My DD6 is at a charter school. Overall, we love it, and we do feel in many ways it is the right environment for her. The school follow's Ernest Boyer's Basic School philosophy. Focus on building a strong school community, meeting every child on their own level, strong music and arts (which is DD"s passion) program, etc.
For DD's personality and comfort level, the school is a great fit. The verdict is still out on the academic aspect. They definitely meet the needs of kids who are special needs or academically delayed. Not sure about meeting the needs for gifted kids yet.
One area that I don't know how to tackle is the school policy that kids can only read picture books at school in K and 1st. I understand the theory behind it (that picture books can contain much more complexity than early chapter books), and the school does not do AR or any other kind of leveled reader.
For a while I was okay with it; after the first parent-teacher conference I got the impression that differentiation was happening with DD, at least as far as reading was concerned. Her teacher isn't doing any fluency work with her (she is already a fluent reader, and her teacher recognized that right away); instead she is working on helping DD pull out the deeper meaning from stories, abstract concepts and vocabulary. We were told that she is having DD read 2nd grade level picture books for this purpose, even though her actual reading level is quite a bit higher. One example she gave was having a Puss in Boots picture book, and new vocabulary DD learned, such as "miller".
However, I think that is slipping, and I can't imagine limiting DD to picture books for another 1 1/2 years. The school loops, and she will have the same teacher (and same classroom library) next year as well.
Is this a battle worth tackling, since it is a school-wide policy, not just teacher specific? I have thought about asking for subject acceleration. I honestly don't know if I should rock the boat, or just leave things be. DD seems happy to read anything, whether it is Curious George, the back of a cereal box, or Barack Obama's memoir hanging out on my bookshelf.
She is not the kind of child to complain, but she has asked why certain books aren't in her classroom (Charlotte's Web, Magic Treehouse, Judy Blume....like I said, my child reads books at all kinds of levels!).
