Common Core question for proponents

[Anonymous]

Rick Lavoie: There are a number of schools within the field of education; in terms of the way we view the relationship between reading and learning. I come from the school where the inability to read is a symptom of a larger language problem. The overwhelming majority of kids who have difficulty, who have learning problems, have difficulty reading. And the overwhelming majority of kids with reading problems also have learning problems. So, I have a difficult time teasing the two of them away because they are so fundamental and so interlocked.

I think that schools should be sure that kids have oral language before they start teaching reading. Vocabulary and use are so much more important before they read. CC needs to go.

[Anonymous]

Anyone read the story in WAPO magazine about the Teach for America teacher who was accused of shoving a student? That's the problem. CC certainly won't fix that.

[Anonymous]

Anyone read the story in WAPO magazine about the Teach for America teacher who was accused of shoving a student? That's the problem. CC certainly won't fix that.

This. It's pretty simplistic to think that you can throw a manual of standards out to the schools and FIX the "problems". You cannot legislate what happens in a classroom. The DOE seems to be unbelievably clueless.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Anyone read the story in WAPO magazine about the Teach for America teacher who was accused of shoving a student? That's the problem. CC certainly won't fix that.

Nobody ever said that the Common Core standards, all by themselves, would fix all problems in education.

[Anonymous]

Nobody ever said that the Common Core standards, all by themselves, would fix all problems in education.

They will make the problems worse.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
I think that schools should be sure that kids have oral language before they start teaching reading. Vocabulary and use are so much more important before they read. CC needs to go.

I don't know what you mean by making sure that kids have oral language before they start teaching reading. Very few children start kindergarten unable to talk.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Nobody ever said that the Common Core standards, all by themselves, would fix all problems in education.

They will make the problems worse.

Oh? How would the Common Core standards have made the problems of the Teach for America guy in the Washington Post magazine worse, exactly?

[Anonymous]

The problems of CC and standardized testing are pretty well laid out in this website:

http://weaponsofmassdeception.org/

[Anonymous]

Oh? How would the Common Core standards have made the problems of the Teach for America guy in the Washington Post magazine worse, exactly?

LOL! You really have drunk the Kool Aid!

[Anonymous]

I don't know what you mean by making sure that kids have oral language before they start teaching reading. Very few children start kindergarten unable to talk.

Sad,how many people realize just how limitied are the skills of so many kids in the US. Do you want to know why there is an achievement gap? It starts with lack of vocabulary and language skills.

[Anonymous]

Sad,how many people realize just how limitied are the skills of so many kids in the US. Do you want to know why there is an achievement gap? It starts with lack of vocabulary and language skills.

edit--meant to say How few people realize how limited are the skill of so many kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Oh? How would the Common Core standards have made the problems of the Teach for America guy in the Washington Post magazine worse, exactly?

LOL! You really have drunk the Kool Aid!

That doesn't answer the question.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

I don't know what you mean by making sure that kids have oral language before they start teaching reading. Very few children start kindergarten unable to talk.

Sad,how many people realize just how limited are the skills of so many kids in the US. Do you want to know why there is an achievement gap? It starts with lack of vocabulary and language skills.

If you mean to that schools should make sure that all kids' oral language skills should be comparable to the oral language skills of the typical middle-class child before the schools start teaching reading, then you should say that.

[Anonymous]

Oh? How would the Common Core standards have made the problems of the Teach for America guy in the Washington Post magazine worse, exactly?

New, inexperienced teachers tend to follow what is handed to them by the administration (because they have no experience yet that can lead them to make decisions that are based on the reality in front of them). Also they want to do what they are told (as most employees want to do). I know this because I was once a new teacher who experienced problems and asked for help (only to find that the "help" made things vastly worse because teaching is not something that can be scripted and every classroom is different). So, if this man had CC standards and believed that all the children were in a certain place and he should teach to those standards (which many of the children were not ready for), he would create a very frustrating environment in the room. He may also teach to the standards because he was being told that there would be a test and that he would be held accountable based on the results of that test. These things would not only cause the students to be frustrated and misbehave, but would cause anxiety for him. Instead of being told to get to know the students and help them learn at their various levels, he would be told to "follow the standards". At some point, the tension in the room becomes untenable and there is a constant "fight" between the teacher and the students. He did ask to be moved from his first classroom and they did move him, but then he would have had to have gotten to know a whole new group and teach to new standards. That was when the incident occurred (in the second classroom). Everyone in teaching knows that the second classroom is going to be a whole lot more challenging than the first one you had (because nobody moves out of an easy classroom). He obviously did not understand how the system works.

Now, a seasoned teacher would read the standards and realize (based on experience) that many of the standards would have to be lowered for the group or there would have to be stepping stones to getting to the standards. The seasoned teacher may see that students are not even close to the standards and that he/she has to back up. The seasoned teacher would know how to back up and how to bite off pieces of the curriculum that were the right size and difficulty for the students. That teacher would also have a lot of tricks in the bag (games, songs, manipulatives, etc.) That teacher would also realize that the standards may not be met that year for some students and that it would be okay. They would not stress. The seasoned teacher would know that the immediate concern (before any learning can even occur) is to manage the classroom. This is a big effort all by itself and if the room is not managed correctly at the beginning of the year, there is little hope for anything to occur later. The TFA teacher was not remotely ready to do the job. The standards just added a layer of anxiety. The TFA teacher needed to spend time learning how to manage the room, but the whole emphasis on the standards and test scores created anxiety.

Do you understand this? Have you ever tried to teach 30 second graders?

The people teaching these kids are the heroes of our society . . . they have lots of people telling them how to teach and what to teach and they have to really be on it.

[Anonymous]

But DC already had standards, before DC adopted the Common Core standards.

How would the Common Core standards, vs. the standards that DC had before the Common Core standards, have changed the situation?