Teacher's Journal - As Dumb As It Gets
A letter is about to go home to all the families explaining that, starting next year, the Level IV Gifted curriculum will be the default curriculum for all kids at our school. In short, we're going to teach ALL the kids as if they were not just Gifted but Top Level Gifted, including those kids who were already struggling and failing with the General Ed curriculum. So the genuinely Gifted kids will presumably still be in separate classes, but now everyone else will be studying the exact same material.
"Students who have been taught using Level IV Gifted curriculum often are better prepared for high school," the letter says. WELL OF COURSE THEY ARE - we selected them for Level IV based on how well they were ALREADY doing in school, among other things, after all! This is like saying every student in the future will have to be on the basketball team because the kids on the basketball team get more basketball scholarships, or in the future everyone will have to apply to Harvard because the kids who apply to Harvard are more likely to get into Harvard, and those who do get into Harvard are more likely to succeed financially.
I'm told no actual educational justification for this was offered in the orientation meeting (to which I wasn't invited), just, y'know, the usual politics.
There is absolutely no rational reason to think this will benefit the GE kids, and for once the GT parents will have an excellent reason to be outraged, although in theory their kids won't be deprived of anything; it does beg the question that, if what we're doing for the brightest kids is also fine for those with mental retardation, clearly we haven't been aiming high enough with the Gifted ones.
So congratulations to the parents and politicians who spent decades undermining and watering down Gifted education; now you can point your fingers and say, "See, ANY kid can do this stuff." If they can, it's because YOU RUINED THE ORIGINAL PROGRAM.
"Students who have been taught using Level IV Gifted curriculum often are better prepared for high school," the letter says. WELL OF COURSE THEY ARE - we selected them for Level IV based on how well they were ALREADY doing in school, among other things, after all! This is like saying every student in the future will have to be on the basketball team because the kids on the basketball team get more basketball scholarships, or in the future everyone will have to apply to Harvard because the kids who apply to Harvard are more likely to get into Harvard, and those who do get into Harvard are more likely to succeed financially.
I'm told no actual educational justification for this was offered in the orientation meeting (to which I wasn't invited), just, y'know, the usual politics.
There is absolutely no rational reason to think this will benefit the GE kids, and for once the GT parents will have an excellent reason to be outraged, although in theory their kids won't be deprived of anything; it does beg the question that, if what we're doing for the brightest kids is also fine for those with mental retardation, clearly we haven't been aiming high enough with the Gifted ones.
So congratulations to the parents and politicians who spent decades undermining and watering down Gifted education; now you can point your fingers and say, "See, ANY kid can do this stuff." If they can, it's because YOU RUINED THE ORIGINAL PROGRAM.