Reposting from another parent....I received this from a friend and thought it might be worth sharing the conversation with you guys (even though I got waaaay off topic and BTW, thank you friend!): Friend: So, I read a lot of the stuff that you post about the common core and you seem very angry. Now, I might be totally wrong here and I dont really know much about this topic, however it is common knowledge that American students lag far, far behind their competition from other countries in disciplines such as math, science and languages. It occurs to me that perhaps someone did some research and came up with a systematic way to teach our students more advanced info and critical thinking/problem solving skills at younger ages... Is that a negative thing? It may appear to be difficult and confusing.. And maybe its not how you and I were raised... But maybe thats a positive thing? Maybe children need to be taught new ways of learning and thinking at younger ages? Please, tell me your thoughts because I know you to be an exceptionally intelligent and open minded woman... Im curious what Im missing! Me: Angry you say? Hmmm, you must have missed something. Im livid! Im glad you asked about America versus other countries. Its not something I discuss very often and its a totally valid question. Your observation it is common knowledge that American students lag far, far behind their competition from other countries is usually based off of PISA scores (Program for International Student Assessment). The top countries that we are often compared to are China, South Korea and Finland. China and South Korea handle their education very differently than the US. Their main focus is on test taking. The children are not taught how to think, they are pushed, very hard to do well on the tests. If a child isnt grasping a concept, or is slow, they are left behind. Eventually, these children drop out of school. Because of this, the scores that we see do not include all of the children, they arent tested. America attempts to educate their entire population, many countries dont bother. This leads to a huge discrepancy in the test scores. Additionally, the suicide rates in these countries are sky high. This goal of having everyone ace the test has its price. It results in a lack of creativity and critical thinking. Last year China filed something like 25,000 patents. Most of which were changes to existing inventions. America filed somewhere near 150,000 many of which were for completely new inventions. There have been 8 Nobel laureates from China, 350 from the US. Many wealthy people in China send their children to America for their high school educations so that can learn how to think critically. Test scores are not necessarily indicative of a better education, they really only represent better test takers. Let’s talk about Finland. Finland has a completely different structure. They give their teachers autonomy and don’t focus on the tests. Finnish children don’t start school until age 7, they rarely take tests or have homework. They arent measured at all for the first 6 years of their education. Elementary school children get 75 minutes of recess every day (we get an average of 27). All of the teachers must have a masters degree and the curriculum is only a broad guideline. Science classes are capped at 16 students so that they may perform practical experiments in every class (their math and science scores on the PISA tests are through the roof). Finnish children take one mandatory standardized test when they are 16 years old, that’s it. So, let’s contrast the Finnish model of education to the new Common Core (CC) curriculum. Every single minute of the teachers’ lesson plans are scripted (zero autonomy). The next push for our education system is to require children to attend pre-k classes. Common Core requires that all children be tested weekly with high stakes testing occurring every spring for a couple of weeks. High stakes testing begins in the 3rd grade. The teacher creativity and personal input is really not permitted by CC; it is so structured that teachers could be replaced by computers or low level employees without any degrees. The CC science standards have yet to be rolled out, so I cannot directly correlate them to Finland. I agree with you that we could do better; however, Common Core is NOT the answer. I’d love to see us implement the Finnish model, which is the polar opposite of CC. However, Finland has a population of 5.4 million people; New York City alone has 8.3 million. Rolling out their model to the entire US would be a tremendous task. And culturally, we are so different, that there are many elements that just wouldn’t fly here (can you imagine if all the sudden we told everyone hang on to your kids for a few more years, no school until they’re 7 years old. That alone would totally change the structure of our lives and families. We have MANY areas of the US that were doing GREAT! The problem schools had a direct correlation to the poverty level. We need to figure out how to help the low income districts, not make everything so convoluted and meaningless so that we can all fail equally. Common Core is not, no way, no how the solution. It’s a killer of education and we are smart enough to find a better way. By the way…I’m at work so I didnt have time to site my sources…and this is only TOMTOP @ Facebook
Posted on: Mon, 31 Mar 2014 15:40:23 +0000