Wanat to guess how different the experiences of the non-RSP Language Arts/Math teachers were like compared to mine this year?

As for inclusion (a very different thing), I support the inclusion of many SpEd students into a class that best matches their abilities, and agree that they require a qualified teacher who is knowledgable about their subject.

People, it is after all, PUBLIC education. Perhaps, the idea that it’s possible for public education to meet all the INDIVIDUAL needs of each student is implausable. Perhaps individuality and the greater public good are oxymorons. Perhaps, differentiated classroom is bullsh*t?

Perhaps one of the reasons that the institution that is public education is in crisis is because of the self absorbed demands of the public?

One word, people, (or maybe two, depending): homeschool

Let me try explain. The school my kids goes to separates out the bright kids…this means that there are one or two per classroom. This means that most of the other kids in the classroom are normal or low kids. That particular year (kindergarten), my child is of one ethnicity, the other bright kid was of another ethnicity. All the other kids (several different skin shades) were normal or lower acheivement levels. She looks around the classroom…notices who can’t read, notices that all the kids of one ethnicity can’t read are and decided they are dumb.

If they would group the high kids together, she could see that all ethnicities were represented in the higher achievement level and come to a different conclusion.

I’m not sure how meeting the needs of my kid comes at the expense of yours, but okay.

“gifted students are ones who are able to sit in their seats for an hour at a time.”

Well, we don’t disagree there and that attitude still persists, but again, you seem very upset about the labeling of giftedness. I personally don’t like the word either, but there isn’t another one at the moment. It has nothing to do with anything but an academic fit in a traditional classroom, which is why the label is not really helpful (and off-puting). People have gifts that don’t include a high IQ.

btw, I do understand the difficulties with labels as I am also the mother of a special ed kid. Now, there’s some stigma for you.

Well Susan, suppose that what you believe your kid (at IQ 130+) needs, comes at the expense of what my kid needs? The “loaded” words (”low” and “high”) are those that were used by Jane to describe her kid–and presumably the others. Parent2 added the information that the others (that her child ended up “babysitting”) were strugglers and disrupters. Hence my comments about the mythologies of what “high” and “low” kids look like. Jane added the additional information (that I am not entirely certain that I understood) that in her school it appeared as though there was a racial/ethnic dimension to who was “high” and “low,” or in her daughter’s words “dumb.”

What my kid needs is to have his skills and abilities recognized and to be seen first as (his words) a HUMAN BEING rather than a category. He needs to learn math, reading, history, science, writing. Throughout his elementary years history and science were regarded as incidentals–completely optional. In high school science is taught via worksheets by teachers who never majored in science. There is not lab–those classrooms are for the “regular” kids. HIS giftedness (and he was finally identified–after years of disability, not that it has made one shred of difference–the district doesn’t know what to do with a kid that fits in two categories) needs to be nurtured. Actually, I had suggested this to the gifted specialist back in elementary school. Oh, no, says she–gifted students are ones who are able to sit in their seats for an hour at a time.

You’re using some strangely loaded words, Margo/Mom, so I’m having trouble following what you’re trying to say.

Also, repeating “mythology” as though there is no truth to what you don’t believe isn’t helping, either.

Yes, there are gifted/LD kids who get overlooked and shouldn’t be, but that has nothing to do with the average gifted kid (and we’ll just start with an IQ of 130+ as a starting point) being miserable in a slower moving classroom.

You can point to all kinds of things, but I’m sure I can dig out my own research supporting what the others have said. However, I don’t have to because I have also seen it with my own lyin’ eyes. You just don’t want to listen. That’s fine, but to what end? If my kid is suffering because of endless group work and a slow classroom place, then something needs to be done. It has nothing to do with labeling.

That has been our experience with the hetergenous achievement level grouping . We also got the added benefit of my then five year explaining that people of a specific ethnic group were dumb. The school does such a good job of separating the bright kids that she hadn’t dealt with a bright kid of that group.

I took a look at hoagiesgifted and browsed some links. You might want to go there and pay particular attention to some of the material regarding multi-exceptionality. Keep in mind that both giftedness and disability are constructions in the law and have some arbitrariness associated with them. The assumption of a hierarchy–from high to low, flies in the face of reality. I also stumbled onto some material (at Johns Hopkins) that was listed in a biblio that I couldn’t immediately access that pointed out that ability grouping and cooperative learning are not mutually exclusive topics.

There is a fair amount of mythology that suggests that “gifted” students are compliant, eager and cooperative learners. Their progress is impaired when they are forced to suffer in a classroom with students who are disruptive, non-compliant, poorly socialized. This mythology contributes to areas of “giftedness” being overlooked in students with disabilities and learning disabilities going undiagnosed in “gifted students.” Neither condition is to be desired. The penchant to label and separate has not served us, nor our students, well.

“Working with others” is not quantifiable, except in the amount of time spent socializing. I do not think group work has made my children better citizens; it has, however, increased their frustration at the low level of instruction, and the unfair grading practices.