Contact your reps on Common Core

[farmerbyron]

My wife and I recently started reading about this as our little one will be starting school next year. This stuff I am hearing from other parents and reading is scary as a parent. I hope its not to late to get into the fight to keep this out of our schools.

It is absolutely not too late. Get on the horn and let your representation how you feel and that you are watching them closely. There are many parents that are up in arms about CC and it is really nonpartisan in nature. You have both the right leaners and left leaners working to repeal. It is bad law and I hope our state govt. does not underestimate the outrage among parents over this issue. It has very conservative friends of mine looking into democrat candidates for state superintendent and governor candidates. In fact, if the democrat nominee for gov. is against CC and supports repeal, they will get my vote.

 

[crrcboatz]

It is absolutely not too late. Get on the horn and let your representation how you feel and that you are watching them closely. There are many parents that are up in arms about CC and it is really nonpartisan in nature. You have both the right leaners and left leaners working to repeal. It is bad law and I hope our state govt. does not underestimate the outrage among parents over this issue. It has very conservative friends of mine looking into democrat candidates for state superintendent and governor candidates. In fact, if the democrat nominee for gov. is against CC and supports repeal, they will get my vote.

well said!!!!!!!!

 

[rawhide]

Congressman Bridenstine co-sponsoring legislation to stop common core.
Although it seems we have enough problems with our own elected government officials.

I haven't thoroughly evaluated all the candidates for State Superintendent but from what I've seen not a single one from either party is opposing common core. Although Hoffmeister does state

we must limit government and respect local control. Locally elected school boards, teachers, their local communities, and most importantly, parents should make decisions about whether or not they want to educate their students. The federal government should have no role in telling Oklahoma schools what to teach.

I thought this article on Fallin's new Secretary of Education is very concerning.

 

[streak]

I know people on this board don't do facebook but I plan on pushing the agenda to my friends by using a few of these places ( as well as legislators)

https://www.facebook.com/stopcommoncore

https://www.facebook.com/ParentsAndEducatorsAgainstCCSS

 

[farmerbyron]

Excellent example of the rubbish being taught in common core.

http://www.mommabears.org/1/post/2014/02/a-papa-bear-speaks-up-engineer-dad-explains-concerns-for-7th-grade-common-core-math.html

A Papa Bear Speaks Up: Engineer Dad Explains Concerns for 7th grade Common Core Math
02/15/2014

On Facebook these days, talking about our children’s homework has become sport. We wonder who is writing the common core curriculum and how they come up with some of the content? Everyone is comparing notes. Generally we see our teachers and school integrating common core with as much creativity as they can while still keeping some school academic traditions that the students look forward to each year that might not be on the “to-do” test list for common core. Seems more and more though, if it is not on the test, it gets dropped from the lessons. But, who can argue with higher standards? We are optimistic. But, up till now we have taken a wait and see position on whether common core is as good as they say.

We are not political. We are just reasonable. As a family we are probably a typical public school family with kids who excel in the system. Generally grades are good. Every now and then we see some 100% in TCAP categories. We diligently communicate with our teachers and we are very strict about completing homework and trying our best. Sounds like the model family any teacher would want? My wife and I are both public school graduates who are college educated. I have a chemical engineering degree. Math is my thing. And I enjoy helping my children with math homework. But, this week revealed to me a disturbing trend in math curriculum - vocabulary.

My son had been struggling. So we took on this week’s lesson with a little more hands-on approach and were puzzled with what we saw. On the math vocabulary list were “Constant of Variation” Defined as: a constant ratio in a direct variation AND “Direct Variation” Defined as: the relationship between two variable quantities that have a constant ratio.

"When two variable quantities have a constant ratio, their relationship is called a direct variation or a direct proportion. The constant ratio is called the constant of variation." (Page 405 Common Core math 7th grade textbook published by Pearson).

This is absolute mush. Made up for the sake of introducing words into math. I have had plenty of math in my time, and have never heard of a "constant of variation" or "direct variation" in either engineering school or in my work as an engineer.

The text's authors have attempted to string together some meaningful math words to try to define a simple concept of proportion. The concepts of proportions, and functions and relationships are very vital in understanding algebra, but I think if I was a student I would be lost in the mush. I thought maybe I'm out of touch, but you can't even find these phrases defined in Wolframalpha. Is this what is meant by “common core aligned”? To integrate made-up words so we believe them to be true? Guess Wolframalpha is not aligned?

A big part of the problem, if I understand the issue, is that this common core initiative is pushing all this standardized mush onto the teachers and taking away all autonomy and creative skills the teachers bring to the class with their diverse students. Somehow the belief is that if we integrate language arts into math, we will somehow strengthen our language skills? Nice idea. But, not with made-up words. I wonder if I would have become an engineer if language arts were a part of my K-12 math education?

So here is my attempt to verbalize and over-explain in the common core style of math written expression:

“If you were to graph the creative flexibility afforded our highly educated and maximally qualified teachers over time with common core, you would find that both the first derivative of the function and, most alarmingly, the second derivative of the function, are negative. There is no point of inflection as the function approaches infinity (i.e., increasingly decreasing teacher autonomy, with no turnaround in sight.)”

Look at the actual list of vocabulary (in picture above). Some words are viable. But, don’t make up stuff just to make us think we are going deeper or to give our kids an excuse to write in math class.

If this what we have signed on to with Common Core, I now understand why so many parents are asking for its repeal. Parents who are really paying attention lose trust in the idea common core is better. I understand this curriculum has not been field tested. So it makes perfect sense to let teachers field test by plucking out the good curriculum content from this mush we have been given in the Pearson textbook and leave the made-up definitions out of mathematics.

-submitted by a concerned Papa Bear in Tennessee

I know for a fact that they are pushing literary assignments onto all subjects. My wife, who teaches art, has had to add a certain percentage of literary assignments to meet the new standards. I really worry that eventually they will be testing art with standardized testing and frankly, the only way to get a test in art is to for the content to be heavy on art history. The kids hate art history and teachers hate teaching it. Yes, some is necessary but to make an entire HS class focus on art history is a disaster. One of the primary purposes for an art class is to give kids a creative outlet. A reprieve from all the other BS they are dealing with throughout the day.

 

[rawhide]

Senator Ford refuses to hear bill
http://www.okcfox.com/story/24743799/hundreds-protest-common-core-ed-standards-in-okla

 

[farmerbyron]

Congressman Bridenstine co-sponsoring legislation to stop common core.
Although it seems we have enough problems with our own elected government officials.

I haven't thoroughly evaluated all the candidates for State Superintendent but from what I've seen not a single one from either party is opposing common core. Although Hoffmeister does state

we must limit government and respect local control. Locally elected school boards, teachers, their local communities, and most importantly, parents should make decisions about whether or not they want to educate their students. The federal government should have no role in telling Oklahoma schools what to teach.

I thought this article on Fallin's new Secretary of Education is very concerning.

This is the line that the CC proponents are going to tow. They are going to say that since the National Governors Association (which Fallin chairs) came up with the standards, that it is not federally controlled. It is a cop out and removes all local control over our school systems. Most of us can agree that the closer the control is to a community, the better the school can adapt to the varied and changing needs of a district. Just like any other iteration of govt. Closest to the people is best.

 

[farmerbyron]

Maybe a visualization will help some more people understand the insanity. I know I've seen this with my own first graders homework. Every story he reads has questions at the end and every damn one asks either how he thinks the character "feels" or how he "feels" about the story. Just nonsense.






This one is from a first graders homework. (not mine.)


Another question from 1st grade.

 

[rawhide]

This is the line that the CC proponents are going to tow. They are going to say that since the National Governors Association (which Fallin chairs) came up with the standards, that it is not federally controlled. It is a cop out and removes all local control over our school systems. Most of us can agree that the closer the control is to a community, the better the school can adapt to the varied and changing needs of a district. Just like any other iteration of govt. Closest to the people is best.

From what I've read I think you are right and I stated as much in the line above the quote I posted. Like Fallin stating she opposes federal control while maintaining the same standard of control from OKC.

 

[crrcboatz]

From what I've read I think you are right and I stated as much in the line above the quote I posted. Like Fallin stating she opposes federal control while maintaining the same standard of control from OKC.

Just as I have said earlier in this thread NEVER forget, a school should reflect the community it is located in. That is an adage I was taught in 1980 via OSU administration course I was taking. The thought then was if you give that up to a state or federal inanity you have lost control of that concept. As mentioned earlier such local control includes but is not limited to is, leadership, board members, curriculum, teachers, finance, transportation, etc. That concept has served this country since the one room school days. During that time we have gone to the moon (to this day no one else has), first atom bomb, on and on and on and on. This entire concept is about CONTROL. Farmer has it right, the governor is trying to sell the fact that since it is not a fed thing all is well. She is in fact head of the governors organization for this very thing. She is in fact seeking to control education through a renegade state supt that gets her marching orders from the governor's office, and the governor will threaten funding to schools if the public does not bend to this. She has already done this too!!! This is textbook Texas education. This is textbook Florida education. Bow to this ideology and you will NEVER get local control back. This old fart has no dog in this fight. That said, common sense and a buttload of years invested in Oklahoma Education tells me this is a turning point for all of that. The public better wake up and fast.