Departmentalization

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Home : 2002 : November : 20

Departmentalization
By Gail

Our school is departmentalized grades 4-6. I happen to teach Reading and Social Studies. For the most part I love the departmentalization but there are some drawbacks. There are days when you need to spend more time on
a topic or concept (in the case of Math) but you have a rigid schedule to adhere to. Not getting your class out ON TIME throws the whole team off schedule, and believe me, there is always one on a team that is never on time. Also, with the new emphasis on accountability and the No Child Left Behind, we're finding that many of our benchmarks
are crossed over into subjects we don't teach.

For instance, the Language Arts teacher is having fits because 12 of her benchmarks have to do with
Reading. One person can't do it all and we are seeing a problem with this. Overall, I like self-contained better, but that's just my opinion. I'm hoping to move down to a lower grade next year for this very reason.