I had a fascinating conversation with my master teacher today that I think exemplifies the struggle that all teachers are facing as the country adopts Common Core, while illustrating the kind of work and planning we are going to be doing together as a new unit on poetry begins and I get more experience in the role of the teacher.
The next chapter in the book the school uses centers around poetry, and the different types of poems that can be written. My master teacher and co-teacher have been in discussion for a couple weeks, trying to figure out how to identify how they can connect the poetry to Common Core standards when they are not as familiar or used to them as they want to be. Weaving through all of this is some distress over the freedom and time they will have now that they do not have to prepare students for taking the CST.
Things finally started coming together today in terms of planning, and I got a sense of what is going to be happening after the students take their chapter test on Tuesday.
It is the conversation that happened at this point that I found to be really valuable in terms of my learning and moving forward as an educator.
My master teacher shared that she found the chapter on poetry confusing due to the new Common Core because there are no standards that directly correlate to teaching poetry to students and how she believes that a lot of what is in English textbooks are not always things that she finds to be of particular value to her students. We talked about how students need to cultivate critical thinking skills and the ability to prove their ideas and arguments. This left her to wonder how she could involve poetry, get students the vocabulary that they need to know, and make sure that when we start asking them to think critically and show proof and refer back to the text, they get it, which she often doesn’t think they do.
I feel that through this conversation, I began to understand her perspective a bit more than I have so far. She’s very open about how unsure she is about Common Core, and how she doesn’t know what to do with the freedom she has now that she doesn’t have to spend weeks preparing students for the CST. I don’t think this is uncommon in education. But I also think there could be a lot more buy-in from students if we did not separate school-learning from real-world learning, which I think that Common Core does a better job of doing than how I was taught in middle and high school.
This leaves me with two goals for the upcoming weeks:
These are two goals that I really believe in and hope to always be doing with my students, but I think there is some forward momentum happening that I find to be exciting and important for my learning. My hope is that I will be able to create lessons that give voice and purpose to my students while challenging them to become more critical thinkers. All while experiencing this transition from rote, textbook learning to learning the skills to navigate 21st-century content.
It’s a process. A fascinating one. I can’t wait to share what happens when I start teaching analysis to 8th-graders using poetry. I’m going to shoot for the moon. And I’m bringing my students along for the ride.
The next chapter in the book the school uses centers around poetry, and the different types of poems that can be written. My master teacher and co-teacher have been in discussion for a couple weeks, trying to figure out how to identify how they can connect the poetry to Common Core standards when they are not as familiar or used to them as they want to be. Weaving through all of this is some distress over the freedom and time they will have now that they do not have to prepare students for taking the CST.
Things finally started coming together today in terms of planning, and I got a sense of what is going to be happening after the students take their chapter test on Tuesday.
It is the conversation that happened at this point that I found to be really valuable in terms of my learning and moving forward as an educator.
My master teacher shared that she found the chapter on poetry confusing due to the new Common Core because there are no standards that directly correlate to teaching poetry to students and how she believes that a lot of what is in English textbooks are not always things that she finds to be of particular value to her students. We talked about how students need to cultivate critical thinking skills and the ability to prove their ideas and arguments. This left her to wonder how she could involve poetry, get students the vocabulary that they need to know, and make sure that when we start asking them to think critically and show proof and refer back to the text, they get it, which she often doesn’t think they do.
I feel that through this conversation, I began to understand her perspective a bit more than I have so far. She’s very open about how unsure she is about Common Core, and how she doesn’t know what to do with the freedom she has now that she doesn’t have to spend weeks preparing students for the CST. I don’t think this is uncommon in education. But I also think there could be a lot more buy-in from students if we did not separate school-learning from real-world learning, which I think that Common Core does a better job of doing than how I was taught in middle and high school.
This leaves me with two goals for the upcoming weeks:
- Explicitly include Common Core standards in my lesson plans, so we can work together to make sure that when we set goals for each lesson, we work towards the standard more than we work toward the content within the book.
- Weave in tasks that mirror what is being asked of students on the Smarter Balance Test that they will be taking in April so that students do not view the testing as a separate entity, but an assessment that truly represents the kind of work we are already doing.
These are two goals that I really believe in and hope to always be doing with my students, but I think there is some forward momentum happening that I find to be exciting and important for my learning. My hope is that I will be able to create lessons that give voice and purpose to my students while challenging them to become more critical thinkers. All while experiencing this transition from rote, textbook learning to learning the skills to navigate 21st-century content.
It’s a process. A fascinating one. I can’t wait to share what happens when I start teaching analysis to 8th-graders using poetry. I’m going to shoot for the moon. And I’m bringing my students along for the ride.