Anonymous wrote:Just wondering-----I think I had a really great education in a suburban school. It was demanding and challenging. How do you think this happened without Common Core?

If a school or classroom has a high % of easy to teach students, it is much easier to provide a great education.

Just wondering-----I think I had a really great education in a suburban school. It was demanding and challenging. How do you think this happened without Common Core?

to pp. I think you have a good idea. Unfortunately, the standards are not necessarily "building blocks" to the next standard. Some are-=-but not all.

the problem with standards, of course, is that it's ridiculous to expect every 11 year old to know and accomplish the exact same things. Some pick things up easily, some work hard and get the hard material, some need more time in one area but excel in another, etc., etc.

This is what I would love to see. I know it will never happen, but a girl can dream:

Develop a list of standards through 12th grade (or through 8th grade if you want). Maybe even keep the common core standards. But disasociate them from the grade levels.
So the standards look like one giant list of things a child should learn in rough order:
1. One-to-one number correspondance
2. Identify shapes
...
34. Add two digit numbers with sums greater than 100
...
78. Determine the slope of a line.
etc.

You can provide parents with a general guideline. "By their 6th birthday most children have matered math standards through #12. By their 7th birthday most students have mastered standards through #23. etc"

And then move each child through the standards at a pace approriate for them. Group kids according to where they are with the material, rather than their birthday. For example, all kids in the school working on standards 13 - 15 work togeher in a math group, weather they are in K or in 2nd. Eliminate the current construct of "grade level" entirely, except for homeroom, lunch, etc. Teach each child where they are and ensure that they actually master the material before learning more advanced material, instead of just mindlessloy promoting them each year.

It shouldn't be as hard as we're making it.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:


The need to get rid of Common Core because it is an unproven set of standards that was sneaked in the back door by bribing states with money. There is ZERO PROOF it works. It turns our kids into guinea pigs.

There was ZERO PROOF the former Maryland state "voluntary" curriculum worked, too. ANd it relied on teaching children to write these things called "BCRs" (brief constructed response -- Aka short answer that resulted in children never learning to write a simple 5 paragraph essay. The Common Core Writing standards are much better than the old Maryland requirements.

+1

And, PP forgets that Common Core was not "snuck in to states" - it was jointly developed by several states, has already been in use by several states, and the Feds only got on board with it and helped fund it after the fact.

Anonymous wrote:


The need to get rid of Common Core because it is an unproven set of standards that was sneaked in the back door by bribing states with money. There is ZERO PROOF it works. It turns our kids into guinea pigs.

There was ZERO PROOF the former Maryland state "voluntary" curriculum worked, too. ANd it relied on teaching children to write these things called "BCRs" (brief constructed response -- Aka short answer that resulted in children never learning to write a simple 5 paragraph essay. The Common Core Writing standards are much better than the old Maryland requirements.

Anonymous wrote:

The need to get rid of Common Core because it is an unproven set of standards that was sneaked in the back door by bribing states with money. There is ZERO PROOF it works. It turns our kids into guinea pigs.

If you only want schools to use "proven" things (curricula, standards, techniques), then those things have to be tested, on kids.

If you don't want kids to be guinea pigs, then you can't test things. And if you can't test things, you can't prove that they work (or don't work).

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Are you saying, "My child has a language disability, therefore no child in public school should be expected to achieve anything better than what my child can achieve"?

I'm the poster with the language-disabled child. What an ungracious witch you are. This isn't about holding precious Lulu back from her potential for greatness. It's to get the boot off the neck of my child with a disability.

Children with disabilities should be taken out of the grade level standards scheme. It's not workable for them. Instead, they should be measured by their progress. Whenever possible, they should be taught grade level material, be it accommodated or modified. IEPs can require this, but Common Core makes no allowances for IEPs or disabilities. It pretends that with a tweak or two, everyone will magically be on grade level if the teacher or student just discovers their "grit."

Common Core doesn't make allowances for ANYTHING. They are the grade level standards.

Common Core doesn't measure ANYTHING. Tests are being devised (PARCC etc) to measure whether chlldren have met grade level standards. NOT whether children are making progress. Whether they are reaching the grade level standard.

I agree with you that children with IEPs should be measured by their progress. This is a reasonable goal to work towards. Not "Get rid of Common Core because it is inappropriate for learning disabled students."

The need to get rid of Common Core because it is an unproven set of standards that was sneaked in the back door by bribing states with money. There is ZERO PROOF it works. It turns our kids into guinea pigs.

Children have always been guinea pigs wrt education. There is always something new coming along. Education changes with the progress of our society. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. Public or private it doesn't matter.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Are you saying, "My child has a language disability, therefore no child in public school should be expected to achieve anything better than what my child can achieve"?

I'm the poster with the language-disabled child. What an ungracious witch you are. This isn't about holding precious Lulu back from her potential for greatness. It's to get the boot off the neck of my child with a disability.

Children with disabilities should be taken out of the grade level standards scheme. It's not workable for them. Instead, they should be measured by their progress. Whenever possible, they should be taught grade level material, be it accommodated or modified. IEPs can require this, but Common Core makes no allowances for IEPs or disabilities. It pretends that with a tweak or two, everyone will magically be on grade level if the teacher or student just discovers their "grit."

Common Core doesn't make allowances for ANYTHING. They are the grade level standards.

Common Core doesn't measure ANYTHING. Tests are being devised (PARCC etc) to measure whether chlldren have met grade level standards. NOT whether children are making progress. Whether they are reaching the grade level standard.

I agree with you that children with IEPs should be measured by their progress. This is a reasonable goal to work towards. Not "Get rid of Common Core because it is inappropriate for learning disabled students."

The need to get rid of Common Core because it is an unproven set of standards that was sneaked in the back door by bribing states with money. There is ZERO PROOF it works. It turns our kids into guinea pigs.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Are you saying, "My child has a language disability, therefore no child in public school should be expected to achieve anything better than what my child can achieve"?

I'm the poster with the language-disabled child. What an ungracious witch you are. This isn't about holding precious Lulu back from her potential for greatness. It's to get the boot off the neck of my child with a disability.

Children with disabilities should be taken out of the grade level standards scheme. It's not workable for them. Instead, they should be measured by their progress. Whenever possible, they should be taught grade level material, be it accommodated or modified. IEPs can require this, but Common Core makes no allowances for IEPs or disabilities. It pretends that with a tweak or two, everyone will magically be on grade level if the teacher or student just discovers their "grit."

Common Core doesn't make allowances for ANYTHING. They are the grade level standards.

Common Core doesn't measure ANYTHING. Tests are being devised (PARCC etc) to measure whether chlldren have met grade level standards. NOT whether children are making progress. Whether they are reaching the grade level standard.

I agree with you that children with IEPs should be measured by their progress. This is a reasonable goal to work towards. Not "Get rid of Common Core because it is inappropriate for learning disabled students."

Anonymous wrote:Are you saying, "My child has a language disability, therefore no child in public school should be expected to achieve anything better than what my child can achieve"?

I'm the poster with the language-disabled child. What an ungracious witch you are. This isn't about holding precious Lulu back from her potential for greatness. It's to get the boot off the neck of my child with a disability.


Children with disabilities should be taken out of the grade level standards scheme. It's not workable for them. Instead, they should be measured by their progress. Whenever possible, they should be taught grade level material, be it accommodated or modified. IEPs can require this, but Common Core makes no allowances for IEPs or disabilities. It pretends that with a tweak or two, everyone will magically be on grade level if the teacher or student just discovers their "grit."

Anonymous wrote:

They SHOULD be evaluated on the standards. That's the point of a standard.

Either you meet it, or you don't.

Well. Good luck in finding teachers that will teach in poor schools or teach ESOL students. You are setting them up for failure. Teachers in AAP will be just fine.

Actually, if you evaluate teachers based on student growth, the AAP/GT teachers will have the hardest time proving their children made growth, because so many gifted kids score at the top of the test (ceiling) that it is hard to show progress unless you use above grade level tests!

It's the children who score lowest that can make the most progress.

They SHOULD be evaluated on the standards. That's the point of a standard.

Either you meet it, or you don't.

Well. Good luck in finding teachers that will teach in poor schools or teach ESOL students. You are setting them up for failure. Teachers in AAP will be just fine.

Anonymous wrote:The problem, once more, is that students and teachers are being judged and evaluated on the standards. Not a good policy for one size fits all.

They SHOULD be evaluated on the standards. That's the point of a standard.

Either you meet it, or you don't.

The problem, once more, is that students and teachers are being judged and evaluated on the standards. Not a good policy for one size fits all.