Second of two parts
Re “Why Common Core Can Be a Plus Concept for Schools”
Not only at a glance but upon probing, the Common Core curriculum introduced in the School District and throughout California this year is similar to a bag full of brainstorms spawned by the left:
Like their climate change, anti-fracking, minimum wage and war on women campaigns, Common Core externally looks and smells like your mother’s cooking — impressive, practical and worth one’s heavyweight commitment.
What all five of these genius plans have in common is that as your shovel of curiosity creases into the earth, as you dig toward the heart of the matter, you suddenly start scratching your head with both hands simultaneously.
Clarity proves ephemeral.
Remember the feeling when you reached to grasp the smoke from your father’s pipe?
As my late non-friend Dorothy Parker said of Oakland, “There is no there there.”
Liberal scientists have been unable to prove their climate change charges, fracking has been found to be safe all along, minimum wage laws have hurt union loyalists and the only war on women is coming from the left.
As for Common Core, one seeking lucidity would be severely challenged, not to mention stumped.
Find an educator who can define Common Core in two sentences with fewer than 100 words. It is billed as a nationwide uniform approach to English Language Arts, a vague stew, and Math.
Now what?
The School District has given parents of first grade students a sort-of Q & A primer that could have been sent out by Ben Franklin and called Common Sense instead of Common Core.
Called “A Parent’s Guide to the Common Core State Standards,” the District found it helpful to inform us that the acronym is “CCSS.” Need I repeat?
Four questions are spotlighted on the cover – two useless, two worthwhile, which could be a metaphor for the whole government-mandated undertaking.
Accidentally or otherwise, the black and white four-pager is marvelously practical advice for first-time parents of first graders. It is, however, just abstract enough to be maddeningly exasperating.
We will conclude on a positive note, with the two useful Q & A’s.
“Will instruction look different in my child’s classroom?
“Yes, your child’s teacher will be creating lessons with greater focus on collaborative learning, critical thinking, presentation and research, utilizing more non-fiction sources while linking contents to real world situations.
“Will the CCSS change the way my child completes his or her work?
“Yes, your child will be required to think things through and be able to articulate and write out the why behind their answer, including being able to cite evidence, make arguments and defend the answer.”
Provisional verdict on Common Core: To be determined.
