What Grade is My Child In, and Does it Matter?
There are two questions here. The answer to the first question, “What grade is my child in,” in one sense is unimportant from an educational point of view. Elementary education is largely skill-based. Skills, of course, are linked to grade levels. Even so, a degree of mastery of a particular skill should be evident before a student is presented with more advanced instruction in the same skill category. Our product, Essential Learning Objectives, provides a check list of learning objectives in math and language arts. While it’s arranged by grade level, it’s also arranged sequentially from simple to more complex processes. Irrespective of grade level, students aren’t expected to jump into long division before they understand and can compute short division.
While we suggest you teach to the child’s instructional level irrespective of the child’s grade level, the notification requirement here in Oregon applies to students between the ages of 6 and 18. It requires the parent to declare a grade level. The rule reads:
581-021-0026 (1) (b)
A child is considered to be six years of age if the sixth birthday of the child occurred on or before September 1 immediately preceding the beginning of the current school term. A six-year-old is assumed to be a kindergartner, unless the parent wishes to place the child in a higher grade.
Students entering public or private school as six-year-olds are typically going into first grade. Should you therefore declare your six-year-old student a first grader? We suggest “no” at this time and say let the assumption stand. This relives pressure for families whose student is delayed in acquiring reading skills. Besides, you can always test at or above the student’s grade level for your own information. We keep test confidential. However, once you test your child at a higher grade level and decide to turn that test in to the ESD, you can’t go back and test at a lower grade level and still be in compliance with Oregon testing rules. Retention is not permitted.
Thanks for reading!
Curt Bumcrot, MRE
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