I don't know about you, but lately I've been feeling like I've been getting a mixed message when it comes to the Common Core State Standards. On the one hand, there are instructors from both the English and Education departments warning us about the seriousness and difficulty of the widening implementation of CCSS. The standards are marked as something we will need to know inside-out and be able to explicate at a moment's notice if a principal decides to walk in on one of our lessons as teachers and ask how our instruction is following them. In other words, our mastery of CCSS and its incorporation into our daily planning is, at times, the key to our success in both getting a job and keeping it.
On the other hand, some instructors do not pay as much heed to CCSS. For them, these standards are something that we can easily just add on to a lesson afterward, and, because of their vagueness, do not require us to study them deeply. What is more important, they proclaim, is that we know how to do all of the other things associated with teaching well: creating a community of learners, engaging students with relevant and authentic tasks, holding high expectations for all, etc.
Neither of these approaches are necessarily misguided, and frankly, if either of them are, none of us would know because we've never been on the job. But what I find surprising is that, within both viewpoints, very little actual study of the specifics of CCSS has been required thus far, at least in the classes I've taken. Sure, our lesson plans have to include them, but we have never once been assigned the task of reading through the standards, discussing what they mean, or debating their merits/inefficiencies specifically.
To be clear, I am not referring to ENG 481 since we have just started. I do not know where we will be headed in terms of CCSS, but based on the inclusion of Richard Beach's et al. Teaching to Exceed the English Language Arts Common Core State Standards, I would guess that our study of CCSS will quickly become more focused. I suppose that this class, the one before student teaching, is the time to fully integrate the standards into our training, but, at the same time, I feel like it would have been better knowing more at this moment as well. Again, I don't know whether or not an in-depth study of CCSS is required for us to be successful teachers; that is for the program directors to figure out. However, while this class has a text devoted solely to CCSS, our ED 330/432 instructor just reassured us last week with something to the effect of, "don't worry, we won't spend too much time discussing CCSS."
Both of these classes are the ones designed to most directly prepare us for student teaching and in terms of this topical issue, I feel like there is not much of a consensus. Yet as I finish this post, I've been thinking to myself, "Why not just read them yourself?"
Cheers
On the other hand, some instructors do not pay as much heed to CCSS. For them, these standards are something that we can easily just add on to a lesson afterward, and, because of their vagueness, do not require us to study them deeply. What is more important, they proclaim, is that we know how to do all of the other things associated with teaching well: creating a community of learners, engaging students with relevant and authentic tasks, holding high expectations for all, etc.
Neither of these approaches are necessarily misguided, and frankly, if either of them are, none of us would know because we've never been on the job. But what I find surprising is that, within both viewpoints, very little actual study of the specifics of CCSS has been required thus far, at least in the classes I've taken. Sure, our lesson plans have to include them, but we have never once been assigned the task of reading through the standards, discussing what they mean, or debating their merits/inefficiencies specifically.
To be clear, I am not referring to ENG 481 since we have just started. I do not know where we will be headed in terms of CCSS, but based on the inclusion of Richard Beach's et al. Teaching to Exceed the English Language Arts Common Core State Standards, I would guess that our study of CCSS will quickly become more focused. I suppose that this class, the one before student teaching, is the time to fully integrate the standards into our training, but, at the same time, I feel like it would have been better knowing more at this moment as well. Again, I don't know whether or not an in-depth study of CCSS is required for us to be successful teachers; that is for the program directors to figure out. However, while this class has a text devoted solely to CCSS, our ED 330/432 instructor just reassured us last week with something to the effect of, "don't worry, we won't spend too much time discussing CCSS."
Both of these classes are the ones designed to most directly prepare us for student teaching and in terms of this topical issue, I feel like there is not much of a consensus. Yet as I finish this post, I've been thinking to myself, "Why not just read them yourself?"
Cheers
Michael--
ReplyDeleteI can't help but call attention to the ever-and-oft changing factors that influence whatever the current political moment education is in, and the need for teachers to be resourceful. I was hoping that many of you had already read the standards, or, if you haven't, go ahead and read them so as to make sense of Beach et al conceptions for implementation!