometimes unrealistic) expectations placed on them.
As for homework, please do not get me started. I used to assign (because my principal made me) 2 hours of homework a night to my 5th graders and about an hour to my second graders. THIS IS TOO MUCH. (In my not so humble opinion.)
They do need practice, but like you said, when do they get to play?
Hang in there, while these grades are a foundation for later acheievment, a NI in second grade spelling is not an indicator that they won't make it into Harvard.
Thanks for letting me ramble!
As a fellow educator, I welcome and appreciate your "ramblings"!
ReplyDeleteYes they actually are in a private school, I was so annoyed that I didn't even consider that as a possible explaination! It hasn't become an issue prior to now so I didn't pay attention.
Why the homework? what can be done? My father says if a teacher can't get the lesson done in class time, and must send homework, they aren't doing their job, now I don't go THAT far in judgement, because shit happens, but I don't think 1 hour of homework for a grade 2 student (it's a reality in our house) is an effective teaching practise!!!
homework is not a horrid thing. The proper purpose is reinforced practice. Therefore, a GOOD homework assignment should be one that simply forces kids to practice the principles learned in class.
ReplyDeleteThey should not be doing anything new, or asking the parent to teach (although checking homework is helpful) they should already know how to do this stuff and simply be doing a bit (emphasis on a bit) of repetition. (thus says the current brain research stuff when I was still teaching things may have changed in the past 5 years.)
Quite honestly an hour for grade 2 is too much, the general rule if thumb is 10 minutes per grade. (So grade 2, twenty minutes.) This was NOT the case when I taught at private school however.
This may not be her teachers fault entirely, it may be the excessive amount of curriculum that has to be covered in a year.
Hope this helps.