From K-12 children across the nation go to school each day with a willingness to learn. While the children may be ready and willing, not all states are ready or able to offer the same level of education. The Common Core State Standards were implemented by the Federal Government in order to standardize education across America. These Common Core State Standards grew out of the No Child Left Behind program instituted by former president George W. Bush. One frightening realization many teachers come to have is that the Common Core State Standards are not a curriculum, but only standards that must be met. Now they must figure out for themselves what they should teach to meet the standards. So when most parents today hear the phrase “Common Core,”
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Several shifts towards placing a stronger emphasis on “argumentative and informative writing versus narrative, imaginative or personal writing than prior state standards” mean that teachers focus less on writing for fun, and more on writing for a specific reason. (Wilcox, et al. 2). One major problem noted is that the Common Core State Standards “benchmarks for writing development [were] ‘simply educated guesses as to what students should be able to do at particular grades’” (Wilcox, et al. 5). Teachers had no conclusive way to measure a student’s progress in their writing skills. As Wilcox, et al. show, “…perils include: … approaching recursively-developing literacy competencies in a piece-meal and linear way based on trivial grade-by-grade distinctions … [and] the overemphasis on ‘one and done’ high-stakes assessments of writing that can strongly shape instruction” (4). The authors come to the conclusion that students who have one big assignment will not learn how to properly write, versus students who are able to write in a more relaxed setting. Their argument is that the focus is on the wrong type of writing, but they also admit that no one focus by itself will have all the …show more content…
They point out that, “while we often associate standardized testing of writing achievement with contemporary K–12 classrooms, it has long been commonplace in the US. Most popular accounts of standardized testing in the US identify the late 1960s as the beginning of the age of standardized testing” (Addison and McGee 2). In fact, national standards have been around for even longer, originating in the mid-1800s and early 1900s (Addison and McGee 3). Addison and McGee do not take issue with the existence of Common Core standards, rather they are concerned with the effects these standards have on writing, rhetoric, and composition. They make an assumption that a standardized test for writing may be developed, which is unfortunately not likely as writing itself is not something that can easily be captured with one
Several shifts towards placing a stronger emphasis on “argumentative and informative writing versus narrative, imaginative or personal writing than prior state standards” mean that teachers focus less on writing for fun, and more on writing for a specific reason. (Wilcox, et al. 2). One major problem noted is that the Common Core State Standards “benchmarks for writing development [were] ‘simply educated guesses as to what students should be able to do at particular grades’” (Wilcox, et al. 5). Teachers had no conclusive way to measure a student’s progress in their writing skills. As Wilcox, et al. show, “…perils include: … approaching recursively-developing literacy competencies in a piece-meal and linear way based on trivial grade-by-grade distinctions … [and] the overemphasis on ‘one and done’ high-stakes assessments of writing that can strongly shape instruction” (4). The authors come to the conclusion that students who have one big assignment will not learn how to properly write, versus students who are able to write in a more relaxed setting. Their argument is that the focus is on the wrong type of writing, but they also admit that no one focus by itself will have all the …show more content…
They point out that, “while we often associate standardized testing of writing achievement with contemporary K–12 classrooms, it has long been commonplace in the US. Most popular accounts of standardized testing in the US identify the late 1960s as the beginning of the age of standardized testing” (Addison and McGee 2). In fact, national standards have been around for even longer, originating in the mid-1800s and early 1900s (Addison and McGee 3). Addison and McGee do not take issue with the existence of Common Core standards, rather they are concerned with the effects these standards have on writing, rhetoric, and composition. They make an assumption that a standardized test for writing may be developed, which is unfortunately not likely as writing itself is not something that can easily be captured with one