dianeravitch posted: Katie Osgood, who teaches in Chicago, describes what the Common Core and PARCC have done to her classroom. Whatever the children read is decontextualized, lifeless, bare of interest, skill-based. They are engaged in close reading, following Respond to this post by replying above this line New post on Diane Ravitchs blog Katie Osgood: Forget Winter, Here Comes PARCC! by dianeravitch Katie Osgood, who teaches in Chicago, describes what the Common Core and PARCC have done to her classroom. Whatever the children read is decontextualized, lifeless, bare of interest, skill-based. They are engaged in close reading, following David Colemans ideology. She writes: My school is drowning under the ridiculous Common Core Standards. Everything I know to do to inspire my students is forbidden. Instead, we are forced to deliver truly horrible curriculum in developmentally inappropriate ways with pacing charts that move so fast all our heads are spinning. My students with special needs are shutting down, acting out, or just giving up entirely. Sometimes I hear them whisper, I hate school. And they are right to think that. All the teachers are upset. And every time we ask Why? Why are you making us do this? the answer is always the same. PARCC is coming…. For the past two weeks, my co-teacher and I were teaching off the standard that asks our fifth graders to compare and contrast two pieces of literature from the same genre. In my inclusion classroom, that looks like reading two myths without any teaching around what myths are, about Ancient Greece, about how the myths point to our own humanity. No, we are told to have the kids create a Venn diagram of the two texts and then practice writing a constructed response. The kids have no idea who Zeus or Hera are. They know nothing about the way myths were used to explain religion and nature to an ancient people. There is no chance to connect these ancient stories to the kids own lives. I hear the kids mutter, Why are theses such funny names? But because we are on a strict pacing guide, and because the teaching of Greek Mythology is not in the standard, we simply moved on. This week were on to comparing poems. In order to practice more constructed responses. To get ready for PARCC. I cannot believe how we are warping the experience of reading for these children. Sometimes we are told to do a close readof stirring passages about the Underground Railroad for the sole purpose of pulling out the main idea and supporting details. We dont actually talk about the Underground Railroad-letting the horror of slavery sink in. No, its simply about getting the skill, so the kids can demonstrate the same skill on the dreaded test. What a ridiculous disservice. I still remember my fourth grade teacher reading us a novel on Harriet Tubman and how that story was one of my first understandings of true injustice. We were inspired to create art projects, to write poetry, to pull out further texts on slavery from our library. We had class discussions. We wrote letters. We felt the text come alive. Our kids are not getting anything remotely like that experience. Because of PARCC. And to make things worse, I teach at an all African-American school in a high-poverty neighborhood on Chicagos southside. Killing the love of reading before it starts for my students is nothing short of criminal. But because of the high-stakes nature of PARCC, knowing that schools just blocks away have been closed for their poor test scores, our school is in a sickening frenzy to raise our test scores by any means necessary. Everything revolves around this test. And my students who so desperately need safe, supportive, relevant, and engaging learning environments, instead are given high-pressured, standardized, test-prep CCRAP. Will anyone defend these absurd practices? Or must we go along because Arne says so. Because the College Board says so. Because the business community believes that Common Core will prepare our children to be globally competitive. Based on what evidence? dianeravitch | December 10, 2014 at 11:00 am | Categories: Common Core | URL: wp.me/p2odLa-99p Comment See all comments Unsubscribe to no longer receive posts from Diane Ravitchs blog. Change your email settings at Manage Subscriptions. Trouble clicking? Copy and paste this URL into your browser: dianeravitch.net/2014/12/10/katie-osgood-forget-winter-here-comes-parcc/ Thanks for flying with WordPress
Posted on: Sun, 28 Dec 2014 18:16:41 +0000
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