Consider Your Children’s Needs for School Choice
When considering different school options, you can ask yourself the following questions about your child or collectively about your children:
- What is my child’s personality type?
- Does she prefer playing or socializing in small groups, large groups, or by herself?
- Does she like to lead a group in various activities?
- Would she prefer to watch others and then follow in small group play and socialization activities?
- Is she easily frustrated when playing and socializing with others?
- Does she get angry when things do not go her way?
- What are her favorite activities?
- Does she prefer outside or thinking types of activities?
- Does she prefer paper and pencil activities or large muscle and interactive activities?
- Would she learn best by reading with you, listening, or watching others?
- What are her academic experiences?
- Does she recognize letters and letter combination sounds?
- Has she exhibited other pre-reading or reading skills?
- How does she apply number sense in everyday activities?
- What has the teacher said about her social, emotional, and learning skill development?
- What concerns do you have about her academic success and learning challenges?
Mary Ann Burke, Ed.D., Digital Education Expert, is a substitute distance learning teacher for Oak Grove School District in San Jose, California and the author of STUDENT-ENGAGED ASSESSMENT: Strategies to Empower All Learners (Rowman & Littlefield: 2020). Dr. Burke creates digital language arts and substitute teaching K – 12 activities for teachers and parents. She is the Cofounder of the Genparenting.com blog. Burke is the former Director II of Categorical & Special Projects for the Santa Clara County Office of Education that supports 31 school districts serving 272,321 students in Santa Clara County. She is also a previous Director – State & Federal Compliance for Oakland Unified School District, the former Director – Grantwriter for the Compton Unified School District, and was the initial VISTA Director for the Community Partnership Coalition in southern California. Much of her work focuses on creating innovative digital trainings and partnership programs for teachers and families to support students’ learning. These programs were featured as a best practice at a National Title I Conference, California’s Title I Conferences, AERA Conferences, an ASCD Conference, the NASSP Conference, and statewide educator conferences.
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