An Ohio teacher sent this YouTube video made by a student, John Prusak, who started an anti-Common Core club, with tee-shirts and this video. You will be amazed.
An Ohio teacher sent this YouTube video made by a student, John Prusak, who started an anti-Common Core club, with tee-shirts and this video. You will be amazed.

Fantastic video!
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Great video. Until more kids come aboard, it’s going to be a long haul for parents and teachers. Glad to see creativity and critical thinking hasn’t been snuffed out – YET!
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Reblogged this on David R. Taylor-Thoughts on Texas Education.
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Excellent = A+ Love seeing this – here’s a reminder of what technology SHOULD be used to do!
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WOW!
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Hopefully more kids will become aware and help to stop the madness. AND, the a-holes in control of forcing this down our throats will stop saying the kids are being fronted by the teachers and the unions and realize that they themselves know they are being played for ca$h.
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Officials in Ohio are not likely to be amused or moved, but I applaud everyone involved in creating this video.
State officials want to cut art, music, PE in elementary schools and, in K-12, those media specialists who contribute to this mischief, and school counselors and social workers.
In addition to narrowing the curriculum, state officials want to ignore the health general well-being of students. These essentials for education worthy of out students could be out the door by administrative fiat, a change of the “operating rules” for schools.
Our Republican Governor Kaisch appoints a majority of the State Board of Education. I imagine they are all keen on his “outcomes” focus. That means “job-ready” students for Ohio employers, or college-ready kids
It also means third graders who read to some sort of proficiency standards or else they are held behind. Of course those test results are not usually available in time for schools to tell the kids whether they will be moving along with other students into grade four or held back. The upshot is god-awful trauma caused by last minute pass-fail news and havoc with teacher assignments, class sizes, and budgets (reading intervention specialists, more tests).
Got this in an email yesterday. The date of the vote is really November 10.
On November 11, 2014, the Ohio State Board of Education will vote on changes to the Ohio Administrative Code: Standards for School Districts and Schools – K-12. • One of these changes, Ohio Administrative Code Chapter 3301-35-05-4: Faculty and Staff Focus has serious implications for the education of the whole child. • Ohio Administrative Code Chapter 3301-35-05-4: Faculty and Staff Focus that makes provisions for elementary art, music, physical education as well as school nurses, library media specialists, school counselors, school social workers in K-12 schools will be eliminated.
A short and excellent presentation on the issue is at
If you are in Ohio and want your voice heard, the link for action is part of the presentation.
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I really look forward to watching the video later. Here’s another view from America’s youth.
Saira Blair, 18, from West Virginia became the youngest elected state legislator in the country on Tuesday. Her father is a state senator. Here’s what she had to say about the Common Core on her campaign link:
“COMMON CORE IS BAD FOR WEST VIRGINIA STUDENTS
The Common Core State Standards (CCSS) aims to conform students to a uniform achievement goal. As someone who just recently came out of the public education system, I strongly oppose this legislation. It overreaches government’s authority and removes the ability for teachers to efficiently cultivate a classroom that encourages competitiveness and results. I HAVE WITNESSED FIRST HAND HOW CCSS WILL NEGATIVELY AFFECT THE QUALITY OF EDUCATION HERE IN WEST VIRGINIA.”
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Feel free to copy and paste into Twitter as a Tweet. If the video link isn’t there to copy because the video activated in this comment when I posted it, that okay. No big deal. Click over to YouTube and copy the original to paste into the Tweet. Then it’s on Twitter. :o)
Spread the Word. In the 2014 election we lost some battles, we won some. The war goes on.
In Ohio
Another Brick in the Common Core Wall
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In fact, you can visit my Twitter page and ReTweet the one I just put up. I’ll be Tweeting it again as the day grows. If it isn’t at the top when you visit, scroll down. It will eventually appear. You can’t miss that kid saying “I’m a Kid! Not a Test Score!”
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Lloyd, I need to ask you some questions. I don’t tweet, but should.
How do I do this. I need advice.
I need your email address. Can you go to my oped author’s page and message me with it?
http://www.opednews.com/author/author40790.html
Also, I have an idea that is tickling my brain, about my legacy. I have been thinking about this ever since I saw “The Judge,” and heard Robert Duval’s impassioned speech on his legacy.
It is particularly pertinent to the rejection by students of the common core crap, which replaced the legacy we classroom teachers offered America’s future citizens
You see, I am presently organizing a room filled with the materials I generated for my practice over 40 years –, the books that informed my practice and the student’s work which I gathered when I was the cohort for the standards. I will not discard it, and I am planning on filming this room’s contents. I just do not know what exactly I will do to bring the truth of WITTT (what it takes to teach… kids how to learn) to the public.
It is so easy to forget that we k to 12 teachers leave a huge legacy especially when tens of thousands of us veterans were thrown out as so much trash. It is easy to overlook the fact that we classroom teachers shape the minds of our future citizens, and ensure their success.
I frequently get emails from former students (who find me on Facebook or Linked in —I do not have a twitter presence… maybe you can help me to do this). They tell me how important my class was to them, as in this letter below. THIS is my legacy… I cannot relegate it to the trash, yet I am not sure how to proceed.
This letter from one of the thousand youngsters who passed through my classroom practice before they charged me with incompetence and almost made me forget my legacy.
Dear Mrs Schwartz,
” This is almost unreal! I am so glad that I have this opportunity to share with you what an inspiration you have been.
“We (Catherine C, Diana P, Leah B) speak so often and so highly of you since we graduated East Side Middle, we jumped out of our seats when Catherine told us she had been in touch with your son’s wife. We have stayed good friends (see pictures attached) and look back to the days in your class and know that you had such an enormous impact on or lives till this day. You encouraged us to be creative, patient and yet free, a most valuable lesson.
“We joke sometimes that your class was better than our sophomore year college literature class, but actually it’ not funny at all- its true. I still have the assignments you gave us and cherish them, and still remember the books you had us read. I remember feeling so confident in your class, a feeling no other teacher made me feel at that confusing time in a teenagers life. You combined a perfect balance of discipline and a genuine love of teaching young people, a quality which so many teachers lack in the public school systems and therefore deeply saddens me to hear that you are no longer teaching there.”
“Little Bio: With your encouragement I auditioned for the art program at LaGuardia high school and graduated from there in 2001. I then attended The School of Art and Design at SUNY Purchase and graduated with a BFA in 2006. Since then I worked….etc “There is so much more I would love to share but I must get back to work.” “I will be in touch soon!”
“All the best,
“Jackie L”
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This was the most popular video on YouTube for creating a Twitter account. There were others if this one isn’t enough.
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Here’s my suggestion for sharing your material.
First: Do you have a WordPress Blog? I only mention WordPress because that’s what I use and the platform Ravtich uses.
Oganize your material by subject and then break each one down into a short post of 500 words or less. Anything longer, should be a series: Part 1, Part 2, etc.
In addition, you might want to produce your own YouTube Videos that run, on average 2 to 3 minutes—videos designed to accompany the posts.
Lloyd
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Thank you for having this conversation with me, even as I create that site about ‘conversations with a teacher’ — ME! I already have an introductory post on the value of conversations and accountable talk with a teacher or mentor, but it has to wait until I create the introduction to the site… and I am busy with the holidays and family.
Lloyd, I have already created that site’ Speaking As A Teacher, but have not begun to post. I need it to be my voice, and to be (from the get-go) something special… a site where the classroom practitioner tells it as it is…or rather, how it once was, when teachers were running their practice and all learners were enabled by the expertise she brought– the talent and the insight as she applied what college had showed her about the human mind.
I have wonderful things to scan… it is going to be a unique place where I finally get to speak again, after they tried so hard to silence the authentic voice of the teacher… so Duncan could bamboozle everyone.
As you know. I cannot add a thing to my old Apple, ‘Speaking As A Teacher” site which I created on my first Macintosh, in a program called iweb,. Sigh! Apple (in its infinite wisdom) took me.com down
I have already begun to write a series of diary/journals also called “Speaking As A Teacher” at Oped, where I can reflect on what I actually say at WordPress. This is a great way to expand a 500 word post, so as to add my motives and insights. THAT diary tool is unique to Oped, and is different then all the other writing I do there — articles and commentary.
Publisher Rob Kall chides me that I have been promising this series “Speaking As A Teacher” for some time now, but ,ya know… he has NOT assisted my in any way to bring the readers THERE to education issues — so that they see education as the critical issue of the day that it is.!!!!
Rob is a fan of sexy stuff like the NSA and Snowden and Crimea and what he really believes will take down our democracy. And all the while, an ignorant public marches to folly and elects the very people who are destroying the road to opportunity. The bureaucracy that exists in the schools takes its clue from the culture at the top:
http://www.opednews.com/Quicklink/The-Secret-Service-and-the-in-Best_Web_OpEds-America_Class_Class-conflict_Congress-141008-981.html#comment515166
In fact, when I was bugging him about the lack of attention to what he sees as a ‘ a topic” called “schools — “I am not interested in that ‘topic,’ he actually wrote to me!!!
However, as I began to post more of Diane’s posts, he took and interest and puts her posts in the main page of the newsletter. I know he would love to interview her, but it is not MY place to tell her that this would be a good idea.
I am the only one there, covering the education debacle that is unfolding before the public’s cynical eyes.
That said, I have been telling my story in many places and to many legislators, journalists, editors, and bloggers for 16 years now, and what happened to me BUT the utterly lawless process that affected a hundred thousand veteran teachers is unknown! STILL!
THAT IS WHY THE CAN STILL DO IT… make up tales and slander the classroom practitioner. Tenure did not mean a job for ever, it just guaranteed a contract which INCLUDED DUE PROCESS!
Despite the fact that MY story is THE story that puts a lie to all the ‘we need to evaluate the teacher misdirection that is going on for too long. That Time piece could have been the cover a decade ago.
As a student of the media, and a teacher of their methodology I know what the media has looked away from… what is missing in the public eye, the story that puts the focus where it belongs on the problem.
http://www.speakingasateacher.com/SPEAKING_AS_A_TEACHER/No_Constitutional_Rights-_A_hidden_scandal_of_National_Proportion.html
Speaking As A Teacher,(MY wordpress blog site already, Lloyd) will let my story unfold in the larger context of WITT, my acronym for ‘what it (really) takes to teach” a roomful of emergent learners, but anyone who wants to know who Susan Lee Schwartz really is, should go to that site.
There I am, my beginners photos as I used the new digital technology to pursue a lifelong hobby now that my practice had been ended and my career stopped from my life.
There is it, in the essays and on that blog, my astonishment in the absence of rules and regulations…. hee, he.. this before the GOP began to flout laws and hoodwink the public into believing their lies.
http://www.speakingasateacher.com/SPEAKING_AS_A_TEACHER/No_Rules_or_Regulations.html
There it is, a decade ago, the very process that is still in play, for example in LAUSD, because the legal arm for a classroom teacher is the union rep, and mine were corrupt to the core, and I have all the evidence… which FYI, Randi herself knows has personally seen. She ‘rescued me’ into retirement.
But then, if you look at the photos on the About Me, page,
http://www.speakingasateacher.com/SPEAKING_AS_A_TEACHER/_ABOUT_ME__A_TEACHER_OF_LITERACY.html
you will see what I retired to, what saved my sanity, because at 60, finding my way back into a job — let alone back to a career that has been eradicated — was not an option. Those kids you see there –my grandkids– , reading the books that were the legacy from my primary school practice, are all adolescents now, but back then they replaced the children whom I had come to spend 10 months with each year… America’s children in NYC.
So, Until my WordPress blog is ready, and until my series at Oped is begun, I want to create those little videos to use, and begin to post my ed writing and other things at Twitter. Thanks for the tutorial video… I will watch it when I can… busy with hubby & family right now.
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I re-posted the actual Youtube,
http://www.opednews.com/Quicklink/A-Student-s-View-of-Common-in-Best_Web_OpEds-Common-Core_Nonsense_Testing_Video-141107-676.html#comment518880
with references/quotes in the comment I(and links within the comment) to posts at this site:
“A teacher involved in implementing Common Core in her classroom (in Conn.) writes at the Ravitch site:, “Common Core for the most part is teaching with a script, and scripts suck the oxygen out of a classroom.” We are hearing more and more from teachers involved in the teaching of Common Core State Standards (CCSS) that it is simply not working. In the State of Tennessee, which is one of the earliest states to hop on the Common Core bandwagon and one of Secretary of Education Arne Duncan’s favorite states because it quickly fell into line, a recent survey by Vanderbilt University conducted of teachers in Tennessee now show a majority of the teachers (56%) believe that the Common Core should be abandoned. Not fine-tune or refine it, mind you, but abandon it ! Another poll released by “Education Next”, a journal published by the conservative Hoover Institution, found that the term “Common Core” has become toxic.”
Ohio is a grand example of how public education is not only being subverted by the common core crap, but is being looted.
Read these:
“Ohio: Kasich Urged to Investigate Imagine Charter Schools’ Money Grab”
and this one:
“Toledo: Imagine Charter Rent Stirs Outrage
“Where have the state watchdogs been while Imagine Charters have profited handsomely with taxpayer dollars?”
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Susan. Here is another suggestion in addition to Lloyds–long term. The universities that you attended may accept and catalog the records you have, including photos, letters and the like. The librarian, an archivist, will post the inventory on line. This is not the only way to preserve the records of what you value and may wish to see another generation value, but this option that may have a longer life than the digital formats which are theoretically stable but depend on the stability of the on-line hosting services. Ideally you do both, but at some point you may want to bow out of the online fun.
Most university librarians are on top of changes media for “storing and retrieving information.
I think you are correct is wanting to get more of your wisdom and records of that into circulation.
The person with whom I did student teaching more than 50 years ago was eccentrically wonderful–brought live chickens to school for kids to draw, engaged the principal and parents in many activities that taught them to value the program, team taught with the music teacher even after retirement, had the whole school study the arts for a third of the year–classroom teachers on board to enhance learning in art with reading and writing, social studies, science and the rest –focussed on one or more of the arts–music, dance, theater, literature, visual, architecture– Two-day school-wide capstone with performances on the campus by professionals in the arts–whole symphony, modern dance group, singers from the opera, illustrators of children’s books, mimes, and so on. Records of these and other “instructional works of art” are now mine. She died several years ago. Our records will go the same destination–a university library. The materials are well organized. The archivist can offer guidance relevant to your collection.
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Laura, it is late at night, and I just read your post. I am a bit overwhelmed at this moment, at your interest and Lloyds in this idea which has become very real to me. All my life, especially in my classroom I have been alone, figuring things our for myself.
Then in 1995, our of the blue came Victoria Bill, from the University of Pittsburgh to study what it was I had done, and to match my best practice to the thesis for the research.
I did not know what I did, or how I did it, but they told me. It was not long after my first materials and the students work were mailed to the LRDC, that the head of that department, Stephanie McConaughey wanted to know who that “brilliant teacher” was, this in an email according to Vicki. Stephanie had replaced Lauren Resnick who went to Harvard with her thesis: “The Principled of Learning” which became the research project, when Pew funded it.
They studied my practice for 2 years, interviewed my students and copied their work and mine, videos were sent by me, and they sent a dil crew; they matched my practice to the standards (the principles of learning) and used my work, showcased it at their seminars and sent it around the nation. They paid me to useone unit, (Marjorie Rawling’s The Yearling).
But to this day, they never sent me a single page that explained what they did with all that data. NO information except a small entry which was supposedly described my curricula.
When I was selected as one of the six, out of thousands studied, to be represented hat the Danforth Seminars where, according to Vicki, visual displays of my practice and those of the other five were showcased for the superintendents and staff developers from over 50 districts, I asked for some slides, anything that show my work. I have an email somewhere from Vicki describing the reception my work received and the many questions it generated.
But, other than that I never received a page of information.
When the real National Standards research was suborned, disappearing as Bush and company re-wrote the national agenda for public schools, all traces of my incredible work, and the research disappeared.
I need to reach the LRDC…The Leaning and Research Development center at the University of Pittsburgh. I need to find Vicki Bill and Stephanie, or anyone.
I have a legacy, and I want to see it! I have a voice and I want to speak as a teacher again… and I have the credentials, although, thanks to the corruption at th eDOE in NYC, my employment folder contains not a shred of evidence that for several decades I was one of the most successful teachers of my generation… they erased me, but I AM BACK!
Now, I need help, because I do not know where to begin.
Thank you Laura, and Lloyd and all of you for recognizing that I have something to say,and something that deserves to be saved!
Thank you Diane for this teacher’s room!
Gotta go to sleep. Tomorrow is another day.
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“Now, I need help, because I do not know where to begin.”
I can only suggest that you write down your end goal on a piece of paper and then start writing one to five daily goals that will eventually lead to that end-goal.
To reach that end-goal is a journey of ten thousand steps—metaphorically because the journey could be longer or shorter—and every day offers you the time to take another step. That means, everyday, you set a reasonable, daily goal or goals that will lead to the end-goal and your responsibility is to finish that daily goal before you go to the next step—another daily goal.
If you were starting out on a journey by foot to trek around the world along the equator, what would be your first step?
Remember, that the equator runs about 24,901 miles but 78.7% of that distance is across water and 21.3% is over land. That leaves 5,304 miles you have to walk. You also have to plan how your are going to cross all that water.
You may never reach your end-goal but every step you take shrinks the distance left the walk. If you never start the journey, then you will never take a step.
This is how I’m living my life to the end. I set daily goals all leading to an end goal. Maybe by the time I’m gone, I will have covered only 80% of that distance to the end goal but 80% is much better than zero.
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Oh Lloyd. Such wonderful advice and such lyrical metaphors, snf all that wonderful information on the earth’s circumference.
Yes, it is my philosophy, to set goals. All successful people know this is the only way to get where you wish to end up.
I heard a poet use a different metaphor. He sees the distant objective as a lily pad, and although it is clear, the lily pads that lead to it are blurred; she he backtracks until he gets to step one and then 2…
I do this, too, and little by little I accomplish big tasks. I wrote a play, and it was read professionally by The Penguin Repertory here in Rockland NY.
I wrote curricula for an entire school, and put it into practice over 8 years until my school became the top magnet school in NYC, and Harvard came a knocking.
I raised 2 sons, and one is a cardiologist and the other the CEO of an internet security company (Gluu) but neither of them CALL ME often.
I am married 51 years to the same man, and THAT takes patience and foresight.
But that room, with a lifetime of materials, books, charts, visuals, student work seems beckons… it is my legacy and I have to organize and capture the essence of what I did. hen in my posts, translate it into WITTL… what it really took to teach kids to learn.
And, I do a little each day, even as I organize my other legacy, my photos,of which I have 100,000, including a thousand that have won competitions and are gorgeous.
I do not have a site where they can be seen, and send them to friends by email, until I put them up. (I had a photo site, but it went down when apple took down Me.com and I lost my bite, speaking as a teacher,.)
I feel so lucky to have you as a cyber-mentor.
Thanks for taking the time… it means a lot to this old lady.
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You are welcome but I’m also no spring chicken.
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Great video!
Especially the baby sitting at the computer asking if his testing time is up.
it can’t be a good sign when the very students you are claiming to teach “how to think critically” make it clear through creative mockery that they know how to do that much better than you do.
“The Concrete Core’
He took six hundred mill
And threw it in the drink
The Concrete Core of Bill
Has now begun to sink
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Like.
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I love it! I would say Ohio has some smart thinking kids to come up with this!
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Thought I’d share a petition from an Ohio student. Lots of smart kids in Ohio…(it is a response to the district converting to common core aligned CPM Math)
“Hello, my name is Kristin Kawecki and I am a junior at Olmsted Falls High School. I am currently enrolled in an Algebra II class and am extremely concerned by the new learning curriculum. Within this new program, the students have been split into “teams” of three or four people and are expected to learn the material through the textbook and their peers, referencing to their teacher only by last resort.
Throughout my entire math career, I have maintained a 96.3% average while also acquiring, “Geometry Student of the Year” in my sophomore class. So why, might you ask, am I struggling in this course? I would not say it is the material, considering my earlier successes in the algebraic field but in fact, is the lack of teacher leadership. So far this school year, I have been assigned forty homework problems; all of which have yet to be taught to me by my teacher. In previous years, students were required to take notes, complete the homework, and then ask questions the next day. What established a teacher as “good” was whether he or she could bring the class to a level of understanding. This has yet to happen. In fact, I was told on the very first day that I am required to teach those around me. If this is true then where is my paycheck? I do not have a degree in mathematics and within my independent studies, my only obligation as a student is to prepare myself in the best way possible, not those around me. I’m not opposed to helping others, but I can’t tutor someone else before being taught.
Another major concern I have within this new learning environment is the lack of accountability. It is very easy to hide amongst a group and in previous math classes the laziness of my peers affected their grades, not my own. Now, as a team member, my grade is determined by the work habits of everyone, not just myself. Of course, this is great news for the less than average student expecting to “skate by”, however, for the students who pride themselves in their work and come to class to learn, it only makes it that much more of burden. My grade should be a personal reflection of my work ethic and the time that I have dedicated to my studies. And if that means that the student that isn’t working, and isn’t making their schoolwork a priority doesn’t receive a good grade, then that is their responsibility, not my own.
Lastly, this new course is extremely degrading to high school students. Paging through my textbook on the first day of school, I was appalled at the condescending lesson plans and basic wording. The entire first chapter explained to its audience, raging from 15 to 17 years of age, how to communicate to their neighbor. We spent our first week of class, making shapes out of yarn. I have learned more about how to be a “team member” than how to find the value of x. An important lesson, I admit, but hardly a mathematical skill. How can you expect us to conduct ourselves as adults if we are being taught like elementary school children? If a student is unable to learn in a lecture type environment, that student should be addressed personally. It is very unfortunate that our “School of Academic Excellence” seeks to hold back the academically advanced in order to raise the test scores of a small group of students. A student will only be as responsible as an authority figure will allow them and I hope for the sake of your students, you begin to treat us like the adults we are about to become.
Sincerely,
Kristin Kawecki”
https://www.change.org/p/the-olmsted-falls-school-board-disband-the-core-connections-and-return-to-the-old-math-curriculum
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The t-shirt campaign is reopened for a few days! Check it out! http://teespring.com/anti-common-core-club
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from Myanmar to Cuba to Iran and elsewhere, these sanctions have produced few results and could not achieve the goals hoped
for by the US. Finding the Yellow Brick Road to Data Governance
in a Federated Higher Education System. An onboard restaurant manager is needed to keep a check on whether the menu card includes top
dishes and customers appreciate the selections.
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