This Year

As many Westerly Creek families know, 2nd - 5th grade students receive academic instruction via platooning. This practice involves teachers specializing in a given content area (e.g., Literacy, Math/Science/Social Studies) which research has shown to be a highly effective instructional practice.
In previous school years, our platooning classrooms would have a new schedule in late January or early February, which would involve students switching their morning and afternoon instructional blocks for the opposite content area. This often caused significant disruptions to students for whom received specialists' services (Special Education, Gifted and Talented and English Language Acquisition). After weighing the issue with 2nd - 5th grade teacher teams' and parents' input, the Collaborative School Committee decided on December 4 that students would keep the same schedule through the second half of the 2012-2013 school year, to minimize disruptions and breaks in instruction.