This post is a description of EngageNY, the scripted curriculum written for use in New York state and now migrating to other states. Ken Wagner, former deputy commissioner of the New York State Education Department, now Rhode Island state superintendent, promises to import them to Rhode Island. New York’s new state commissioner says she used the New York curriculum with great success in Florida. Read this post and decide for yourself. Be sure to read the comments.
Here is a sample:
The same people who gave us standardized testing have now given us standardized teaching, which goes directly to the information a student can get, how the student gets it, and what the student is supposed to get out of each and every class minute. It is 19th-century educational lockstep, pushed by the White House and institutionalized by the New York governor’s office.
If standardized testing dumbed down school and teacher evaluation, standardized teaching takes it a step further: It dumbs down the kids.
The project is called “Engage New York.” It does anything but.
If, say, you are a teacher of 11th-grade English in Buffalo, you get, every 10 weeks, a thick three-ring binder with instructions on what you are to do in every class. The copy I have of one of these runs 587 pages. The volume is excruciatingly boring to read. (I cheated: I skimmed most of the pages.) I cannot imagine what it is like to be a creative and imaginative teacher hamstrung by it. Worse: I cannot imagine what it must be like to be a student in classes that now have to be taught by teachers forced to deliver this drivel or be fired.
The book is divided into teaching “modules,” which list what questions the teachers should ask, what answers they should get, and how they should respond to them. They list what words students should learn each day.
There are regular pages headed “Unit-at-a-Glance Calendar,” telling the teacher the specific lines and paragraphs to be covered in each class. There are pages listing “Activity” items for each class; each named activity includes the percentage of class time to be devoted to it. One, for example has “Activity 1: Introduction of Lesson Agenda. 5%”; Activity 2: Homework Accountability. 10%”; “Activity 3: Masterful Reading. 5%”; “Activity 4: Hamlet Act 1.2, Lines 900-110 Reading and Discussion, 60%.”
Day after day of this, class after class, minute by minute.
The questions the teachers are ordered to ask are often so banal they read like a Monty Python parody. Here is an example. The teacher is told to ask the question, “What information do you gather from the full title of the play: The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark?” (All teacher questions are in bold type.)
Permissible student answers are:
—The play is about a person named Hamlet.
—This is a tragic or sad play.
—Hamlet is a prince.
—This play likely takes place in Denmark.
This is drivel. The book is full of things like that. It is also full of misinformation.
They will create a teacher shortage (which is by design) and bring in drones from TFA and other organizations that will be nothing more than facilitators. As long as they can read they can become a classroom facilitator. This is why I tell teachers at every chance I can that THEY are out to destroy the traditional teacher and replace them with obedient room monitors and by them remaining silent now in order to protect a short term job they will in the long term end up unemployed. If enough teachers in EVERY school banned together and got parents to join them we could shut this down. Heck if parents would just take their kids out of school for 1 year (let them sit on the sofa reading good books and doing good math) the kids would learn more and we could implode the system. Instead of us on our knees to them it will be them on their knees to us. It is up to the parents now. Either you STARVE THE BEAST or the beast will destroy our future and our children.
Exactly. This is about the deprofessionalizing of teaching. Proving, what many already believe, anyone can teach.
It’s all very clear to me. Education is a $600 billion dollar industry. Greedy, ignorant, selfish people want that money for themselves. Identify the highest poverty stricken schools ( you can substitute ‘black’ here) then label them failing and introduce privatization. This allows the siphoning off of funding into the pockets of the overpaid owners/administrators. Their rationale …why waste money on our future crop of Walmart employees and jail fodder. It’s institutionalized segregation at its worst. Enter big business with big contracts for big money to sell any old crap “educational materials, testing, curriculum”
Hence – deemed EnrageNY by professional educators.
Love the carousel of nincompoops (sp?) that is in place now for education posts. These deformers hop on and off in different states spreading their damaging ideas. We dump one on Rhode Island, Florida dumps one on NY. Some weird version of the Peter Principle.
The discussion on the link says that this product is from Pearson and that the pacing guide is set up to be used with FIDELITY. This means all teachers on the same page at the same time when a supervisor comes to observe and rate your performance. The concept of a module with built in assessment and pacing is no different from vintage programmed instruction with the addition of tools for teacher survelliance, likely in the form of some data dashboard for supervisors who, according to one teacher are insisting that this product be used. To stop this idiocy, the state department contracting process needs to be investigated. Who is making these decisions and with what perks of throwing Pearson business that looks like a total monopoly, no alternatives for teachers. .
This reminds me of my first teaching job as a junior high French teacher. I used an audio-visual approach, and I can still recite the rigid procedure that was required at each phase of the lessons. It was so boring I thought my brain would shrivel and die. I think it propelled me into the new, unproven field known as ESL. I got my master’s, my autonomy, and I never looked back. Then, I discovered what it was to be a teacher.
“Hence – deemed EnrageNY by professional educators.”
TAGO!
Whatever the particular toxic eduproduct they are peddling, the rheephormistas know that they are dumbing down the teaching and education in public schools when it involves OTHER PEOPLE’S CHILDREN.
When it comes to them and the crowd they run with—THEIR OWN CHILDREN— it’s a, er, horse of a different color.
This blog, 3-23-2014, “Common Core for Commoners, Not My School!”—
[start entire posting]
This is an unintentionally hilarious story about CommonCore in Tennessee. Dr. Candace McQueen has been dean of Lipscomb College’s school of education and also the state’s’s chief cheerleader for Common Core. However, she was named headmistress of private Lipscomb Academy, and guess what? She will not have the school adopt the Common Core! Go figure.
[end entire posting]
Link: https://dianeravitch.net/2014/03/23/common-core-for-commoners-not-my-school/
Thank you for your comments.
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Sadly, this is why I chose to retire. I could not teach with a script followed by testing the children with a poorly designed, invalid tests.
with poorly designed, invalid tests.
Watching the implementation of ed reform is like watching a Simpsons episode. Instead of Mr Burns and Smithers, we have Bill Gates and David Coleman.
We implemented elementary ENY math last year in our district in Oregon. It was a disaster! Whenever teachers dared to deviate from the script, they risked being subjected to a surprise observation by an administrator wielding a laptop and a Danielson Framework. We heard the word FIDELITY over and over.
I can predict what our administrators will be saying next year based on what the Gates Foundation is saying this year. I never cease to be stunned at how these people will sacrifice independent judgement and even self respect in an attempt to move up the administrative food chain and above all else, avoid being sent back to the classroom in a teaching role….a fate worse than death!
Fear pervades everything in our district. Those with the courage to speak up are treated like the skunk at the picnic and immediately find a target painted on their backs.
Maybe someone will recognize the math program that I am describing. As a sub in a special ed room, I was asked to handle a small group for math instruction. I was handed a teacher’s manual and the student workbooks. My task was to read the commentary that went with the pages that the students needed to complete. My teacher’s manual had no visuals of the workbook. I had no idea what the students were actually being asked to do since I could not see their workbooks. My job was to read… period. The program took any chance of differentiation right out of the mix. Since the teacher was there, I delivered that damned lesson “with fidelity.”
Since my subject, Social Studies, is increasingly short changed since it is not tested, I assume that permissible 11th grade student questions, before the required question is answered, would include what is Denmark and what is a prince. Since arts programs and field trips are things of the past, I assume another permissible 11th grade student question would be what is a play.
So very sad
The wherewithal exists to stop the madness. It’s called the NEA, AFT/UFT etc. The evidence is out there that these reforms failed as pointed out by this blog. Perhaps this blog along with the Badass Teachers group and others such as Leonie Haimson’s group should combine forces and encourage massive strikes. That would get the publics attention on how destructive the Obama educational policies have been. Let’s be clear at least as it appears to myself. It is the Obama administration’s educational policies that have enabled, even encouraged, the destruction of public education.
Check this out:
Tee hee hee…. Perhaps teachers can videotape themselves doing a module then all following years they can just pop in the tape, sit at their desks and read a book. How’s that for using technology? Districts have been using these modules in so many different ways. Some teachers are told to stick to the module, some have more free reign. My husband is an English teacher and he always complains about the ridiculous errors, narrowing of themes, and the fact that his own unit lessons are so much broader and well-constructed. I wonder what will happen when college professors are told to read from a script. Will they do it????
DENVER PUBLIC SCHOOLS just contracted with EngageNY. How fitting!
As a parent, I have come to know EngageNY from the ridiculous math homework. If the reading comprehension is way above grade level, and the math has no link to common sense, it’s an EngageNY math sheet.
In the 1960s this was known as creating a “teacher-proof curriculum.” And lots of education “innovators” pursued that goal.
And it was as worthless then as it is now.
I decided to take on one of the modules for my APPR project. I have been a vocal critic of the modules, but lacked any experience actually working with them. I’ve attached the write-up of my experience. Feel free to share with anyone who thinks EngageNY is a good idea.
i actually use this curriculum, both ELA & math, in my Boston Public School third grade class. I can only speak for my school and grade level, but I was told to not use it as scripted as it is a “thinking teacher’s curriculum “. Third graders read powerful books such as Nasreen’s Secret School, Rain School, and The Librarian of Basra which opens them up to diverse cultures and educational norms. The projects kids are required to engage in are equally immersive. For example, in another unit third graders are asked to complete a PSA on the importance of water conservation.
While the math curriculum is more scripted than is ELA, a “thinking teacher” can quite easily amend/adapt/edit as needed.
I helped to start Less Testing, More Learning in BPS and MA, so am hyper aware of standardizing our kids’ education. Engage NY though gives me access to culturally appropriate and diverse books and materials that better reflect my extremely diverse students’ experiences.
Who paid you? The ELA modules suck. I have been teaching for 22 years, and I know what good teaching is. The ELA modules are definitely not. You can kiss up, but in your heart, YOU know what is best for your students, not some people writing a script.
ENY is nothing but drivel, even when teachers use the instructional protocols set for each unit. I couldn’t believe the lack of instructional know how within the staff when this crap was brought to us. It was eye-opening!!! I, too, left the profession this year because of this scripted mess.
The EngageNY Modules came to the state quickly and cheaply when CCLS were adopted. Ostensibly the need for these modules was that “core aligned” curriculum was unavailable. Some publishers had rushed to label their materials as aligned, but it wasn’t so. Even though the advice was for districts to work to develop their own core-aligned curriculum, the reality in many poorer schools in NY was that the funds were not available to pay teachers to do the work up front-and the modules were a readily available for downloading and batch-printing by your ever-helpful regional entity.
Modeled, I believe (possibly the first round was actually created by…) Expeditionary Schools (a charter operation that had received some recognition), the modules are cumbersome instructionally and academically-especially if approached as a script. A well known representative of this charter organization presented to a group of educators from my region, and when she said “The modules were never meant to be a script-no one would ever present a master teacher with a script…” The bewilderment was audible.
The language being used in the area schools was that these modules were being adopted, and that they were to be taught as presented. When the people actually responsible for the work involved brought concerns to administrators over time constraints on lesson time, content, the continually changing and mistake-ridden resources available for free after operational control in NY switched to engageny…the response was often a “You do what you need to to make it work in your room…You’re the professional…” and so on. It wasn’t just the rigor and bulk of the material involved-there were many flaws/mistakes/typos in the presentation of materials that required ongoing quick-fixes by the teachers and by parents at home (if a student is fortunate enough to have parents who find/understand these flaws).
Is anyone surprised that NY would save some money, maybe even collect some diverted RTTT dollars by pumping out some cheaply thrown together gruel? I’m not sure how this works exactly so this could be my cynical conspiracy theorist coming out. But from the time the Obama administration decided it was worthy of reforming public education, politicians, non-profit political action/lobbyist groups, spokespeople accustomed to revolving in and out of political appointments to private industry, “education leaders” who spent little or no time educating…basically folks unfamiliar with the arena and the people actually doing battle within it-all have gotten involved in the attack teachers and manufacyture snake oil business instead of collaborating with the professionals.
No wonder that these modules continue to be refined and modified, or that teachers were asked to help modify those modules.
http://perdidostreetschool.blogspot.com/2014/04/is-nysed-admitting-engageny-modules-are.html
As a 2nd grade teacher with nearly 20 years teaching experience, I cannot express how disturbing it is to be forced to use the EngageNY materials every day. It goes against everything we know works effectively to engage and educate our students. As professionals originally hired for our creativity, enthusiasm, and dedication – these materials do everything possible to kill those qualities in each of us.
We were told from day one that we were to use the program “with fidelity.” It was obvious that no one had actually reviewed the materials (probably due to the fact that many of the modules hadn’t even been completed yet when districts adopted them) or had asked teachers to take a look at what we were being given ahead of time. We also were not given any training – the boxes were just delivered just a few days before the school year began. As the year progressed and it became increasingly evident that there were multiple errors and/or no way to implement all of the many components scheduled in a day with the time allotted, we were then told to “use common sense.” We were not exactly sure what that meant as we were still expected to follow the program and would be evaluated on our use of it as well.
Last year we entered our second year with EngageNY. Having been through it once, we are still identifying more and more errors and, most importantly, developmentally inappropriate material that we are expected to present to our students. Mid-year we were told that we would finally have a day to meet with a representative to do some training. All we had ever requested was that someone come in to our school and demonstrate exactly HOW all of the materials were to be used in a given lesson. Please just SHOW US! – we asked over and over. That would never happen. However, during our “training” (which was essentially just a sales presentation showing us each component), again we asked how it would be possible to fit all of these things that were dictated in a lesson into our limited time each day. The representative did finally admit that there really couldn’t be any at to fit 2 1/2 hours worth of lessons in an hour or 1 1/2 hour period.
We, teachers and students, are being set up to fail. It is so sad to think that I hear teachers talk about “the good old days” when we used to be able to create fun and engaging activities that students enjoyed and we loved teaching! I am sorry that this has been a bit long-winded (and I could go on and on with more about this), but I haven’t had an opportunity to share this with any teachers outside of my own district. It is both comforting (and discouraging) to know that there are others experiencing the same things around the country. I hope that we can come together and fight for what we know is right for our students!
11th grade students are no longer reading/enjoying full books or plays in public/common core driven schools…it’s all about excerpts and non-fiction articles now.
Here was my comment to the post that Diane referenced. I am going to make it my mission to inform Rhode Islanders about the total disdain that Ken Wagner has for authentic teaching and learning. According to the RI Dept of Ed and Gov. Raimondo, he “developed” EngageNY. By his own admission he is opposed to Opt Out and for data collection. These are the trifecta of evil in my book: Common Core/Pear$on testing/data mining.
I find this so profoundly disturbing that I can hardly see straight to type this comment. I live in RI. As you may know, our Governor, Gina Raimondo, recently nominated NY State Deputy Commissioner of Ed Dr. Ken Wagner to be our new Commissioner of Education (replacing Broad-trained Deborah Gist). This past Monday night the RI Board of Education and Council on Elementary and Secondary Education met to decide whether or not to confirm Dr. Wagner. I was the only one to speak against his confirmation. Dr. Wagner was credited with developing EngageNY, and seemed to be delighted that it has been downloaded for free 20 million times. He also declared that the Common Core does not script lessons, but actually frees up teachers to teach creatively. Another egregious comment of his was that we don’t have to be concerned with Piaget’s developmental stages–that theory is passé. Now we know that children can do so much more than we had expected of them before. Yes, every first grader is delighted to learn about the Code of Hammurabi. Here is my post in RIFuture.org, published before the meeting. http://www.rifuture.org/will-ken-wagners-past-in-new-york-shape-his-future-in-rhode-island.html
I think Wagner was the NYSED official who traveled during the damage-control phase of the common core/state testing/RTTT assault and let parents at that time know that there was no choice for them-personal data about their child, them, their family would be collected/stored and shared. I am paraphrasing-but that was the “gist” (sorry for using module-speak for any 3rd grade teachers out there).
Denver Public Schools is adopting the EngageNY curriculum. Many of our innovation and charter schools have also started to follow the Uncommon Schools and Success Academy models.
I’ve never once had a conversation where any administrator at the school or district level knew anything more about either than the PR. When confronted with the terrible rates of success after HS graduation that these models produce, they just shrug. When asked why wealthy districts and ‘successful’ schools aren’t clamoring to adopt these models and curriculum, I often hear that the ‘research shows that these are the most successful models for at-risk children.’
Substitute black or brown for at-risk and you probably can’t get away with that statement. Usually, when they realize that not only do I teach for the district, and that even though I’m white, my non-white children are stuck in a prison-model public school, they realize that they made the statement to the wrong audience.
Anyone want to make a guess at the percentage of adults who push this actually put their own children through it?
Succinct, powerful, moving.
“Truth is powerful and it prevails.” [Sojourner Truth]
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The 6th grade module has a unit titled “The Hero’s Journey.” As a working associate for the Joseph Campbell Foundation I was quite curious and dug into that module. Nowhere is Joseph Campbell’s name mentioned. (The HJ is a schema in literature discovered by his scholarship.) The source of the information used for the unit is some guy with a myth oriented website. It’s not a bad website and HE sites Campbell as his source.
We expect better from our own students. I have little doubt that one can find questionable pedagogy in the rest of what was essentially a rush job.
I was also given a scripted curriculum that I was told to teach “word for word.” Each lesson’s description was something like 20-30 pages long and then the teacher had to design her own activities or worksheets or assessments to go with each lesson. Then, the lessons were at least 2 years advanced for my students.
The lesson would begin by saying, “Your students already know how to…so we are going to build on that knowledge to do …”
Well, sorry, but my students DIDN’T already know how to…so I had to teach a few lessons on the thing they were supposed to already know BEFORE presenting the lesson. I lasted until Christmas break, when I almost had a nervous breakdown! I have over 20 years of teaching experience…and I know how to teach!! I had NEVER struggled like that to try to incorporate a curriculum before in my life!
Over Christmas break, it dawned on me that all the school REALLY wanted was high standardized test scores. They wanted me to teach the curriculum, but not as much as the test scores, and I knew how to get high standardized test scores.
So, I spent hours copying the scripted curriculum into the lesson plan software that we are required to use. (Yes, not only are we handed volumes of scripted lessons, we also need to TYPE them into a lesson plan software!! Talk about busy work!) I filled up the entire spring semester’s worth of lesson plans in this way.
And then I closed my classroom door and taught my way for the rest of the year.
My students had the highest standardized test scores in the entire school. And we had a great spring.
But, I didn’t return the next year. I took a different position so I’d never have to do that again. Now I’m working on a master’s degree in another area so I can leave teaching altogether.
I’ve come to believe that yes, the deformers are trying to deprofessionalize teaching and make it something that can be delivered remotely by either a video-taped teacher or a voiced-over lesson. Cyber-Schools, Learn zillion, Khan Academy, flipped classrooms. The idea is that there will only be a need for a FEW really brilliant teachers to deliver the content and the students only need classroom monitors and facilitators. Classroom monitors and facilitators can do the job for much less money than highly qualified teachers with Master’s degrees! And those FEW teachers can be paid well as well as strictly controlled. What a boon for software and hardware developers!! No wonder Bill Gates and others are backing this so robustly!
The sample is not outrageous, since the question is valid, what a teacher might do to introduce a subject. The problem is that they need modules since teachers will not be around long enough to use these techniques on their own. They cut off all options for teachers to do different things that may be more challenging and rewarding..Also, there is no place for creative writing or speaking. Puppet shows can be fun too.
My CA district adopted EngageNY last year. When in a district-wide meeting with other 8th ELA teachers, a teacher made mention of successfully using other materials to teach To Kill a Mockingbird (to our far below grade level readers). We were informed that the district had not adopted the novel but the curriculum and expected us to teach TKAM using the EngageNY lessons. When we asked if we could teach the Frederick Douglas unit since it aligned with the Social Studies curriculum, we were told no because it is not an “8th grade” unit.
My district in upstate NY is using these modules, but the Board never adopted them. Can someone familiar with NYS education laws help me out here: isn’t one of the BOE requirements in NYS to officially adopt (vote) on what curriculum a district uses?
All this is pure BULLS..T. ! ! ! Another example of the Bush/Obama “Every Child Left Behind” with this sort of lock-step teaching. Where is the creativity and indeed genius that many thousands of teachers in the US generate every day in their classrooms? All of this is nothing more than so egotistical POLITICIANS can justify their existence and justify it to their constituents that they are doing something about education. . . when indeed they are destroying it. At the same time ostensibly “progressive” Democratic Governors (ie. Malloy in Connecticut and Cuomo in New York)have been slashing social welfare and psychiatric services which COULD enable children, and more importantly families, to prepare their children for school earlier so that professional educators can do exactly that, and not have to excessively deal with emotional and social problems which take up an inordinate amount of valuable “learning” time in most schools today, especially in most low-income and economically depressed cities and rural areas of this nation. I taught secondary Social Studies for 37 years and LOVED my career from the first day to the very last day before I retired. I have also served for eight years on the Board of Education in my hometown and am currently completing 16 years on the regional Board of Education which serves three towns surrounding the University of Connecticut. And YES, I am re-upping for another four year term ! What I have seen in my ten years of retirement is Superintendents of Schools who are businessmen and have had NO training as teachers and sometimes not even as administrators “srunning the show”. Our own now gone Commissioner of Education in CT is an example of one of these. Where is the LOGIC, indeed the SANITY, in situations like this ? ? ? It is the DUTY of government to provide services to struggling parents who are BOTH working often two jobs and thus not having enough time or energy to properly instruct their children in the intellectual, emotional, psychological, and social mores of our society before and when they enter public schools across this nation. Politicians have failed MISERABLY at this, and instead blame the teachers. This is a phenomonen which will in the long run lead to distastrous consequences for our nation. Its repurcussions are already being felt ! It appears that politicians, once again, are taking the “easy way out”. In conclusion, I offer to politicians the following: A POX ON ALL YOUR HOUSES.
Bob, that last line says it all. Thanks for trying to fight the good fight for those of us still “in the trenches.”