Are the new national academic standards rotten to the (Common) Core?
Here is another compelling and passionate piece from Pelham City, Ga., school chief Jim Arnold. (You can search the blog for other Arnold essays.)
Arnold takes on the new Common Core Standards, in which former Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue played a pivotal leadership role through the National Governor’s Association.
By Jim Arnold
I must state from the outset that I am innately suspicious of the underlying motives or educational benefits of any initiative – Common Core included — supported by the Georgia governor who instituted austerity cuts in 2003, led Georgia to be one of the only states to use teacher furloughs to balance the state budget and consistently under funded public education in order to promote quality fishing.
Common Core is a standardized national curriculum. Why is this problematic? From an historical context, a centralized school curriculum serves the goals of totalitarian states. Jefferson warned us about that.
There are additional issues:
1) There are few interdisciplinary connections between subjects. Research for many years has shown the positive effects of interdisciplinary connections on student learning and achievement;
2) Citizenship, personal development and the promotion of democratic values is ignored.
The rationale given by the GADOE behind this mandated implementation of Common Core was threefold:
1) An answer to the problem of student mobility;
2) An opportunity to create an economy of scale, and;
3) An opportunity to compare “apples to apples” when ranking schools, systems or students between and among states.
Student achievement seems to be missing from that particular continuum. Adopting a curriculum to solve societal mobility issues is like measuring flour with a yardstick. There are easier solutions. “Economies of scale” mean little when our Legislature continues to under fund public education. When you can’t afford textbooks the opportunity to not buy new ones at a cheaper price is hardly an advantage. It is rather troubling to note the number of educational “reforms” that ignore educational research, as if invoking the magic word “reform” is enough to allow any imposition however implausible.
With adoption of the Common Core standards, you can rest assured that Common Core standardized testing is not far behind. How can we expect a single, nationwide standardized “pick-a-bubble” machine scored test to effectively measure what is taught in practically every school system in the United States? The documented testing issues we already see with state assessments will increase exponentially.
The June state Board of Education minutes listed over $25 million in state contracts for testing and test development for 2013. Whether these investments are educationally justifiable or wise never seems to be the question.
Standardized tests were designed, once upon a time, to serve as prescriptive tools to help teachers help students. Presently, they serve as autopsy reports that include first time test taker results whose primary purpose is not to assist teachers in improving student achievement but to rank schools and systems. Teachers cannot effectively use data provided at the end of the school year to assist students that leave their class two weeks later. If we were serious about using these tests to measure achievement – and there’s a mighty big “if” about whether they do – we would give them at the beginning of the year to provide substantive data for teachers.
In a time when parents –and, as an extension – the public – are demanding more and more personalization for their child’s education, Federal and state educational agencies continue to insist upon more and more standardization – falling once again into the fallacy of “what’s good for one child is good for all children.”
The Common Core standards will ultimately serve not to improve student achievement but to increase the profits of standardized testing companies. The effects of poverty, family and socio-economic factors on education will continue to be largely ignored in our infatuation with the misguided belief that student achievement will improve through intensified measurement.
The “teach the test” and “test prep” and “testing pep rallies” environment will grow stronger through the implementation of annual growth measurements (annual growth = 100% – 2011 proficiency rate of first time test takers divided by six) for schools and flawed teacher evaluation models tying teacher ratings and salary to student scores that together will serve as almost insurmountable incentives for teachers to teach to the test, by the test and for the test.
The United States has, since the 1950’s, been rated in the bottom 25% of every educational rating system imaginable. The fact that our country has set the economic standard for the rest of the world, that our creativity, achievements and scientific progress far overshadow the nearest competitors would seem to lead us toward the beginnings of a discussion about the efficacy and reliability of the ranking systems we seem to trust as infallible measurements.
Sooner or later, even legislators must see it’s not about race, it’s about poverty; it’s not about a test score, it’s about student achievement; it’s not about a standardized curriculum, it’s about good teaching; it’s not about the business model, it’s about personalization; it’s not about competition, it’s about cooperation. Until that time, we will continue to get the kind of Legislature and public education system we vote for.
Relevant content and applications of knowledge through critical thinking, problem solving, modeling and higher order thinking skills should be the focus and goal of our educational process. Education is not supposed to be about determining or defining a specific amount or trove of material that must be learned in order to advance to the next level, but a matter of cultivating and growing inquisitiveness and curiosity in students that eventually grow into life skills. None of these skills or processes can be measured with any degree of reliability, accuracy or validity by a multiple choice machine scored test.
My suggestion is that we trust teachers enough to give them the freedom to do what they do best – teach children on a personal and individualized level. Micromanagement is an egregious sin and an almost irresistible temptation for state and Federal officials.
I predict a period of extensive frustration on the part of teachers before they get to the point they must eventually reach to decide that if anything is to be done to effectively implement the Common Core curriculum they must do it themselves at the local school level. Teachers, in this case as in so many others, are not the problem, they are our unrecognized salvation. Just as with Georgia Performance Standards, the efforts of teachers will eventually – in spite of everything politicians can do to make them look like scapegoats for what are truly societal issues – be the salvation of Common Core implementation in spite of state and Federal mandates and implementation schemes and not because of them – until, of course, the next big reform comes around the corner.
–From Maureen Downey, for the AJC Get Schooled blog
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107 comments Add your comment
Preaching to the choir
July 1st, 2012
9:36 am
He’s absolutely correct and in language even legislators can understand. Amen, Brother!
bootney farnsworth
July 1st, 2012
9:56 am
face it – we’re screwed.
Sissy
July 1st, 2012
10:14 am
I want to work in his district!
Shar
July 1st, 2012
10:20 am
I agree with some of what Mr. Arnold writes, particularly his comment that student achievement is ignored in the goals of the Common Core and his railing about test scores, I do believe that there are some benefits to the approach.
The current curriculum fails too many students, and is far too vulnerable to the machinations of agenda politics. The endless subterfuges by interest groups of all stripes, the political bandstanding of politicians eager to curry favor with whatever idealogues are locally prevalent, focus on getting their point of view incorporated into teaching materials, to perpetuate and indoctrinate their beliefs. That is propaganda, not education, and I am hopeful that the state’s role in facilitating this politicization of curriculum can be at least hemmed in by agreement to a national set of academic mandates.
I believe, too, that is why “Citizenship, personal development and the promotion of democratic values is [are/] ignored.” Those are typically areas that are most prone to idealogical interference, and are best learned through modeling, not curriculum.
I agree, too, that interdisciplinary associations between subject areas make learning (and surely teaching) more robust, but wouldn’t this be a function of teaching practice rather than curriculum?
Yes, concerns about how a Core Curriculum can be twisted to a profit center for the testing industry and a set of cement shoes for teachers are valid. But I like the idea of focusing curriculum on areas of agreed-upon importance and protecting the classroom from intellectual predators, right and left.
GwinnettParentz
July 1st, 2012
10:23 am
Apparently a fellow Democrat partisan of Maureen’s, today’s guest columnist alerts us in his very first paragraph that we’re about to read a highly jaundiced view of the Common Core curriculum initiative.
And if liberals howl about something—there MUST be merit in it, right?
Really?
July 1st, 2012
10:31 am
Creative teachers? Oxymoron. Give em the script.
Good Mother
July 1st, 2012
10:35 am
Hogwash.
Common core standards enable us to compare schools from state to state. Arnold doesn’t want us to do that because it would show the rest of the country just how bad GA schools are performing.
Shining a bright light on any problem is the first step to fixing the problem.
We should not hide our poor-performing schools by creating our own curriculum and judging ourselves by our own standards. That’s like the fox guarding the hen house.
GA kids will compete for GA colleges and GA jobs with kids from other states. It is waaaaay past time for a standardized curriculum and a standardized test nation-wide. We tax-payers and parents NEED to know how our kids are REALLY performing so that we can make real, informed decisions about where to live and send our children to school.
Teacher2
July 1st, 2012
10:37 am
The Common Core standards will ultimately serve not to improve student achievement but to increase the profits of standardized testing companies. The effects of poverty, family and socio-economic factors on education will continue to be largely ignored in our infatuation with the misguided belief that student achievement will improve through intensified measurement.”
This is so true! The number of standardized testing businesses will soon become one of the largest business industries considering the majority of the country now has Common Core standards. The new potential testing market is huge: the number of states with Common Core, the number of school systems within each of those states and the number of schools in each of those school systems. It is all about making a profit using the disguise of “reform”! Every reformer has a motive, from selling books, testing materials, curriculum, textbooks, workbooks, seminars, webinars, software and for-profit charter schools models. The money being made often with the help of governors, legislators and other policy makers at the determent of children is unconscionable.
Secondly, I have seen firsthand in my career as a teacher for nearly 20 years in Title 1 schools the effects of poverty, family and socio-economic factors and its impact on education. Everyone outside of the classroom wants to ignore the dynamics of these factors. “The misguided belief that student achievement will improve through intensified measurement” should be the new motto of public school teachers.
@Jim Arnold, thank you for your words of wisdom!
GratefulTeacher
July 1st, 2012
10:54 am
“I must state from the outset that I am innately suspicious of the underlying motives or educational benefits of any initiative – Common Core included — supported by the Georgia governor who instituted austerity cuts in 2003, led Georgia to be one of the only states to use teacher furloughs to balance the state budget and consistently under funded public education in order to promote quality fishing.”
As soon as I read this statement, I knew Mr. Arnold’s essay would be biased. I do not agree with many of the statements in this essay, but then again, I am looking forward to the new CCGPS initiatives with excitement. I just hope we are given the time and support to fully implement the standards and measure the results.
Maureen Downey
July 1st, 2012
11:05 am
@Gwinnett, If you follow the national view of Common Core, you will find howling from all sides. Not sure how you see this as a liberal/conservative divide. I suggest you look up Texas and the Common Core or Alaska. Some of the first states to embrace it, along with Georgia where Gov. Perdue chaired the national governors’ committee to create the standards, were Northeastern states
Maureen
Jerry Eads
July 1st, 2012
11:10 am
A nicely written piece, Jim. Your argument that the CC will actually be WORSE than what we have is a fascinating prospect. Several people close to the fire have told me that PAARC (the multi-state “testing club” purportedly developing CC tests) appears interested in telling teachers HOW to teach even more than telling them what to teach, which would make it yet another attempt to make learning “teacher-proof” rather than finding ways to help teachers be better teachers.
If you are correct – and I think the evidence (if not others’ rhetoric) suggests you may well be – America as a society will continue its downward slide as we seem to be consciously, willingly and deliberately working to cripple its educational system.
justjanny
July 1st, 2012
11:27 am
@Pelham City School Chief, Jim Arnold well-written and thoughtful article…don’t necessarily agree with every point, but you do give the readers some intelligent points to ponder rather than just spew the private school over public school rantings.
Kathleen Carpenter
July 1st, 2012
11:39 am
There are many inaccuracies in this piece and an incomplete understanding of the situation. The new Common Core language arts standards at the high school level allow us to break free of the outdated, Eurocentric canon of high school English courses that (a) don’t interest most kids and (b) completely misses the boat to prepare children for the information-based workplace of tomorrow.
In addition, the state of Georgia is part of the PARCC consortium for implementing new technology-enhanced assessments that will require all students to demonstrate higher-order thinking. As a mother of three elementary-aged children I cannot wait for them to participate in such a vibrant learning experience. I think it will wake a lot of our school leaders and teachers up!
Also, the Common Core consists of standards, not curricula. There is a difference and the author would be wise to engage his teachers in understanding this difference and in taking advantage of the rich opportunity we have in being a part of this effort being taken on in dozens of states. Sure, it will not be without bumps in the road, but it can be done in a very positive, energetic way that benefits children and teachers. What a wonderfully exciting time!
crankee-yankee
July 1st, 2012
11:47 am
Really?
July 1st, 2012
10:31 am
So whom would you have write the script?
bootney farnsworth
July 1st, 2012
11:56 am
@ Jerry,
waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay back when I was in HS (before electricity, indoor plumbing, and cable TV) I had a social studies teacher who maintained the primary goal of public education was to foster race relations – get us all to get along.
while I never bot that completely, it does seem the American political class has always been more interested in a on the surface civil community than an educated one
bootney farnsworth
July 1st, 2012
11:58 am
anyone who thinks Ga kids are just competing -and losing the competition- with their American counterparts is sadly and grossly mistaken.
d
July 1st, 2012
12:01 pm
I am just waiting for all the “aligned to common core” textbooks to come out. That’s not what common core is about. I will say I am worried about how the CC is being meshed with the current GPS in other subjects. Improving literacy is good, but it has to be done in a way to preserve the content and integrity of the other subjects which includes labs in science (not just reading about science), discussing and analyzing in social studies, and reading literature, not just technical reading in English.
zeke
July 1st, 2012
12:12 pm
In the end, the common agenda since the 50’s and 60’s is to make everyone come out with the same results! We do not allow the best and brightest to achieve for fear they might do better than others! We do not challenge them for fear others cannot keep up! I don’t gives a rat’s rear whether those students are white, black, yellow, brow or polka dotted! WE MUST CHANGE THE SYSTEM TO CHALLENGE AND REWARD ALL STUDENTS BASED ON THEIR ABILITIES AND ACHIEVEMENTS, NOT HOLD BACK THE BRIGHTEST BECAUSE SOMEONE ELSE MIGHT LOSE THEIR SELF ESTEEM! PRIME EXAMPLE: when my children were in elementary and middle school in the 70’s and 80’s, our small county school system did not have the financial resources to offer all the courses, advanced courses or facilities for labs and such as the city schools. So they started a gifted and talented program to challenge those students who were capable of doing more than the system could offer. These 4th, 5th and 6th grade students did special projects, research, lab work, etc. It proved so popular that in the middle schools they changes to group those children of like abilities in the same classes. Those who were obviously on a more advanced level were grouped together and so on! THE KIDS, ALL KIDS IN ALL GROUPS WERE HELPED, DID GREAT WORK. The teachers were thrilled. Those teaching the, let us call it the A group, were so thrilled that they could explain something one time to this group and not have to do it again, letting them teach and improve. Same to the other groups B, C etc.! Because the children in these groups were all at about the same educational level all of the groups had better results. The groupings were done by standardized test scores, grade in the subjects, teachers recommendation. There were white, black and others in all sections. As best as could be, there was no discrimination based on race. But then, some parents were “offended” that their child was not in the A group and threatened to sue the county school system. Rather than spend the money against a lawsuit, the county decided to DROP THE PROGRAM and use the money for the schools! What a waste! Education should be about allowing the children to advance as they are capable, not about some socialist version of “everyone equal”! Sure, everyone should be treated the same in the eyes of law and government, but, try as they may, socialist liberals cannot make everyone equal in intelligence, personal drive, physical abilities or income!
Proud Teacher
July 1st, 2012
12:16 pm
Yes, Dr. Arnold does have valid points. Yes, Dr. Arnold does seriously address the anxst of most public school teachers who see another educational trend that will create more problems for the teachers and less learning-for-life education for the students. But why do we teachers continue to bend as a willow trees leans in the winds to every mandate issued by those who are not in the know, those who have great “data” and research results to design such intricate, complicated, illusory standards?
We teachers in the classroom have faces with personal history in front of us. Why are we highly educated and personally committed teachers not allowed to address that issue first? There is a long series of hoops that all teachers must jump through in order to keep our jobs, and sadly, the last hoop of importance is the student, for it’s paramount that the school system have all of the right percentages and all of the correct boxes checked in order to stay out of trouble with those who have no investment in our classrooms, or else we will be ousted and replaced with someone who is more committed to the numbers than the students.
What Dr. Arnold writes here is only part of the critical situation that real teachers in the classroom face.
Whining? Maybe a few, but definitely not the majority. In too many cases, once again there will be less real learning while the teachers are trying their best to have the students memorize and respond by rote to more standardized tests.
Students are not robots; they are tomorrow’s adults. Why must we be forced to treat them as such?
crankee-yankee
July 1st, 2012
12:25 pm
“Relevant content and applications of knowledge through critical thinking, problem solving, modeling and higher order thinking skills should be the focus and goal of our educational process.”
This cuts to the core of the problem with “reform” movements. The “reforms” that permeate education are upside-down. Where research tells us we should focus on big-picture ideas, as stated in Mr. Arnold’s piece, and relevant content will follow, “reforms” are merely content driven and never allude to the big-picture as if it either is beyond the authors’ comprehension or they think it is beyond ours.
The truth is, students are a not all one size, some need to master content before they can apply it to big-picture ideas but just as many need to see the big-picture idea first so they can make sense of the content. This is why teaching has always been referred to as an art, not a science. No prescription can be applied to all children yet that is what “reformers” push. Let the education professionals (I’m talking teachers here, not administrators) do their job.
On the one hand, the message we get is that we should (rightly) tailor education to the individual (do SPED IEP’s ring a bell?) yet the prescriptive “reforms” do just the opposite.
Will we learn from the mistakes of the past? Texas was the canary in the coal mine for NCLB but no one listened. Now we have early adopters of Common Core raising sticky questions, will that be ignored as well?
Brandy
July 1st, 2012
12:32 pm
Amen, brother! Of course, saying something along these lines is likely to get you labeled a “union shill”. As an educator, I actually believe there should be a national curriculum–but(!) the Common Core isn’t the best of the multitude of options, especially when you look at Georgia’s proposed curricular implementation which is poorly written and fails to recognize how behind some students are, how special others are, and, even, how advanced some are. One size has never fit all and it sure won’t this time around. >>sarcasm warning<>sarcasm warning<<
Hmmmmm.....
July 1st, 2012
12:33 pm
…..” led Georgia to be one of the only states to use teacher furloughs to balance the state budget and consistently under funded public education in order to promote quality fishing.”
I stopped reading after the above sentence. How could a school system like the APS be “underfunded” when their per student spending is in excess of $14K per student????
Proud Teacher
July 1st, 2012
12:45 pm
As for more erroneous behavior in the higher echelons . . . . follow the money . . . . $14K per students? Yes, I think this requires line-item investigation.
Maureen Downey
July 1st, 2012
1:10 pm
@Hmmmm, Because the local property taxpayers pick up the slack from state cuts — much of the total cost of funding students falls on local taxpayers in many metro counties that want more than the basic education that the state funds. Many, many systems are now asking more and more of local taxpayers to compensate for deep state cuts.
Maureen
Ronin
July 1st, 2012
1:13 pm
It’s a business, run to manage and measure various achievements (or lack thereof) and then sell more “advanced” education solutions to school systems that have the funds to afford it.
Maureen Downey
July 1st, 2012
1:21 pm
@Proud, I will note that I have looked at APS spending in the past and found that the spending on the average/regular/ordinary student with no special services is not out of line with the rest of the small to moderate systems. That per pupil total includes kids receiving extraordinary services so it is important to break it down.
Maureen
Proud Teacher
July 1st, 2012
1:23 pm
Ah, so it is not 14K per child . . . really. . . Yes, special needs requires special services.
BehindEnemyLines
July 1st, 2012
1:23 pm
Hopefully this self-serving crybaby had some decent cheese to go with his lousy whine.
re: it’s not about a test score, it’s about student achievement — If the items being tested are the appropriate ones, that score IS student achievement
re: it’s not about a standardized curriculum, it’s about good teaching — with an acceptable curriculum
re: it’s not about the business model, it’s about personalization — LOL, _everything_ is about the business model you clueless waste of bandwidth & oxygen. So sayeth those of us of have grown tired of footing the bill for the hogs at the public trough. And there are few areas that have been more sorely in need in correction than the good money after bad thrown down the dry hole of overpriced daycare known as public (re)education.
re: it’s not about competition, it’s about cooperation — perhaps the best indicator of just how clueless the author is. With finite resources and an excess of bodies, EVERYTHING involves competition.
Progressive Humanist
July 1st, 2012
1:24 pm
Actually, multiple choice items can measure higher order thinking, problem solving, and critical thinking. They’re known as interpretive questions. A paragraph, chart, graph, picture, excerpt, problem, etc. is presented to the test taker, who must then extract the relevant information and use it to come up with a solution to the question. More and more standardized tests are using this format. It allows the test to go far beyond assessing memorized knowledge and instead assesses students’ skills and how they process information. And, contrary to what Mr. Arnold suggests, this can be done while retaining content validity and with a high degree of reliability.
To his larger point, it would indeed be a great idea to be able to test students using more real-world oriented assessments, such as performance assessments that require problem solving and critical thinking. However, this is where real problems with validity and reliability surface. Performance assessments are notoriously subjective, not to mention they are time consuming to complete and score. It’s difficult to see how they could be realistically incorporated into large scale high stakes assessment while maintaining accurate, objective scoring.
Psychometricians are consistently trying to improve measurement instruments to include new and more accurate ways of assessing learning and skills. But at this point none of the naysayers have offered a suggestion for these assessments that will supposedly test “relevant” “real-world” content and application of knowledge.
Testing is here to stay so griping about it isn’t going to do a whole lot of good. Instead, offer some solutions for assessing students on content, skills, and knowledge that you think is more important than what we’re assessing now, and come up with a way to measure it reliably. I’m all for reforming assessment and so is everyone else I’ve ever known in the field of assessment. We’re open to suggestions. Just make sure they are superior to our current measurement techniques.
gone2
July 1st, 2012
1:27 pm
I stopped reading after the above sentence. How could a school system like the APS be “underfunded” when their per student spending is in excess of $14K per student????
Why, exactly Hmmmmmmm. Seems it’s the age-old and biggest problem in education. It’s NOT that money’s not there, it’s that it is siphoned off BEFORE IT REACHES the STUDENTS and the instructors teaching those students! Look at ANY central office in this state. There’s plenty of money there! It’s just poorly spent. The department heads all have assistants- when it’s TEACHERS who really DESERVE the clerical help. There’s ALWAYS room for YET ANOTHER position if it needs to be found for an underperforming administrator. Teachers and students never seem to benefit, but the FAT CATS aren’t bothered by furloughs and such. Whatever happened to MANDATORY SUBSTITUTE requirements for central office administrators?? Gave them a little reminder of what it’s actually like in the classroom: morning duty, bus duty, 15 minute lunches (on- campus, not at the country club), lesson planning, grading, meetings and more meetings, and ,oh yes, the actual face-to- face with the real clients, the students. Too many have lost perspective of how much time and energy,not to mention money, it actually takes to individualize instruction. ONE SIZE does NOT, and NEVER WILL, fit all. Glad I’m gone. Never could stick to those scripted programs. Might as well have robots as instructors- or just turn on a TV or computer.
crankee-yankee
July 1st, 2012
1:28 pm
Hmmmmm…..
July 1st, 2012
12:33 pm
Don’t cherry pick. APS is an abomination, agreed, but do not label the entire state based on one egregious stand-out.
Overall, education in this state is underfunded starting, most recently, with the end of the Barnes administration. All the advances Miller effected have been wiped out to the tune of $4 billion.
Brandy
July 1st, 2012
1:33 pm
Whoops! Part of that got eaten…My comment should end with “(sarcasm warning) Well, at least the curricula publishers and test makers can make more money. Who cares about the children, anyway? (sarcasm warning)”.
redweather
July 1st, 2012
1:34 pm
@Kathleen Carpenter, you write “The new Common Core language arts standards at the high school level allow us to break free of the outdated, Eurocentric canon of high school English courses that (a) don’t interest most kids and (b) completely misses the boat to prepare children for the information-based workplace of tomorrow.”
And so it’s the “outdated, Eurocentric Canon” that is holding our kids back? Please explain. This ought to be pretty good.
GwinnettParentz
July 1st, 2012
1:41 pm
The Pioneer Institute in Massachusetts recently released a legal analysis of the standards push behind Common Core and found that the Department of Education’s involvement in it runs afoul of three federal laws prohibiting the federal government from getting involved in curriculum: The federal government has (1) incentivized states to adopt the standards through $4.35 billion in Race to the Top grants, (2) conditioned access to No Child Left Behind waivers on standards adoption, and (3) paid for the corresponding national assessments.
Pioneer also found that, cumulatively, implementation of the standards will cost states some $16 billion.
So maybe this complaint has merits?
Progressive Humanist
July 1st, 2012
1:43 pm
And I would also ask this: What are all these important topics and projects that teachers are now having to bypass in order to prepare students to do well on high stakes tests? If you’re covering the curriculum you’re supposed to and sticking to your standards and objectives, everything you do should be preparing students to do well on those assessments. Good teaching IS good test preparation. If the test is measuring the academic content and skills that educators have agreed are what students need to master (which I concede is sometimes debatable) and your students are learning that academic content and those skills, then how is the test hindering your ability to teach?
crankee-yankee
July 1st, 2012
1:48 pm
BehindEnemyLines
July 1st, 2012
1:23 pm
Talk about clueless wastes of oxygen & bandwidth…do you have anything positive to add to the discussion besides tired opinions?
“re: it’s not about a test score, it’s about student achievement — If the items being tested are the appropriate ones, that score IS student achievement”
This is one basis of the missive, the tests have not been proven to measure achievement, only rote memorization.
“re: it’s not about a standardized curriculum, it’s about good teaching — with an acceptable curriculum”
Basis #2 questions the acceptability of the CC curriculum
“re: it’s not about the business model, it’s about personalization — LOL, _everything_ is about the business model you clueless waste of bandwidth & oxygen. So sayeth those of us of have grown tired of footing the bill for the hogs at the public trough. And there are few areas that have been more sorely in need in correction than the good money after bad thrown down the dry hole of overpriced daycare known as public (re)education.”
How wrong you are…we are talking about people, not widgets
“re: it’s not about competition, it’s about cooperation — perhaps the best indicator of just how clueless the author is. With finite resources and an excess of bodies, EVERYTHING involves competition”
Involves, yes…but having competition be the end-all is just myopic, just look at the Sandusky case.
Good Mother
July 1st, 2012
1:48 pm
Progressive Humanist is EXACTLY RIGHT.
I WANT teachers to teach to the test because they test measures what the kids need to know — mostly, reading comprehension. The kids read a paraprah or more and answer questions about the information in the paragraph.
The answers are right there in black or white. All the kids have to do is read and understand what they read.
However, if the children can only memorize “sight words” they are not really reading…they are just memorizing.
My kids were constantly taught IN SCHOOL by their teachers to memorize sight words.
That IS NOT reading.
I had to teach my kids to read the right way — simple phonics. Know the sounds the letters make and sound out the word.
Half of these standardized tests are simply knowing how to read.
If teachers are teaching kids to learn to read, they will pass the test.
Courtney
July 1st, 2012
1:56 pm
I enjoyed the article. Thank you
I love teaching. I hate what it is becoming...
July 1st, 2012
1:57 pm
@Behind Enemy Lines
crybaby
lousy whine
score IS student achievement
everything_ is about the business model
clueless waste of bandwidth & oxygen.
hogs at the public trough
good money after bad
overpriced daycare
EVERYTHING involves competition
Yep. Looks like you got all the good ole “talking points” in there – Congratulations! Also shows you really have no clue yourself. But then, what do I know, right? I’ve just had my “boots on the ground” actually DOING the job you find do easy to dismiss. For over 20 years, I have actually been working in a classroom, serving on district committees and helping develop curriculum, and oh, you know, that other thing, TEACHING.
But I don’t know anything. Others like me don’t know anything. Twenty years involved in the day to day hands-on operations of education gives us NO insight into to our job, what works and what does not. No. We need to listen to people like you. Anonymous posters on a blog who have probably not been a classroom since they graduated (if they graduated.)
catlady
July 1st, 2012
1:58 pm
Mr. Arnold’s first paragraph is so great, I almost swallowed a tomato reading it! Especially the “consistently under-funded public education in order to promote quality fishing.” Priceless! Of course, we know that the money “saved” went to other “worthy projects” as well–roads, Oaky Woods, etc.
I also fear the “Common Core,” especially after the indignities and jack-boot behavior caused by Reading First and the scripted texts. When I click the dog-clicker, say, “Heil, Hitler!” Millions of dollars given to the FOB who provided the materials, and now they are in for another round of millions (while the kids languish) laughing to the bank.
How many more “saviors” are we going to adopt? We haven’t even finished “unpacking” the GPS!
The government of Georgia acts like the 50s housewife–give them NEW! and IMPROVED! and they will buy it every time! Throw in a few Reforms! and Research Based! and they become near-orgasmic!
Mr. Arnold, I know there is no hope for you to work within the state’s deparment of education, since you actually think, but we will be looking for a superintendent up here soon…had you thought about living in the mountains?
northatlantateacher
July 1st, 2012
2:06 pm
@GM: For someone as interested in education as you are, I’m amazed that you want a teacher to teacher your kids to the lowest common denominator. Progressive Humanist is right – it is possible to test higher order thinking skills on a MC assessment. It is not what is actually tested on our state tests. The EOCT for my subject area is insanely easy. If I taught to the test, I’d be teaching capitalization rules, paragraph main ideas, spelling and basic identification of literary elements – in high school. That’s the EOCT my kids take.
I’m not familiar with elementary school curriculum, so I can’t speak for sight words vs. phonics. I can tell you without a doubt that if teachers only taught to the test students would learn very little.
northatlantateacher
July 1st, 2012
2:07 pm
*teach…
Good Mother
July 1st, 2012
2:11 pm
Lesseee, let me add this up — CRCT unfair, racist test, just a money-maker for test makers, Common Core — unfair, racist test, just a money-maker for test makers…
No matter what measurement is put before the teachers on this blog, an overwhelming majority of them will complain that “it ain’t fair, just ain’t fair). The truth is most of the teachers on this blog do not want any measuremenht of any kind because they will know it will highlight how pitiful a Georgia public education is.
No matter what test, what measurement is used to evaluate, most teachers on this blog will throw up their arms in disgust.
GA public schools are an embarrasment to Georgia
The cat is out of the bag. The writing is on the wall. It’s been written about, discussed and documented. GA public schools are simply inadequate. No amount of complaining about common core standards is going to hide the poor performance of GA schools.
crankee-yankee
July 1st, 2012
2:23 pm
@cat
Funny you should mention Hitler, he implemented a national curriculum where every child was “learning” the same thing at the same time on the same day across the nation. Is this where we are headed? If Hitler thought is was a good idea, should we not reject it…
jd
July 1st, 2012
2:36 pm
Has anyone looked at the score since all these “businessmen”, most of whom have never managed more then 5 employees, have offered their “wise” advice to run our schools? Seems like it’s time to stop digging that hole.
catlady
July 1st, 2012
2:56 pm
crankee–yes, I am very afraid so.
GM: In your first post, you said,”it would show the rest of the country just how bad GA schools are performing.” I would argue that, no, it would show how bad Georgia STUDENTS are performing. There is a difference.
In your second post, you state,”The answers are right there in black or white. All the kids have to do is read and understand what they read.” Not exactly true. Most reading, past third grade, requires children to make connections between what they read and what they already know. Sometimes they have to make predictions. Second point on that is, understanding IS what reading is. Saying words phonetically, or by sight words, or by context clues, is NOT reading. It is calling words. REAL READING is interactive: You decode the word (by whatever method) you make connections to what you already know, and you add to that set of knowledge. If you mis-decode a word, REAL READING will send you to backup and re-read, as it won’t make sense if you UNDERSTAND. This was a great FAIL for Reading First.
Third, you say, “My kids were constantly taught IN SCHOOL by their teachers to memorize sight words. That IS NOT reading. No, but there are some words that are best recognized by sight. These are words in the 20% of English that are NOT phonetic. Or they are little words you would not want your child to sound out every time they saw them. Think of this: Your child has to sound out The boy got the ball. Sight words help your child move to automaticity–recognizing and calling words smoothly, which facilitates READ READING.
I have three children. The two oldest were phonetic readers. They were both reading way before they were 4. They had sight words, of course, but “big words” they could sound out. They both scored near-perfect on any reading achievement test you can name. My younger daughter, taught by me the same way, was much more dependent on sight words and context clues. She still became an excellent reader–has a master’s in astrophysics now.
Teachers use all these methods to help students learn to READ–that almost mystical interaction between a person and text that leads to COMPREHENSION. BTW, I have taught about 1000 children to read, and now I spend my days helping poor readers–kids 2-3 years behind–with their reading. I use every tool in the kit to do so.
Finally, your last submission: When I was in school, if I didn’t do well at something (defined by my mother as less than 95%), it was because of ME. My parents never, ever, blamed the teacher for my (apparent) inadequacies. They knew that the material was presented, and that perhaps I needed to spend more time on it in order to master it. But the fault for a low test score, if I got one, was MINE. Were the teachers so great back then? No, by today’s standards they were much less skilled. So what is the difference? The stool has three legs, not just one.
My two cents worth
July 1st, 2012
3:15 pm
The problem with all standardized testing is that everyone ends up teaching to the test because you are going to be compared to others. There are students in high school who can’t name the continents because NCLB did not measure science or social studies, so that got left out. My friend is a wonderful teacher but common core stifles her and actually prohibits her from raising the bar for her students (and 1/3 of her 30 fourth graders are EIP).
southside teacher
July 1st, 2012
3:29 pm
d
I’m sorry to report that the ‘aligned to Common Core’ textbooks are here and I will put them in my students’ hands in August.
Time and again, national standards have delivered disappointing outcomes in other countries. Why would it be different here? Don’t point to Europe; the UK is having their own debate on the value of GCSEs, A-levels and Standard Assessment Tests. http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2007/jun/10/sats.schools
Finland doesn’t have a set curriculum, doesn’t use standardized testing (they think we’re nuts!), and regularly kicks butt on international comparisons.
Meanwhile, Sidwell Friends and other top tier private schools here only use these ‘instruments’ as a tool for the individual student, not as a weapon against anyone.
Are the new national academic standards rotten to the (Common) Core? | Get Schooled | Ripples | Scoop.it
July 1st, 2012
3:57 pm
[...] Here is another compelling and passionate piece from Pelham City, Ga., school chief Jim Arnold. [...]
Are the new national academic standards rotten to the (Common) Core? | Get Schooled | Everything on the Common Core Standards | Scoop.it
July 1st, 2012
4:08 pm
[...] Here is another compelling and passionate piece from Pelham City, Ga., school chief Jim Arnold. [...]
I love teaching. I hate what it is becoming...
July 1st, 2012
4:08 pm
@GM “My kids were constantly taught IN SCHOOL by their teachers to memorize sight words.
That IS NOT reading.”
GM, I doubt very much that ALL your children were taught in reading was how to recognize “sight words. ” Nice that you helped them to learn how to “sound out” words, but that would not help them with words like: was, through, of, have, they, what, there, etc. That is why we teach them as “sight words”. Did you actually ASK of of your children’s teachers about this?
crankee-yankee
July 1st, 2012
4:32 pm
It never ceases to amaze me that the same people who espouse “local control” in government are so willing to jump on a national band-wagon that, ostensibly, aligns with their beliefs in spite of the fact they end up losing control.
Should not local control over education, where the needs of the local community are addressed, take precedence? With room for state/national standards but not in lieu of them.
There is no ONE way to do it and we would be wise to look askance at those who tell us so.
David
July 1st, 2012
4:46 pm
Have to agree….Sonny Perdue and his education and budget advisors were complete failures!
Dr. John Trotter
July 1st, 2012
4:48 pm
Mr. Arnold, you and I both know that it is all about the money.
http://www.theteachersadvocate.com
Tabitha
July 1st, 2012
4:49 pm
When we havea major recession and people produce less of the valuable things that governments like to tax like income, profit, property values and sales, then there is less money to spend on education, parks, police, fire and even fishing. There is not some magic money pot that the government needs to reach into to keep from cutting budgets in the face of massive declines in tax revenue.
Failure to recognize this fact eviserates your opinions.
Guiding Light
July 1st, 2012
5:14 pm
One point missed. The CC was funded by Bill Gates, who also participated in it’s development. It is an example that with enough money anything can be bought.
bootney farnsworth
July 1st, 2012
5:58 pm
here’s a question, not taking sides on the politics of it
since the state is constitutionally obliged for K-12, is it legal for the state to continue to dump its fiscal responsibility on local communities? can the state continue to cut its spending and force local communities to pick up its slack?
2 cents
July 1st, 2012
6:00 pm
@ Tabitha. Mr. Perdue quit funding QBE in 2003, waaaaay before the recession.
Mac Bogert
July 1st, 2012
6:03 pm
Bravo. Teachers have been at the bottom of the food chain starting in the 70s, I guess because of the backlash against the counter-culture/hippie flash that lumped them with other of the ‘effete’ class, as Spiro Agnew pronounced. I think I was a pretty good public school teacher, and in five years saw my autonomy vanish as parents, administration, and the central office decided that they needed to make not just strategic but tactical decisions about the classroom. I quit shortly after my principal, a man not much troubled by thought (some principals are excellent so I’m not trying to brand a class), upbraided me for giving too many A’s.
I much prefer Sudbury schools, where EVERYTHING is decided and managed by the entire population, with No specialized administrators.
I enjoyed the article
Have fun,
mac
http://www.azalearning.com
2 cents
July 1st, 2012
6:05 pm
@GM. My kids could read before they started school. But the sight words aren’t to memorize, it’s about an automatic response much like multiplication tables.
Good Mother
July 1st, 2012
6:08 pm
Crankee yankee says “There is no ONE way to do it and we would be wise to look askance at those who tell us so.”
Not true.
There is ONE way to do it. That way is to prepare the kids for the SAT and ACT tests and to prepare them for college.
Kids in GA have to compete with kids all over the country for the same jobs and the same colleges. ONE way IS the right way.
We speak English in this country. Everyone must learn to read and write and undunderstand English.
We all need to add, subtract, multiply and divide.
The core standards are just plain common sense. We all need to learn those standards for whatever we do in life and at home.
crankee-yankee
July 1st, 2012
6:23 pm
Tabitha
July 1st, 2012
4:49 pm
I do not disagree the recession has had an extreme effect on education funding.
However, recent history will tell us that is not the whole story.
1) The state legislature passed a law limiting & capping millage rate increases BEFORE the recession which had a negative effect on revenue once local property assessments declined.
2) The billions of dollars cut from the state education budget started long BEFORE the recession, (Perdue’s first year in office) not as a result of it. Yes some cuts originated afterwards but certainly not ALL.
http://gareport.com/blog/2011/09/27/our-sat-scores-stink-but-at-least-we%E2%80%99re-saving-money/
‘Perdue also signed a series of budgets that cut the state’s formula funding for K-12 education by a combined amount of nearly $3 billion during his two terms. These funding reductions were also known as “austerity cuts.”’
http://gbpi.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/fy2013_Budget-Analysis_Ed_k12_01232012.pdf
Adjusted for inflation, GA state funding per student dropped from over $3,700 in 2002 to about $3,300 in FY 2005 with an additional $200 drop through 2012.
Sonny was NOT an education governor and neither is Nathan.
Eric
July 1st, 2012
6:30 pm
Great post, Maureen. And so well-written, Mr. Arnold. Thank you.
It is disturbing to see these trends. I always ask the same question: who is really served by all the testing? What difference does it make which state is first and last, since there’s only 1-50 slot ranking? Unfortunately, many parents buy in to the testing hysteria so that Johnny can go to the finest university, etc.
BC
July 1st, 2012
6:30 pm
If we provide rigor and relevancy, the rest will take care of itself. As an elementary school administrator, I encourage my teachers to take risks and create a climate of critical independent thinking. Our goal is to empower our students to take ownership for their learning K-5!
Tony
July 1st, 2012
6:35 pm
On the hypothesis that “good tests measure what kids need to know” as proposed by some of the bloggers today, I must strongly disagree. There are several reasons, but I will limit my response to three.
1. Tests, as designed and used today, can only measure a small slice of the knowledge that kids have. They cannot measure the full range of skills that are important in life because it is not possible to design tests to measure all that knowledge. Creativity, for instance, is one of the most valuable traits that a person brings to business/industry. Yet, we design and administer tests that promote the antithesis of this characteristic. Trying to standardize all students into one mold will be absolutely disastrous for our nation.
2. The current testing craze in the US is pushed more by the big publishing houses who have a huge stake in the market. If you follow the money, you will see the trail leading right back to the big companies. They are pushing an agenda of more and more testing in order to line their own corporate pockets with cash that should be used to buy resources for our schools. Check out how much lobbying money comes from the big testing companies.
3. Even within a set of skills that most people agree to be important, our assessments are limited in their abilities to measure what kids know. The biggest limiting factor is reading and understanding the language used to build the assessment. Kids have different experiences based on where they live, how they grow up, and whether they are grossly affected by poverty. Whether you like it or not, these kids are the ones who get the short end of the stick when it comes to the modern day assessments. You can use all the current rhetoric you like, but the reality remains. Poverty has an adverse affect on student achievement.
The idea of “teaching to the test” is morally repulsive on many levels. The Common Core Standards currently being rammed down our throats have the potential of undermining our schools. When you couple that effect with the underfunding of public education in our state (and many others), we have created the ultimate self-fulfilling prophecy that our nation’s schools are failures.
How many private schools are lining up to implement the Common Core Standards?
South Georgia
July 1st, 2012
6:36 pm
Send me standardized kids to teach and I will not complain about “standardized testing” them!
Proud Teacher
July 1st, 2012
6:43 pm
Amen, South Georgia!
have you read them?
July 1st, 2012
6:46 pm
I’m just wondering how many of those who have commented have actually read the Common Core Standards. I can just speak from my familiarity with the K-5 Math Common Core Standards. They are well written and in alignment with what we should demand from math education–true conceptual understanding on the part of students as a result of effective teaching. In regard to testing, it is my understanding that PARCC assessments will be a combination of selected response and free response–very different from the current CRCT.
another comment
July 1st, 2012
6:50 pm
From what I have read the High School college prep is realy based on the New York State Regents curriculum. Being a graduate of that system, in one of its many small school districts, it will serve the country well.
Each of my cousins that have moved out of NY, to Texas, California, Florida, North Carolina, South Carolina or Georgia, all feel that our Children have had the educational short stick. While those that stated in the New York schools are comfortable with the public schools. As are any college friends cousins with children in the Mass, Ohio or Virgina schools.
The biggest problem are these huge districts. The districts should be one high school and their feeder school. Special Schools and Votech schools can be shared by multiple small districts. This is the only sure way that you don’t have “Palace Administrations”, the money goes to the school house.
Common Core is written by the same people who write the NY Regents curriculium. What Georgia and the south from Virginia down, doesn’t work. So you need to try something else. You also need to split up these districts.
Lee
July 1st, 2012
6:51 pm
What we have here is the equivalent of a 300 pound, 3-pack-a-day doctor telling me I need to exercise more.
Maybe if some of these school districts would consolidate and do away with multiple layers of overheads and administration, the austerity cuts wouldn’t hurt so much. City of Pelham, pop 4400 or so, has one elementary school, one middle school, and one high school. But Mr. Arnold is making $125,000 per year to preside over that “system”. He’s probably the highest salary person in the whole town. Go figure.
————————
“Sooner or later, even legislators must see it’s not about race, it’s about poverty…”
Category: If you tell a lie long enough and often enough, pretty soon, people will accept it without question. Or, since Mr. Arnold presides over a podunk system with 55% black enrollment, he’s offering this to appease the parents why their system lags behind others in the county.
—————————–
“The United States has, since the 1950’s, been rated in the bottom 25% of every educational rating system imaginable.”
I call BS on that one and Maureen should be ashamed to let it go through without questioning it.
————————————-
The bottom line, there is plenty of blame to go around for the CURRENT dismal state of education in the USA. The reason standards scare educrats so much is they fear that being able to compare apples to apples will expose their poor performance.
Jerry Eads
July 1st, 2012
7:07 pm
GM, you get 2nd place for least informed, I’m afraid (There was one much worse but not worth responding to). If all we want from our public education is the basic “3r’s” at the 6th-15th percentile level (about the pass level difficulties for CRCT and EOCT), then we get a population suitable only for pushing picture buttons on fast food joint sale registers.
Humanist noted that bubble tests CAN measure higher-order skills (I’ll use that label to represent the the gaggle of terms used in that arena). Absolutely true. The PROBLEM is that low-bid minimum competency tests do hardly any of that, and it may well be that the PAARC tests will not either, as it’s ENORMOUSLY expensive to build such questions and then ensure that they ACTUALLY measure higher order skills. They’ve already put their self-imposed deadline back at least once.
Like the dozens of other “reforms” I’ve lived thru (maybe fewer than Bootney
), it seems to me entirely possible that CC will follow all the rest of them – unrealistic promises in the absence of evidence, then a regressive failure back to low-level, low-bid recognition bubble-testing. I DO hope not. I’ll remain as always incurably hopeful, yet not particularly optimistic.
Rockerbabe
July 1st, 2012
7:18 pm
If you want to improve the schools, then get the politicians out of the school system.
Susan
July 1st, 2012
7:28 pm
Agree with the writer from Pelham City, Ga. You can’t ignore the culture of attending school “because you have to until you are old enough to quite and draw a check.”
Susan
July 1st, 2012
7:29 pm
correction “QUIT school”
crankee-yankee
July 1st, 2012
7:35 pm
Good Mother
July 1st, 2012
6:08 pm
Wrong on so many levels.
I am speaking to tactics, not strategy.
Focusing only on the SAT & ACT leaves out too much and as we have found out here in GA, Science & Social Studies will get the short end of the stick in order to boost math & LA scores (notice I did not say skills).
I cannot present material the same way and have every student reach the same level, too many variables. There is no ONE way, otherwise I could present material the same way to my gifted, regular ed & special ed students with NO difference in outcomes between them. Were that the case, we wouldn’t need AP courses nor IEP’s.
Tony
July 1st, 2012
6:35 pm
well said
teacher&mom
July 1st, 2012
8:04 pm
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/28/opinion/collins-a-very-pricey-pineapple.html?_r=1&ref=education
Common Core = more standardized testing….not less.
Think at least 3-4 testing session per year. It’s being sold as “formative assessment” to benchmark student progress. We’re being sold a bill of goods to justify MORE testing. Not to mention the technology investment required to offer all testing online.
A few quotes from the link above:
“This is the part of education reform nobody told you about. You heard about accountability, and choice, and innovation. But when No Child Left Behind was passed 11 years ago, do you recall anybody mentioning that it would provide monster profits for the private business sector?”
“Pearson is just one part of the picture, albeit a part about the size of Mount Rushmore. Its lobbyists include the guy who served as the top White House liaison with Congress on drafting the No Child law. It has its own nonprofit foundation that sends state education commissioners on free trips overseas to contemplate school reform.”
btw…Kathy Cox was the recipient of one of those overseas trips. Ms. Cox and Stephen Pruitt, went on to work for Achieve, Inc. Google Achieve and educate yourself of their role in CC and the Next Generation Science Standards.
“An American child could go to a public school run by Pearson, studying from books produced by Pearson, while his or her progress is evaluated by Pearson standardized tests. The only public participant in the show would be the taxpayer.”
And for those students who don’t graduate high school….Pearson has taken over the GED.
“If all else fails, the kid could always drop out and try to get a diploma via the good old G.E.D. The General Educational Development test program used to be operated by the nonprofit American Council on Education, but last year the Council and Pearson announced that they were going into a partnership to redevelop the G.E.D. — a nationally used near-monopoly — as a profit-making enterprise.”
Let me readjust my prior equation….
Common Core = More testing + Profits for testing conglomerates
madaboutmath
July 1st, 2012
8:25 pm
There are some things you should all know about the CC high school math standards. First, Georgia is trying to be a cutting edge state, and roll out the Common Core before other states. Sounds great, but the reality is that there are no textbooks, no tests yet (in our training meeting, we were told that the EOCT will most likely just be cut and paste questions from old ones), not really even any curriculum for teachers to use (What is on Picasso is a joke as far as I’m concerned.). In other words, our kids will be the guinea pigs of the country. Second, while the elementary school standards have been well planned and will be consistent from state to state as far as what is taught in each grade, the high school standards are not. Each state can choose from the entire list of standards and put together whatever standards they choose for any particular course. So the whole idea of solving the mobility problem is moot with high school math. Third, not surprisingly, Georgia has neglected to consult teachers in choosing what skills to teach in which grade. For the Coordinate Algebra class, there will be 3 units of algebra, followed by a unit of statistics, followed by 2 units of geometry. (Sound familiar to Math 1, 2, 3?) Quadratics (clearly an algebra topic) is introduced the next year in the geometry class. As teachers, we hear from the teachers of juniors and seniors that math students can’t factor, and yet we are not going to introduce them to factoring until 10th grade. All of the teachers were appalled at the training meeting. Georgia’s version of high school CC math is a huge step backwards from what we taught this past year in GPS Algebra. I see huge problems ahead for the students who are the 9th graders this coming school year, just like for the class of 2012, who were the guinea pigs for Math 1, 2, 3.
Tony
July 1st, 2012
8:48 pm
Not directly related to today’s topic: http://www.mikeschmoker.com/pedagogic-fads.html
Nice read.
Mary Elizabeth
July 1st, 2012
9:24 pm
I highly recommend that any reader – who is interested in an in depth discussion of America’s idealism, spirituality, the thinking of our founding fathers as well as Lincoln’s and Frederick Douglass’ – listen to this hour presentation, through interview, with philosopher and professor, Jacob Needleman, as presented, today, on Public Radio. See link, below:
http://www.onbeing.org/program/inward-work-democracy-jacob-needleman/222/extraaudio?embed=1
Once Again
July 1st, 2012
10:14 pm
Central planning doesn’t work. Never has, never will. Just another excuse to prop up a failing federal bureaucracy.
Why do you continue to subject your children to this child abuse? Why are you not working for an end to government run education? Why are your children not important enough to you do change the way they are being raised and educated?
Fled
July 1st, 2012
11:35 pm
@Once: Although we are coming from very different places, I agree that sending children to secondary school in Georgia borders on child abuse. As a former Georgia teacher (it never stops feeling good to write that), I decided long ago that I would never subject my kids to secondary education in that benighted place. I made the multiple sacrifices necessary to get myself into a position where they could have a private education. It hasn’t been easy. When they started school here, they were woefully behind their peers. However, kids always rise to meet the true level of expectations, so after some hard work, they have recovered. Now they are two years (at least) ahead of their friends they left behind.
To anyone who thinks money and class size does not matter in education, I would ask why private schools cost so much and all stress small classes with individual attention. You get what you pay for.
Actually, I find myself in agreement with a national curriculum so long as it is real. The Fulton County School Board serves as the best-ever argument against so-called “local control.” Interested people might find it illuminating to look at how the UK implemented their national curriculum. One key is having external people assess the final portfolios students submit in support of their work. Students do or don’t do the work, and earn rewards or consequences as a result. They also employ a system of school inspectors who do actually make sure that schools are doing what they ought. In the UK everyone knows exactly what must be done and how students will demonstrate that they can do it.
Unfortunately, it does seem clear that products of Colleges of Education (especially Aderhold Hall) are not on the whole prepared to lead students where they need to be. Many teachers are eager and motivated to do the right thing, but COEs are so full of people who are clueless themselves, enjoying a cushy teaching load while producing little of value, that a degree in education is practically an intellectual death certificate. Would we lose anything valuable if we closed down all COEs and established a program whereby students with real degrees learned to teach in an apprenticeship-type program? That is how they approach things in Finland.
Irisheyes
July 1st, 2012
11:37 pm
I teach elementary, so that’s all of the experience I have with CCSS. From what I’ve seen and studied so far, there are both good and bad. Having been a child who moved to four different states during elementary school, standards that are the same from state to state are helpful. There were lots of time I would move into a new school, and there was something I had not learned that my new class had. Sure, I was pretty bright and had parents who were willing and able to help “fill in the gaps”, but it still would have been easier if all the states had been teaching the same thing. Secondly, I love to read blogs written by various teachers across the country, and I’ve already gotten lots of ideas, lessons, activities, etc from those blogs. It’s great that I can get ideas from teachers in Florida, Utah, Massachusetts, and New York, just to name a few. I’m always looking for ideas to make my teaching fresh, new, and interesting. Finally, the math standards especially are written fairly well. (In my opinion) The old standards were “a mile wide and an inch deep” to quote the old saying, and these seem much more focused and narrower. I think that in the younger grades, the focus is on understanding rather than exposure, and I feel that gives the students a good, solid base. There is also a focus on problem solving, which I find is something that my students lack, year after year. I haven’t spent as much time with the language arts standards, because, in my grade, if you can get a child to read a grade level text and be able to talk to you about it in a fairly intelligent way, you’ve succeeded.
I know that as the students move up in grade levels, the focus becomes more and more on informational writing and not as much on fiction, and that is worrisome. I loved the novels that I read in high school, and no high school education is complete without reading the great classics. Hopefully, those won’t be forgotten.
What worries me is how the testing companies have their tentacles throughout the creation of the tests, test prep, textbooks, etc. I’m just afraid that schools will force the materials from the companies on us and not let the teachers teach the standards in the way that works best for their individual classes. What will work for one class (or for one year) may not necessarily work so well for another year. It all depends on the makeup of the class.
Matthew
July 2nd, 2012
6:20 am
Some, “Good Mother”, calls this hogwash?
That is a piece of the puzzle that Dr. Arnold doesn’t
address. That is, uninformed and ignorant parents
who are victims of establishment brainwashing….:)
ScienceTeacher671
July 2nd, 2012
7:41 am
catlady
July 1st, 2012
2:56 pm
That post is almost as good as the original article.
AlreadySheared
July 2nd, 2012
8:10 am
What a bunch of hooey. At least with respect to mathematics, there is no reason on earth NOT to have a national standard curriculum.
I think that what shakes folks up is that once there ARE standardized math tests to go along with a common math curriculum, by definition HALF if the system scores posted will be below the median national score (likely also that half will be below average).
ScienceTeacher671
July 2nd, 2012
8:19 am
I really enjoyed the article, and would love to have Jim Arnold as the superintendent in my district. That said, I don’t know that I agreed whole-heartedly with it. I don’t really have a problem with a basic national curriculum, that has everyone learning the same topics in at least reading and math at approximately the same time – but I’d rather they base it on the curriculum in Massachusetts instead of the one in Georgia!
I don’t really have a problem with some standardized testing, but I’d like it to be more meaningful than Georgia’s state tests. Yes, I understand the difference between norm-referenced and criterion-referenced, but the ITBS not only tells me how a given student is performing compared to others across the nation, but if s/he is having trouble in reading or math, it tells me where the areas of weakness are, unlike the CRCT.
My students take an EOCT, and I have no problem with that. We’ve had very few poor teachers in our department, and the EOCT helps weed them out. What I have a problem with: In my class, the students who fail the EOCT are those who failed the reading or math CRCT the year before, and were socially promoted anyway. What I also have a problem with: the student who actually gets 85-95% of the questions correct only scores 2-5 points higher than the student who only got 63% of the questions correct, because of the way the state curves the scores, and a student who only gets 45% of the questions correct will still pass.
Common Core seems to assume that all students are at least on grade level in reading. That’s not the case here in Georgia. That’s going to be a problem.
HoneyFern School
July 2nd, 2012
8:24 am
Common Core is about money (making more for testmakers and textbook publishers) and politics (so each politician can have their name on a significant-sounding change in education).
The standards won’t make education better; it won’t produce more college graduates, kids more prepared to enter a trade or higher test scores. Only solid teaching can do that.
But we don’t want solid teaching. We want factory workers, and we want to keep the social structure in this country exactly in place. Until we change the thought behind what it means to be educated, it doesn’t matter what capitalized name you throw on the movement. You will get the same lackluster results from students marking time in a system that doesn’t care about them.
Jane Robbins
July 2nd, 2012
9:50 am
I don’t know if this gentleman is liberal or conservative, but there’s plenty of reason for conservatives to object to the Common Core standards. For one thing, they’re being imposed on the states by the federal government, working in cooperation with progressive “education reform” interests in Washington. For another, if GA implements Common Core, it must adopt the standards word for word, with no opportunity to change anything and only minor opportunity to add anything. This means the end of local or parental control over or even influence on what their children are taught. And the standards are admittedly designed to prepare students for nonselective community colleges, not 4-year universities. The English standards “dumb down” the study of literature to the point that by grade 12, 70% of the reading curriculum will be “informational texts,” such as technical manuals, rather than creative literature that actually teaches students fundamental truths about life. Goodbye, Hamlet; hello, “How to program your iPhone.”
Mountain Man
July 2nd, 2012
10:07 am
From a parent that has moved around a lot while having school-age children – we ALWAYS checked out the local school district, it was our NUMBER ONE concern about where to buy a house and live. At least once, there was a possibility of living in one state or another. At leats with ITBS or apparently with Common Core, you can compare school systems against each other.
Teachers should not fear testing for evaluation of the SCHOOL SYSTEM. Testing should not be used to evaluate individual teachers.
Dr. John Trotter
July 2nd, 2012
10:07 am
I have been saying it for years. All of the testing, the “common” standards poop, etc., are driving by money. To be able to sell your wares to the different states and school systems, you first have to identify certain systems as “failures.” You will want to keep them as “failures” too in order for your “products” and “services” to be purchased. You really don’t want to see any significant improvements or they will not need your “products” and “services.” Hence, don’t even address an area which could surely improve these systems, viz., improved discipline. No, just observe the “passover” when it comes to this subject. Just pass it on by. Don’t address this. Improving student discipline might actually improve student achievement and then these systems would need your “products” and “services.”
Mountain Man
July 2nd, 2012
10:08 am
“by grade 12, 70% of the reading curriculum will be “informational texts,” such as technical manuals, rather than creative literature that actually teaches students fundamental truths about life. Goodbye, Hamlet; hello, “How to program your iPhone.””
That will be much more useful in real life than Hamlet. Just sayin”.
Progressive Humanist
July 2nd, 2012
10:13 am
Tony,
Your post is exactly the type thinking I was describing at 1:24. You suggest that current assessment methods are not measuring the most relevant skills (debatable) and that they can’t measure all student traits (true). As an example you discuss creativity. I think it would be a great idea for us to assess creativity. However, first you’ll need to provide us with a strong operational definition. Cognitive psychologists can’t even agree on what intelligence is, much less creativity. Then you’ll need to come up with a means of testing creativity (provided you can come up with the definition first). That measure will have to be something that can be objectively and reliably scored for tens of thousands of students, so you can’t suggest having students do a project and having a group of five teachers score each one according to a rubric. So, as I said, people in assessment are willing and able to reform measurement practices, but you’ve got to come up with a solid way to do it. Pointing out highly abstract constructs that we’re not currently measuring doesn’t mean that the skills we are measuring now are not valid or being measured reliably.
And it is true, as you point out, that poverty has an adverse effect on achievement. But that’s not the fault of the test. If we don’t like the reading on the scale in the bathroom in the morning that doesn’t mean we get rid of the scale. It is simply a fact that some groups of students will have learned more than other groups of students. And tests are designed to figure out who has learned more and who has learned less. The fact that there are differences doesn’t mean there’s something wrong with the test; it actually suggests the test is picking up on real differences in learning. Those differences used to fall more along racial lines, and still do to some extent, but now it appears they are more closely associated with socioeconomic levels. But again, just because the assessment picks up those differences doesn’t suggest the test is faulty.
Suggest a better way to assess tens of thousands of students. I’m all ears.
Jerry Eads,
I think you’re exaggerating the difficulty in creating higher order multiple choice questions somewhat. Most language arts tests now focus almost entirely on higher order questions. You will find almost no items that test discrete knowledge that must be pulled from memory on current LA EOCTs. It’s all reading comprehension, application, analysis, etc. All the information students need to answer a question is on the page, and the items therefore test cognitive processing. Math tests are all problem solving (although I’d like to see them present more real-world formats and scenarios instead of simply presenting numbers and equations). So I’d argue that to a large degree standardized assessments are already testing higher order thinking. We can still improve the tests, but it’s certainly not outside the realm of possibility to practically assess higher order skills.
Jerry Eads
July 2nd, 2012
10:18 am
Unfortunately, Jane has it right, apparently. I have yet to talk to a HS English teacher who’s comfortable with the CC “standards”: they seem intended to produce plumbers and electricians (not a bad thing) but at the expense of preparing students for university.
ST, my guess is that you don’t really understand the difference between NRT and CRT. In the first place, the state tests are NOT “CRTs.” They are MINIMUM COMPETENCY tests whose p/f points were quite arbitrarily selected by the industry standard excuse “modified Angoff” method. Go look things up; I’d wager even a wikipedia article will suffice. And, for the fiftieth time, the state’s mincomp tests ARE NOT SCALED, even though they call the scores “scale scores.” The differnce, say, between 750 to 800 has NO relationship whatsoever to the difference between, say, 800 to 850 (you pick the numbers, matters not). The ONLY points that have any meaning at all are the pass and “pass+” points, and ONLY in terms of “pass” or “fail.” The developers have no requirement whatsoever to have any other score points mean anything.
Finally, yet again, how many questions a student gets correct on a test depends on two things (okay, many more than those but): How much they’ve learned and HOW HARD THE QUESTIONS ARE. The most accurate (4-choice bubble) tests are those in which the median (middle score) student gets about 55% of the questions correct. Tests that are designed so that the average student gets more than 70% of the questions right (like almost all classroom tests) are generally less accurate.
Jerry Eads
July 2nd, 2012
10:36 am
Hi PH. Well done. I suspect our agreement to disagree may well be on the level of processing required by an item, and the degree to which a given test actually includes higher-order items. Certainly the SAT and ACT include some higher order items and they are arguably some of the best-made tests in the world. My concern is that low-bid tests having to be developed on very tight schedules with very limited (still very expensive) resources – like state minimum-competency tests – generally include little more than simple recognition or at best very poorly done and “not very high” higher-order items.
I DO have some hope (in spite of concerns about national – and worse, “teacher-proof” – curriculum) that the PAARC tests purportedly being developed to measure CC will be an improvement.
Oh, PH, I spent fifteen years running state testing programs for another state, several of those running the whole thing (rather, it ran me). From that experience I chose never to darken a test development door again so I’d never again be a part of the damage we do. From that experience I do indeed get a bit testy about the subject, bad pun intended.
I enjoy your contributions, PH. Please keep it up.
Concerned DeKalb Mom
July 2nd, 2012
11:18 am
Maureen, has there been any investigation into how the different districts are preparing to roll out the Common Core? Thinking of DeKalb, in particular, where teacher work days are now a thing of the past…I’m wondering where the time is to be found to get these teachers up-to-speed with the new requirements? I had heard other systems were doing work last year to get ready; shockingly (sarcastic), I don’t think DeKalb has done anything to this point. Anyone looking into that at the AJC?
Mountain Man
July 2nd, 2012
12:44 pm
“CC “standards”: they seem intended to produce plumbers and electricians (not a bad thing) but at the expense of preparing students for university.”
The “common core” should not be for preparing students for college, it should be the basis of getting a High school diploma. College students will, of couse, add much more to the CC. But when a business sees a diploma that says – “mastered the CC”, it will actually MEAN something. Not like today’s “attended school and not necessarily that often” diploma. It would be nice to know that a high school diploma actually meant a student could read, write, and do simple math.
Mountain Man
July 2nd, 2012
12:47 pm
I will say it again for all you “teach to the test” types. If a test is measuring basic knowledge like simple reding, writing, and arithmetic, then if a student doesn’t know these thing, He** yes, I want the teachers to be “teaching to the test”. For the college student types, you don’t have to worry, they just take the test and ace it.
Mountain Man
July 2nd, 2012
12:48 pm
reading
Progressive Humanist
July 2nd, 2012
1:09 pm
Jerry Eads,
I helped to create the current version of the GED. When we were writing items we never mentioned Bloom’s taxonomy or went out of our way to list the ways we were assessing higher order thinking, but all the questions were application, analysis, etc., at least on the portion I worked on. But that test was upwards of six years in the making and was not cheap to create, so it may speak to your point about the low-bid tests that are not as well constructed. But the LA EOCTs I’ve seen here in Georgia appear to have the same type of questions as the ones I wrote. Of course, history assessments will contain a greater number of knowledge-based questions, but that’s the nature of the content area- they’ve got to know the facts. My point is that we can and are assessing higher order thinking on high stakes tests. And as you know, it’s educators who generally decide on the content and constructs to be tested, so I am skeptical of the idea that the assessments don’t measure relevant information.
I see that you have had a change of heart based on your years of experience in the field, and sometimes that happens. But my question is what do you propose instead? Certainly there have to be assessments to determine whether students are acquiring basic skills in reading and math, just as there need to be assessments that can evaluate if students have acquired the prerequisite skills for college. So what should the structure of educational assessment look like, in your opinion? Ed assessment isn’t going to disappear, so how should it be done more productively?
William Casey
July 2nd, 2012
4:29 pm
National Standards and “big stakes testing aren’t ALL bad. However, why (except for somebody getting rich) reinvent the wheel? In my subject, American History, such a system has been in place FOR YEARS. It’s called the Princeton Advanced Placement Course and Test. It includes a lot of higher order thinking and yet allows for individual teacher judgement and freedom. I taught this course from 1982 until my retirement in 2006 at St. Pius and Fulton County’s Crestwood, Chattahoochee and Northview high schools. Why not simply implement this program for ALL students? The teacher-training system is already in place and “aligned” textbooks already exist.
Truth in Moderation
July 2nd, 2012
5:09 pm
@Gwinnettparentz
Your post was right on the money. Do you have a link to this legal analysis?
“The Pioneer Institute in Massachusetts recently released a legal analysis of the standards push behind Common Core and found that the Department of Education’s involvement in it runs afoul of three federal laws prohibiting the federal government from getting involved in curriculum:”
Joseph O'Reilly
July 2nd, 2012
5:25 pm
Common core standards are great opportunity for Georgia because
i Georgia students will be assessed by common core standars that will be great to work hard to catch up the state averages as Georgia being one of the lowest performing state
ii Georgia may not be able to manipulate test data like it was before and has to challenge schools trachers and students
If we were one of the top states above concerns may be discussed but we are not. We cant be a Texas to avoid this responsibility because of not having money like they had and using its interest rate to run schools.
Give ne standards a chance
high school teacher
July 2nd, 2012
6:18 pm
You can find a copy of the units of study for Georgia at http://www.georgiastandards.org. I am a bit displeased with the selection for British Literature. The first unit, a fictional unit, features Macbeth as the extended text. Not bad. The second unit, an informaitonal unit, features a Shakespeare biography. Really? 18 weeks of Shakespeare is a bit much for the future plumbers and electricians, and college-bound students as well.
I am more concerned with the selected texts of the 6th grade (my son is going into 6th grade this year). They begin middle school with a study of Chicken Soup for the Teenage Soul. I can think of nothing worse for 11-year-old boys to read than Chicken Soup for the Teenage Soul. By contrast, the last unit of the year for 6th grade is a study of The Outsiders. I know this book has been poopular with 8th graders, but I don’t really want my 6th grader to read it.
I am all for common core standards, but the units that the state DOE has produced make me sad.
Michael Paul Goldenberg
July 2nd, 2012
11:01 pm
Bravo, Jim Arnold! It’s encouraging to education professionals, parents, and other people of good will to see a superintendent with the courage to say publicly what many in your position know but fear to say: the Common Core has no clothes. It’s a bogus solution to a phony crisis designed to benefit test companies, publishers, and “experts” who will be happy to offer guidance on how to implement the Common Core, and to take public money from school districts who are foolish enough to believe that there’s some sort of magic in these pseudo-standards.
Truth in Moderation
July 3rd, 2012
1:50 am
We can’t afford to pay teachers, but we can pay for assessments……..
“We project that the annual cost of assessment for states participating in the consortia will increase by a total of $177.2 million each year (see Figure 3). These are not one-time costs (which are covered by the federal grants to the consortia), but ongoing operational costs that will be faced each year. Over the seven- year horizon of this cost analysis, the total increase would be over $1.2 billion.”
National Cost of Aligning States and Localities to the Common Core Standards:
http://www.pioneerinstitute.org/pdf/120222_CCSSICost.pdf
Sherman Dorn
July 4th, 2012
2:16 pm
Arnold is incorrect about Jefferson, who proposed the Bill for the More General Diffusion of Knowledge in Virginia in the late 1770s and would have set up a statewide system of public education, including curriculum standards. Not that we need agree with Jefferson, but maybe our use of the history should include accuracy… For more on this topic, see http://shermandorn.com/wordpress/?p=5104
guest
July 5th, 2012
3:19 pm
It is not clear from this that the author has actually read the common core. How can a set of skill standards be a national curriculum? Instead, the core argues many of the same things made clear here — students need to read, write, and think critically at a high level. There is no question poverty prohibits that, but that does not mean standards cannot be set high and then we work to support all students in getting there.