If the Powers that Be took the stand that the Common Core was like a salad out of which I could pick the stuff like celery and radishes, which I hate, into which I could put goat cheese and dried cranberries if I felt like it, I'd have a much different opinion of it.
Take what a kid really loves and refer to the Common Core to find the standard. Keep track of what standards the kid has mastered. Then an assessment could be made based on what standards the kid has chosen to achieve. I could look at something like that. Maybe even support it.
But if the Common Core is what it's being accused of by detractors, a national curriculum that a school is connected to like glue and that is tied to national testing; if a school or teacher or student cannot veer to make room for tangents of discovery, delight, passion, then it's no bargain. It just ties the hands of teachers and students alike.
A person may reject learning something now, but may be totally into it later. Or maybe that student will never be into it, but fills his time with the thing he loves most.
Access to knowledge! Freedom to learn! Flexibility to teach with passion, learn alongside children! If the Common Core is merely a recipe for a salad, and they make kids eat the radishes, then, all things considered, I vote no.
The Coomon Core standards are connected to the "new assessments" and to the student longitudinal database, cannot have one without the other . It is a 3fer if you will.... With the emphasis on accountability, not on student learning.
ReplyDeleteWhat I don't get is that if my state taught the common core standards plus the Maine Learning Results, it would have to have a K-23 system, says my superintendent. How can that be done??
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