I believe that my daughter's teachers (and most other teachers/schools) really do want to help kids. But there's a lot of evidence indicating that many or most of them don't have the mathematical background required for making proper evaluations of the the flashy textbooks that get pushed by the big publishers. And yet that certainty comes in here: even in that blog post, the author emphasized that the books should be written by educators. She didn't really mention subject experts with graduate degrees in mathematics. This is almost as depressing.
Bingo. I've talked and talked and talked to our national charter organization about this very point for YEARS. The major problem with their assessments is that they aren't being written by subject experts-- but by "educational" ones who have "background" in the subject. That misses nuance that genuine subject experts catch in an instant, and also ferrets out those little problems that dog GT kids like crazy in curricula (ambiguities, inconsistencies, conceptual errors when viewed from a higher level of understanding, etc).
This is why nationally normed exams in subject areas are NOT written by
subject educators but instead by subject
experts. I know, I know... I will just tuck my soapbox away now...
There really isn't a good way to fight this. As Bostonian noted, the options are pretty bleak either way-- they chose to go outside the system for authentic learning whilst (nominally) keeping the child in on-level instruction, and we chose to push for what acceleration they WOULD give us (and we pushed kinda hard, actually)...
So we fight to get DD to do work which at least occasionally
is actually a waste of her time... (and really, how on earth do you answer such an assertion when both you and your child know that it is TRUE??) and have her work
almost at her ability level. Bostonian's family, they have authentic work... but it also requires a child who is willing to 'phone it in' at school, on the compliance side.
I'm not sure which is better. It probably depends on the child. Knowing our DD is what led us to go this route rather than forcing her to submit to ANY amount of material that is 2-5 years below her readiness level. The reason is her response to doing such tasks-- abject refusal and total shutdown. In her case, we know from experience that there's no reasoning with her in this particular venue re: material that she finds an insulting waste of her time and energy. She would really and truly rather fight and do NOTHING than be treated like a trained seal for even a short period of time.
Bostonian's route-- taken with my DD in particular-- could only lead to an ODD diagnosis, frankly.
Enrichment is a great option for some kids. But not all of them are willing to put up with the mind-numbing, remedial portion of things alongside it.
Val, I also wonder if rigidity is related to a lack of conceptual background in the subject. That seems to be something I've noticed with my DD's teachers-- the ones that are most rigid seem to have the most superficial understanding of the material themselves. It makes them really uncomfortable to think outside the lines.
