The Common Core State Standards freak me out. Really. Taking some of the math practice problems online and looking at the guidelines that go along with the test gave me anxiety. How am I going to ensure that my students can be successful on this test? How can I avoid "teaching for the test"? We discussed some of these issues in class yesterday, but I really didn't find any comfort in a solution.
One of the major things I'm going to have to incorporate into my math class is not only teaching students the math, but teaching them to be explicit in their explanations of how they got to their answers. On the Common Core Assessment, part of the math section is to explain how the student got to a certain answer. This isn't intuitive, especially in the younger grades, and it's a skill that has to be taught and cultivated. I can't just show students how to do a story problem and expect them to be able to explicitly list the steps and thought process they had about it. I'm going to have to consciously think about it.
What scares me even more about the test, is the fact that they have to take this test online. The test related to the Common Core is actually called the Smarter Balance Assessment. This means that I'll have to teach my students not only how to write exponents on paper like they'll usually see them, but also how to write them on a computer (2^7). I guarantee there will be a handful, if not majority, of my students who have never seen that exponent computer symbol before. This test also assumes that they are comfortable using the numbers on a keyboard and typing in general. Hopefully, if I'm teaching high school, they will have some of these skills, but I know that I will need to teach some of them as well.
Furthermore, I am graded on how well my students do on this test! This means that even if I have brilliant students, who just enter their answers wrong on the computer or have difficulty with typing and other keyboard entries, they could get much lower scores than they deserve, and I could get punished for it. How then, do they expect us not to spend our time teaching directly to the test in order to attempt to "guarantee" their success on it? I suppose this comes down to a moral issue, of me knowing that it's more important to teach them the math material and make sure they understand the concepts that will help them in the future, rather than focusing on how to type equations exactly how the assessment wants them. What's even better, is that this test will be enacted during my first year of teaching!
Can you say stressed?
I also found the math section of the test very intimidating, and I am so glad that I am not a math teacher. It is not an easy process to learn how to explain your academic process, but there does seem to be a lot of value in it. I think that this program will be preparing us pretty well for these tasks and unless I am much mistaken not all teacher education programs do. I'm sure you'll be fine, we just need to make sure that we are keeping the students in mind while planning our lessons.
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed reading your perspective on the CCSS. As a Spanish teacher, I don't have any qualms about teaching to the test or worrying about exact standard I need my students to learn because my subject area isn't tested. That being said, it scared me that even if the teacher is in another grade or an untested subject, the administration will find a way to hold you accountable for it. That is terrifying to me too.
ReplyDeleteI was reading Rachel's latest blog post where she talks about the overwhelming nature of implementing all of the millions of things we're learning into our classrooms, and this is just another thing to add...but we will make it through!
On a side note, teaching subject-specific computer skills seems really relevant not only for the test, but for a more technology -based future. Just like you'll have to show them where all the symbols are, I'll have to go through the shortcuts to adding accents and tildes.
I totally empathize with you about being thoroughly freaked out after looking over the Smarter Balanced Assessment questions! There have been moments over the summer, when students seem like they are intuitively able to understand how to do a problem, but then are thoroughly perplexed, and want to change their answer, when you ask them why! Getting students to show their work and be able to explain their process is no small task. I worry about being able to devote time to this part of "how to do math" and balance teaching new content. And we also need to think about how we will prepare students with the digital literacy skills they will need to be successful on these tests! But I do agree with Claire, that there is value in teaching the subject specific computer skills as well. Whether it will be as useful to students that don't go on to study more math in their future is not as clear to me, but hopefully they will be able to use these skills to at least deepen their conceptual understanding of math by paying particular attention to notation as they learn these skills.
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