I doubt they understand either, they are probably just making things up as they go along. I found out at conferences last spring that DS hadn't even been doing his reading assignments in class. He was spending all of his time reading his own books that he brought in from home. Then when he went to go meet with his reading group, he had no idea what anyone was talking about and therefore didn't participate and he didn't have his sheets/reports filled out. And no one thought to intervene? (the reason he didn't do the reading assignments is because he thinks the passages are short, silly, and babyish, although supposedly they were two-three grade levels ahead, so who knows).
