I'm fed up!
I have children on both ends of the spectrum, SPED and GT. Neither is getting their needs met. My youngest GT child began third grade this year, full of excitement to meet her teacher and see her classmates and learn cool new things. She wore her back pack for the whole week preceding the start of school and had me pack her lunch to eat at the dining room table. She LOVED school.
This is not the smiling face I'm greeted with when I pick her up. The pressure of testing and content and curriculum (that isn't even developmentally appropriate), the lack of play and choice and exploration, compounded with inconsistencies with staffing and stressed out teachers are all making my little eight-year-old's passion for learning disappear.
Sadly, I don't see any of this changing any time soon. Am I to just roll with it, tough it out, and send her off to test or practice for the test or "build stamina" for testing everyday with a knot in both of our stomachs? Everyday--for the next 9 years?? I can't do it. She cries at night. Complete meltdowns.
Her class recently took Unit Assessments in ELAR and Math. She received a 73 and 81 and was overcome by anxiety and the feeling of failure. This is not okay. At what point do we do something? What can we do? I'm a teacher in the same district and don't see any enjoyment---staff, students, no one.
What are we doing to our schools? What are we doing to learning? What are we doing to our future? Who's going to say enough is enough? How do we change this? We're all dying inside--our creativity, our passion, our love for knowledge, all of it. What are we going to do and when?
