just a quickie, as I'm having a rough baby week...we had total ambivalence, too, and only tested, with trepidation, after a year of banging our heads on the school wall. It was a relief thinking we'd at least have some idea, ballpark, what we were dealing with, rather than wondering if the school read our son better than we did. We just had a meeting with the school today...how's this for ambivalence-causing...the administration that utterly ignored our polite conversations, letters, pleas, etc for more than a year, has decided, entirely on their own, to provide what I was planning to scheme, politic, volunteer, and manipulate to eventually get - they've decided to rework their entire first grade to do flexible groupings and have the kids travel to different classrooms for different level work, so that the teachers don't each have to try to straddle such a great range of needs in the classroom. They're going to trade off which teacher gets what group, too, so everyone gets to work on novels or what have you. The teachers seem happy, and we're thrilled. But...we spent all last year hearing how they cannot possibly group, the classrooms were all fully differentiated, etc, and besides, we were pushy and our kid not that smart. Then we come in with an outside psychologist and some nifty numbers and suddenly they're revamping everything?? I mean, great...but...if it was this easy to do, why on earth didn't they do it before?? So ...I'm really happy, and so glad we tested...but really ambivalent. Our son would be the same person without those tests and numbers, so why is it so different having the numbers? His needs - and those of all the smart kids around him who aren't tested - aren't any different for a number.
well. I guess I'll take it. And I'll try to be really really enthused and positive and hope this spreads into other grades, b/c I think it's a REALLY good thing for a lot of kids.
