re: Let's Talk Common Core

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Teaching our children how to THINK should be a goal of every person.

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But you don't learn theory first. You learn facts first. Theory last.

Not clear where you get your conclusion that 'the majority can't do the math' but that's not the case. I have friends who are doctors and PhDs in math for whom the way they are teaching math under CC makes no sense whatsoever. All of a sudden, math has become a narrative, not an exact science. And the way it's been taught for generations is not longer correct. Example: a friend's son was asked how 1/2 is similar to 4/8. He very wisely answered that 1 is half of two and 4 is half of 8. He was marked wrong because 'that's not the way it was taught in class.' Brilliant teaching, not! His parents have a PhD in Physics and a Master's in Physics. He's now being homeschooled. Common Core has been great for boosting homeschooling ranks.

Almost every common core test I've seen is an improvement over the rote sludge I was getting in grade school.

I'm like 90% sure the reaction to common core is because it has the tribal stopword "common" in the name.

I think the ELA standards are fine in and of themselves. The biggest letdown to me is that CC misled with its supposed intent to increase depth by reducing breadth. They're just as cumbersome as the old Framework and allow little time for depth.

I also don't get how CC is supposed to eliminate "teaching to the test." There is a test. And as teachers, administrators, and educational companies become more familiar with it, all constituents will be playing the game as usual.

One of the main issues is the blanket introductions. Kids in 9th Grade for example are suddenly opened up to this new rigor that has been absent all their school career. We can't expect them to be successful.

Common core rigor and standards should have started 100% implementation from the beginning so that kids can be developed and cultivated to expect and succeed with it. A relative easing or mixing of certain aspects for all other kids until after 12 years you have a fully integrated system with fully developed children and the system is firmly in place.

Education changes every 3-5 yrs because they think they can just drop blanket changes, doesn't work like that.

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One of the main issues is the blanket introductions. Kids in 9th Grade for example are suddenly opened up to this new rigor that has been absent all their school career. We can't expect them to be successful. Common core rigor and standards should have started 100% implementation from the beginning so that kids can be developed and cultivated to expect and succeed with it. A relative easing or mixing of certain aspects for all other kids until after 12 years you have a fully integrated system with fully developed children and the system is firmly in place. Education changes every 3-5 yrs because they think they can just drop blanket changes, doesn't work like that.

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Agree 100%. I am a 5th grade teacher. Last year when we suddenly implemented the new standards, some of the topics I used to cover in 5th grade math were suddenly in the 4th grade curriculum. I had a curriculum to teach them that built upon those topics but they hadn't learned them yet. I had to teach them 4th grade standards in order to even begin my 5th grade ones...they never caught up....how could they? It should have been phased in.

You will hear that the CC was brought into being by a consortium of governors. But the truth is it was written nearly completely by one person, David Coleman. Do some research on this dude and some of you may be frightened. He is now the president of the ETS and is overhauling the SAT to match the Common Core.

I think some of the standards are good in theory, but I don't like how quickly it was rolled out. We are finding MANY MANY mistakes in our expensive new Math program, and the practice test we were promised long ago still isn't ready. Our first test is in March. It isn't going to be pretty.

I've been a teacher for many years and even though we always had a test, I never considered my approach "teaching to the test". Now, we are all totally teaching to the test. There is very little time or appreciation for creativity and unlike what we all learned in school for individual differences, they ALL have to pass the same test regardless of their ability, even those who have an IEP. And my evaluation and pay raise depends on these scores, yeah that is fair. Try giving Ford parts to a Mercedes factory and expecting them to turn out a Mercedes. Kids are humans and have all types of family and emotional issues that can prevent them from learning to their best ability. But we've still got to crack that whip and keep moving. The feds are trying to suck the joy out of learning and I fear they will succeed.

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I got an A

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I could have gotten a hundred but I made a stupid mistake on the muffin question.

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We've gotten a long way from this sort of rigor. Common Core is actually doing one thing right - its teaching kids how to think rather than what to think. Its frustrating to adults because most of them learned how to memorize a test.

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when it comes to Math, it really doesn't matter how to think it really is what to think.

If you memorize division multiplication subtraction and addition tables, doing simple math which we have taught for a long time, is efficient and easy to do. I rarely have to do math now of days, I usually just pull out a phone and plug it in my phone. But when it comes down to it I remember how to do it.

here are some simple but long math problems. Don't pull out a calculator, do it on paper. Do it the old fashion way, than do it the common core way. Tell me which is faster.

537 X 534

782 / 28

523562 + 678659

25214 - 14253

In the real world, we usually do math by calculators I realize that but if you ever have to do it by hand the quicker the better. The world demands results not knowing how.

Common core math sucks because it forces you to do a lengthy process that can be done just as well quicker.

Sounds like the issue isn't CC it's the crappy teacher.

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Learning facts before theory has given us a group of 20-somethings that can spit out facts like a boss but have no idea how or when to apply those facts and no idea how to think critically. The only way they succeed is if life is laid out like a textbook, which doesn't happen.

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respectfully--you are wrong, sir! This generation does not know their basic math facts because memorizing them is not stressed. Concepts are stressed. We have a generation of kindergartners through 4th graders who can tell you what a trapezoid is, but they can NOT tell you what 7 + 6 is.