What Does It Mean to Give Each Child What He or She Most Needs?

This article was originally featured in the Winter 2018 edition of Carroll Connection. In this edition we asked our students how we are doing on our mission to give each child what he or she most needs. Read what they had to say. (Article 2 of 8)

Give Each Child

Carroll School is fiercely dedicated to giving each child what she or he most needs. What does this mean? To us, this means that we strive to understand each student’s unique learning profile. To do this, teachers and tutors assess and track student performance daily and build lessons based on children’s mastery of essential grade-appropriate skills.

What does this mean to students? Read on ...

Lauryn Muller (4th grade): “Give each child” means I’m getting the right support I need and I’m getting it every day. That’s real important to me and I feel like I’m learning a lot more than I did at my old school. At my old school, homework was really hard. We’d learned about it for 10 minutes and then the teacher would say, “OK, now go home and do this.”

Keelin Ercolani (8th grade): “Give each child” means that students come here and maybe they don’t have the strategies they need to succeed. Carroll takes it from there and gives students what they need - whether they are struggling in math, reading, writing, etc.

Luc Alonzo (5th grade): We’re all completely different. For example, some people are better at learning how to read and others are better at math. They both need training for different skills. (Do you think Carroll does that successfully?) Completely.

Eliot Woessner (Upper 9): In each class you can get 1:1 teaching and the teacher knows exactly what you need. For instance, I got moved from one English class to another one because I needed more writing. Teachers watch how I learn and how I do work and they adjust the curriculum to exactly what I need.

Lilah Daniels (7th grade): At other schools, there is one way to teach. But here there are different ways of learning for each person.

We say on our website that our learning programs move forward as fast as each student can go and as slowly as necessary to ensure mastery. What do you think this means?

Oakley Robbins (7th grade): I’m not sure if this happens but it seems like the teachers look at everyone’s grades and put the kids at the same level in the same class. So they can all start at a reading level (easy or hard), whatever you are ready for. Then, they slowly work their way up. Instead of going straight to hard and moving really fast.

Greg Altman (4th grade): I think that’s really helpful. Dyslexia sort of slows down your learning and Carroll is trying to speed it back up. How they do that is time.

Keelin Ercolani (8th grade): My teachers push really hard and that’s what I need personally as a learner. I didn’t have confidence when I came to Carroll. I was in the basement with the other kids because I had this learning problem. I needed someone to say, “You can do this.” Carroll teachers push me but I feel stronger because of it.

Read the Print Version