Tuesday, October 30, 2012
Reducing Standards
The part about chapter 2 that I found most interestin was when they referred to reducing the amount of content standards and teaching the few remaining standards more in depth. They mentioned that Oregon had recently drastically reduced the number of standards we are teaching and that we have seen a huge growth in 8th graders knowledge as a result (they said they perform more like sophmores). Is this something that our district did prior to common core (cut some standards out) and if so did it work as well as they talk about in the book? Just wondering. I often feel as an elementary teacher, overwhelmed by having to teach them every subject with enough depth and understanding so this has been something that really got me thinking about how in depth each of my lessons are and which standards should hold priority over others if any...
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Oooh, I am so glad you brought up that bit because when I first read about that Oregon math statistic it I was all amped up about it, I highlighted it, and then I forgot all about it. When I was in high school in Oregon ~15 years ago I believe algebra was the prescribed sophomore math class. Sure lots of students do algebra in 8th grade now, but a lot of students did that 15 years ago too. I don't like how Schmoker makes it sound like Oregon has found some grand solution to our math problems. We are far from that.
ReplyDeleteAlso my Oregon high school math standards are like a mini booklet while my h.s. science standards fit on one page. I don't feel the math standards have been reduced to a reasonable level (If Schmoker is correct and they represent only a third of what they used to be what in the world did they used to look like??). Still a lot of stuff in there that I never used getting my engineering degree - I question the time we spend on inequalities, constructions, and formal proofs for folks that still do those.
I agree with Rachael, and I feel like we are trying too hard to hit too many things early on, which then eliminates time to get really good at the building blocks that they need to do well later on.
ReplyDelete