Teachers Reflect on CCSS, the ‘Shifts,’ and Close Reading

Posted on July 22, 2013 by Aaron Grossman

In a video produced by EngageNY, educators in New York reflect on their implementation of the Common Core. Teachers address topics including the instructional shifts, close reading, and text-dependent questions. You can watch the video here.

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Advancing Literacy Practice with the Core 7/22&7/23

Posted on July 21, 2013 by Aaron Grossman

Washoe educators worked through the last summer session of the inservice course Advancing Literacy Practice with the Common Core. This is the fourth posting about the course and you can access many of the materials included in the session here. The PowerPoint and course continues to be updated as participants, who took part in previous offerings, share reactions and feedback. Consequently, several activities have been modified and new video content has been linked.

Updated PowerPoint

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Conservatives for Common Core

Posted on July 19, 2013 by Aaron Grossman

Conservatives for Higher Standards has created a website detailing their support the Common Core State Standards.  The website explains why groups, traditionally skeptical of large educational initiatives, favor the CCSS effort. You can access the website here which includes sections on debunking myths, talking to parents, and making the case for military and business support.

The project is effort supported by the Foundation for Excellence in Education and the Thomas B. Fordham Institute.

In previous posts, we’ve described support from large educational groups including the AFT, NEA, NAESP, NASSP, and NASBE.

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Scoring Guides for SBAC Practice Tests

Posted on July 17, 2013 by Aaron Grossman

In May we linked to the SBAC Practice Test (here). SBAC has subsequently released scoring guides for each grade level test that you can find here. The scoring guides are available for ELA and math and include sample responses to the constructed response questions.

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The Limitations of Using Readability Scores

Posted on July 15, 2013 by Aaron Grossman

Relying on the quantitative features of text complexity can be limiting and misleading. This is nicely demonstrated in a video posted by Montgomery County Public Schools (here) in which viewers learn how changing two words in a passage lowers the readability by a full grade level.  Using the story, “Benny the Elephant,” “Benny” is replaced with the word “Ben” and “elephant” is replaced with “dog.” These two nondescript changes lower a 400-word text from a reading score of 3.1 to 2.2.

The video also shows you how to find readability statistics in Word and how you can use this application to measure something you’ve written quantitatively.

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Getting Kids Hooked on Non-Fiction Books

Posted on July 15, 2013 by Aaron Grossman

“Building knowledge is building literacy.” Robert Pondiscio is quoted as saying in  Holly Korbey’s article profiling rich non-fiction titles. Apart from making the case for having students read informational texts, Korbey, lists a number of titles that educators may want to encourage students to read.  You can find the article and list of books here.

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Advancing Literacy Practice with the Core

Posted on July 8, 2013 by Aaron Grossman

Washoe educators moved through a third offering of the inservice course, Advancing Literacy Practice with the Core. The 15-hour class touches on a number of important features of the CCSS that enable practitioners to match classroom practice to the standards, 2014-2015 assessment, and well-vetted resources. You can review the course materials here and the most current PowerPoint, with updated video links, here.

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Preparing Our Students to be Informed Citizens

Posted on July 8, 2013 by Aaron Grossman

Robert Pondiscio, in an editorial for CNN, describes the importance of teaching civics and history in our public schools. Although the Common Core are not referenced specifically, Pondiscio helps build the case for why all of our students should have the chance to work with a coherent body of knowledge—an important part of what it means to do CCSS. You can read the article here.

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Sound Instruction Instead of ‘Test Preparation’

Posted on July 3, 2013 by Aaron Grossman

New York Times Washington Bureau Chief David Leonhardt led a discussion for the Hamilton Project on “the economic imperative of expanding college opportunities.” At minute 34:08 the panelists are asked how ACT and SAT can mitigate for the advantages affluent students have when taking these examinations—often through expensive test preparation opportunities. Jon Whitmore of ACT, Inc. gets the conversation started and describes a “suit of tests” that move all the way down to 3rd grade. He argues that these tests will then enable educators to identify students who may need additional support or who can qualify for new educational opportunities. This is followed by College Board President David Coleman describing changes to SAT that will reflect sound instructional practice instead of “test preparation.” You can gain full access to the discussion here.

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The Problem with Question Taxonomies

Posted on July 2, 2013 by Aaron Grossman

In a provocative piece for Edutopia, Todd Finley, an Associate Professor of English education at East Carolina University, describes the limitation of taxonomies and the importance of rethinking classroom discussions. Apart from describing what strategies we might want to limit, Finley provides a number of “mechanics” to facilitate rich discussions. You can read the article here.

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