Alan Singer of Hofstra University has written positively about the Common Core. But he realizes that something very important is missing from them: Any interest in education for democracy. The a core is heavily focused on skills, not content. The skills of citizenship are not among them.

Categories Common Core

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Yvonne Siu-Runyan says:

August 17, 2013 at 3:22 pm

Of course it isn’t. That’s the purpose.

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Jeff Nguyen says:

August 17, 2013 at 3:23 pm

My take on the Common Core in Kindergarten…http://deconstructingmyths.com/2013/08/17/a-plain-little-thing-2/

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2old2tch says:

August 17, 2013 at 3:28 pm

The Common Core and its associated accountability measures are basically an outline for survival of the fittest in a global free market society, which has nothing to do with a democratic society.

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- Harlan Underhill says:
  
  August 17, 2013 at 8:30 pm
  
  “democratic society.” Are you referring to our own? Don’t we vote for Congress, the President, Governors, state legislators, County executives, City council members, School Boards. How can one get more democratic than that?
  
  Well, there is one way, for the parents and students in each school to vote every year on which teachers to rehire and which not. Would you be in favor of THAT direct a democracy?
  
  No, I didn’t think so.
  
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  - 2old2tch says:
    
    August 17, 2013 at 9:01 pm
    
    Harlan, you need to read the whole thread. In retrospect, my own post seems rather over the top, but I was unloading all my frustrations into my agreement with Singer.
    
    Would I vote for parents and students to vote for retention of teachers every year? I’m not sure what that has to do with my questioning the genesis of CC and the accountability movement. As the parent of four children, I do not think it appropriate that students and parents have the sole voice in employment decisions. I have a voice in local school elections. I object to special interest groups exerting undue influence through economic wealth (and in the U.S. its consequent political power). I’m sure you can pick apart what I am probably expressing poorly, but try to see what I am trying to say.
    
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  - Louisiana Purchase says:
    
    August 17, 2013 at 9:43 pm
    
    Well, guess what? This coming year part of Utah teachers’ evaluations will be parent and student surveys, so I guess that having the parents and students make employment decisions is happening after all.
    
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  - Robert Rendo says:
    
    August 17, 2013 at 10:32 pm
    
    Harlan, I would entertain your idea if in exchange, I could teach MY way (with virtually full autonomy) design the curriculum and the testing used to assess students. It would be a tradeoff. . . .
    
    But in the public realm, you are told more or less exactly how to teach, right down to the very scripting, scope, and sequencing.
    
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  - Ellen T Klock says:
    
    August 18, 2013 at 8:54 am
    
    My one daughter had terrible teachers in 7th grade. There was a lack of communication and she was not doing well. My son, on the other hand, had a fantastic seventh grade experience. I can’t express how impressed I was with how well the worked with me to provide him with a successful year.
    
    They were the same teachers.
    
    Each child is different. More than once my children would have the same teacher and achieve different reactions and results.
    
    Working with teachers, some years they had a wonderful class and other years they worked twice as hard with half the results.
    
    Even with over thirty years of experience in education, I don’t feel qualified to vote on whether a teacher should be rehired from year to year.
    
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- Middle school teacher says:
  
  August 17, 2013 at 10:02 pm
  
  Hi Louisiana,
  My district here in CT piloted our new reformy teacher evaluation system. Parent or student surveys are a component. However, the surveys are given and aggregated by school, not classroom. The parents who respond may not be the parents of students you have actually taught. We were told this will make all of us responsible for the school climate. Remember, “No excuses!” … especially if you work in a classroom with real children.
  P.S. If you get tired of saying “No excuses” you can substitute the phrase “It’s all my fault.”
  
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  - Louisiana Purchase says:
    
    August 18, 2013 at 1:36 am
    
    Well that’s even more charming than our evaluations will be. We’re supposed to have our own scores from our own students and their parents–I HOPE! It’s still ridiculous either way, of course. I never even meet most of the parents of my students.
    
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Alan says:

August 17, 2013 at 3:52 pm

That’s a feature, not a flaw.

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Robert D. Shepherd says:

August 17, 2013 at 4:05 pm

“The core is heavily focused on skills, not content.”

Indeed. The Common Core in ELA is a list of abstract skills.

Diane, would you tell that to the people at the Core Knowledge Foundation? The organization was founded on the idea that knowledge matters (thus the name), and it’s founder has written book after book about why skill-focused instruction that leaves out world and process knowledge is a problem. But now it’s become a huge cheerleader for the CCSS. This seems to me extraordinarily bizarre.

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- Middle school teacher says:
  
  August 17, 2013 at 10:31 pm
  
  So true! The lengthy post you did on this a while back was brilliant and compelling. It really helped me move my thinking along on the CCSS. When first confronted with the CC my initial reaction was puzzlement. What is so new about teaching students to identify the main idea in a text or write a narrative or follow punctuation rules? Any language arts teacher worth his or her salt has been doing that all along.
  
  To some extent, there is an “Emperor’s New Clothes” scam going on. My city is dumping huge amounts of money to purchase new CC aligned textbooks. They’re even working out how to get more computers so we can take those new tests.
  
  But, these problems are not the only problems. As you point out, CC focuses on abstract skills rather than content knowledge. Apparently it is not important to read a Shakespeare play, a Robert Frost poem, or a Poe short story. Any text will do. In addition, content knowledge in non-tested subjects is down-played, disregarded, or simply cut from the curriculum.
  
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Alabama teacher says:

August 17, 2013 at 4:39 pm

Common Core is simply not developmentally appropriate for the early childhood grades.

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Louisiana Purchase says:

August 17, 2013 at 8:40 pm

Yep! I’ve been saying for two years that the CC doesn’t have any social studies at all. All we merit is an appendix. The appendix is all reading and writing skills, not any kind of teaching about citizenship, voting, the Constitution, anything. I have been told that I should still teach my state core, as well as CC. The ignoring of social studies since NCLB is disgusting, because one of the main reasons for founding public education in the first place was to create knowledgeable, informed CITIZENS. The elimination of social studies as an important discipline (along with arts, music, physical education, etc.) is one of the worst things about all of this “reform.” I’m tired of reading and math and STEM to be the most important thing.

Get this: at a Cub Scout Pack Meeting I went to recently had its theme as “STEM!” The National Boy Scouts included it as a monthly topic for Cubs. These are 7-10 year olds. It’s disgusting.

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- Alabama teacher says:
  
  August 17, 2013 at 10:16 pm
  
  My Social Studies professor in my Social Studies Methods Class that I took while earning my Masters degree spoke at length about the importance of teaching social studies if Democracy is to survive. I sometimes wonder if Congress has the problems it does because its members were not exposed to enough social studies during their school years.
  
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  - babycatz says:
    
    August 18, 2013 at 3:29 am
    
    A little scary to think about, but one might ponder if that’s what “They”ultimately have in mind – that democracy not survive. Not teaching “real” SS and selectively teaching minimal sanitized re-writes (or omitting) allows the new order of reformers to relegate significant historical events and all our Founding Fathers established to the twilight zone. When no one remembers or understands democracy, the citizens become a malleable group of sheeple…..unaware they have lost all that really matters.
    
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- Middle school teacher says:
  
  August 17, 2013 at 10:36 pm
  
  Exactly right. Preparation for “college and career” is by far too narrow a goal. I don’t mean to get too crazy alliteration-wise, but we need at least three more “C” words: citizenship, community, and character.
  
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- Ellen T Klock says:
  
  August 18, 2013 at 9:03 am
  
  In Buffalo, the focus was on preparing for the ELA and Math tests. There was an uninterrupted hour and a half literacy block and an hour math block each day. With specials and lunch, there was a half hour left each day for science OR social studies. Since there was no testing on those subjects in the primary grades (except for the science test in fourth grade), these subjects were not considered important. NYS even dropped the fifth grade social studies assessment.
  
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Deb says:

August 19, 2013 at 6:23 pm

Oh. I know. I was the district representative (no one else was interested, not even in the high school, I taught 4th grade) to the training for the upcoming Soc Studies CC implementation. The presenter was telling it like it is. He was shaking his head. The state dept is underfunded with 2 people employed to create and manage all the Soc St objectives. Most of the info is online. Well, it MIGHT be online by now. Most of it didn’t work. Probably due to understaffing. After all in Ohio, one person should be able to do the work of 4 … and for reduced salaries … if they work in the public sector … out side of the legislative cronies in Columbus.

There were almost NO high school Soc St requirements. I believe it was 2 half credit subjects. I was appalled. I hope that they changed this since 2011-12.

Their attitude kind of defeats the thread of schools as a place to learn how to work together in a democratic republic. I don’t believe there was much economics, either. It is ridiculous, at least to me. But, I took my notes, turned them in, ran off the 4th grade materials from the online site (two 3-inch binders) and took off into the sunset. Also … shaking my head.

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- Harlan Underhill says:
  
  August 19, 2013 at 7:35 pm
  
  Schools are not democratic republics. They are dictatorships with the teachers as prison guards. Maybe some teachers teach their students ABOUT democratic republics, and about capitalist economics such as the USA is supposed to be, but I’ll bet even that is not done. You teach tyranny by example and expect the state of Ohio’s education management to even sniff at a whiff of democracy?
  
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  - Deb says:
    
    August 19, 2013 at 8:12 pm
    
    You, sir, are the captain of misinterpretation. Oh, well.
    
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