Tuesday, January 15, 2013

Common core

On another post Anonymous included a link to a PG article from last October and wrote:

NEW POST:
http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/news/education/city-schools-phase-in-new-standards-including-tougher-math-for-5th-grade-657630/

Finally PPS is addressing the Common Core State Standard which are NOT NEW!

As has been cited on this blog before, 87% if what are being referred to as "old standards" by PPS Chief Academic Officer, ARE the "new" Common Core State Standards.

If Pittsburgh Schools (other than CAPA) had been following the PA State Standards (the so-called "old standards") all of PPS students would not have a problem "ratcheting up" to CCSS. Instead, all Pittsburgh Schools that did not reach the State 2012 goals of Reading at 81% and Math 73% (after 10 years if trying) will have difficulty with CCSS. Those few, very few, schools in PPS who met the previous goals will sail easily into the upper levels of Common Core State Standards. However, it will be a sad struggle for the majority of PPS who have not met the PA Standards for the past 10 to 15 years of inadequate curricula and instruction.
as adults in the world at large.

4 comments:

Questioner said...

Anonymous also wrote:

For the PG "comments" blog on Common Core State Standards:

P.S. It is not about "teaching to the test" it is about the need to test what is being taught since the basic skills that we send children to school to learn have not been learned. So, it has become necessary to hold schools accountable for preparing children to THINK sufficiently to be successful after 12th grade. So, it is not okay to graduate students who cannot read, write or do math

Questioner said...

From the bottom of the article noted above:

First Published October 15, 2012 12:00 am

Many of us will remember reading about Kassidy and her sister some months ago.

Anonymous said...

This article is just a written smush of podge for what reason?

The fifth grade teacher Nina D need a pat on the back for writing curriculum that is disjunctive?

It is a sad case of wasted space-not for the srudent highlighted in the article.

They should hqave went to this teacher's classrook and done a series of indept articles and have a 5-6 series inputs before the test and see how her teaching really worked with overall test results!!!!!?

Anonymous said...

How could PPS not expect to have a problem with student achievement since for the past four years the school district failed to make the curriculum a focus of in need of attention? Bloggers here have repeatedly called out their concerns over a curriculum that is repetitive, boring and fails to address the skills and concepts needed to be targeted for students to demonstrate achievement on the PSSA's.

Instead, the failed CO leaders placed all of their eggs in one basket, teacher evaluation! We see the effects of this at the school level expose itself in the inability of PELA principals to have a working knowledge in understanding the various content areas. Their year of training focused on logging evidence of teacher behaviors and fidelity to a curriculum that has short changed our students.

Want to increase student achievement? Focus professional development on the Common Core State Standards. A multipronged fork in the road lies in front of us. When we concentrate or isolate teaching and learning to one entity, failure will abound. It's time to broaden the view for success realizing that many components working together will improve results. Content, interpreting data, prescriptive lessons, pedagogy, best practices, relationship building with staff/students/parents/community, school environment/discipline, and yes, teacher evaluation must all be a matter of attention in unison. Nothing in this world operates successfully in a vacuum. If you want a car to operate at its potential, then you need adequate levels of gas, oil and water. All three impacts the car in three very different ways but you'll never get the car to move forward with any level of success if you fail to maintain all of the required fluids.