better late than never...

Last New Year's Eve I blogged about the glory of entering 2014 AC. Unfortunately, I didn't get around to posting it to my blog. I did, however, include it in the newsletter I wrote for my local association. Ironically, this ended up being my last association newsletter. My president wasn't happy with my post for some reason, so she fired me from my unpaid position as newsletter editor. #whatthef**kever! Sadly, the association newsletter died with this last editorial. Go figure. 
 
So, here goes... Better late than never... maybe.

10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1…  I don't know about you, but I was soooo ready for 2014 to arrive in all its glory. I had been waiting for this moment for over a decade and...  I. Couldn't. Wait. A new day would soon be dawning and I was waiting in eager anticipation. As the clock struck midnight, a miraculous change could be felt first on the right coast, then in the midwest, soon the left coast felt it with Hawaii ringing in the New Year Miracle last. As it happened, Facebook and Twitter were alive with the sound of music crossing this great land of ours as the shift we had been waiting for occurred. The great day had finally arrived and now All. Children. Are. Proficient. Or. Above. Oh, happy day! 

Surely we would now be bringing back the arts, music, science, social studies, voc. ed., physical education, RECESS, developmentally appropriate curricula and classroom teacher created tests back into the classroom. Surely we would be seeing the end of high-stakes testing, and the test prep to infinity and beyond that goes with it. No longer would we be Teachers as Testers! We would finally return to being Teachers... dare I say it... as Teachers! Can I hear an Amen! 

Data (that four letter word) would no longer be driving instruction. The never-ending analysis of data, created by tests whose questions we were not allowed to see, would end. Our children would no longer be Data Points. They would be children once again! The individual differences of our children would be celebrated and the cruel standardization of our children would cease to be. Deficit-based thinking would be so five minutes ago! No longer would our children be seen as common, but as unique. Children would once again be engaged in the learning process and actually enjoy coming to school. Students, teachers and administrators, finally released from the tyranny of the US Department of Education, could once again enjoy teaching and learning! Oh happy day! When will vacation be over so that we may enjoy this new world?

Happy New Year, y’all. Enjoy all that 2014 has to offer.  #TYNCLB

In 2015 I will continue resisting CC$$ and high-stakes testing. I'm so tired of this sh!t. Srsly!

nea ra 2013 - in opposition to nbi a

I tried, but the delegation voted to support spreading the Corporate Core propaganda.  Here's what I said:

My name is ATeacherAnon from California and this is my first RA.  I am speaking as an individual.

I strongly oppose NEA’s support of the Corporate-, Privatizer-, Education Deformer-, Bill Gates-driven Common Core State Standards, which were NOT developed by real, certificated CLASSROOM teachers or child development experts.

Nationally renowned early childhood expert Dr. Nancy Carlsson Paige's research told us that out of the 135 people who developed the K-3 standards, there were NO classroom teachers or child development experts among them,  resulting in standards that are not developmentally appropriate.

Dr. Stephan Krashen predicts that the CCSS will increase testing twentyfold.

I predict that that our already narrow, boring curricula will continue to be so. I predict that we will continue to ignore the needs of the whole child. I predict that we will continue to waste months of instructional time on test prep and testing.

As our class sizes continue to grow, precious dollars will be used to buy technology to serve the Corporate Core. I've read the Finnish national education standards. They do not look at all like the Common Core.

My professional conscience leads me to support real, classroom teacher-driven change, not corporate driven change.  We are burning out and stressing out kids. Kids have become disengaged from learning.

I oppose having my union dues spent to support the CCSS and spread Corporate Core propaganda to our students, families, and colleagues.

I urge you to oppose support for the implementation of these expensive, unproven set of standards.

I urge you, instead to support real, classroom teacher-driven change that will address the individual needs of all of our children.

Haven't we learned anything from NCLB?

my opinion of the common crap standards? do they really want to know?

Recently, my school district sent out a survey to teachers asking for input on the Common Crap Core National $tate $tandard$. The district has hand-picked a Common Core $tate $tandard$ Implementation Steering Committee to represent teachers and allow for transparency. Sadly, what my district tends to do is only select teachers who will passively, yet enthusiastically, suck down whatever Kool-Aid the district puts before them. If one is an advocate for doing what's best for kids as opposed to corporations, well, don't sit around waiting for a call to join a committee. And let me be clear: its not that my district evil, its just that they think they don't have a choice, so they cowardly roll over and accept the truly bad ideas being shoved down from on high. Then the dominoes continue to fall as administrators push these bad ideas on teachers who are then expected to push them onto our students. This circle-of-educational-life truly sucks. No Hakuna Matatas from me. I'm seeing problems everywhere and it doesn't look like they're going to be going away any time soon.

So, though I doubt it will garner anything more than an eye roll and maybe an Oh, she's the developmental one... followed by yet another eye roll, here's my response to the survey:

Common Core $tate $tandards $urvey

1.  What are you particularly excited about regarding the transition to CC$$?

·    Is this a trick question? (I really wanted to say Are you fucking kidding me? but I'm trying to be somewhat professional.)

·    And BTW - Most teachers don’t even know what the CC$ are or how they will impact our students and our profession.

2.  What obstacles or issues do you foresee?

·      Continued de-professionalization of teaching

·      Teacher burnout from over a decade of top down mandates that have yet to close the achievement gap.

·      Continued student burnout. 

·      Increased stress experienced by children, teachers and school districts due to increased high-stakes testing.

·      Continued mislabeling of children as failures because they are not developmentally ready to master the standards.

·      A further narrowing of the curriculum

3.  What essential questions do you have regarding the $tandard$ or the transition?

·      Why are only TK and K having to implement the CC$ in the 2012-13 school year? (Though I'd vote for NO one implementing them next year, or any year, for that matter!)

·      Implementing the CC$ will be co$tly (follow the money): more profe$$ional development; more high-$take te$t$; more technology; new textbook$, etc. How can there be adequate funding for implementing all aspects of the CC$ when we are experiencing continued budgetary crises?

·      The CC$ will require substantially more high-$take$ te$ting (Stephen Krashen predicts that testing will increase 20 fold.)

o   More high-stakes testing = less teaching. 

o   More high-stakes testing = more teaching to the test.

o   How are we going to protect our students from such abuse?

·      The CC$ were NOT developed by classroom teachers or child development experts. We will still be in a ‘one size fits all’, test-centric environment, expecting ALL children to learn and master standards at the same pace.  How will this benefit our children?

·      Will our curricula become even more narrowed? (Hint: Yes)

·      Will our curricula become even MORE test focused? (Hint: Yes)

·      And, yes, are the CC$ developmentally appropriate at any grade level? (They aren’t at my grade level and they go against best practices based on rigorous, peer-reviewed research.)

·      The CC$ diminishes the importance of fiction and personal narrative writing.  Coleman, a leading idiot author and smarmy architect of the CC$, expressed his view of personal narrative quite succinctly: “[A]s you grow up in this world you realize people really don’t give a shit about what you feel or what you think.” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pu6lin88YXU

Coleman is not an educator. Bill Gates, who bank rolled the CC$, is not an educator. Are we comfortable implementing standards that were determined by non-educators?

·      Have we learned nothing from the failure of NCLB? Basing everything on one test score is lunacy. The most important things cannot be measured. Creativity in American students is declining. Duncan, Gates and Obama would never submit their own children to these mandates. Why are they submitting ours?

·      Will the CC$ eventually be challenged in the courts as a violation of federal law that prohibits the federal government from imposing a national curriculum on our nation’s schools?

·      How will implementing the CC$ close the achievement gap? Please be specific and cite peer-reviewed research to support your argument.

Interesting links addressing the CC$:

·      http://whatiscommoncore.wordpress.com/2012/06/15/anti-common-core-in-national-news-from-reuters-washington-times-cnn-huffington-post-tampa-bay-times-deseret-news-new-york-post/

·      http://blogs.edweek.org/teachers/living-in-dialogue/2012/05/yong_zhao_common_core.html

·      http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/common-core-wont-likely-boost-student-achievement-analysis-says/2012/02/16/gIQAOfZuJR_blog.html

·      http://susanohanian.org/core.php

NCLB’s Lost Decade for Educational Progress:
What Can We Learn from this Policy Failure?

·      http://www.fairtest.org/NCLB-lost-decade-report-home