What does Common Core really mean? |
On Board Online • September 24, 2012
By Cathy Woodruff
Senior Writer
State education officials estimate New York is hitting the halfway point in an overhaul of standards and curriculum sparked by adoption of a multi-state approach called the Common Core. But educators who are deeply immersed in the effort still struggle to define the concept and explain how it is changing public education.
Three enthusiastic local educators who were invited to brief the state Board of Regents this month said their colleagues have been uneasy about how the Common Core will change how they teach and how students learn.
“A lot of the anxiety around this was just not knowing,” said Courtney Jablonski, a network team leader with the Washington-Saratoga-Warren-Hamilton-Essex BOCES. She told the Regents at their September meeting that the most common question was very basic: “What does it look like?”
Jose Carrion, assistant superintendent for instruction in Poughkeepsie schools, said that sitting in on training sessions on math instruction was a revelation for him. Even though “I probably could do the calculations,” he said, “I realized I didn’t really know math.” He said, “I love the Common Core” because it requires a sophisticated approach that helps students reach a deeper understanding of math.
In meetings in Poughkeepsie, Carrion said he asked teachers to pretend they were explaining the Common Core to parents in laymen’s terms. That intrigued Regent Robert Bennett, who led the Regents as its chancellor from 2002 to 2009. He asked if anything had been put in writing. “I’d like to see a copy of that, if you could,” Bennett told Carrion.
What is clear is that the Common Core involves big changes. “Our teaching methods are about to make a tremendous shift,” said Lori Ann Storey, a fourth-grade teacher in Oneida County’s Waterville Central School District.
Hopes are high that the changes will be an improvement. In a NYSSBA Pulse Poll conducted via email last month, 45 percent of school board members who responded rated the implementation of Common Core Learning Standards as the initiative most likely to have a positive impact on students in the coming school year. It was, by far, the top choice of board members, with the introduction of teacher and principal evaluations a distant second place, 21 percent.
Next spring, New York will begin to introduce student assessments built around the Common Core standards, and the testing transition is scheduled to be complete in 2014.
New York has devoted much of its $696 million in federal Race to the Top funding to implementation of Common Core standards and curriculum, said Deputy Education Commissioner Ken Slentz. That includes $348 million distributed to districts for training on the implementation of the Common Core and related parts of the Regent’s Reform agenda, plus $50 million for curriculum development.
The State Education Department also has continued to expand a Common Core section on its EngageNY website, offering instructional videos and sample instructional modules that teachers can use in their classrooms.
“The Common Core sits at the foundation of just about everything we are doing under Regents Reform Agenda and certainly under the Race to the Top,” Slentz said in an interview with On Board.
When asked to explain how the Common Core differs from what’s traditionally been taught in classrooms, Slentz said the most significant change is that the standards are “back-mapped,” or reverse-engineered, from the ultimate goal of giving students the skills and knowledge they will need to succeed in college or a career.
In the case of English language arts, for example, that means incorporating more non-fiction and informational reading into assignments and classroom work.
Texts suggested by architects of the Common Core include old fiction favorites, such as Charlotte’s Web, Mr. Popper’s Penguins and The Black Stallion. But they also include an array of non-fiction and technical volumes, including Amazing Whales, The Story of Ruby Bridges and Hurricanes: Earth’s Mightiest Storms.
In math, Slentz said there will be less material to cover, particularly in middle grades, but more emphasis on fully understanding and mastering the concepts that are taught.
“Right now, you will hear teachers say, ‘I didn’t have time to slow down to deal with kids who were not getting it,’” Slentz said. “The Common Core asks that we cover less and emphasize key areas of priority. In doing that, the list of things to cover is much less than it’s been in the past – thereby giving teachers the gift of time.”
Slentz stressed that the transition would involve a shift for teachers toward encouraging “deeper” understanding of material that is more clearly linked to concrete, real-world applications.
The term Common Core is short for the Common Core State Standards Initiative, in which New York joined with other states to develop consistent standards in math and English language arts.
That collaboration has spawned two multi-state consortiums that are leading development of tests that will measure how well students are meeting the new standards. New York is part of the PARCC consortium.
New York is unusual among members of the consortium in its focus on providing a Common Core curriculum and support, Slentz said.
“To our knowledge, New York is the only state that is actually developing curriculum to support the components,” he said.
Along with the pedagogical shift in classrooms, Regents Chancellor Merryl Tisch has said the Common Core transition is encouraging a shift in the role of the State Education Department.
She noted at the September Regents meeting that the department is using it as an opportunity to build more mechanisms to support teachers and schools in implementing the new curriculum and define what constitutes good practice.
“This is what state education departments should be doing,” Tisch said, “and it makes Race to the Top money a worthwhile expenditure instead of just one more reform that will go where other reforms have gone before.”