Subject: 6th grade math
From: "Sally Selby" <[email-masked]>
To: "Sally Selby" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 13 Sep 2012 19:04:34 +0000

Dear 6th grade families,

We are excited to begin another year rich with growth and learning in your child's math class.  Students have been placed in 6th Grade Math or 6th Grade Advanced Math, and the 6th Grade Math groups have been differentiated to provide appropriate review and challenge for each student. Grouped classes began today.

Students in all groups will be faced with substantive mathematical challenges and high levels of rigor and will be guided through all the topics of our standard 6th grade curriculum. We have placed your child in a class that we feel will provide appropriate challenges, manageable pacing, and accessible levels of abstraction given his or her developmental needs. While we have done our best to ascertain which grouping is best for each student, we acknowledge that it may be necessary in some cases to change our initial placement later in the year in order to better serve the child.   In order to minimize disruptions for both teachers and students, however, we will only be making placement changes at three fixed "change dates" in the school calendar.  The change dates will be as follows:

October 24th
December 12th
February 19th *

*Note: After February 19th, students will remain in their respective placement groups for the rest of the year.
While placement can sometimes be a source of anxiety for students and parents alike, please know that we take considerable care in making these placement decisions so that your child's developmental needs are best served. The math teacher and I will have plenty of time during the first six weeks to carefully evaluate your child and decide whether he or she would be best served by moving to another group at the first change date.

If you do not feel that your child's developmental needs are being adequately served by his or her placement, feel free to let me know. However, remember that no changes will be made for any students until October 24th.

If you have any questions about this placement process or schedule, feel free to call or email me.  ([email-masked]<mailto:[email-masked]>   202-537-8411)

Thanks in advance for your support!

Andrew Callard
Middle School Math Department Chair