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"District officials say the controversial practice of tracking students — or separating them based on talent and ability — is simply wrong." Is this really controversial? Where is this controversy happening?
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Sep 11, 2015 03:30
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That's really lovely but it seems to be a distinct issue from students having different levels of ability and classes that reflect that fact
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Sep 11, 2015 03:53
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PERPETUAL IDIOT posted:Sure - just use a measure of the singular concept of "student ability" that isn't heavily associated with racial and socioeconomic factors, and then place students into different tracks based on that measure. Seems simple enough, really. I'm not sure why the course of action is to pretend all students are equal because racists might abuse the system. Shouldn't the goal be to improve educational opportunities for students with these disadvantages instead?
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Sep 11, 2015 04:33
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computer parts posted:What if the disadvantaged students benefit from an integrated class? That's certainly possible, but I would be skeptical of the claim that they need to be in the same class using the same curriculum, as opposed to peer tutoring or some other system. I think there is a societal interest in helping high achieving students advance as well as ensuring a quality education for all students, and I don't believe those goals are mutually exclusive.
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Sep 11, 2015 04:59
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Nessus posted:What does "helping high achieving students advance" mean here? Like there's this artificial dichotomy between having special courses for the Saiyan elite mathletes or whatever, and having coursework in which students engage in large amounts of peer tutoring. My understanding is that from a pedagogical perspective, peer tutoring is amazing for everyone concerned, and if you're in a situation where either all thirty kids in the class can get a lot of advantage, or the four hot shots can get a WHOLE lot of advantage and everyone else gets jack poo poo, I think you go with #1. By the phrasing of the article, it seems like the school is keeping the common algebra 1/algebra 2/geometry/precalculus setup, but they're delaying algebra 1 to 9th grade for all students. That means they won't see calculus in high school unless they are extremely motivated to make it happen. Algebra to calculus is a bigger jump than middle school pre-algebra to algebra, and anecdotally I've noticed that spending a year on calculus in high school makes it easier in college. If ~10% of students are fully ready for algebra in 8th grade and they have to wait a year, that's a wasted opportunity to get them to where they could be.
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Sep 11, 2015 05:42
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