Public Gets Glimpse of Science Standards

An ambitious effort to refocus K-12 science education across the nation entered a new phase last week with the release of the first public draft of voluntary, “next generation” science standards.

Organizers say the standards aim not simply to provide a foundation of essential knowledge, but also to ensure that students apply that learning through scientific inquiry and the engineering-design process to deepen their understanding.

Twenty-six states, from California to Maine and from South Dakota to Georgia, are “lead state partners” in the effort and have worked on the draft in collaboration with a range of educators and experts.

To read full article visit: EdWeek

To view draft of Science Standards, click here.

Source: By Erik W. Robelen, EdWeek

Published Online: May 11, 2012

Posted on 16 May 2012

Common Core setting a new education standard for Ohio

Place three rectangles of varying shapes and sizes in front of a group of third-graders.

In today’s classes, a teacher might ask what the length of one side is, or what the area is. In a year or two, however, the broader question might just be: “What size are these?”

Educators are being asked to teach differently, thanks to the new Common Core State Standards. This means the classroomcould operate much differently come 2014 — although some districts are implementing them sooner.

The Common Core will replace Ohio’s state standards adopted in 2002. Prior to then, local districts developed their own curriculum standards.

The rectangle question represents the difference between new and old, said Terri Bucci, who specializes in mathematicseducation at The Ohio State University’s Mansfield campus.

Current questions of students might be closed-ended, written for a specific response. A question asked under the Common Core standards, however, will be open-ended and require students to think critically.

It allows “a deeper understanding of ideas, being able to meet each child where they are,” Bucci said.

The Common Core

Many education reforms come from the political process, but the Common Core didn’t go anywhere near Congress or the Ohio Legislature.

It was developed by the Council of Chief State School Officers and the National Governors Association Center for Best Practices, organizations that include Ohio Department of Education Superintendent Stan Heffner and Gov. John Kasich among their bipartisan members. The Ohio Board of Education then voluntarily adopted the plan.

“This process let all perspectives have a voice and also relied heavily on evidence of what works,” said Michael Cohen, president of Achieve, a national education policy group that helped develop the standards.

Forty-four other states have adopted the standards as well. Education experts say this means education will be mostly the same across Ohio and the U.S.

“In this day and age, when there is some need for society to have some measure of student progress, there should be more commonality in the objectives to which students are learning,” said Randy Flora, director of education policy and coalition relations for the Ohio Education Association.

Developing new tests

A separate effort is under way to develop new tests that follow the Common Core, led by the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers, a consortium of state education officials.

PARCC calls for the end-of-the-year assessment to be done on a computer, but other testing throughout the year might use more nontraditional method. Students could be asked to complete a project or give a presentation instead of filling in a bubble sheet.

“Instead of having weekly quizzes and tests, there will be a greater emphasis on performance-based assessments, a demonstration of acquired skill and knowledge …,” said Tom Reed, executive director of achievement and leadership services with the Educational Service Center of Central Ohio. “The way teachers monitor student progress is going to take on a very different look and feel, from tightly scripted to things that become more open-ended.”

These assessments still are being developed.

Much of the training for the Common Core is funded with federal Race to the Top grants awarded to Ohio to encourage innovation in the classroom.

Right now, teachers and administrators are going through professional development to prepare for the crossover.

However, Reed said, in some classes there won’t be much of a change because teachers already are using some of these techniques in the classroom.

“There are a lot of teachers who have embedded these principles in their practices for a long time,” Reed said. “Good teaching and effective teaching look very similar.”

Changes coming to classrooms

Here are 10 ways classrooms might operate differently by 2014 with Ohio’s new Common Core State Standards.

1. More nonfiction

Move over, Mr. Shakespeare.

There will be more emphasis placed on nonfiction works in English classes.

In fourth grade, under the standards, 50 percent of literary content should be fiction and 50 percent should be nonfiction.

By eighth grade, that ratio should shift to 45 percent fiction and 55 percent nonfiction, and by 12th grade it should be 30 percent and 70 percent.

“That’s what the ratio of fiction to nonfiction is in the real word,” said Tom Reed, executive director of achievement and leadership services with the Educational Service Center of Central Ohio.

The point isn’t to devalue the classics typically used in English class, Reed said. The emphasis will just be shifted. “Fiction does have its place, and there is a great amount to be learned from it,” Reed said.

2. It won’t all be on paper

Students will see increased speaking and listening requirements.

Terri Bucci, who specializes in mathematics education at The Ohio State University’s Mansfield campus, said students comprehend information better when they talk about it.

“Being able to talk about ideas of measurement, fractions and area will help us have an entry to these new ideas,” Bucci said.

3. A different kind of test

Students still will see a bubble test sheet here and there, but for the most part, sharpening a No. 2 pencil and filling in a series of circles will become a thing of the past.

Instead, students will be required to answer questions in long form based on text presented to them.

Michael Cohen, president of Achieve, a national education policy group that helped develop the standards, included the following example in a PowerPoint presentation to Ohio educators.

A current question might read: “Lincoln says that the nation is dedicated to the proposition that ‘all men are created equal.’ Why is equality an important value to promote?”

Whereas a question under the new standards would read: “How does Lincoln use the idea of ‘unfinished work’ to assign responsibility to his listeners?”

4. Some state assessments gone, end-of-year assessments to be on computer

Students still will have to take the federally-required standardized testing, but state assessments will likely disappear, said Emmy Partin, director of Ohio policy and research for the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, an Ohio think tank.

Ohio is a governing state for the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers, a consortium of state education officials, which is developing new assessments for students to go along with the Common Core. According to PARCC, there will be three main types of assessments:

Performance-based assessments: Focus on extended answers and applications of concepts and skills. This might not be a test; it could be a research project or some other sort of demonstration.

Speaking and listening assessment: An informal assessment to see how much students have learned.

End-of-year assessment: Computer-based and multiple choice. The advantage of doing it electronically, Reed said, is that results will be determined and analyzed more quickly.

5. Math to involve more reasoning

It’s less about learning what the numbers are, and more about what they mean.

“Students will need to understand how numbers work,” said Pat Gordon, a first-grade teacher with Mansfield City Schools. “What’s the impact? It’s more about a deeper understanding.”

A current question on a math test might look like: “What is 15-3?”

Cohen said a new question might be: “Candice wrote the number sentence: 15-3=X.

“Which of these is another way to write Candice’s number sentence?

A: 15 + X = 3

B: 15 x X = 3

C: 3 + X = 15

D: 3 x X = 15″

6. Fewer chapters in the book

One frustration for teachers is that they feel like there’s too much ground to cover. The Common Core calls for fewer topics to be covered in class, and the remaining ones to be covered in more depth.

Partin said that by focusing on just a few select subjects, students will get a greater depth of knowledge.

“Teachers say our standards force them to do a ‘drive-by’ coverage of content areas,” she said. “This is going to be a very welcome change for students and teachers.”

This is welcome for Gordon. “It will make teaching and learning a lot more enjoyable, because we’re not trying to get through so many things,” she said.

7. Teachers across subjects must work together

The Common Core is about looking at big ideas that stretch across different subject areas, which means teachers of these subjects will need to work together.

This could involve applying math lessons in science, or reading lessons in social studies.

“Literacy is the common thread that runs through all of this in school,” Reed said.

8. Argumentation

Reed said there are biases to any written work, so students must learn to separate fact from fiction.

Argumentative writing will become much more prominent under the Common Core.

Students must have, “The ability to read information, to understand the point of view …” Reed said, then, “create their own idea based on what they just read or heard.”

9. More than a book

The Common Core encourages students to learn from more than just the textbook.

“We’re trying to prepare students for the world, and there is no textbook for the world,” Bucci said.

Students in science classes might be encouraged to read an article in a medical journal, or students in social studies might be asked to read an original historical document.

“If we’re going to teach students the art of argumentation, they must learn what it means to be a primary or secondary source,” Reed said.

10. Marrying reading and writing

Frequently on existing tests, reading and writing are assessed separately, Cohen said. Students might answer questions based on a text, or write an essay.

However, the Common Core encourages “text-dependent questions,” where students must read a text then write something based on the text, Cohen said. This will frequently be based off nonfiction work, and students might need to form an argument.

Source: Coshocton Tribune, by Jessica Alaimo

Posted on 28 March 2012

Educators in Search of Common-Core Resources

As states and districts begin the work of turning common academic standards into curriculum and instruction, educators searching for teaching resources are often finding that process frustrating and fruitless.

Teachers and curriculum developers who are trying to craft road maps that reflect the Common Core State Standards can find themselves in a dispiriting bind: Their current materials fall short, and there is a dearth of good new ones to fill the void.

“Teachers are struggling, and very few people are helping. Almost nothing is available for them to use,” said Aaron Grossman, a former 5th and 6th grade teacher in Nevada’s Washoe County district who now works at the district office writing curriculum.

Many school leaders are finding a rough road as well.

Visit EdWeek, to read the rest of this article. Published 02.24.2012

Posted on 4 March 2012

Common-Core Standards Drew on Ideas From Abroad

Other nations’ curricula and academic standards were important sources for those who put together the learning goals that have won approval from nearly all states

In crafting a set of learning goals that nearly every state in the nation has embraced, the architects of the common-core standards effort sought to import from abroad key lessons about what top-performing countries teach their students.

To distill and articulate those goals, the common-core writers tried to balance the rigor, coherence, and focus they saw in the standards of high-achieving countries—and U.S. states—with the American tradition of respecting states’ and districts’ freedom to choose what they teach. All but four states have adopted the standards, taking the United States closer than ever before to having one shared set of academic expectations.

To read the complete article visit: EdWeek, 01.09.2012

Posted on 13 February 2012

New ‘common core’ standards a challenge for educators

Reading teacher Linda Unser is a little overwhelmed and a little worried.

She has spent the new school year at Frankfort Elementary School pulling together books for the two units each grade is teaching under the state’s new common core standards.

The new standards are very different than what the state has had since 2005, and the books kids are expected to read are tough.

“A lot of these materials are a lot more difficult than what we’re currently using,” Unser said. “It’s very overwhelming. It just kind of changes the way teachers will be teaching.”

The standards, created by teachers, school administrators and experts, have been adopted by almost every state and territory in the country. New York state adopted them in 2010.

They’re based on one overarching goal – to make students college-and-career ready by the time they graduate from high school. That might seem obvious, but this summer the state determined that less than 40 percent of students across the state met that goal in 2010.

Teachers are being introduced to the new standards with example units – series of related lessons on a specific topic – and aided in building their lesson plans by teams from BOCES.

This year, schools are required to teach two units at each grade level to the new standards so teachers can try them out.

Next year, more example units will be available, and during the 2013-14 school year they will be completely rolled out.

Sarah Indermill, coordinator of instructional support services at Herkimer BOCES, is part of a team that has been helping teachers start using the common core standards.

Indermill has given them examples provided by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and helps teachers develop lesson plans based on those units.

“We’ve shown them a lesson, we’ve talked them through it,” Indermill said. “We also go into districts and support the teachers.”

The new standards more or less start with what a college student needs to be able to do: study independently, glean information from complex textbooks without help and be ready to take college-level mathematics.

The standards give suggested course pairings in math to get the best use of high school courses. In reading and the other subjects, the common core suggests increasingly difficult books with speaking and writing tasks that demand students back up their arguments and answers to questions with evidence.

“Really the breakdown comes in the type of text that we’re reading,” said Ken Slentz, deputy commissioner for P-12 Education.

Books are slightly more complex than what they read now, Indermill said. At the elementary level half are literature, half are informational text. At the secondary level, information texts make 70 percent of the reading.

Students are required to do “close reading” and provide answers based on what they’ve read. One example, she said, is if a student is shown a picture of a sad lion from a book, and asked to interpret it, the student has to give evidence-based reasons why he or she thinks the lion is sad.

“They have to give you evidence. That’s very simplistic, but think of it at a higher level,” Indermill said.

Under the current standards, a student might be asked how he or she feels about what they just read.

That’s “a very different setup” than asking a student why they believe their answer is correct based on evidence in a specific text, Slentz said.

This year’s standardized test will still be based on the old standards. Slentz believes that when the tests are rewritten to the new standards there will be some idea of how well the new curriculum is working.

“When you see, next year, the first round of assessments come out, that will certainly be our first indication,” he said.

Unser won’t be alone trying to find appropriate reading materials. The new curriculum means new textbooks and supplementary materials, something each district will have to pay for.

Slentz, a former superintendent from the cash-strapped West Canada Valley Central School District, understands what that means.

“Let’s be honest. There is a cost to this,” he said. “We have to help districts be creative in bringing this home.”

Source: UTCIAOD.com, October 23, 2011

Posted on 1 November 2011

Common Core Found to Rank With Respected Standards

The common-core standards in English/language arts and mathematics are generally aligned to the leading state standards, international standards, and university standards at the high-school-exit level, but are more rigorous in some content areas, says a report released Wednesday.

Researchers at the Educational Policy Improvement Center, or EPIC, a Eugene, Ore.-based research organization, compared the content and curriculum standards for California and Massachusetts; the Texas College and Career Readiness Standards, a collection of competencies and skills for secondary students that complements the state’s high school standards; theInternational Baccalaureate standards; and the Knowledge and Skills for University Success, a set of expectations endorsed by 28 research universities and used by the College Board as a reference in its own standards. The authors wanted to see how closely the content covered, the range of material included, and the depth of that material correlated with the Common Core State Standards Initiative.

To read the remainder of this article visit, EdWeek. Published: October 26, 2011

Posted on 31 October 2011

Five Myths About the Common Core State Standards

The Common Core State Standards are one of the most significant initiatives in American education in decades. Yet the swiftness with which they were developed and adopted has left educators uncertain about exactly what they are. A number of myths about the standards have emerged.

Myth #1 The Common Core State Standards are a national curriculum.
Americans have long had a leery view of a national curriculum, but the Common Core State Standards do not create this scenario. Standards are not curriculum: standards spell out what students should know and be able to do at the end of a year; curriculum defines the specific course of study—the scope and sequence—that will enable students to meet standards. There are many possible curricula schools could use that would lead students to the Common Core State Standards.

For example, one of the Common Core standards for English language arts in grade 5states: “By the end of the year, read and comprehend literature, including stories, dramas, and poetry, at the high end of the grades 4–5 text complexity band independently and proficiently.” This standard does not spell out how teachers will teach students to “read and comprehend literature.” Nor does it indicate which texts to use. The standards document includes a number of suggested texts that are of appropriate complexity (in grades 4 and 5, these include Antoine St. Exupéry’s The Little Prince, Robert Frost’s “Dust of Snow,” and Kadir Nelson’s We Are the Ship: The Story of Negro League Baseball), but these are meant to be examples, not a reading list.

Myth #2 The Common Core State Standards are an Obama administration initiative.
The Obama administration is a strong supporter of the Common Core State Standards initiative, but the administration did not lead it. The initiative was, and continues to be, state-led.

No federal official was on the work teams and feedback groups that developed the standards. Then, once the standards were released, forty-five states and the District of Columbia—each acting on its own—chose to adopt the standards.

The Obama administration clearly supported the effort. In its Race to the Top program—a $4.3 billion competitive grant program that awarded funds to states that pledged reforms in four key areas—the administration awarded 40 points out of a possible 500 to states that adopted “a common set of K-12 standards” which were internationally benchmarked and that prepared students for colleges and careers– such as the Common Core State Standards. States could conceivably have won the grants without adopting the Common Core standards specifically. In February 2010, President Obama said he might tie funds from the federal Title I program to adoption of the Common Core standards, but the administration never followed up on that plan. The administration provided incentives but did not force states to adopt the standards.

The administration did provide $330 million to two state consortia to develop assessments to measure the Common Core standards, but these funds support development. States are building the assessments, and once the assessments are in place, they will be administered and operated by states. They are not federal tests.

Myth #3 The Common Core standards represent a modest change from current practice.
In preparation for adoption of the Common Core standards, several states conducted analyses that found considerable alignment between them and their current standards. Yet while the content of the two sets of standards is similar, the level of knowledge and skills the Common Core calls for is in many respects quite different from what current standards expect and what schools currently practice.

Take English language arts. Perhaps the main idea of the Common Core ELA standards is the notion that students should read increasingly complex texts in order to be prepared for the reading they will do in postsecondary education. Yet research the standards-writers relied upon showed that the complexity of texts assigned in high school has actually declined over time, while the reading requirements of entry-level college courses have increased. The Common Core Standards raise the expectations for text complexity considerably.

Myth #4 States cannot implement the Common Core standards in the current budget climate.
Implementing the Common Core standards, which involves revising assessments, developing curriculum materials, providing professional development and tools for teachers, and other tasks, will cost money. And officials in 76 percent of districts in Common Core states said in a survey released in September 2011 by the Center on Education Policy that inadequate funds for implementation was a major challenge.

Yet the survey also found that 80 percent of districts had efforts to implement the standards under way or planned for 2011–2012. And more activities are likely once the assessments to measure the standards are in place.

Myth #5 The Common Core State Standards will transform schools.
Advocates have high hopes for the Common Core State Standards. They believe that a common set of expectations that are geared toward what students need to know to succeed after high school and that are benchmarked to the expectations of high-performing countries will lead to substantial improvements in student learning.

Yet even the most passionate advocate of standards will acknowledge that standards, by themselves, do not improve education. Standards can do a great deal: they can set clear goals for learning for students and teachers, and establish guidelines for instruction and performance. But to have an effect on the day-to-day interaction between students and teachers, and thus improve learning, states and districts will have to implement the standards. That will require changes in curricula and assessments to align with the standards, professional development to ensure that teachers know what they are expected to teach, and ultimately, changes in teacher education so that all teachers have the capability to teach all students to the standards. The standards are only the first step on the road to higher levels of learning.

Source: Harvard Education Letter, Volume 27, Number 5 September/October 2011

Robert Rothman is a senior fellow at the Alliance for Excellent Education and the author of Something in Common: The Common Core Standards and the Next Chapter in American Education (Harvard Education Press, 2011).

Posted on 25 October 2011

Three Reasons for Common Core Optimism

Are standards the silver bullet that will solve education’s problems? Although anyone who has been involved in education for more than a few years can be forgiven some skepticism, the new Common Core State Standards actually have the potential to make a difference, said Bob Rothman, senior fellow at the Alliance for Excellent Education, in a panel discussion October 18 (watch here) launching the release of his book Something in Common: The Common Core Standards and the Next Chapter in American Education.

Rothman cited several reasons for optimism:

• Teachers find these standards clear and easy to understand. Unlike previous standards, the Common Core State Standards are based on a rational progression toward a common goal—college and career readiness.

 

• The two consortia that are developing assessments to measure student progress on the standards include people who helped develop the standards and are intimately familiar with them.

 

• The fact that so many states have adopted the standards means it’s more likely there will be interest and energy about developing curriculum materials to support them. And the consortia’s mandates include some funding for development of such materials.

 

 

Obstacles remain, though. Others on the panel—including Massachusetts Secretary of Education Paul Reville; Lucille Davy of the James B. Hunt Jr. Institute; and Bob Wise, president of the Alliance—pointed out that many of the 44 governors who originally signed on to the standards have left office and there’s no guarantee their replacements will be as eager to implement the standards during state budget shortfalls.

Another challenge is public perception—a recent Pew poll shows only 11 percent of the public knows what the Common Core State Standards are. In addition, there may be confusion and resistance if assessments linked to the new standards initially appear to show decreasing student achievement. Rothman expressed concern that publishers and professional development providers will rush to claim that their products are aligned to the new standards, and it will be difficult for educators to know whether such claims are true.

In general, though, the panelists agreed with Rothman that the Common Core State Standards offer an opportunity to reinvigorate the conversation about education reform. Many educators feel renewed excitement because they believe that this time the whole package will be delivered—including curriculum, instructional materials, and assessments. As Davy commented, “I think it’s unprecedented for so many people to be pushing in the same direction.”

Source: ASCD Community Blog, October 20, 2011

Posted on 25 October 2011

Why Common Core Standards implementation is slow

Funding concerns and inadequate guidance from state officials are two key reasons that the implementation of the new Common Core State Standards in public school districts across the country is going slow this school year, according to a new survey by the nonprofit Center on Education Policy.

The Common Core State Standards (CCSS) in English language arts and math are an attempt to standardize across what students learn from kindergarten through 12th grade, and have been a big part of the Obama administration education reform platform.

Though not mandated, states were encouraged by the administration to adopt them, and, so far, 44 states and the District of Columbia have adopted them.The standards were released in June 2010 by the National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers.

Supporters say the standards will help ensure that high school graduates have the knowledge and skills they need to succeed in college and the work. Critics have attacked the standards over a number of issues, including concern that they will lead to more standardized testing, that some of the standards for young children are too rigid, and that the standards don’t give teachers enough leeway to help students who aren’t on grade level in reading and math.

When the standards were released, educators expressed concern that without equitable resources for new educational materials and teacher training, the effort wouldn’t amount to much. The survey by the independent Center on Education Policy bears out lingering concerns about funding as well as other issues.

Among the survey’s findings are:

• Seventy-six percent of districts in states that adopted the standards report that adequate funding for implementing all aspects of the CCSS is a major challenge.
• About two-thirds of the districts in adopting states cited inadequate or unclear state guidance on the Common Core State Standards as a major challenge.
• Only 29 percent of the districts in states that adopted the standards have assigned or plan to assign resource teachers to help teachers integrate the CCSS into their classroom instruction in math and English language arts.
• Fewer than one-third of the districts in CCSS-adopting states have changed or plan to change their educator induction or teacher evaluation systems to make them more consistent with the CCSS.
• Forty-seven percent of districts in the adopting states cited inadequate curriculum materials to support integration of the CCSS in classroom instruction as a major challenge.
• Less than half of the districts in CCSS-adopting states have developed or plan to develop new local assessments to measure student mastery of these standards.

Other findings include:

• Almost three-fifths of the districts in states that have adopted the standards view them as more rigorous than the ones they are replacing and expect student learning to improve as a result of implementation.
• Two-thirds of the districts in states that have adopted the Common Core State Standards have begun to develop a comprehensive plan and timeline for implementing the standards or intend to do so in school year 2011-12. And 61 percent of the districts are developing and/or purchasing curriculum materials.

Source: The Washington Post, September 15, 2011

Posted on 23 October 2011

County schools planning for Common Core State Standards

Posted on 17 October 2011