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On February 11 2016 13:59 Falling wrote:
Okay. I don't get it. What's the big deal with Common Core? I've been reading through the Grade 8 standards for English, and it seems like pretty boiler plate stuff. Sure they make the same mistake of BC's old learning standards with having a hundred items in the English section (you can tell the English section was written by English majors), but one lesson can usually hit five of those learning standards anyways. Is it purely a state's rights tiff because the actual line items seem pretty innocuous.
The standards and skills outlined in the Common Core are nearly identical to earlier individual state standards, and I have yet to find a single person who fundamentally disagrees with the overall list of ideas and strategies and content that are reflected here: http://www.corestandards.org/Math/ and here: http://www.corestandards.org/ELA-Literacy/ yet fully agreed with earlier state standards. It's basically the same stuff, except the idea was to make sure everyone is speaking the same language and always on the same page. Not a particularly bad idea in many regards. The standards and skills of Common Core also reflect current educational research, in the same way that earlier standards reflected them. That's all good stuff.
Honestly, the biggest issue with "Common Core" - and by that, I just mean "the way that students are being educated nowadays" - is that parents don't remember the content and they learned in different (read as: less efficient/ less effective/ less useful, 99% of the time) ways than their kids do now. And to many people, different = bad. It should be noted that this long predates Common Core; Common Core just happens to be a newer educational buzzword that has the spotlight, so many people incorrectly attribute "new/ different/ bad teaching methods and problems" to Common Core, despite the fact that Common Core isn't a magical list of problems that students need to solve.
It didn't help that the PARCC standardized test was a complete flop, because it was 100% online despite the fact that a lot of schools didn't have the necessary infrastructure and technology for things to run smoothly. The teachers weren't given appropriate professional development either. And really, no one likes standardized testing anyway. It's pretty much the one aspect of education that teachers, parents, and students are all united against. But, yet again, standardized testing long predates Common Core, and many of the testing issues (minus the technology) are completely independent of Common Core.
Edit: If I have to read one more bullshit article about "Insane Common Core Math Question!" or see one more picture-of-a-math-problem-that's-taken-out-of-context-and-has-confused-a-moronic-parent, I'm going to go crazy. The fact that people think that Common Core is a book of ridiculous problems just makes me so sad. The problems that get posted have existed long before Common Core did, and as a math educator I can easily figure out the context in which they're important and taught, and surely what the lesson was in class that led to that specific homework problem. But the average parent doesn't understand this because they weren't in their child's class, so they just assume it's all bullshit because they didn't learn it that way 30 years ago.
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On February 11 2016 13:53 xDaunt wrote:Show nested quote +On February 11 2016 13:26 Introvert wrote:
In many instances Trump is just being unnecessarily vulgar. That's not the same thing as being anti-PC. Perfect example was the recent incident with Cruz.
Edit: Sweet, there is now double post detection. Regardless of whether what Trump said is vulgar or anti-PC, all of the feigned outrage is still funny.
It's not really feigned outrage, it just makes some people sad and upset that the Republican candidate is very likely to be the American version of Berlusconi. I mean this isn't some reality show it's the election of the United States President and you're a few elections short of putting President Camacho into office
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Canada11372 Posts
Yeah, that seems to match what I'm seeing in the actual text. It really doesn't prescribe HOW to teach any of the skills so teacher autonomy prevails- and so really a bad teacher or a good teacher will continue to do so as the HOW you teach the skills makes all the difference in the world. But I really don't see anything specifically bad with the skills they want taught.
+ Show Spoiler +
Text Types and Purposes:
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.8.1
Write arguments to support claims with clear reasons and relevant evidence
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.8.1.a
Introduce claim(s), acknowledge and distinguish the claim(s) from alternate or opposing claims, and organize the reasons and evidence logically.
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.8.1.b
Support claim(s) with logical reasoning and relevant evidence, using accurate, credible sources and demonstrating an understanding of the topic or text.
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.8.1.c
Use words, phrases, and clauses to create cohesion and clarify the relationships among claim(s), counterclaims, reasons, and evidence.
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.8.1.d
Establish and maintain a formal style.
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.8.1.e
Provide a concluding statement or section that follows from and supports the argument presented.
The above is exactly what I'm trying to develop in my Humanities 8 students: coherent, well-supported, logical reasoning.
But standardized testing seems an entirely different issue, and if so, outrage on the Common Core seems more of a distraction, the lightning for misplaced fury.
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You're spot on that a good teacher or a bad teacher will ultimately make or break a course, regardless of what curriculum or book they're using and regardless of whether or not their state has adopted Common Core.
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Common core gets the hate because it has a little bit of everything for nearly everyone to hate.
1) Teachers don't like it because they need to work on new lesson plans. They also don't like it because of its emphasis on standardized testing.
2) Parents don't like it because it offends at every level. Smart kids as always get bored, but middle and low intelligence kids can't go to thier parents for help because it is like learning a new language sometimes.
3) Local officials don't like it because it limits thier ability to pander on education issues. And it does cost money.
On top of that, its really a lot of disruption for little to no gain. When your district adopts common core you aren't going to see noticable improvements. Most are schools are not failing, because they don't have the right curriculum, its because of issues outside of school entirely.
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On February 11 2016 14:49 cLutZ wrote:
Common core gets the hate because it has a little bit of everything for nearly everyone to hate.
1) Teachers don't like it because they need to work on new lesson plans. They also don't like it because of its emphasis on standardized testing.
2) Parents don't like it because it offends at every level. Smart kids as always get bored, but middle and low intelligence kids can't go to thier parents for help because it is like learning a new language sometimes.
3) Local officials don't like it because it limits thier ability to pander on education issues. And it does cost money.
On top of that, its really a lot of disruption for little to no gain. When your district adopts common core you aren't going to see noticable improvements. Most are schools are not failing, because they don't have the right curriculum, its because of issues outside of school entirely.
To piggyback off that, here's something I had written a while ago in a larger note about Common Core:
My Primary Issue with Common Core
It's a waste. I honestly don't think these "new" standards are going to change anything. The idea is to streamline educational standards and ideas, but I don't think that's really a primary issue for American education. Some educational issues that I *do* think are necessary to deal with include:
-We need to look at equity of school systems and students. The largest correlation of academic success rests upon the districts' and families' socioeconomic status. Let's first make sure that schools can afford books and chalk and good teachers and the occasional computer, so that all students can properly compete for higher education and good jobs.
-There is too much emphasis on standardized testing. Regardless of the standards, we focus on standardized testing. Obsessively. To the point where teachers lose entire weeks of school just so students can take other tests, not to mention the other weeks that teachers need to waste trying to "teach to the test" so that students can be prepared for them. Teachers already struggle to teach a jam-packed curriculum in 180 days. How could they do it (properly) in 150? It should be noted that many of the best-educated countries don't concern themselves with standardized tests.
-We, as a society, don't respect teachers. We spend so much time trying to fit their abilities onto a checklist and trying to be overly charitable and polite towards inappropriate students and parents, that we don't let teachers teach. We don't let teachers have the freedom to run their classroom independently. We don't defend or trust teachers. Teachers aren't infallible, but American culture does not respect teachers, which is yet another huge difference between us and the leading countries. Education has become the Rodney Dangerfield of American professions, because we don't want to let the experts teach our kids; we don't trust other people with our kids, let alone for 6 hours each day. Parents and students and teachers and faculty and governments need to work together for educational success.
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Parents and students and teachers and faculty and governments need to work together for educational success.
That about sums it up. Also, I'm not kidding Maddi! 
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Cayman Islands24199 Posts
i may be biased because i think some subjects just need to be prepared with solid fundamentals, but having some testing does not really necessitate bad teaching. it may be that standardized testing pressures teachers to put testing results above teaching the material in a way that allows it to be grasped and thus used as foundation into more advanced study.
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Some of CA's common core math books spend too much time pushing the abstract reasoning first (breaking 3x+4 into three green boxes, four red boxes. Breaking the negative 1 into one yellow box) and then including the "how we learned it" bit in later sections. I have only minor gripes and generally the teacher teaches past the offending sections, because I'm in an area with mostly good schools and good teachers. I spend some free time tutoring, and these books will have you facepalming from the time to time, but I don't react with outrage. Maybe when it's my kid having to learn it and I'll see more of a grades1-12 timeline.
On February 11 2016 09:18 Nyxisto wrote:Show nested quote +On February 11 2016 09:02 Danglars wrote:On February 11 2016 08:44 Paljas wrote:On February 11 2016 08:28 cLutZ wrote:On February 11 2016 08:17 Paljas wrote:On February 11 2016 08:07 Plansix wrote:
Socialism doesn't require the "seizing the means of production or nationalizing the industries". That's one route, but it is not a requirement. Yes it is. but can you really be socialist if you don't want nationalization? yes, you can, e.g. communist anarchism Only in the strictest sense of socialism as a means rather than an ends (the desired goal being government control over the economy). You have literally no idea what you are talking about. Anarcho communists surely don't want government control over the economy, but they are obviously socialist. This is what happens when all your knowledge about different economic models comes from fox news and new york times.If you look at the results of a high taxes, protectionism, selective subsidies, directed taxes (on tobacco, carbon, etc) and regulations you can get 99% of the control that socialism provides, with much fewer political costs. Again, its not about control, and you are still stupidTake, for instance, minimum wage. The state could create a grocery store that pays whatever wage they like, but it would probably fail, and whoever's idea it was would be ridiculed. However, if you impose the minimum wage, what happens when that same store owner goes under is people say "haha look at that incompetent owner, he cannot adapt to the times." You can see this sentiment whenever the minimum wage or wal-mart comes up on Reddit as they circlejerk about how a "company that doesn't pay a living wage shouldn't exist." Your posts about evil taxes and minimum wage are a fight against windmills. Its funny, really. Wait, you bluster on about communist anarchism and it's Clutz that gets all his news from biased sources? It's like the second coming of samzdat and wake up sheeple to what's really happening. Since you included Fox and NYT, like both sides have no clue what socialism means, perhaps you'll suggest another? + Show Spoiler +Perhaps since the true story is so hidden, you might suggest the daily worker archives as a good first step? Saying socialism isn't about control does not make it so. This is observing politics with the horse blinders on. It pains me to play devil's advocate, but across the issues the socialist argument is government can do it better and guide a hopelessly greedy and corrupt capitalistic system by using inpartial experts to fix everything from healthcare to banking to benefit the common man. That involves a level of control over markets and incomes. Come off the sloganeering and technicality-pointing if you want to persuade and enlighten. The point is simply that Bernie isn't breaking with any American tradition or trying to invent something new. He's advocating a mixed economy with certain government services which isn't foreign to the US. The dismantling of essential public goods and services is a new phenomenon since the Thatcher era, Bernie isn't propagating any foreign ideology, he's merely trying to balance the scales a little. If that's so, his point didn't really break through. He's more into the "well, technically" and "all your points are laughably absurd, good day sir" school of debate. To your point, however, I think most of his detractors realize he's the newest iteration of a usually gradual move towards a higher presence of the government in the economy. I hear the latest bipartisan budget lists expenditures to individuals as amounting to over 70% of the overall budget. Government redistribution is a rather modern American tradition, you're right. Whether this serves to balance the scales depends on how you view the rich in the country and the poor.
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Canada11372 Posts
I have only minor gripes and generally the teacher teaches past the offending sections, because I'm in an area with mostly good schools and good teachers. I spend some free time tutoring, and these books will have you facepalming from the time to time, but I don't react with outrage
Well, I think that's what good teachers do. You want to fulfill the learning standards as best you can, in good faith, but teacher autonomy should allow you to mitigate any poorly expressed learning standard. Most teachers, I think, are pretty flexible and agile, rather than getting super uptight rather than getting stuck with a fixed mindset: "I can ONLY teach it this way. The standard TRAPS me." I don't that helpless mindset is necessary. There's usually a way around that still satisfies what the standards want. Whereas, you really can't get around standardized testing. You're locked.
To give me context, just how many standardized tests are schools getting saddled with?
As much as we complain about standardized testing up here (although usually it has to do with HOW it is used, namely the Fraser Institute ranking all the schools based on the results), I don't think we have that many. But we have a Foundation Skills Assessment in Math and Language Arts in Grade 4 and 7. We have provincial exams in Grade 10 for English, Science, and Math; in Grade 11 for Social Studies; and in Grade 12 for English/ Communications.
Also, from the examples given from the poster above, are all the complaints from the Math side? The complaints the pop up on a google search tend to be on the Math side as well, and I really didn't see anything in the English side. I mean, there are some parents complaining about some of the selections in the recommended reading list, but that's not actually the learning standards, it's only recommended, and unless there's something I really like on a recommended list, I tend go my own way anyways for short stories and poems (and to be honest, very often novel selections are usually limited to what the school has already purchased over the years- unless you are going public domain and making photocopies... and then good luck with the cost.)
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It seems that the maths is what gets the most hate. The main gripe I've seen expressed is that the methodology used to find the answer is weighted more than the answer. Common core doesn't care as much about the student getting the correct answer as it does with teaching the student how to figure out the correct answer. Mostly parents complain when they see some methodology they've never seen or don't remember and believe the 'old' methods are better and quicker (memorizing multiplication tables, etc.).
I understand those complaint but I agree with the premise that an education should focus more on critical thinking than just getting the 'right' answer.
Also from what I've seen the standards are rather broad in many areas and it is left up to teachers to figure out how to go about it, which provides for varying results.
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On February 11 2016 14:21 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:Show nested quote +On February 11 2016 13:59 Falling wrote:
Okay. I don't get it. What's the big deal with Common Core? I've been reading through the Grade 8 standards for English, and it seems like pretty boiler plate stuff. Sure they make the same mistake of BC's old learning standards with having a hundred items in the English section (you can tell the English section was written by English majors), but one lesson can usually hit five of those learning standards anyways. Is it purely a state's rights tiff because the actual line items seem pretty innocuous. The standards and skills outlined in the Common Core are nearly identical to earlier individual state standards, and I have yet to find a single person who fundamentally disagrees with the overall list of ideas and strategies and content that are reflected here: http://www.corestandards.org/Math/ and here: http://www.corestandards.org/ELA-Literacy/ yet fully agreed with earlier state standards. It's basically the same stuff, except the idea was to make sure everyone is speaking the same language and always on the same page. Not a particularly bad idea in many regards. The standards and skills of Common Core also reflect current educational research, in the same way that earlier standards reflected them. That's all good stuff. Honestly, the biggest issue with "Common Core" - and by that, I just mean "the way that students are being educated nowadays" - is that parents don't remember the content and they learned in different (read as: less efficient/ less effective/ less useful, 99% of the time) ways than their kids do now. And to many people, different = bad. It should be noted that this long predates Common Core; Common Core just happens to be a newer educational buzzword that has the spotlight, so many people incorrectly attribute "new/ different/ bad teaching methods and problems" to Common Core, despite the fact that Common Core isn't a magical list of problems that students need to solve. It didn't help that the PARCC standardized test was a complete flop, because it was 100% online despite the fact that a lot of schools didn't have the necessary infrastructure and technology for things to run smoothly. The teachers weren't given appropriate professional development either. And really, no one likes standardized testing anyway. It's pretty much the one aspect of education that teachers, parents, and students are all united against. But, yet again, standardized testing long predates Common Core, and many of the testing issues (minus the technology) are completely independent of Common Core. Edit: If I have to read one more bullshit article about "Insane Common Core Math Question!" or see one more picture-of-a-math-problem-that's-taken-out-of-context-and-has-confused-a-moronic-parent, I'm going to go crazy. The fact that people think that Common Core is a book of ridiculous problems just makes me so sad. The problems that get posted have existed long before Common Core did, and as a math educator I can easily figure out the context in which they're important and taught, and surely what the lesson was in class that led to that specific homework problem. But the average parent doesn't understand this because they weren't in their child's class, so they just assume it's all bullshit because they didn't learn it that way 30 years ago.
tbf a Calculus prof I had saw some of those questions (she had young kids) and thought they were really dumb. And she (and I think most people) know it's not just a big new math book.
But you laid out a lot of the other problems. They dovetail nicely with my conservative outlook and wanting more local control to deal with the many issues that need to be addressed.
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Does it ever cross your mind that maybe, whoever prepared those programs know the subject more than the average person on TL? Because this website seems to hold the key to solver every human issue from education to IS...
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If experts can't agree, why should we agree with them? The world isn't run by experts anyway.
That's just a really weird question on multiple levels.
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On February 11 2016 17:09 Introvert wrote:
If experts can't agree, why should we agree with them? The world isn't run by experts anyway.
That's just a really weird question on multiple levels.
RIght. So, if two doctors don't agree on a remedy, you might as well ask your plumber. But i doub you do that, isn't it?
Experts have different points of view but usually they have 20+ years of work in the subject.
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From what I remember they only spoke with a few experts at the beginning and then didn't consult with anyone at all when passing common core. Experts weren't really involved at all.
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Canada11372 Posts
I honestly don't think the 'new' methods are contradictory to memorizing times tables. I think it's really important to understand the why- whether by grouping or 5x3 is 5 +5 +5 or 3 +3 +3 +3 +3 or however they want to do it. But at some point, for efficiency and speed, it's helpful to memorize up to the 12 or 13 or 14 times tables. ...it seems to me I got both. Explanation and memorization... and while there was an expectation to memorize, most of the memorization happened at home with flash cards. There really is nothing stopping parents to do the same thing. How much class time would the parents want teachers to devote to pure rote memory? That's a great thing to do at home.
I understand those complaint but I agree with the premise that an education should focus more on critical thinking than just getting the 'right' answer.
Well, parents can rejoice with what's coming down the pipe. (I assume if US isn't leading, it'll soon follow suit with the next education wave as it's always a pendulum shift.) What I'm hearing now from the new curriculum is that they have realized you can't do critical thinking without material to critically think about (of course), you need foundations to problem solve, etc.
Everything comes full circle in education, and it seems there is a growing realization that while swinging hard for problem solving was a good thing, the intention was not to leave behind the foundation skills that you would need in order to problem solve in the first place. So another shift is coming to course correct. Even the big shift into Inquiry based education needs a solid foundation to function.
On February 11 2016 17:24 Kickstart wrote:
From what I remember they only spoke with a few experts at the beginning and then didn't consult with anyone at all when passing common core. Experts weren't really involved at all.
Honestly, however many teachers or experts you get involved, and even when it's down at a local (in my case, provincial), you still get the typical "who the hell came up with this?"
But whether it was few or many, there's nothing too egregious in the Grade 8 English... except that it's unwieldy because they broke it down into too many learning standards. But we had the same problem under the old curriculum at the provincial level. Our new curriculum is fortunately aiming for a little more brevity.
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On February 11 2016 17:18 SoSexy wrote:Show nested quote +On February 11 2016 17:09 Introvert wrote:
If experts can't agree, why should we agree with them? The world isn't run by experts anyway.
That's just a really weird question on multiple levels. RIght. So, if two doctors don't agree on a remedy, you might as well ask your plumber. But i doub you do that, isn't it? Experts have different points of view but usually they have 20+ years of work in the subject.
Seeing that you post quite a bit the European equivalent of this thread, I'm confused by your problem. (Most) people here have two things: ideas and free time. They choose to spend it discussing things that interest them. This includes things about which they are not experts. People do this all the time. Aside from a few activists, I don't think anyone views this forum as a place where great issues are decided.
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Canada11372 Posts
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On February 11 2016 17:29 Introvert wrote:Show nested quote +On February 11 2016 17:18 SoSexy wrote:On February 11 2016 17:09 Introvert wrote:
If experts can't agree, why should we agree with them? The world isn't run by experts anyway.
That's just a really weird question on multiple levels. RIght. So, if two doctors don't agree on a remedy, you might as well ask your plumber. But i doub you do that, isn't it? Experts have different points of view but usually they have 20+ years of work in the subject. Seeing that you post quite a bit the European equivalent of this thread, I'm confused by your problem. (Most) people here have two things: ideas and free time. They choose to spend it discussing things that interest them. This includes things about which they are not experts. People do this all the time. Aside from a few activists, I don't think anyone views this forum as a place where great issues are decided.
I'm all with you as far as discussing is concerned, no big deal with that. I am referring to certain posts which really look delusional. 'I have no idea about the subject but we should do X' has no place in a rational, informative discussion imo
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