Mary Hendricks-Harris

Mary Hendricks-Harris is chief academic officer for the Francis Howell School District in Missouri. With more than 20 years of experience, Mary has been a special education teacher, director of special education, and director of assessment.

New Answers to Old Questions: Transition to Common Core

One of the things I am most excited about is planning for the transition to common core state standards. At the same time, this shift keeps me up at night. How will we get it done? How will we fund the transition? Professional development? Bandwidth? While I am not sure if these are the right standards or if the process for determining these standards was perfect, I do know it is time to embrace change in both curriculum and instruction. I am not alone in the excitement and anxiety surrounding the transition, but I also know this process is going to be much easier for our district than others, thanks to the professional learning community model. We have a clear mission, vision and values. There is a culture of continuous improvement and collective inquiry, and thank goodness our teachers have regular time to collaborate and are accustomed to answering the four questions:

  1. What should students know and be able to do as a result of this course, class, or grade level?
  2. How will we know that the students are not learning?
  3. How do we respond when students do not learn?
  4. How do we respond when students learn more?

As we grapple with the common core, these four questions remain the same; the answers will change. What we want students to know and be able to do will be more rigorous, more focused on the knowledge and skills that will prepare students for colleges, careers, and life. We know there is a gap between what students can do when they graduate high school and the expectations of colleges or careers. In 2010 the American Management Association conducted a survey of 2115 managers and executives from around the world. This survey clearly demonstrated skills like collaboration, creativity, communication and creative thinking were vital. The executives reported these skills were priorities in their organizations, and these skills were evaluated both for hiring new employees and reviewing current employee performance. The answer to what we want students to know and be able to do is changing.

How we know our students are learning is also changing. We will know they have learned new standards by moving beyond bubbles and toward application both in summative and formative assessments. The focus of assessments will move from content memorization to complex application. I am confident educators will be able to know, like never before, if our students are on track for future success. We will continue to need systems for students who don’t get it or already get it. The PLC model makes interventions and extensions systematic. This will be an incredible support as we move forward.

The four questions must continue to be answered in the coming years. Common Core and next generation assessments are game changers, but the game board remains the same. During this shift, we can depend on the PLC process to provide a foundational structure.

References

American Management Association. (2010). AMA 2010 critical skills survey. Retrieved 1/13/2012-- http://www.amanet.org/training/articles/Executives-Say-the-21st-Century-Needs-More-Skilled-Workers.aspx

Comments

amiel

I work in a title I classroom and have observed teachers from my school as well as district wide becoming frustrated because of having to write new cc units and lessons. Although I have not heard a single teacher against common core, many will tell you that the transition has not been very smooth for the fact that they've worked for months on units only to have to change what they have already done, that however, is a district concern. I have not had to write new plans/lessons to meet common core, but I have seen the impact that the common core has had on our students and it has been a very positive one. The bar has been set high, and the students are rising to the occasion. Our test scores so far this year are great!

Posted on

betsy.dotson

I currently serve as the ELA School Improvement Chairperson for my 3-5 elementary school. I have been to several trainings regarding the transition or "shifts" and actually look forward to the new core which promotes more critical thinking skills. However, teacher buy in is going to be extremely difficult at my school. After studying the core I can totally see how it can be overwhelming to most teachers, especially the most seasoned. There is a lot of objectives to cover, but I think that by using PLC time to identify "essential learnings" cross grade level, it will relieve some of the stress. Any other suggestions for strategies to ease the transition during PLC time?

Posted on

cmc

I have to agree that as a special education teacher, I am looking forward to Common Core but still feeling a little uneasy about the implementation. At my school, we have had many PLCs regarding the transition to Common Core, which have given the fundamentals of the concept but there are still a lot of questions. The first two questions are regarding what the students should be able to do, and how we will know if the students are not learning. We, teachers, were asked during a PLC meeting what we felt would be the best way to test our students’ growth. Has anyone had similar experiences from his/her school on testing the growth of students or has your school already established this in some fashion? While I do appreciate that the county is asking for guidance from the teachers, I still feel like the county does not have firm grasp the implementation despite the fact that we will start in August. This makes me uneasy about such an important program rolling out.

Posted on

WendyCody

Hi All,

I'm an educator from Maine who has spent the past few months trying to get my head around the CCSSs. I too see them as a terrific opportunity for us to affect positive change in the classroom. I'm also finding that while schools are being provided with a lot of information about the CCSSs, they're getting much less in the way of practical guidance regarding implementation. Last year, a Maine-based company (AcademicMerit) did a pilot study of its CCSS-aligned online tools throughout our state, which I read about in the local paper. It seems that this company is doing great work with the summative and formative assessments that Mary mentions. As I understand them, the tools' writing assessments especially seem to foster PLCs. Let's continue to find ways to help each other embrace these changes!

Posted on

Mary Hendricks-Harris

I do think there will be common pacing, especially for those using the interim assessments.

Posted on

Mary Hendricks-Harris

My experience has been that most groups prefer to focus on the first two questions. If you can focus the group on the data from common assessments, the last two questions should flow naturally. Our elementary teachers have found they can develop intervention/extensions groups more easily if they look at all kids in the grade level versus just those in their class. Some groups may avoid the last two questions because they don't have answers. If it is possible that is the case, consider a book study. There are lots of great books out there.

Posted on

aminniti

Your posting was also timely for me. I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately. I know this process will take planning, and it’ll take time. I just hope not too much time. I feel that we’ve needed this focus for quite some time, and I hope no one drags their feet hoping that it’ll go away. I remember when I was a first year teacher, and we started to examine course objectives. Some of my colleagues said “didn’t we already do this like 10 years ago?” About five years later, we began forming PLCs, and some of my colleagues said, “don’t worry the pendulum has swung with NCLB.” Overall, most of my colleagues are on board, but it’s just interesting to see how far we’ve come. I really like the 4th question “How do we respond when student learn more?”. I feel that question is missing from our core questions, so that should definitely be added to our core questions. Sometimes I feel like those students fly under the radar and are not pushed as much as they should be because our focus is on those who are not learning.

Posted on

grade2girl

I agree with sarah44, I am very excited about the Common Core. I think it will give a clear direction for many districts and schools. Having such a wide spread adoption of the Common Core should help provide a solid foundation for our students especially when they move from school to school. Does anyone think we will ever get to a point that schools using the Common Core are using the same pacing? The district I work at now has not done as much training and planning for the implementation yet but I am looking forward to it!

Posted on

sarah44

As an Elementary school teacher I have never been more excited to see the Common Core Standards. I know our curriculum has changed many times throughout the years, but I feel this time it is here for good. I love the idea of having most of the states across the US adopting these standards. This way we are all on the same page and our students should be ready for college or the real world by graduation time.

Posted on

greene

I am very excited about the initiative of the common core standards. This thrust from recalling basic facts to learning for meaning and application is what students need in order to be successful citizens. However, like the above colleagues I feel stressed because of the transition. Recently, I have met with my PLC group and we have begun to discuss what needs to be achieved for us to successfully transition to the common core standards. Although, this transition will not be easy I'm excited about the outcome of the new standards. Ljjones throughout your career you will always come across people in the profession that do not take change well the only thing we can do is be open to change and positive about it and hopefully it will rub off.

Posted on

ljjones

I feel I am in the same boat as amvaldes. I am a new teacher in Tennessee and we too are headed toward Common Core standards. In my school our grade level collaborates often and we address your first two questions well among our group. However, the answer to the last two questions are mostly left up to the individual. As a first year teacher how do I persuade others in my school to bypass their hesitancy on discussing this as a group so that implementation of the Common Core will be a more smooth transition?

Posted on

amvaldes

Your blog could not have come at a better time for me. I am a teacher in North Carolina and we are in the transitional point of becoming a Common Core school. I am struggling with this idea because I'm a new teacher still trying to find my voice in the school and trying to learn all of the necessary information to be successful. My PLC group is good but not focused. You have just inspired me to take what you discussed and turn out PLC around. I see how important the questions you posed were and how we should really make them the center of our discussion. I want to thank you for sharing this blog.

Posted on