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6 thoughts on “Variety Pack 3”
Yikes, big question.
My question is why there is a placement test at the other school/program? There should be the understanding that a Level I course is a Level I course. Clearly there will be gaps in what students have experienced – they haven’t been in that classroom before! However, a year of Level I is a year of Level I. When students come to our District, we place them according to their transcripts and course history. I hope this is not within your own District.
No, it is more about kids leaving our little rural dirt road independent school that serves mostly lower-middle income families to go to either a large public school or a more traditional prep school, both of which have more traditional programs.
Kids who have been in our school sometimes leave after 8th grade because they want/need a bigger social scene and/or different extra-curricular opportunities, etc. There are several whose parents work at the prep school, so we pretty much know we’re losing those kids after 8th grade.
This is definitely an ongoing thing we’ll need to address. I don’t think they have placement tests at the local regional high school, but they do at the other private schools where a few of our kids end up going.
Some CI teachers use the last few weeks of school to do some grammar and address that issue. My school forces students to buy workbooks that go along with their books (which I never use) at the beginning of the year. To avoid having students/parents ask me why they wasted $20 , I just do 10 minutes a day doing exercises in their workbooks to justify that purchase. It gives them a change of activity and I explain to them that this is a different part of the brain they are using and that it will not help with acquisition.
I believe Carol Gaab did the same thing in May.
I hate to admit this, but I do some conjugating work with my students, mostly my 8th graders because so many of them are going into traditional programs at the high schools…and I would feel badly, after almost 3 full years with them of TCI, if I didn’t partially prepare them for a more traditional program.
I welcome others thoughts on this.
Feed the need. Wait until the end of the year and then give them a little traditional work using structures and vocabulary that they know. Ben is right. Their future success will have nothing to do with you. But at least you will know, and be able to explain, that you were true to your beliefs and gave them a bit of experience with the “other side” in order to help them to be successful. It is all that you can do. It will never be enough for some of the folks they go on to. Then again, probably nothing would!!!!
with love,
Laurie