And NOW back to our Regularly Scheduled Program
MY LATEST RANT!!


STAR Testing! I'm still not even clear why the hell they do this but have a pretty good idea. STAR stands for "Standardized Testing and Reporting" and I believe it happens everywhere and is an objective measure of a school's/district's /state's level of performance with public education. That maybe an over-simplification and doing some research so will update here if I'm blowing smoke in the wind.

And a preface before I go further... I'm venting here because I try very hard not to say any of this in front of the children. As long as they're in public school, then I feel they should participate (altho I think there maybe a way to opt out) and am attempting to hold the ol' tongue on the subject (thus the blog post)

Sooo we received this handy dandy reminder from the school to feed our children a nutritious breakfast next week and make sure they get plenty of sleep. WHAT?? I guess maybe they think we're pretty slack the rest of the year? And sorry for my dripping in cynicism attitude here.. but suspect many of you would agree. The testing takes place from 9-12 AM every day next week - more WHAT?? 15 hours of flippin testing for a 2nd grader?

So I was already NOT in a good mood over this hellish prospect when on Wed my 8 yr old comes home from school and tells me the Gov of CA will be seeing his personal test and he was worried? OK.. steam coming out of ears now.. I explained that more likely the Governor would see overall results for our area as well as the state. Evidently the teacher had said something like: "make the school, community and your state governor proud by doing your best".. NOW... before going further, my son can often take things out of context and misinterpret things but ya know the fall out happens at home and the fall out was "not wanting to go to school".. and "not wanting to take this darn test".. I truly love his teacher and emailed her. She felt horribly about and was wonderful in that she listened to my concerns and then spoke to the other kids. They were also worried (3 of the 5 kids in 2nd grade).. she gave them a full blown, and heart felt apology and talked about "doing your best etc"..That was WONDERFUL.. and I so appreciate that we parents can talk to her and she doesnt get defensive. Altho i wouldnt be surprised if I have "witch parent" labeled across my kids' files!

So I was starting to return to my latest saying and thinking: "it is what it is"... when the kids got home from school this afternoon and I was presented with a "practice STAR test".. It now sits next to me. I dont know what to do with it altho I think I'd like to puke on it! OMG.. who in their right mind has decided that 2nd graders need to take a mini SAT..? I mean seriously - 82 freaking pages sitting next to me. Mind you my son reads above grade level - probably well above. In the language arts section there are complex 2 page stories with 4-6 questions at end. Often two answers are very similar.. WHAT?? My God these kids are 7 and 8 and some dont read at nearly my son's level AND they're just learning AND they dont have the attentional level of sitting thru testing for this long. WHAT FLIPPIN' MORON CAME UP WITH THIS TEST??? AND why????

Sooo yes..now the steam is really flowing but having a glass of wine to calm down! I just think it's absolutely ridiculous. I think it's totally inappropriate for kids this young to be under so much pressure. I feel that way for all kids but esp for many in our school who are ESL.. reading has taken them longer. YET they're all doing beautifully. BUT this is stuff they dont do that much in class.. maybe they should and their spelling packets do include some of this, but I also think this is higher level stuff. WHY do such young children need to be subjected to this kind of HUGE pressure? I truly believe, for some kids, it could really turn them off to school in general.. NOT the way to set the stage for future learning!

As I've often said: "No child Left Behind" was designed by some politician who probably doent even have kids. IMO.. it's destined to "leave kids behind".. No,... the saying should be "No Child Left Behind as long as your Perfect and test where we want you!" AND I wont even go to that place that discusses how much is taken away from "imaginative and fun learning (encouraging the child to use their natural "love" of learning and exploring" to figure things out) because of all this testing time. This has been 2 solid weeks out of the year for this. Each "report period" the school pulls in a sub for 2 weeks so the primary teacher can pull kids out and test them independently. Perhaps that's just our school...

How many of you grew up without "no Child left behind?".. and how did you do? I did fine. I dont remember homework til around 4th grade. I dont remember even basic tests til about that time too altho maybe wrong there. I remember loving school.. going because I loved to learn new things and I had no underlying fear that I wouldnt perform up to some standard. Have we really done our children justice of late? I think not and am pissed! But "it is what it is" and until I know that I dont have to work (for sure and right now that's NOT a "for sure") I wont be thinking about homeschooling again. My greatest frustration is that my oldest (I believe) would love school a whole lot more if there wasnt so much pressure and that kills me because he's doing so well.. sigh.... thanks for listening! Gonna go bury my head in the sand and shut up now!