Combo Classes
My son attended a private school for Kindergarten and is attending public school this year for 1st grade. His skills are at about the end of first grade in math, and he easily reads books on a 3rd or 4th grade level. The school he is in now has a very low enrollment. About 147 total kids in K-8. The school has the highest test scores in the district, very few behavior problems, and the whole community is involved in keeping the school at #1. Too good to be true... you may be right!Because of such low enrollment, some of the grade levels have to be combined into classes with one teacher. At the beginning of the year, the classes were combined into K-1, 1-2, 2-3 etc. Somehow my son got dumped into the K-1 class. In the first few days (they started on 8/13) he was bringing home his class work and it was not challenging for him at all. I found out the 1st grade students in the K-1 class were actually getting Kindergarten assignments and talking about colors, the alphabet, and so on in class.
I attempted to get him moved into the 1-2 class, but it was "full" (meaning the teacher didn't want to be overwhelmed with her 17th student). The VP and I worked out a plan where he would attend the 2-3 combo class for Language Arts and K-1 for the rest of the day. Well, they just disbanded the 2-3 class. The 2nd graders went into the 1-2 class and the 3rd graders into a new 3-4 class. (you with me so far?) Now my son is back in the K-1 class all day. I was not notified and only found out because of looking at his homework and having him tell me he is no longer in the 2-3 class.
Shouldn't he be attending the 1-2 class at least for Lang Arts? Has anyone been through a similar experience? Should I go back to the VP for another solution? I have a feeling they're going to say they cannot accommodate him. What then?
Any advice, links, feedback is appreciated!
Posted by:
wilxsmith
Reply from:
Laura Compian
Date: Sep 5, 2008 at 4:09 pm
Reply from:
jeniw96 Date: Sep 11, 2008 at 12:35 am
I understand your concern. I'm currently teaching a K 1 combo class. I am in a situation where the district will not pay for extra teachers and classrooms for only straight grade classes. I am not in control on who is in my class (for the most part), but I do know that the 1st grade students were chosen by their K teacher because they are more independent learners than others.
I am however, teaching twice as much curriculum. Therefore, I'm holding each grade responsible for only their work for their particular grade.
I have noticed one thing about my students in the past couple of years. Students are coming with more phonics and decoding skills, but severely lack others skills like being able to infer, line up, listen and follow directions, and respect the teacher.
I hope maybe some of this helped since it's coming from the other point of view.
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