My son is in first grade. His public school has an extremely high rating according to state standards. The school has had good levels of funding from the state and community grants as well. On paper this school is exceptional, but my son and I are dissatisfied with the level of education he has received thus far. The school has a dedicated special education program for gifted students. But there is only one teacher to serve the needs of sixty students. The homeroom teacher is left to meet the needs of all students: gifted, ESL, learning disabled, or developmentally delayed.
The classrooms have smart boards and access to a computer room. The library is well stocked and the teachers are veterans. The teachers do the best that they can with all their resources, but it comes down to one teacher per 20+ students. The teacher is mainly forced to deal with pulling up those that fall behind.
The state textbook agencies are not helping matters with their expectations student progress through out the year. What bothers my husband and me is that the math text does not show significant progress in skill development from beginning to end. The expectations for the last week are only mildly more advanced than that taught in the first week.
There is not a science text. Now science education is promoted as highly technological for the first grade class. They get to watch episodes of the Magic School Bus on the classroom Smartboard. Now I like a good episode of the Magic School Bus, I think it is a great Sunday morning cartoon show. However I do not think that it is a sufficient substitute for hands on science experience. So do you think that a Sunday morning cartoon is sufficient science education for our children? I don’t. My son and I do home chemistry and physics experiments. We read about animals and biology. We study robotics and programming. School seems to be more like glorified daycare. Is anyone else concerned about the standards of education being brought down to the level of a few students, versus working toward bringing up those that fall behind?
Unfortunately, I think this is a common problem, especially in our economy right now. Many schools are being forced to cut programs and staff in order to keep up with budget issues. The result is that the education of the students suffers because their individual needs can't be met in the same way. Teachers must focus on the children who aren't up to par with the rest of the grade level, and those who excel are left to their own devices. This is an area that really needs to be examined more closely and something needs to be done to make sure these kids are challenged in new ways.
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