Thinking About Standards

Standards have been on my mind a lot lately, as I am sure they have been a topic of consideration for many educators. I started my teaching career shortly after NCLB was enacted, so my whole career has been during the context of standards-based reform. When I first saw the CCSS document for English Language Arts, I was not that concerned because of the emphasis of the standards providing what to teach, without dictating how to teach it. I could see how they could still align with the workshop philosophy, as well as appreciating the shift toward an emphasis on higher levels of critical thinking. I could also recognize advantages of collaboration among states.

Yet, I started to hear diverse perspectives on the Common Core and questions of whether or not it was really a step in the right direction. I also heard criticisms of professional organizations such as NCTE for accepting the standards too quickly without putting up a fight against them. One person in particular was a   name that I have known since my undergraduate ESL/bilingual education courses, someone who was regarded as one of the "big names" and who I highly respect, so it gave me even more pause and careful consideration.

However, over time I have realized that I tend to agree with NCTE's rebuttal that they recognize the standards are not going away completely and that as an organization one of their roles is to support teachers with the transition. I appreciate that they are prompting dialogue and considering how teachers can participate in the process of thinking about implementation. I also recognize that they have played a role in voicing concerns, both through the process to provide feedback and through their recent Resolution on Challenging Current Education Policy and Affirming Literacy Educators' Expertise.

Recently, I read two NCTE books related to standards, Adolescent Literacy at Risk?: The Impact of Standards and Supporting Students in a Time of Common Core Standards: English Language Arts Grades 6-8. I will post about both of them separately soon, but one of the main aspects that stood out about them was the dedication to treating teachers as professionals, just as the resolution mentioned above also highlights.

Fall Update

This fall I have been finding my bearings in a new context - a one year sabbatical replacement position teaching undergraduate teacher education courses. I have many of the same students in the three courses that I am teaching because of the cohort model at our university. I really enjoy the close-knit community of learners since for the past three years I have been in an educational context that valued the sense of collaboration and community in a k-8 setting.

I co-presented at my first national conference along with two of my colleagues, sharing research on recruiting and retaining teachers in rural areas with implications for administrators and teacher preparation programs. A nice bonus was that the conference was held on the coast of South Carolina, being able to intermix conference sessions with walking along the beach reflecting (and experiencing the wonder and joy of learning about something new - horseshoe crabs).

I have also been attending classes for my doctoral degree - one on large scale literacy assessments and another on quantitative research, along with working on the preliminary stages of my dissertation. Considering the Common Core and the implications it has for teaching has also been on my mind a lot lately as well.

Needless to say, I have been thinking and reflecting a lot this fall. I have missed blogging, but I am also working through what to blog about. For so long I have been blogging about teaching reading and writing, areas that I am still passionate about, but this fall my work has had a different focus. I am looking forward to winter term when I will be teaching some literacy courses, such as Children's Lit and Emergent Literacy.

As educators, it is interesting to consider how our identities are shaped over time by our contexts and experiences. I hope to blog on more consistently once again in the upcoming months.