I would be interested in knowing which other curricula DCPS considered. Did they even consider other options? Or did CommonLit, who is based here in DC and employs some former DCPS teachers (none of them are very experienced) get lobbied by them to just try it for one year.

Maybe we need to submit a FOIA request to find out.

I’m willing to bet they were lazy and just “stumbled” onto this option.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PP sounds like they work for CommonLit or DCPS. Most parents are complaining because CommonLit removes ALL books from the curriculum. One novel per quarter seems doable and yet DCPS gave the green light to this program without any tweaks.

Because they are lazy. They don’t want to customize. They rolled this pilot out with a few weeks notice to parents in August. They rolled it out so quickly that they didn’t have time to institute any customizations. This is being piloted to the detriment of students for one whole school year.

I don't work for common lit or DCPS. I'm a parent but have done a lot of curriculum work.

Did you see all these comments from teacher reddit? https://www.reddit.com/r/ELATeachers/comments/1jlglt6/commonlit_360/

" it’s making me consider leaving the profession. The materials are mind-numbingly boring, and it’s turning my students into robots. Classes that used to be exuberant and engaged now have no personality. It’s read, answer a (often poorly worded) question, and repeat. I’m sure there are ways I could make it more engaging, and they can definitely pick up on the fact that I don’t like the curriculum, but I feel like it has sucked all the joy out of teaching. I used to have debates, read scholarly articles, do Socratic seminars, assign creative projects…and now there really isn’t room for any of that."

"Students have the attention span of sandfleas, and we're expected to completely overcome it, but aren't allowed to build reading stamina using long-form text. Everything has to be in short snippets. No novels where the kids are given the opportunity to gain empathy and understanding of other people by sharing in their stories. I hate this timeline. "

We left DCPS for middle school, but I would be very worried about this.

In the future I see a widening gap -- private school students (and in DC, certain charter students) are still reading novels and learning how to analyze texts, and public schools students are left to lower and lower and lower standards in reading/writing/learn science and history, etc.

Parents should absolutely mobilize. Jonathan Haidt's new mission is "get Ed Tech out of the classroom."

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PP sounds like they work for CommonLit or DCPS. Most parents are complaining because CommonLit removes ALL books from the curriculum. One novel per quarter seems doable and yet DCPS gave the green light to this program without any tweaks.

Because they are lazy. They don’t want to customize. They rolled this pilot out with a few weeks notice to parents in August. They rolled it out so quickly that they didn’t have time to institute any customizations. This is being piloted to the detriment of students for one whole school year.

I don't work for common lit or DCPS. I'm a parent but have done a lot of curriculum work.

And to follow up on this ... from my perspective DCPS (and other school districts) should be using an externally vetted curriculum that is all green on Ed Reports. There are other open-source curricula that fit the bill and have more novels; DCPS could have gone with one of those. For example, Guidebooks is highly regarded, uses full length texts each quarter as the base of its curriculum, and has a free version that DCPS could use. In 8th, for example, students read Freak the Mighty, The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind, Call of the Wild, and Animal Farm, along with other shorter texts. This is actually the one I would have wanted them to pick. Nevertheless, Common Lit is very good and highly regarded by experts.

Ed Reports: https://edreports.org/reports/overview/learnzillion-guidebooks-2018

Guidebooks: https://louisianacurriculumhub.com

Anonymous wrote:PP sounds like they work for CommonLit or DCPS. Most parents are complaining because CommonLit removes ALL books from the curriculum. One novel per quarter seems doable and yet DCPS gave the green light to this program without any tweaks.

Because they are lazy. They don’t want to customize. They rolled this pilot out with a few weeks notice to parents in August. They rolled it out so quickly that they didn’t have time to institute any customizations. This is being piloted to the detriment of students for one whole school year.

I don't work for common lit or DCPS. I'm a parent but have done a lot of curriculum work.

Anonymous wrote:There is a huge push for more nonfiction practice everywhere. We're in FCPS and my kid probably won't read a novel at all this year unless it's in a book club.

But there are also full nonfiction books … biographies and memoirs and such.

Anonymous wrote:I’m confused after reading that article. My 8th grade DCPS middle school kid just read A Raisin in the Sun and has to read a book every month and write a book report on it. There are also electives where they are reading Lord of the Flies and getting lots of writing homework.

The new curriculum is in pilot and not rolled out to all schools yet.

Anonymous wrote:PP sounds like they work for CommonLit or DCPS. Most parents are complaining because CommonLit removes ALL books from the curriculum. One novel per quarter seems doable and yet DCPS gave the green light to this program without any tweaks.

Because they are lazy. They don’t want to customize. They rolled this pilot out with a few weeks notice to parents in August. They rolled it out so quickly that they didn’t have time to institute any customizations. This is being piloted to the detriment of students for one whole school year.

+1. How are kids supposed to learn to write if they don’t do sustained reading? At a minimum they need to be reading one book a quarter and doing a book report. I also just find it sad that they are throwing in the towel on introducing kids to great literature.

There is a huge push for more nonfiction practice everywhere. We're in FCPS and my kid probably won't read a novel at all this year unless it's in a book club.

I’m confused after reading that article. My 8th grade DCPS middle school kid just read A Raisin in the Sun and has to read a book every month and write a book report on it. There are also electives where they are reading Lord of the Flies and getting lots of writing homework.

PP sounds like they work for CommonLit or DCPS. Most parents are complaining because CommonLit removes ALL books from the curriculum. One novel per quarter seems doable and yet DCPS gave the green light to this program without any tweaks.

Because they are lazy. They don’t want to customize. They rolled this pilot out with a few weeks notice to parents in August. They rolled it out so quickly that they didn’t have time to institute any customizations. This is being piloted to the detriment of students for one whole school year.

Although Common Lit only has 1 novel per year, it is definitely considered high-quality instructional material that has all green on Ed Report:https://www.edreports.org/reports/overview/commonlit-360-6-8-2023

It's not just what students read, it's the tasks that are built around those readings, and those tasks are much stronger in Common Lit than in DC's home grown curriculum. DCPS could certainly add novel studies on top of Common Lit, or encourage teachers to add literature circles for kids. But as a base curriculum, what Common Lit offers is much stronger than the home-grown curriculum.

I have three kids in dcps. In the “good schools” too. I have seen lower standards each year. Honestly, it started with the pandemic with schools closed for more than a year. It’s just been dumbing down and more dumbing down every year.

This latest change with the CommonLit pilot is just the last straw. So sick of these short-sighted and lazy decisions that affect education of so many kids in the district.

Why is it difficult to take the best parts of the CommonLit curriculum and package it with novel studies and writing and create a more well rounded ELA curriculum? We have a bunch of people in dcps central whose job is to ensure education standards are being met who apparently can’t do this and instead farm it out to a so called “non-profit” like CommonLit.

The founder and CEO of CommonLit barely has any teaching experience and makes almost $400k from this venture.

Sick to my stomach.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Did anyone see this? https://51st.news/opinion-dcps-middle-schoolers-should-be-reading-novels/

Saw this being circulated on X and came here to see if people were talking about it.

Is there some kind of organized effort by parents to take on this new ELA curriculum, as well as the awful science curriculum being taught in elementary schools? I want to joint the movement if it exists and if it doesn't, I want to start it. I'm sick of my tax dollars being used by Central Office to make DCPS curriculum demonstrably worse, especially when I've honestly been reasonably happy with it thus far.

Anyone know? I know DCUM isn't the place to organize but I want to get plugged in with any parents group that is doing this.

I'm really glad the article was written. It's already gotten more than a million views on Twitter, so people are paying attention.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Did anyone see this? https://51st.news/opinion-dcps-middle-schoolers-should-be-reading-novels/

Saw this being circulated on X and came here to see if people were talking about it.

Is there some kind of organized effort by parents to take on this new ELA curriculum, as well as the awful science curriculum being taught in elementary schools? I want to joint the movement if it exists and if it doesn't, I want to start it. I'm sick of my tax dollars being used by Central Office to make DCPS curriculum demonstrably worse, especially when I've honestly been reasonably happy with it thus far.

Anyone know? I know DCUM isn't the place to organize but I want to get plugged in with any parents group that is doing this.

Anonymous wrote:Did anyone see this? https://51st.news/opinion-dcps-middle-schoolers-should-be-reading-novels/

Saw this being circulated on X and came here to see if people were talking about it.