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Posted - 04/30/2012 11:20am Common Standards Ignite Debate Over Prereading
By Catherine Gewertz
Premium article access courtesy of Edweek.org.
Sparked by the Common Core State Standards, teachers and literacy experts are arguing about the role of a time-honored pillar of English/language arts instruction: classroom activities designed to help students understand what they are about to read.
The attacks on—and defenses of—"prereading" are unfolding largely in cyberspace, through online forums, blogs, and email exchanges. What's triggering them is educators' reactions to the new standards and two key explanatory resources created by their architects: a set of "publishers' criteria" and videotaped sample lessons.
That trio has created an impression in some quarters that the intent of the standards is to "ban"—in the words of one blogger—prereading and instead ask students to approach texts "cold," with no upfront assistance. That would represent a sharp turnabout from current practice.
Even as the standards' authors insist that their aim is not to abolish prereading, but to curtail and revamp it, the debates persist, pitting schools of thought on reading instruction against one another. Teachers are asking themselves how to honor the heart of the practice, which is intended to help all students access text from a level playing field, but also to learn from its mistakes.
The debates, some in the field say, open the door to a broad-based re-examination of how to approach reading instruction.
"What's being played out in front of us is a war for the soul of English/language arts," said Alan L. Sitomer, a Los Angeles high school teacher who was California's teacher of the year in 2007.
Interpreting the Standards
If the debates over prereading are a war, one of the battlegrounds has been the standards themselves, with critics claiming that they eliminate prereading.
See Also
Special Report: Math, Literacy, & Common Standards
This report examines the progress some states have made in implementing the standards, what preparations need to be undertaken, and the challenges that policymakers and educators face in achieving the goals of the standards.
But defenders of the standards argue that they do no such thing. The documents call for students to be able to read "independently" and "proficiently," without "significant scaffolding"—instructional supports—by teachers. The standards also note that students may have added need for teacher assistance when wrestling with material above their reading level.
"If someone is reading that as eliminating prereading activities, they're reading it incorrectly," said Kelly Gallagher, an Anaheim, Calif., high school English/language arts teacher and the author of Readicide and other popular books about adolescent literacy. "But once you get into the publishers' criteria," he said, "it gets murkier."
» Read More
Premium article access courtesy of Edweek.org.
Sparked by the Common Core State Standards, teachers and literacy experts are arguing about the role of a time-honored pillar of English/language arts instruction: classroom activities designed to help students understand what they are about to read.
The attacks on—and defenses of—"prereading" are unfolding largely in cyberspace, through online forums, blogs, and email exchanges. What's triggering them is educators' reactions to the new standards and two key explanatory resources created by their architects: a set of "publishers' criteria" and videotaped sample lessons.
That trio has created an impression in some quarters that the intent of the standards is to "ban"—in the words of one blogger—prereading and instead ask students to approach texts "cold," with no upfront assistance. That would represent a sharp turnabout from current practice.
Even as the standards' authors insist that their aim is not to abolish prereading, but to curtail and revamp it, the debates persist, pitting schools of thought on reading instruction against one another. Teachers are asking themselves how to honor the heart of the practice, which is intended to help all students access text from a level playing field, but also to learn from its mistakes.
The debates, some in the field say, open the door to a broad-based re-examination of how to approach reading instruction.
"What's being played out in front of us is a war for the soul of English/language arts," said Alan L. Sitomer, a Los Angeles high school teacher who was California's teacher of the year in 2007.
Interpreting the Standards
If the debates over prereading are a war, one of the battlegrounds has been the standards themselves, with critics claiming that they eliminate prereading.
See Also
Special Report: Math, Literacy, & Common Standards
This report examines the progress some states have made in implementing the standards, what preparations need to be undertaken, and the challenges that policymakers and educators face in achieving the goals of the standards.
But defenders of the standards argue that they do no such thing. The documents call for students to be able to read "independently" and "proficiently," without "significant scaffolding"—instructional supports—by teachers. The standards also note that students may have added need for teacher assistance when wrestling with material above their reading level.
"If someone is reading that as eliminating prereading activities, they're reading it incorrectly," said Kelly Gallagher, an Anaheim, Calif., high school English/language arts teacher and the author of Readicide and other popular books about adolescent literacy. "But once you get into the publishers' criteria," he said, "it gets murkier."
» Read More
Posted - 04/30/2012 11:13am Big Shifts Ahead for Math Instruction
Some topics will be introduced earlier, some omitted, and students will have to show their understanding
By Erik W. Robelen
Premium article access courtesy of Edweek.org.
Nena F. Hupp pauses from reading her kindergartners the picture book Let's Count to help them better understand the math assignments they are about to tackle in small groups.
"Remember, when you get to 10 dots, a better way is to represent those 10 dots with just a stick," said Ms. Hupp, who teaches at Worthington Elementary School in this community near Baltimore. "It takes us forever to have to count all those dots. Mathematicians were smart when they came up with that idea, because it makes it so much easier."
Prior to this school year, kindergartners in the 50,000-student Howard County district—and in public schools across Maryland—were not expected to learn about representing tens and ones, a building block for understanding place value, explains Kay B. Sammons, the district's elementary-math coordinator.
"Prior to the common core," she said, "it was a 1st grade objective."
That's now changing, along with a whole lot more.
Across the nation, big shifts are afoot as 45 states and thousands of school districts gear up to implement the Common Core State Standards in mathematics. The standards will change the grade levels at which some content is introduced, push aside other topics altogether to achieve greater depth, and ask students to engage in eight "mathematical practices" to show their understanding, from making sense of problems to reasoning abstractly and constructing viable arguments.
Some districts are already working hard to make the transition.
Read More Here
By Erik W. Robelen
Premium article access courtesy of Edweek.org.
Nena F. Hupp pauses from reading her kindergartners the picture book Let's Count to help them better understand the math assignments they are about to tackle in small groups.
"Remember, when you get to 10 dots, a better way is to represent those 10 dots with just a stick," said Ms. Hupp, who teaches at Worthington Elementary School in this community near Baltimore. "It takes us forever to have to count all those dots. Mathematicians were smart when they came up with that idea, because it makes it so much easier."
Prior to this school year, kindergartners in the 50,000-student Howard County district—and in public schools across Maryland—were not expected to learn about representing tens and ones, a building block for understanding place value, explains Kay B. Sammons, the district's elementary-math coordinator.
"Prior to the common core," she said, "it was a 1st grade objective."
That's now changing, along with a whole lot more.
Across the nation, big shifts are afoot as 45 states and thousands of school districts gear up to implement the Common Core State Standards in mathematics. The standards will change the grade levels at which some content is introduced, push aside other topics altogether to achieve greater depth, and ask students to engage in eight "mathematical practices" to show their understanding, from making sense of problems to reasoning abstractly and constructing viable arguments.
Some districts are already working hard to make the transition.
Read More Here
Posted - 04/30/2012 11:10am How Innovation and Technology Can Help Improve Student Learning
Education's "Constructive Turbulence": How Innovation and Technology Can Help Improve Student Learning
Digital learning has the power to connect high school students with individualized learning experiences in unique and exceptionally engaging ways. Schools are exploring and tapping into that power at a time when the nation’s education system is facing three major challenges: teacher shortages, tight budgets, and boosting student achievement. In this webinar, you’ll gain insights into how digital technology can help improve student achievement as Gov. Bob Wise, the president of the Alliance for Excellent Education, discusses this topic with Cheryl Vedoe, the CEO of Apex Learning.
Guest: Gov. Bob Wise president, Alliance for Excellent Education
This webinar will be moderated by Cheryl Vedoe, chief executive officer, Apex Learning
Register now for this free live webinar.
Digital learning has the power to connect high school students with individualized learning experiences in unique and exceptionally engaging ways. Schools are exploring and tapping into that power at a time when the nation’s education system is facing three major challenges: teacher shortages, tight budgets, and boosting student achievement. In this webinar, you’ll gain insights into how digital technology can help improve student achievement as Gov. Bob Wise, the president of the Alliance for Excellent Education, discusses this topic with Cheryl Vedoe, the CEO of Apex Learning.
Guest: Gov. Bob Wise president, Alliance for Excellent Education
This webinar will be moderated by Cheryl Vedoe, chief executive officer, Apex Learning
Register now for this free live webinar.
Posted - 04/27/2012 08:28am Social Entrepreneurs Try to Offer Solutions to K-12 Problems
Competition for financial backing is intense
By Robin L. Flanigan
Upset that the elementary school where he taught didn't have a music program, David Wish traded in favors from a few musician friends to collect a ragtag fleet of instruments. Before long, his 1st and 2nd graders at Hawes Elementary School in Redwood City, Calif., were writing their own songs, recording and selling CDs, and attracting attention from newspapers, radio stations, and musical stars like Carlos Santana—who sent the school $10,000 worth of guitars.
» Read More
By Robin L. Flanigan
Published Online: April 24, 2012
Published in Print: April 25, 2012, as Social Entrepreneurs Try to Offer Solutions to Problems in K-12
Updated: April 26, 2012
» Read More
Posted - 04/27/2012 08:26am Studies Question Value of Early Algebra Lessons
Studies Question Value of Early Algebra Lessons
By Sarah D. Sparks
Vancouver, British Columbia
Mastering algebra is widely considered the gateway to higher mathematics and college readiness, but new studies question whether low-performing students benefit from exposure to the subject in middle school.
Separate studies of urban middle schoolers in California and in the Charlotte-Mecklenburg, N.C., schools suggest that placing struggling math students in algebra class does not improve their test performance on state math tests, and significantly hurts their grade point averages and the likelihood of their taking and passing higher math courses in high school.
» Read More
By Sarah D. Sparks
Vancouver, British Columbia
Mastering algebra is widely considered the gateway to higher mathematics and college readiness, but new studies question whether low-performing students benefit from exposure to the subject in middle school.
Separate studies of urban middle schoolers in California and in the Charlotte-Mecklenburg, N.C., schools suggest that placing struggling math students in algebra class does not improve their test performance on state math tests, and significantly hurts their grade point averages and the likelihood of their taking and passing higher math courses in high school.
» Read More
Posted - 04/27/2012 08:23am Concern Abounds Over Teachers' Preparedness for Standards
Published Online: April 23, 2012
Published in Print: April 25, 2012, as Many Teachers Not Ready for the Common Core
A quiet, sub-rosa fear is brewing among supporters of the Common Core State Standards Initiative: that the standards will die the slow death of poor implementation in K-12 classrooms.
"I predict the common-core standards will fail, unless we can do massive professional development for teachers," said Hung-Hsi Wu, a professor emeritus of mathematics at the University of California, Berkeley, who has written extensively about the common-core math standards. "There's no fast track to this."
It's a Herculean task, given the size of the public school teaching force and the difficulty educators face in creating the sustained, intensive training that research indicates is necessary to change teachers' practices. ("Professional Development at a Crossroads," November 10, 2010.)
"It is a capacity-building process, without question," said Jim Rollins, the superintendent of the Springdale, Ark., school district. "We're not at square one, but we're not at the end of the path, either. And we don't want to just bring superficial understanding of these standards, but to deepen the understanding, so we have an opportunity to deliver instruction in a way we haven't before."
