school reform

flaja · 03-16-2008, 04:38 PM

Would you send your child to a K-12 school that has year-round classes (five 9-week academic terms with a 1-3 week break between terms) if he could take at least 8 AP exams or graduate with an associate’s degree (2 years’ worth of college)?

Boanerges · 03-16-2008, 08:20 PM

We home school are are already ahead of the curve.

andiclare · 03-16-2008, 11:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by flaja

Would you send your child to a K-12 school that has year-round classes (five 9-week academic terms with a 1-3 week break between terms) if he could take at least 8 AP exams or graduate with an associate’s degree (2 years’ worth of college)?

IMO, no. If you can't do a Christian private school (1st choice, IMO) or home school (2nd choice), then I'd send my kids to the best public school I could find w/ the regular schedule...No need for kids to be pushed along on the fast track. There's a lot of growing up to do during those years and growing needs time, not necessarily academic pressure...They'll be in college soon enough!

flaja · 03-16-2008, 11:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by andiclare

IMO, no. If you can't do a Christian private school (1st choice, IMO) or home school (2nd choice), then I'd send my kids to the best public school I could find w/ the regular schedule...No need for kids to be pushed along on the fast track. There's a lot of growing up to do during those years and growing needs time, not necessarily academic pressure...They'll be in college soon enough!

The curriculum that I am designing would be for a Christian school. The K-6 part would be pretty much what you’d get in a better public school, although I would concentrate on mathematics, reading and language arts skills; I wouldn’t include science or social studies except as ways to teach the other subjects. Students would have a weekly art and music period as a way of giving their classroom teachers some time to do their planning and paperwork.

The curriculum for grades 7 through 12 would have no more than 5 subjects in any given academic term (the 5th subjects would be art and music appreciation). All of the basic courses (mathematics, social studies, science and humanities i.e., language arts, literature and foreign language) would have a daily lecture period (less than an hour) and some of the courses would also have a weekly 180 minute lab session to augment their classroom time (at most students would have 4 lab sessions each week). A “lab session” would be scheduled for each day of school, but whenever student have a class that does not have a lab session, he will have free time to do homework, study, get tutoring or play games. For the most part my students would never have homework and they would spend far less time each day in a formal classroom setting than anyone in a regular school who has 6 or 7 graded subjects every day.

BTW: Most Christian schools where I live cannot get anyone into college. Since Florida doesn’t regulate the curriculum, teacher qualifications, student testing or accreditation of private schools, most private schools in my part of Florida are nothing more than baby-sitting services.

Who am I · 03-17-2008, 03:11 AM

Absolutely not.
Doesn’t sound like a good schedule to me and I don’t think It would work well.

flaja · 03-17-2008, 12:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Who am I

Absolutely not.
Doesn’t sound like a good schedule to me and I don’t think It would work well.

Why wouldn’t the schedule work? Some countries have a longer school year than what we have in America and in Germany some students even go to school for a half-day on Saturdays.

Boanerges · 03-17-2008, 01:34 PM

In Louisiana students are admitted based on SAT scores and have chances at TOPS and other scholarships. Home school students are required to have higher grade point averages and SAT scores as the generally score much higher.
Sadly many public schools are dumbed down to the level of struggling students and it is hard for students who want to excel to do so. In fact I have a relative who was a certified teacher in the New Orleans Public School system for one year and he quit- why? His students averaged two tears behind their current grade level. He was informed by his principle that if any of his students failed it would damage their self esteem and he would be fired, Very sad.
As far as calling private schools in Florida "nothing more than baby sitting services " I think you are out of line AC. The average student in private school excels the average public school student by a fairly large percentage in their GPA in most states. Couple that with the Christian Schools who teach these kids the Word of God and faith in Christ and it sounds like a winner to me.