School Reform: Thoughts?

I was looking into the Alpha series for fifth grade, and honestly, they don't even offer a math workbook or a practice collection. They just mention having digital quizzes and extra problems online, but the classic physical workbooks and collections are nowhere to be found.
Given that the kids are already lugging around three different books almost every single day for English class, I actually think it’s better if they don't have that much stuff for math either.
Besides, those backpacks are still way too heavy.

If you’re using the Alfin digital textbook over on MozaWeb, there are these little worksheets tucked away on the side—you can actually print them out, and they've got extra problems that feel just like the stuff in the actual book. Plus, there’s this massive pile of additional exercises at the very end of the whole thing that you won't even find in the printed version. I'm planning to give MozaBook a spin next week, though the students don't have access to it yet.

Jason Hall35 said:Look, if the grade-level council actually takes some responsibility, maybe they'll figure out something better for next year. Our local school district covered the cost for workbooks and atlases—I think they grabbed art portfolios too. But why they skipped the math workbooks? Who knows. I bet the teacher just wants everyone on the exact same page, so she won't allow half the class using a workbook while the others are stuck scribbling in notebooks. It’s such a waste of time.
The digitization went smooth, though. Honestly, nobody even talks about tablets anymore.

Maybe I'm just old-fashioned, but my dream would be textbooks that actually have integrated work sections built right in. Everything should follow one solid, set curriculum, lesson by lesson, with a massive stash of ready-to-go supplemental materials for the teachers. Just give them a complete package so they can actually teach without jumping through endless hoops whenever they want to spice up a lesson. And obviously, each subject's book would need to be split into thinner volumes so kids aren't lugging ten-pound bricks around in their backpacks.
As it stands, everything depends on how much talent or drive a teacher has, and let's be real—the gap between them is massive. At my kid's school, it's become glaringly obvious how much my child's class stands out, and every teacher says it's because they have a veteran who's been crushing it for generations. We hit the jackpot, while other kids are clearly getting the short end of the stick.
People used to go on and on about the "digital divide" being this huge injustice that we had to fix by giving tech to kids who couldn't afford it. But do we have a "teacher divide" now? Or a "parent divide" fueled by parents who either don't care or don't even know how to help their kid with homework? Simba, Simba... life isn't fair...

The thing is, there actually isn't a separate math workbook for grades 5 through 8.
It’s essentially a textbook and a workbook mashed together into one single volume—it's been that way with all the major publishers for years now.
Some schools use it as a workbook without any issues, though clearly, that's not the case everywhere. I wouldn't go pointing fingers at the teachers right away, either. They've been fed a lot of half-baked, incorrect info and almost zero clear direction from the top. So, everyone is basically just winging it and doing their best to figure it out on the fly.

Jason Hall35 said:My fifth grader already swallowed all this stuff—logic gates, binary, computer parts... she’s actually into it.
I’m honestly floored because now I see her copying every single math problem from the textbook straight into her notebook. Apparently, they have to return the textbooks at the end of the year. Up until now, they had free books and workbooks, but they used the math ones heavily. Only the standard textbooks that you weren't supposed to write in were returned. Now, thanks to this "reform," she’s spending half her class time just transcribing problems. WTF? They made things so much easier before, and now they've totally backtracked.
Is this a specific teacher thing, or is this happening in every school district? If I’d known, I would’ve just bought my kid her own book.
What a brilliant "reform"—back to chalkboards and tiles...
And don't even get me started on how most teachers are still tirelessly scribbling on the board, barely finishing their bullet points before the bell rings. Plus, they still love dictating everything. It's the most basic, old-school way of teaching—basically stuck in the era of Kamen. It’s pathetic.

She’s had an absolute rockstar of a teacher until now—the kind of woman who deserves every award and a massive paycheck for her dedication, expertise, and constant innovation. This whole mess just breaks my heart.

🤣

There was a time when copying problems into a notebook was standard practice, and nobody thought twice about whether students should be working directly out of textbooks or workbooks. Nowadays, parents act as if it’s some sort of tragedy that children actually have to pick up a pen and write.

Sarah Hall53 said:Linguistics nerds practically staged a full-blown revolution when they heard textbooks wouldn't be workbooks anymore and the number of supplemental workbooks was getting capped.
And honestly? I’m glad we did—my current fifth graders write at the speed of a snail on summer vacation. If they didn't have those workbooks, they might manage to copy and solve, like, one single problem in a forty-five minute period. :/

edit:
I mean, why even have space to write down answers in the first place? It's because the textbooks for every grade except first and fifth haven't changed in forever. Up until this year, those books were perfectly normal workbooks. They would still be working just fine if the government wasn't footing the bill for them.

🤣 🤣

We are incredibly lucky that elementary school is compulsory; otherwise, we might be dealing with eleven-year-olds who can barely grip a pencil, which would be nothing short of a civilizational disgrace.

🤣 🤣

Don't even get me started, Linda Price5. My kid’s handwriting is flawless—super neat, hardworking, and totally on top of things. You completely missed the point and clearly don't get what I'm driving at here. A "reform" should actually mean making things better, not keeping everything stagnant or—as it looks right now—making everything a complete mess.
The textbook actually has a workbook section with designated spots for solving problems. Specifically, we're talking about tables; trying to change that is like trying to cross out a Scandinavian design just because you want to return a newspaper to a newsstand.
Thanks @David Foster80, I had a hunch that was the deal...

Look, just take a few hours to actually read what’s written at the very beginning of the textbook—you know, before the table of contents—where they explain the rules about following the book. You should also check out the textbook law, specifically Article 3, Section 5, regarding educational materials for elementary and high schools.

As far as this whole "reform" goes, the plan is to hand out tablets to students so they can tackle extra assignments that aren't even in the printed book. In the meantime, teachers will just have to figure it out themselves if they feel the kids need more work than what's provided in the standard textbook.

jadetrucker43, it feels like you’ve got some kind of inside track on how these reforms are actually going to play out, so I’m taking your word for it. Honestly? I’m not feeling this at all so far.

I'm not buying it either—this isn't what I'd call a genuine reform in any real sense of the word. Honestly, about 90% of these changes are just cosmetic fluff, wrapped up in a really slick PR campaign to make it look like they actually did something.

jadetrucker43 said:If you’re using the Alfin digital textbook over on MozaWeb, there are these little worksheets tucked away on the side—you can actually print them out, and they've got extra problems that feel just like the stuff in the actual book. Plus, there’s this massive pile of additional exercises at the very end of the whole thing that you won't even find in the printed version. I'm planning to give MozaBook a spin next week, though the students don't have access to it yet.

I'm curious why they wouldn't have access? They can just download MozaBook, sign up, and then activate their digital textbook using the code found right inside the book—and boom, they're all set.
Honestly, though, I think the physical textbook itself has more than enough practice problems to go around, so she hasn't really needed to dive into the extras yet. Besides, with that recent teacher strike, they haven't even managed to wrap up the first unit.
She uses ESfer quite consistently, too.

Linda Price5 said:🤣

There was a time when copying problems into a notebook was standard practice, and nobody thought twice about whether students should be working directly out of textbooks or workbooks. Nowadays, parents act as if it’s some sort of tragedy that children actually have to pick up a pen and write.

🤣 🤣

We are incredibly lucky that elementary school is compulsory; otherwise, we might be dealing with eleven-year-olds who can barely grip a pencil, which would be nothing short of a civilizational disgrace.

🤣 🤣

What shocks me is how they stop teaching handwriting skills starting in first grade. And I don't mean through mindless copying. 😁

Take science class, for example. It varies by teacher, sure, but in my experience, you just finish a worksheet and call it a day. Meanwhile, every textbook ends with review questions. It’s the perfect setup: go home, find the answers in the text, and write them in a notebook. At least then they’d have an actual science notebook for once.

Don't even get me started on English. My kid is in third grade and hasn't had a single assignment where he had to write anything out yet. Anything at all.

I know a kid who just started high school. By the end of elementary school, his handwriting was such a mess that his teachers basically had to ask him to translate his own tests. I can't wait to see how he survives high school. 😵

If this new curriculum reform means less writing, I'm definitely not looking forward to it.

Carol Johnson4 said:What shocks me is how they stop teaching handwriting skills starting in first grade. And I don't mean through mindless copying. 😁

Take science class, for example. It varies by teacher, sure, but in my experience, you just finish a worksheet and call it a day. Meanwhile, every textbook ends with review questions. It’s the perfect setup: go home, find the answers in the text, and write them in a notebook. At least then they’d have an actual science notebook for once.

Don't even get me started on English. My kid is in third grade and hasn't had a single assignment where he had to write anything out yet. Anything at all.

I know a kid who just started high school. By the end of elementary school, his handwriting was such a mess that his teachers basically had to ask him to translate his own tests. I can't wait to see how he survives high school. 😵

If this new curriculum reform means less writing, I'm definitely not looking forward to it.

Well, it definitely seems like that's the direction things are heading.
I mean, you have more gadgets, fewer actual assignments, a much slower pace—basically trying to offload work in every possible way, even where it doesn't make sense.
The kids' fine motor skills are probably going to absolutely tank because of it, I guess.
But then again, that's just the trend these days.
Who really cares about penmanship anymore, anyway?🙄

So, even more work to do at home. Outside of school hours. Next up on the list: freelance writing tutoring. :nemamprikladansmajli:

Carol Johnson4 said:So, even more work to do at home. Outside of school hours. Next up on the list: freelance writing tutoring. :nemamprikladansmajli:

I don't think it necessarily translates to more homework—it might just be extra work for those specific students who actually care about mastering the art of writing, though it feels like there are fewer and fewer of them these days, I guess.😁

Though, if you ask me, private writing coaching could actually turn out to be a pretty lucrative business in the future.🐔

My little one just started first grade, and they actually gave us a presentation about how the curriculum is pivoting heavily toward reading—apparently, they realized kids were struggling to actually comprehend what they were looking at on the page
That’s even why they decided to pull back on teaching formal handwriting during the first-grade year itself...
Right now, the only real writing they’re doing is in their English class; for everything else, it seems like they're just frantically coloring and doodling away 🤣

It would be amazing if kids could start school at age five.
A seven or eight-year-old can just lose their temper right in the middle of drawing a sailboat.

I think I might be losing my mind just a little bit here... 🤣

Back in the day, the lower elementary grades were always a chaotic whirlwind of coloring and drawing.🙄
But at least they were actually learning how to write.
Honestly, stripping written letters out of the first-grade curriculum feels like a total crime against education.☕

I mean, kids just don't get that sense of tangible progress anymore—so many of them have been stuck writing in block letters for a year or two now—and they end up incredibly bored, or worse, it’s just fundamentally bad for their fine motor skill development.

Man, I remember how much I struggled with my English classes back in the day; it was a total disaster.
Now, all my subjects are just like that.

It felt totally overkill to have kids learning all those print uppercase and lowercase letters in the first semester, only to switch to cursive in the second. When I heard they were cutting some of it, I honestly hoped they’d just scrap the print stuff and jump straight to cursive. But nope. :rolayz: What’s even the point of practicing lowercase print? And why spend an entire year drilling those letters just to ditch them completely by next year?

This would actually be perfect for this upcoming school year, the final year before kindergarten.

But honestly, it really comes down to the teacher—I mean, I was showing my friend some of my old school notebooks once, and she just lost it laughing because her teacher's class (they’re in second grade now) used to go absolutely wild with their note-taking for every single subject... like, for one English assignment, they had already filled half a page just practicing the letter A, whereas my notebook had four full pages dedicated to it