Dear Editor,
I am writing in response to the Dispatch article entitled,

Math Makeover.

The information that article,

only 6 percent of ninth graders ranked proficient or advanced on
the CST and only 4 percent of freshman and sophmores were
proficient and only 2 percent of the juniors
…

and further that when the high school pre-algebra teacher
assessed her class she found that they were at 3rd grade math
proficiency level just fuels my opinion and concern that my son is
not learning math at school!
Dear Editor,

I am writing in response to the Dispatch article entitled, “Math Makeover.” The information that article, “only 6 percent of ninth graders ranked proficient or advanced on the CST and only 4 percent of freshman and sophmores were proficient and only 2 percent of the juniors…” and further that when the high school pre-algebra teacher assessed her class she found that they were at 3rd grade math proficiency level just fuels my opinion and concern that my son is not learning math at school!

I am a parent of a child at El Roble Elementary. Kindergarten was wonderful. Mrs. Vasquez split the kids into activity centers a couple days a week with parental support and they got a lot done. They covered all the standards for kindergarten and were assessed and reassessed and I always knew what I was to be working on at home.

First grade was different. I was anxious to find out how my son was doing right away after that first grading period. I found that my son was assessed in reading and reading comprehension and phonics but not in math. I had lots of directions for reading but none for math. My son came home with large quantities of math homework (two to six pages a day). I was confused as to why he got so much homework in math. I asked the teacher why and she told me my son often didn’t know what to do in class and she expected him to look around and try to figure it out first or ask another student and the teacher last.

Evidentally the teacher was just distributing math sheets and helping “the needy” ones that she felt needed her help to complete the assignment. My son was coming home with uncompleted work and I needed to teach him everything at home. Every three months or so I would get a letter from the teacher with a list of things I was supposed to teach at home because they would be tested on it but I never got feedback from the teacher on how my son was performing.

Second grade, I am finding is not much different. I have learned the situation is what it is because many of the children in second grade aren’t at grade level in one or more areas. I am told the children are placed in classes the way they are by state mandate and because by placing the children with a large range of skill and language abilities in the same class, the children who are English Language Learners especially benefit from hearing native English speakers articulate. My son tells me the same thing happens with math. The teacher mostly passes out a math sheet and the kids work on it during class and she helps the ones that are lost.

I’m feeling as a parent that it largley rests on me to teach the grade level standards at home. Justin hasn’t done a lot of writing at school as of November. What he spends most of his time on is writing and re-writing long lists of spelling words at home and using appropriate punctuation at school on little work sheets the teacher passes out.

He’s not actually going through the process of forming his own thoughts on paper and then editing it for spelling or punctuation to learn to write. I need to do that with him at home because it’s not done at school. I listen to my son read to me out loud for 15 to 20 minutes a day and I ask him questions about what he read and I also teach him math concepts that he’s not learning at school and drill him on math facts and teach him his times tables because it doesn’t seem to get covered at school. I am feeling a little pressure and fear about my other two children entering the school district – if I have three of them that need this kind of support at home I may have to just homeschool or go back to work to send them to private school or we will have to move out of the state.

I feel the problems we are having at Gilroy Elementary schools are these: many children don’t have parents that support their learning at home and when they aren’t learning the grade level standards the parents are angry at the teachers and blame it on the teachers and the teachers are angry at the parents and choose not to communicate with them anymore (they probably give up). At the end of the year the teachers, I am told, can only hold two kids back and the summer school program gets filled up and not all the kids that need to finish their grade level material in summer school and the rest of them go on to the next grade unprepared and slip further and further behind.

Meanwhile, the kids are placed in classes not by ability at all. The children are grouped together so the English learners can hear the English language spoken by other children. My son who is not an English learner is forced to learn at a much slower pace, often bored, and doesn’t get all the grade level curricula (as limited as it is since Superintendent Edwin Diaz says we must focus on only reading, writing, and math since there is no point in teaching things like science, social studies, art and music if the kids can’t read).

I will probably get another letter in the next couple months telling me everthing I need to cover at home with my child at home so he can pass second grade. I am feeling like I am almost homeschooling allready. I am not testing him and keeping grades but the burden allready rests on me at home if I want my son to succeed.

What can be done to change this?

I think the teachers need parents to do the assessing at home. If the teachers could give us the tools we could do it at home and know exactly what areas we need to work on with our kids. I know for a fact the teachers have difficulty assessing math. They have a lot of assessing to do in reading and don’t seem to have time to assess math. I also feel that kids cannot and should not be allowed to progress to the next grade level if they are way off the mark. When kids that are still at kindergarten level are placed in a class with second graders it’s very hard on the teachers and slows the whole class down. If a child doesn’t pass first grade they should be held back.

New teachers should be hired to teach that class of older first graders or a combo first/second grade class should be set up to handle the kids that are at the same level but different ages. It’s not fair to slow the kids that could be on grade level down because parents of the children that aren’t learning the grade level material can’t or won’t help at home. If the children can’t get help at home they must get it at school.

What’s wrong with being honest with kids and parents and the community and telling them the way it is?

If more people knew what was going on in the schools maybe the community would support the learning process. Tutoring groups could be formed to teach children English and to teach them to read and write and do math so someday these children could get all the curricula an elementary school child would get if we weren’t struggling so hard to do the “basics”. Music has been proven to enhance children’s ability to learn math and that’s missing of the curriculum at El Roble Elementary. Physical Education helps develop children’s bodies and many children learn kinesthetically but have even developed strong motor development yet in the early years if they haven’t had any sports activities and they are sedentary.

Rachel Oberstadt, Gilroy

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