What I don’t get is the existence of such an insane number of short-sleeved onesies. When is a baby supposed to wear all of them? In winter it’s too cold and in summer it’s way too cold because of the AC. We just end up rotating the same few long-sleeved ones in the end.
Onesies
Clarissa's Blog 
I know this is grossly off-topic but did you know about this?
http://www.cgcs.org/domain/108
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I’ve been trying to figure out what Common Core is about but nobody can say anything definitive on the subject. So I can’t form an opinion.
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It’s supposed to standardize what kids learn across school districts and states. I can’t believe something like this hasn’t existed since we’ve had public schools.
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Teachers seem to complain about it a lot for some reason but I could never figure out why.
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Give us all of your short-sleeved onesies! We’ve got no A/C 🙂
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One of the issues with CC is that a good number of the standards for the younger students are developmentally inappropriate and include concepts and skills most children are just not capable of at the age CC decrees they must be.
Remember, half of all students have below average intelligence and it is the public school’s responsibility to teach and nurture everyone. So if any of the readers of this comment are thinking, I had no problem doing this or that at age X, or My kid can already do that!, good for you. You are obviously smart enough to understand the world doesn’t revolve around you, nor should it.
Another complaint about CC is that it emphasizes reading non-fiction and technical writing (informational text) over fiction and literature. The architect of CC, David Coleman, famously said that when people join the work world, their bosses don’t ask them to write about their childhood, they ask for things like market analysis, “No one gives a sh*t about what you think or feel.”
Where to start on that! Emotional intelligence IS terribly important, in life and in the work world, and one of the ways students develop the ability to see life from someone else’s perspective (a key component of EQ) is through reading literature. Again, if this sort of ability comes easily to you, bully for you. Many people are not like you. Schools do not exist to educate only you.
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Continued:
Having students write about their own experiences helps develop the self awareness that is a key component of EQ. Also, learning to write can be very hard. It is enough to juggle things like sentence structure and organization without adding unfamiliar context into the mix. Having students write about their experiences and feelings is a good starting point. Having a student in the grades write about themselves does not mean they will not grow to be ablessed to write the market analyses Coleman thinks is all important later in life.
Of course, Coleman is wrong about that too. The main purpose of the public school is not to make workers, it is to develop citizens for our democracy.
Coleman also advocates something called Close Reading, which assumes that background knowledge is not necessary for comprehension. There is a video that is easily Google-able of him pretending to teach Martin Luther King’s letter from jail to students who know nothing about MLK or the Civil Rights movement. It is the worst teaching you will ever see and gives you a sense of why it isn’t a good idea to have someone like him oversee the development for a nationwide curriculum.
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I hate auto correct:
“… will not grow up to be unable to write the market…”
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Continued:
Finally, CC revolves national standardized tests that serve only as a stick to beat schools with.
Let’s say you are a third grader. You take the test. The results come back months later, in the aggregate. Your teachers are given no information on how you specifically did on the test! There is no diagnostic value to them.
The school only knows that some students are pulling down the scores and making the entire district look bad.
They focus with laser-like precision on that first grader named N. He doesn’t even know his letters! They figure they better get cracking on him now so that maybe, just maybe, with enough intervention, they might be able to get him to reading somewhere near grade level.
So no more recess, art or music for you, N.! It’s reading tutoring all the time for now on.
This is actually what happened to my neighbor’s daughter, starting in kindergarten. She is a kid that could have really used more socializing with other kids because she has a lot of trouble making and keeping friends. That is why in second grade, her parents put her in a Catholic school, out of the reach of CC and the tests.
Since the tests are based on what is in the CC, teachers must follow it. Even if the methods CC requires don’t work well for their students.
The last thing I will say is that advocates for CC like Arne Duncan and sad for me to say, President Obama, do not send their kids to schools that follow CC. What does that tell you?
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I am not particularly impressed by what my eldest, now a rising junior in high school, has had as assigned reading throughout his schooling. It’s all modern fiction. (The Fault in Our Stars and the like). I understand that these modern pieces help kids better connect with the texts, but they get no exposure whatsoever to any classic pieces from various parts of Europe and the world (which would help cement what they are learning in world history, for instance). I had many of the the Russian, German, French classics in high school — it’s a great time to be introduced to some heavier fare, but here the choices of literature seem to re-enforce this singular focus on the kids themselves and their own world and emotions, rather than teaching them there is a bigger world out there, and has existed for a very long time, and there are more serious and more complex issues than what a western teenager can face.
Eldest is a voracious reader, so I don’t worry too much about him when it comes to reading assignments.
But I do worry about Middle Boy, who is already showing complete disinterest in fiction; he taught himself to read at the age of 4 to be able to play older bro’s video games. He’s in 3rd grade but reads many grades above his grade level; however, he doesn’t read much for pleasure. The problem is to find something that he won’t find boring and stupid. He likes science and humor. He is probably a good candidate for nonfiction.
I have a brilliant undergrad who says he stopped watching cartoons at 4, cause he didn’t see the point, they no longer kept his interest. I think we overall may overestimate the appeal of fiction to children. Some (many?) kids take plenty of interest and enjoyment in the world as is.
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The Fault in Our Stars is not fiction. It’s a pile of steaming bullcrap that shouldn’t be brought anywhere near a school.
I’m a professor of literature, and I absolutely agree that not everybody needs fiction, and that’s perfectly fine. My sister, for instance, is a voracious reader but she’s not into fiction. It’s a matter of personal preference and should never be forced. It is wrong, I believe, to associate reading exclusively with fiction. Children should be allowed to choose the kind of reading that appeals to them. Besides, such preferences can change with time.
It’s important to expose kids to all kinds of reading choices and let them find out what they prefer. But idiotic things like Twilight or Harlequin romance should not be elevated to a status they don’t deserve by being introduced in school.
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Since you like to read so much, are you going to buy all three volumes of *The Complete Works of Putin *(a collection of every word he’s spoken publicly since becoming President in 2000)?
The books are now on sale in Russia. Better hurry — the first print run is almost sold out.
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I’m sure they will be forcing people working for the state (which is the majority of the population) to buy this garbage, like was done back in the USSR.
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