Topic: Federal Standards for English, K-12.

NOTE: In my blog, English Updates, I will be completing an in-depth study of the new federal guidelines for English language arts. For other up-to-date reviews of professional articles in English education journals, please see my blog, English Education Archives at http://engedarc-rays.blogspot.com/

10-second review: An introduction to the standards that is riddled with grammatical mistakes.

Review: Ready for another abbreviation? How about CCSSI? And does CCSSI have anything to do with NCLB (No Child Left Behind)? First, CCSSI stands for Common Core State Standards Initiative. It has produced “draft standards developed in collaboration with teachers, school administrators, experts…to provide a clear and consistent framework to prepare our children for college and the workforce.”

Are you ready for this? The standards are open for public review until April 2, 2010. They were released today, March 10, 2010 and will be finalized in May. Sounds like ramming the standards down everyone’s throat.

Quote: “These standards define the knowledge and skills students should have within their K-12 education careers so that they will graduate high school (sic.) able to succeed in entry-level, credit-bearing academic college courses and work force (sic.) training programs. The standards are: (sic.)

Aligned with college and work expectations;

Clear, understandable and consistent;

Include rigorous content and application of knowledge through high-order skills;

Build upon strengths and lessons of current state standards;

Informed by other top performing (sic.) countries, so that all students are prepared to succeed in our global economy;

Evidence-based. (sic.).”

Comment: The outline above is not parallel. Are the people who wrote that outline the same people who have written the standards? If this is an example of the clear and correct English I can expect in the standards, I’m having feelings of concern already. What are “high-order skills”? Who are the other top performing countries and how are they doing the “informing”? What is the evidence on which the standards are based and how good is that evidence? RayS. You will find the standards at http://www.corestandards.org/. RayS.