Reply to How Common Core is wrecking kindergartner -- with SPECIFIC examples

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[quote=Anonymous]I'm the special ed kindergarten teacher from the other thread.  The one who pretty strongly supports Common Core.  I'm glad to see someone posting specific standards, although I'll also say that I still haven't seen a

I would absolutely support a return to play based developmental kindergarten, where the focus is on communication and social skills, and read alouds and finger paints, and kids dive into reading and writing in first grade.  My first grade teacher stayed friends with my family for years.  I once had the opportunity to ask her about Kindergarten when she first started teaching in the 50's.  She told me that in those days Kindergarten teachers took a completely different track at college.  They didn't have any classes related to reading, because it wasn't considered a Kindergarten subject.  Kids might have learned to write the upper case letters of their first name, but if your name was Ed that meant you still had 24 upper case and 26 lower case letters to learn in first grade.

But that ship sailed years ago.  The notion that Kindergarten is first grade with lower tables, is pretty firmly entrenched in this country, and has been long before Common Core.  My own kids are in high school, but reading groups, and worksheets, and assessments, were definitely the norm when they started K.  11 years ago, when I sent my oldest kid to Kindergarten, MCPS was shifting to full day K with 1 20 minute recess, a shift that was completed county wide long before Common Core came in.  8 years ago, when I moved into an inclusive setting in DC, the reading goal for then end of Kindergarten had just changed from C to D, the same goal that most schools are using under CCSS.

So, honestly, if I'm going to measure the worth of Common Core, I feel like I need to compare it to what came immediately before it.  I feel like the only fair way to evaluate the Common Core standards is to say, if we're going to have an academic curriculum for K, which set of standards is better to guide it.  CCSS, or what came before them?

When I look at it from that perspective, I think the CCSS are better than the standards that came before them in many states, including MD and DC.  Here are some of the things that I like:

[b]English/Language Arts[/b]

1) I like the focus on oral language, and specifically on talking about books, and making meaning from them.  I think that this sets kids up for success down the road when the make the shift from "learning to read" to "reading to learn".  For kids who haven't rich language experiences before coming to school, these experiences are particularly important.

2) I like the emphasis on balancing informational and literary text.  I think that kids deserve access to science and social studies content.

3) I like the fact that the new standards call for a blend of phonics and sight words, rather than focusing narrowly on one or the other.

[b]Math[/b]

1) I like the emphasis on computations within 5 and within 10.  I think this is something that 5 year olds can wrap their mind around, and that working with very small numbers makes them more concrete.

2) I like the emphasis on place value with numbers between 10 and 20.  Place value, in my experience, is absolutely key for understanding math in the later grades, and I'm glad it's getting the attention it deserves.  At the same time, I like that they focus on numbers under 20 which kids are able to manipulate and understand.

3) I like the fact that a number of skills that I'd consider "rote" or developmentally inappropriate, like coin ID, and telling time to the hour, and working with equations, have been taken out and moved to higher grades.

Again, if you want to start a national movement to turn K back into a play based experience, I'd join in.  But that's not a fight about Common Core.  Until that battle is fought and won, I'd rather teach Kindergarteners the Common Core than what came immediately before it.

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