Common Core or Common failure? Families pull kids out of class

katu.com ^ | 11/13/13 | Dan Cassuto KATU News and KATU.com Staff

[Nachum]

HILLSBORO, Ore. – Nine parents pulled their seventh- and eighth-graders out of math class and started teaching them at home, because they are upset with the new Common Core curriculum that public schools in Oregon are starting this year.

Seventh-grader Amy Craig has always been an "A" student in math until this year. She came home with a "D."

The same thing happened to other students in her school. So their moms got together and decided to teach math themselves – an hour every morning.

Then the kids go off to school for the rest of the day.

This is the first school year when every public school in Oregon is using Common Core teaching standards. Forty-five other states use those, too.

"Our teachers would tell you math is more challenging this year than it was a year ago," said Rian Petrick, principal of Evergreen Middle School in Hillsboro, who is not surprised kids are struggling.

Math hasn't changed, but he said there are now fewer numbers and formulas and many more word problems and real-world examples. It includes more group work. That's tough for some kids.

"Our teachers feel like it's the best thing for kids, making them look much deeper into mathematics than they have in the past," Petrick said.

[Albion Wilde]

I have always suspected that a prime goal of Common Core is to separate the elite from everyone else, to hinder kids who can do rote work very well but may not be able to re-invent math in their seventh-grade minds.

The Soviets did that. They channeled kids into various jobs from kindergarten onward.

My experience in the current U.S. as a retired corporate professional who tried a lower-stress job after retirement is that people who excel are subject to discrimination -- regimented employees bully and hate an achiever, and accuse them of snobbery and "not knowing their place." When I would try to introduce any commonsense improvements that actually worked and boosted performance, especially if it made things look better to the regional manager, the knives really came out.

[Cooter]

bfl

[goodnesswins]

HA...that was ME! I excelled at Algebra.....couldn’t understand Geometry....got my worst grade...a C-

[dsc]

“S.M.S.G. survivor here.”

I guess I survived, but I think my life might have been different if I’d had, say, Isaac Asimov for an algebra tutor.

[dsc]

“see how education majors compare to engineering majors in the GRE”

Do you know where those figures can be found?

[The Bat Lady]

They are teaching so that kids can’t learn. Want to see something REALLY scary? This is why kids can’t do math.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wOH9gwImyXg

[Albion Wilde]

...the extensive use of ‘jargon’ in Algebra classes. Rather than explaining what was really being done, teachers would use terms like “Transpose” and give a list of Rules of how to transpose, instead of simply stating that it amounted to performing the same operation to both sides of the equation.

I agree with that. I also found the same thing in business -- execs just talking lingo out of their azzes.

[aruanan]

“see how education majors compare to engineering majors in the GRE”

Do you know where those figures can be found?

I will try to run that down. It's been a while since I read it.