One easy-to-understand explanation of Common Core. I did not write this but wanted to share it ---- Common core started as group of governors coming together and saying they wanted to have a set of standards that they could agree to judge their kids on so that graduating HS in CA meant the same as graduating in TX. This concept was fine but things went horribly wrong. Bill Gates and Pearson Publishing saw a way to make money and avoid taxes. By using their respective charitable organizations they created a standard that they attached to a test and curriculum that they could then pass to their corporate branches to profit from. Thus they got a 100 million dollar tax free research and development for a highly profitable curriculum and server based testing system. Now to make this profitable they needed a way to force this system on all the states. In steps Obama - In trade for more tax deductible contributions to his campaign and those of his friends he uses tax payer money to attach the Common Core curriculum to federal education grants known as Race to the Top. To get the grant funds states must comply. The standards are not yet published but almost all the states rush to adopt them and sign commitment letters so that they qualify for the first round of grants. Then the standard go before a review board chosen by Common Core developers there are only 2 educators of any form on this board of 25. Things get added things get removed but at the end of the day the only 2 educators on the board refuse to sign off because the standards were not an improvement over what the majority of states were already using. But this was just the standard not the curriculum yet. The curriculum is intended to teach reasoning skills in math and English. To accomplish this in math it teaches children about 20 methods to do the simplest addition problems. This includes things like pictures, fact families, line graphs, and fingers. All of this is fine except that it takes time and they did not add hours to the day so these extra methods come at the cost of mastery of the basic skills and fact memorization. Now on to English - So the standard specifically calls for a greater focus on non fictional reading and writing that is intended to convey the childs opinion on the subject in a way that convinces the reader of their point of view. This is 2 parts so I will address reading first. When did you last hear a child talk about what a great non fiction article they read last week? Never. Non fiction does not inspire a love of reading. What it does do is allow the publisher of text books to insert their own version of history, politics and science and force your child to read it. I have seen this first hand. We are 4 weeks into the school year and my son (1st grade) has come home with 4 non fiction reading comprehension assignments. 2 were fairly harmless but one talked about how it is the responsibility of wealthy nations to pay for the care of poorer nations to help them not kill apes, and they other instructed my son to tell about a time he had been discriminated against. Now on to writing - so they want children to write pieces that convey their opinions in a convincing manner. Once again I can say from personal experience that this is really a way to train kids to use emotional language and feelings instead of rational logic and facts to make arguments. Another question my son had on an assignment (Help for Hubble) was Do you think it is worth 900 million to fix a telescope? Why or why not? Now most of these kids cannot comprehend 900 million and the article does not say what % to our national budget 900 mill is or what the future uses of Hubble are or any real facts that would allow a child to make a logical determination. Everything is based on emotion without facts. Also most childhood development experts agree that 6yr olds are not really ready to properly analyze a situation and come up with a decision so this is about as useful as asking them their favorite color. There is also the issue of data mining. These tests are not private. When your child takes a test it goes into a federal bank along with information about you, your race, your religion, your political affiliation, your medical history, your income and any other questions they choose to add in the future. They reserve the right to change the test and the questionnaires at will and impose them on all participating states. The information can be obtained by anyone who claims to have a legitimate purpose for needing it. This means future employers, colleges, political campaigns, and the sky is the limits. If you answered a question at 8 that made you sound like a racist they can use it against you at 30. So I think that is about it. Sorry it is long but it is complicated and I want you to understand it well. It is not about any particular political party, it is about greed and control.
Posted on: Mon, 29 Sep 2014 03:11:42 +0000
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