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- Newsgroups: misc.education
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- From: lwalsh@nemo (Laura L. Walsh)
- Subject: Re: combined elem classes
- References: <1992Sep8.175826.3102@megatek.com> <1992Sep8.193804.23936@tfs.com>
- Message-ID: <lwalsh.716064735@news.cso.uiuc.edu>
- Sender: usenet@news.cso.uiuc.edu (Net Noise owner)
- Organization: University of Illinois at Urbana
- Distribution: na
- Date: Wed, 9 Sep 1992 18:52:15 GMT
- Lines: 32
-
- tab@tfs.com (Theresa Breckon) writes:
-
- >Has anyone heard of the practice of combining grades in elementary
- >school?
-
- >A friend of mine has his son enrolled in a public Huntington beach
- >school. His soon attended this school for first grade, parents were
- >very happy with the school, son did very well. Now, in second grade,
- >they find out their son has been "selected" to be placed in a
- >combined 1st/2nd grade class. Confused because of their son's high
- >placement in 1st grade, the parents talked to the administrator at
- >the school. The administrator said special bright students who worked
- >well alone were selected for this class, i.e. it wasn't made up of
- >"slow" 2nd graders.
-
- >My friend is very concerned with this situation. While he did say
- >that the class seemed smaller then the other 2nd grade clases, he
- >was worried about his child sharing a classroom with 1st graders,
- >repeating things he had learned last year, etc.
-
- >Anyone familiar with this practice? Any comments, reassurances, or
- >warnings welcome. THanks in advance.
-
- I have taught mixed grade classes and my daughter has been in mixed
- grade classes. In some cases they work well, some work indifferently
- and in one case, my daughter's, it worked not at all. If the material
- is designed to be challenging at several levels, if the curriculum
- is really different from year to year, and if the teacher is not
- adverse to individualization, it can be wonderful. If any of these
- things is not true, you need to be much more careful.
-
- Laura Walsh (lwalsh@nemo.life.uiuc.edu)
-