Archive for November, 2008
Just to freak you out about High School
A friend of mine sent me the link from CPS that shows that scores that are required to get into the CPS selective enrollment high schools.
If you aren’t familiar with this process yet, the test scores and grades from 7th grade are used to determine admission. Each child ends up with a score that has a max of 1000 based on the following inputs:
Reading and Math ISAT score percentiles 300 points
High school entrance exam 300 points
Grades 300 points
Attendance 100 points
It is important to note that grades are grades. A “B” at a gifted or tough private school is the same as a “B” in a regular class. So in some cases, a child who is struggling in a gifted class might have a better chance with grades by transferring to a regular classroom and having the opportunity to get better grades. Many kids do test prep for both the ISATs and the high school entry exam beforehand. Man, that is a lot of pressure on a young-ish kid. Or more realistically, based on what my baby-sitter’s mom told me, her kid just didn’t seem to get the importance of the whole thing. How can you really get it when you are dealing with puberty and all the resulting weirdness that makes 7th grade so personally menacing?
But the scary part of this is that the average entry scores among the top schools are already increasing from an already high level. And as we know, more and more people with kids are staying in the city, meaning there is surely a major supply/demand issue in our future. The average score out of 1000 that was accepted into North Side College Prep (highest test scores in the state) was 979 last year. Zoinks. That leaves virtually no room for error or sick days or slacking or any B’s. Kids who got in averaged only 1.5 days off school during 7th grade. So apparently North Side College Prep is a school full of healthy kids (or those who can suck it up and crawl to school while ill.) Lane Tech leaves a little more room for slacking with an average score of 898 and 2.9 days off.
OK, so its it clearly too early to start worrying about this, but I am seeing now why the Alcott parents made the effort to get their own high school going. I wonder what CPS has up its sleeve as the “choice” model continues to expand, but let’s just say it better be good because homeschooling a teen and moving to the suburbs would both do me in.
The CPS link is below:
http://www.selectiveenrollment.org/about/competition.jsp?rn=7128431
Add comment November 26, 2008
Report Card Day
Well, my “baby” has gotten his first report card. And what a report card it was. CPS breaks down the child’s ability into an extreme level of minutae, so that I can learn whether many skills are well developed or partially developed. I am pleased to learn that he is good at skipping! My homeschooling there has paid off. (Actually I lie.. I think he learned that in gym. So that’s why they measured it.) It’s hard to believe that the teacher actually knows the abilities of all 27 children at such a discrete level, but the best part was was I did NOT hear: The words, “We think there was some mistake in your son getting into this class.” But no. Yay! He is keeping up.
The other good news is that I have confirmation that he was not well-suited for the Montessori environment and seems to thrive in a class where he’s told what to do at each point during the day. His teacher even commented that during the Exploration portion of the class, where they can select their own activity (fun stuff that will disappear in first grade like building robots out of legos) he tends to wander aimlessly, unable to select some materials. No problem about that. He can wander for 20 minutes (and at no cost!) Heck, I used to pay almost $1000 a month for him to wander around the classroom for the whole day!
The other fears that were put upon us with his Montessori prek have also turned out to be unfounded. They felt he was “living too much in the world of imagination and fantasy” (accompanied by implications that we let him watch too much TV, read comic books, etc.) We left that school with the fear that unless we got him out of his fantasy world quickly and into projects like potting plants and pounding nails into wood that he would have a hard time in school. Well, I never got him around to the potting and pounding (they do sound like fun kid projects though) and low and behold he has really blossomed in his more traditional-style classroom. And I’m glad we didn’t try to squelch his imagination — it’s a core part of who he is.
2 comments November 13, 2008
So should you try to prep a kid for the gifted test?
OK, so even if you can prep a kid for the gifted test, the next question is whether you should or not?
Question #1: Does prepping help? Just in my own opinion, I think that any type of test prep can help you (or your child) feel more comfortable on the test day and give you the best advantage possible. I definitely benefitted from test prep for the SATs and GMATs back in the day when I could actually concentrate on stuff like that. However since the version of the CPS test is still unknown, you may throw your kid off by having them practice on stuff that won’t actually be on the test. However practing doing little test-type exercises will probably help them feel more comfortable. Which brings up another question — what do you tell your kid about the test? Or do you even say that its a test? A friend of mine told her child it was an “interview” where they would help decide which school was best for her. I told my son that it was a test to see what he’d been learning in school.
Question #2: Can you actually improve the score by prepping your child? From what I’ve seen in my own kid, there are points at which knowledge “gels” in their brains. And before that happens, you just ain’t gonna force it in. When he took the test he could (with coaxing) read some 3 letter words. I am pretty sure that no level of practice could have gotten him beyond that point. I recently was reading some of the basic points of Piaget, who did some of the most famous research on child development. He had a couple tests that can be done to see if kids have reached certain mental milestones. One of them is to show 2 sets of objects with the same number of items, but one is spead out wider than the other. The child is asked which set has more items. Kids about 6 and under will say that the wider set has more items since the group appears visually bigger. I conducted this test on my son with 2 pack of Smarties. I counted out 15 in each pack, right before his eyes. Yet when I asked him which has more he would insist the wide-spread group had more. Honestly it was shocking to see. Like HOW could he not be getting it?!? Finally I counted out the Smarties again for him in both groups. His comment, “WHOAAA! Weird!” Like it was even freaking him out! Ah, the young mind. I guess that’s why they believe that Santa can deliver all the presents on Xmas eve using flying reindeer. So, case in point… I just don’t know if you can teach them more than the are developmentally ready to handle. And if there are certain types of logic questions on the test, ideally they could become more familiar with the questions, but I doubt that they can learn a level of logic that they don’t already possess.
Question #3: Is it good to “prep” your kid into gifted placement? Well, the biggest fear is that if prepping actually helps a kid beyond that their real abilities are, they could end up being in a class where they can’t keep up, which could just make things difficult in the end. I suspect that in the K and 1st grade level classes most kids are given leeway enough that just about any child can learn at their own level. But in the older elementary grades, I think things are really bumped up a notch. Some of that higher-level math could even put an adult to shame. On my tour of Bell, the principal mentioned a girl who moved into the regular 7th grade class so as not to be penalized grade-wise during that year (when grades help determine which high school you get into.) He said it turned out for the best because she got the grades needed for one of the top selective high schools and was now doing very well there. So…. one point in favor of attending a school with both gifted and neighborhood classes.
In the end, I think a lot of parents joke around about prepping for the gifted and classical testing, but I haven’t met any that have truly pursued any type of real prepping. I think most pre-school programs do a decent job of teaching kids the basics (some probably better than others.) If you have had faith in your preschool or what you’ve been teaching at home, you should be feeling like your child is as well prepared as they can be. And finally – not all types of intelligence are tested on these things. Some kids are smart in other ways… in fact one my son’s friends who really stood out to me as being a real smarty did not score high on the CPS gifted test for reasons I cannot fathom, while my son who thinks the word ”buttocks” is the funniest thing on the planet did. Maybe “buttocks” was somehow incorporated into the test?
UPDATED: Here is an interesting post on another blog with input from a person who does gifted testing in NYC: http://edgeforlife.wordpress.com/2008/06/01/interview-with-an-olsat-tester-in-nyc/
2 comments November 10, 2008
Cell Phone Antenna – the Tribe Has Spoken
The LSC on which I serve (as a community member for the neighborhood school) voted unanimously not to move forward with the cell phone antenna. While the discussion took up a lengthy bit of time during the meeting, the best thing to come out of a controversial decision is that everyone in the group finally spoke up and expressed an opinion. Would have been much more interesting had people been split in their opinions, but nonetheless it was good to see people engaged. So much of what the LSC deals with is a bit mundane so this added a small level of excitement.
The school principal made a good point about people who seek out other schools (magnet, gifted (that would be me, heh hehe) but don’t bother to ask about the cell phone situation at those schools. And its true… people are largely unaware of the issue. It does make me wonder which other north side school have the antennas (and whether the school’s parents even know about it.)
Well, in 20 years if we find out that the antennas are totally harmless I’ll feel like a chump for passing up all that money. But for now, nobody will have to worry about being right under the antenna for days, years, or possibly even a couple decades on end.
Add comment November 10, 2008
