Florida school must now teach Algebra to those who are really in need of math life skills.

[madfloridian]

Last edited Fri Oct 31, 2014, 12:52 AM - Edit history (1)

Crossposted in General Discussion for more visibility and with vain hopes for the recs I lost when the bug yesterday took them away from me.

Education reformers are now making their mark on education in this state. Some of us at DU have written about how Special Education students will soon be expected to perform at levels they simply are unable to handle. Why? Because Arne Duncan has fallen for the reformers' pitch that we need to get tougher and more demanding, and that there will be no excuses for failure of any kind. Rick Scott Republicans agree, and few Democrats are speaking out...maybe afraid of going against the party line on it.

Few seem to care, and that disturbs me. We have nearly overnight become a nation lacking tolerance of individuality.

The teachers at this Florida school have done a good job of preparing students with varying disabilities for skills they might need to get into the work force. Now they are going to be forced to spend their time teaching Algebra to these students.

In Florida there has been a special diploma given out to students with needs. This won't be happening anymore, and a state representative is proud of herself for the role she played. She calls this hard-earned diploma just a pat on the head. She pushed to get rid of it so these students could get the "same education" as their peers.

Many of these have Individualized Education Programs called IEPs. They have been already acknowledged by educators and psychologists not to need the same program as their peers. This is a result of the notions of one-size-fits-all, zero tolerance movements.

The article is a little unclear to me, but it looks like those with IEPs will be given a little more time.

Florida Law Has All Students Working to Same Standards




ROOSEVELT ACADEMY teacher Phillip Miles teaches a life skills math class at the school Monday in Lake Wales. Miles said rather than struggling to teach students math they aren't likely to use in their daily lives, he would rather teach them number skills they will need, such as making a budget or calculating sales tax.
RICK RUNION | THE LEDGER

LAKE WALES | On Oct. 13, after nearly two months of school, 9th-grade Roosevelt Academy students were called out of their classes for a meeting.

.....They learned they have to work toward a standard diploma, rather than a special diploma. They found their schedules rearranged, with classes like Algebra 1 in place of intensive math. They were told the whole model of their school, which prepares students with learning disabilities for work and helps them find jobs, would have to change.

"When I got home, I cried because of how much that diploma meant to me," said Georgia Collins.

This paragraph points out the absurdity of requiring the others to fail for four years before qualifying for the special diploma.

"They have to fail for four years before they even get a certificate of completion," said Henry Smith, vocational teacher and career placement coordinator for Roosevelt. "I guarantee you the dropout rate is going to be astronomical."

I agree with the teacher mentioned in the article who said "Rather than struggling to teach them math they aren't likely to use in their daily lives, he would rather teach them number skills they will need, such as making a budget or calculating sales tax."

[SheilaT]

1. Those life skills should be taught to all students,

starting some time in elementary school.

When I was in 7th grade my math teacher took a week out of the regular curriculum to do just that. He taught us how to fill out a check so it wouldn't be very easy to alter, how to calculate interest, and other things I can't recall after more than 50 years. But he said up front that he knew if he didn't teach us these things, no one would. And this was before credit cards became common.

[exboyfil]

2. Interesting situation in our school

You have to take an Economics/Life Skills component. One option is traditional Economics which is a popular choice because it also satisfies one of the Social Studies requirements. My younger daughter was going to take it, but it resulted in a schedule conflict. She is taking Personal Finance instead which teaches those skills (credit cards, checks, investing, pay stub, etc). I am actually glad she made the change because she still can take a college Social Studies class to meet the Social Studies requirement (one she needs for nursing school anyway).

I agree everyone should have such a course. Few college prep students take the course though.

[jwirr]

3. I want to put in a call to action from all the parents of a child who has ever been in special ed. I

want to include special ed teachers in this call also.



It does not good to write to Arne. He is not interested in any of us. But I think that writing to President Obama may be different. I have taken notes from this OP and will be writing as a parent about exactly how stupid this move actually is.

Please join me and lets see if we cannot change at least one thing for the better. jwirr.

[Smarmie Doofus]

5. Where are the parent/family advocacy groups?

Why don't they speak up on this?

[jwirr]

6. I don't think there is one here on DU. At the Arc I am sure they are speaking up but I am also sure

that they are ignored like most social issues are. We started advocating for our children in the late 50s by standing on street corners selling hot dogs and soda to raise money for the schools that we ran in church basement because the schools did not serve our population even though we were taxed for the schools. Finally because we lobbied for their inclusion our children were moved into the school system. Special Education was given rooms and teachers of their own. Later some students were mainstreamed because the classes included some members who could benefit from regular classes. Each student was provided with a IEP (Individual Education Plan) based on their needs and their abilities.

That is were we are at today until the school testing started reducing the methods used to teach these students. Today we are under attack from what people are calling education reform. As a parent I believe that the Special Ed students should be exempted totally from these tests because they do not contribute anything to their needs and are not at all based on their abilities. They also drag schools that serve this population down compared to schools that do not. Arne Duncan does not seem to recognize any of this. What he is doing will end all of the progress we parents have worked for since the 50s. If his privatization of education is allowed to continue Special Ed will once again find itself in the church basement with no funding. Arne is using the disaster capitalism model to get rid of public schools and Special Education.

In case President Obama doesn't know it we voted for change and the change we wanted was an end to trickle down disaster capitalism form of economics. He needs to get rid of Arne Duncan and replace him with someone who actually believes in the public schools and Special Education. To hell with the testing that benefits only the charter/private schools who teach only the top students. We already have an economic 1% we do not need an educational 1%.

[Smarmie Doofus]

4. Idiotic beyond all human understanding.

Having devoted 30+ years of my life to the education of EXCEPTIONAL kids I will not abide this nonsense any longer and will NOT support DEMS who do not respect my 30 years of work.

Speaking of DEMS, since you're in Fla: Where is Grayson on this topic? ( I'll settle for "on corporate ed 'reform' in general".) If we're looking for DEMs who *might* defy the party line, Grayson is good place to start.

[madfloridian]

7. I have heard NO Florida Dems speak out on this. None.

And for your post.

[Ka hrnt]

8. Why are the people in charge of education so stupid?

Oh, right--they're politicians, not educators, and they have absolutely no idea what they are doing. (And worse, they think they DO.)

[Igel]

9. Yup.

It's just reaching Florida, I guess.

A few years ago I subbed a "developmental" class. They're lower in achievement and ability than "resource" classes, which are where you put the kids who aren't up to the level of being mainstreamed even with IEPs and co-teachers.

The lesson plan called for them to do equations for a line, y = mx + b.

The actual lesson was helping them to subtract numbers like 16 - 5. Apparently this was considered "review" and "scaffolding," preparatory to actually teaching them how to graph lines. After all, if you can't solve 16 - 5 you have no chance of dealing with y = 2x - 5 when x = 8. They never even got to dealing with 2 * 8 before they had to move on. Ahem.

This seems insane. But it's reasonable.

Originally these kids were ignored. So SCOTUS and then Congress said, "You must teach them."

So these kids were largely warehoused. And SCOTUS and then Congerss said, "You must teach them." When standardized tests came along, there were "ability group" tests kids could be given. That 13-year-old is working at a 8-year-old's academic level, you give him a test built for him at the right academic level instead of modifying the 13-year-old's test.

So programs were devised to teach them, some good some bad. But soon Congress told schools, "You must be held accountable, and the Pure and True Numbers That Reveal The Real Truth are the One True Standard for holding you accountable." Only modified standard tests were allowed--the One True Test to unite them all, but modified.

Then schools found that if they put the lowest achieving of the low achievers in SpEd classes or on IEPs they could eliminate the trailing, very low grades. And the One True Standard, the Holy Numbers from the One True Test, were suddenly higher.

SCOTUS and Congress, however, said that this was wrong. Some schools then failed to make AYP because suddenly they had too many kids taking modified standard tests. Too late to change all the IEPs, the kids took the modified tests but only a certain number of them could be counted. The remaining kids' test scores were counted as 0 for the purpose of school accountability (the test scores still counted towards the kids' graduation requirements--no kid was punished at that point). School learned real quick to revise those IEPs.

There was no way for either SCOTUS or Congress to distinguish between the Truly Worthy and the falsely CYA-SpEdified students so they hemmed and hawed and then said, "All students must be held to the same standards." The One True Test could no longer be modified. The following year the modified standard tests went away. That meant that all students had to be held to the same standards for teaching.

Some parents liked it. There are parents of kids whose future involve group homes and jobs "uniquely suited" to their (lack of) skills who are convinced that they will go to college. Kids with IQs < 80 who failed Algebra I but who passed a science class whose parents insist they go into pre-AP or AP science.

Some parents--including many of the parents that like it the first year--hated it.

Upshot: Schools gamed the system. To punish the schools and make them teach all kids at high standards every student has to be held to the same test. That means they have to be accountable to the same standards.

While every student is different and unique, with his/her own learning style and multiple intelligences, they all take the same test and get cookie-cuttered. Because every student can learn at cognitively high levels. Even if they're unmotivated, even if they're developmentally disabled, even if they're monolingual in Nepalese and put in a two-way Spanish/English bilingual immersion program at age 13 and need to take the standardized test (English only!) in 6 months.

And don't say that the data you get from such testing is bad. That's blaming the student, and that's never allowed. All data are good.