Have you signed up for The Educator’s Room Daily Newsletter? Click here and support independent journalism! When I started teaching high school English twenty years ago, my main focus was on preparing my students for college. It took me years of teaching, parenthood, a graduate degree, and personal distress about our national politics to finally […]
Standards
Posted inCurrent Events in Education
Who is the Teacher: School or Family?
I saw a discussion post on Facebook the other day about education. No surprise. Everyone went to school, everyone has learned something in their life, so everyone has an opinion. Parents are passionate about their kids and have opinions about all things school. This discussion, however, was a newer one to me. It was about […]
Posted inInstruction & Curriculum
How to Integrate Literacy into the Non-ELA Classroom
If there is one message that I get when I examine the Common Core standards for reading and writing, it’s this: Share the load. I think that English teachers have often shouldered the burden of literacy. We have felt that it is simply our job to teach students to write and to read and to analyze […]
Posted inInstruction & Curriculum
Math Standards in Middle School
I taught middle school math for 30 years. During my career I used many different types of math standards. These standards included school district standards, NCTM standards, a new set of district standards, textbook “programs,” and finally the Pennsylvania state standards. The PA standards very closely resemble the current Common Core standards with one exception. […]
Posted inUncategorized
High Expectations Are Not New For Students
High expectations have become “the raised bar” There is nothing wrong with high expectations, or with “raising the bar”. Good teaching includes working towards students having a depth in skills, and the ability to maintain rigor in their studies. It has always been that way. What has been happening through current corporate-driven reforms, though, is […]
Posted inCommon Core, Featured, Opinion
School VALUES, not "Standards"
Let’s start talking about shared core values, not common standards, please. My colleagues, my students, their parents, my own children… none of them are “common” or “standard.” This sentiment isn’t new to anyone who is serious about education and has done it for any length of time, or to anyone who has children of their […]
Posted inCommon Core, Featured, Opinion
School VALUES, not “Standards”
Let’s start talking about shared core values, not common standards, please. My colleagues, my students, their parents, my own children… none of them are “common” or “standard.” This sentiment isn’t new to anyone who is serious about education and has done it for any length of time, or to anyone who has children of their […]
Posted inInstructional Strategies, Middle School, Uncategorized
Common Core and Mathematics
During my entire career, there were always standards in mathematics. Whether I was dealing with the mathematics standards of the School District of Philadelphia, the standards of the state of Pennsylvania, or the standards of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM), I followed some standards in the teaching of mathematics. With this as […]