Is the rumor true?

Ever since I've gotten my newest student, I've been skeptical about the abilities shes claims to have in math and reading. Today I did a bit of investigating into her records (which are usually put in my mailbox for me to look at for a few days, but didn't happen this time). I didn't find anything of real interest, I was just a bit surprised when I saw her grades. Then I put things back into perspective realizing that she was only at her last school for less than 2 months. Her records from prior schools were not in her folder yet.

In the past couple weeks, since her arrival, I've asked her where she came from before and she always said a nearby district. I kept probing...turns out that she came from Louisiana before. Now, I've never been in a classroom in Louisiana, but I have heard many things about the lack of an educational system. I've also never had a student who grew up in the Louisiana school system...until now.

I know that there are fourth graders at other schools who are farther along in their learning, mostly because they were born with an advantage (whether it is financially or intellectually), but we do our best with the kiddos we have. We don't have much parental support and our school seems to be a place to drop kids off for the day and hope they learn something. We do the best we can, as teachers, to help these kids be successful or learn to be successful. The whole point is that...my kids are far above my new kiddo. She is far behind where she should be and often asks me for help on basic questions. I don't mind when kids ask for help (I greatly encourage it), but she NEEDS my help on EVERY question.

We are currently reviewing for the TAKS test...that's right...REVIEWING. The only problem is that for this new kiddo, it doesn't seem to be a review at all. Apparently she's never seen any of this material before. We're talking fractions, decimals, multiplication, division, reading for context clues, basic comprehension, main idea, etc. Ever since she arrived, I've been spending more time each day walking her through questions than I have with every other student in my class combined. I find it difficult to review the other kids when I'm teaching it to one particlar student.

I know this will be a problem that I'll encounter many more times throughout my teaching career, but it's becoming one of my hardest first year struggles. And...could she have come when we were learning a new topic instead of reviewing for a state test??? Come on parents! (see the blog titled "Parents Are Stupid")