I've been thinking about what's really important, especially about what all kids should know and be able to do (WKSKABATD). That word all is powerful and dangerous. It makes standards an equity issue -- all kids deserve to leave a system of public education with viable life options. But it also requires us to be very thoughtful about whether all kids need to learn all of this stuff.
The Common Core made some progress in creating 'clearer, fewer, higher' standards, but there's still way too much stuff. The curriculum maps for English Language Arts released today are a bit too precious, a bit too literary -- no technical reading or writing to be found.
An 11th grade unit on 18th century European lit emphasizes "Observing narrative digressions, idiosyncrasies, exaggerations, and biases, they consider human, unpredictable, idiosyncratic aspects of storytelling."
One of the underlying standards is: RL.11-12.2: Determine two or more themes or central ideas of a text and analyze their development over the course of the text, including how they interact and build on one another to produce a complex account; provide an objective summary of the text.
Look for yourself. It's a classical curriculum, but does it really represent what all kids should know and be able to do? I don't think so.
Fordham-funded CommonCore.org slammed the Partnership for 21st Century Skills. The P21 folks argue there's some new stuff that is important, but they tried to avoid a fight by suggesting that kids need to know all that old stuff and some new stuff, "the fusion of the three Rs and four Cs (critical thinking and problem solving, collaboration, communication and creativity and innovation).
I think we need to choose. I think we need the courage to focus--to create a radical focus. In order to dramatically increase the number of young people that have viable post high school options and are capable of getting/creating family wage employment, we will need to become radically focused on the dozen things that are really important, that really predict academic and professional success, and we'll have to become much better at teaching those fundamental skills.
If there are a dozen keystone skills that over-predict success, I'm pretty sure these six are on that list:
1. Read tough and technical passages with comprehension
2. Write with concision and clarity
3. Compute decimals and fractions with facility
4. Gather evidence and make a case using probability & statistics
5. Attack a problem like a team of scientists
6. Crank like a coder
To the last point, by the time young people graduate from high school, they should be prepared to do sustained solitary work. Students need the self-awareness to know how they learn, what conditions help them concentrate, and how to monitor their output for quality and productivity.
"I wonder if the 21st century could be marked by demanding of all students a far higher level of mastery of fewer things," pondered a wise friend. As we develop the next generation of assessments, will we have the courage to focus? Will we at least allow schools with a strong and well-grounded hypothesis to focus?
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1) Common Core has released a full set of K-12 English Language Arts curriculum maps. These maps are based on and address every one of the Common Core State Standards in ELA.
2) The maps do not comprise a complete curriculum but rather offer up a series of themed units that include focus standards taken from the CCSS, suggested readings, sample activities, helpful websites, etc.
3) The maps were written by teachers for teachers.
4) The maps are free.
5) The maps are currently in draft form and are being made available for public comment through September 17. You can view them at www.commoncore.org/maps
And finally, as you point out, Common Core is funded by the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation. And we are grateful for their support. But we also receive funding from a host of other sources including the Ford Foundation, Louis Calder Foundation, and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which funded the maps.
Lynne Munson
President and Executive Director
Common Core
While I would like to agree, and have read many authors you recommend, and of course, have names I might add to your list, there is no way in reality that what you propose could come to pass, or would seem sufficiently relevant, given the trouble they would have to go through to comprehend the texts-- and that's just the teachers.