To a Grade School Kid, Why Do They Matter?
Part 1: CCSS (Common Core State Standards)
Why is this initiative holding a historical high ground today
Firstly, we need to keep in mind that the state standards vary largely across different US states. The standards of California can be quite a deviation from those of Texas. In this context, we are using California as a reference.
- The students can start reading text at an in-depth level. Explanation: In the context of primary school, in-depth reading challenges a student with tasks beyond activities such as “story retelling”. A teacher might ask the student a specific question, require the student to locate the answer as well as to provide textual evidence. When answering a question, the student needs to provide the answer and match it with textual evidence, precisely.
The relevance of such skills at a college level begs no doubt. However, the fact that these methods are starting at second or third grade is rather news to young parents. - The students start to decode complex text at a primary school level.
Explanation: To put it simply, today fourth-grade students are dealing with a lot harder text stories than fourth graders ten years ago.
A “sense of crisis” came from a dilemma created when a large portion of high school students entered college with reading skills much lower than college requirements, and it brought policy makers in the education system to make the realization: such training must be solidified at a grade school level. Hence an unprecedented emphasis on “state standards” has trickled down from high school to primary school. What is a direct consequence? Today, third grade kids are required to decode the sophisticated message from Charlotte’s Web (E. B. White, 1899). - The state is quantifying measurements on grade-level reading skills.
- The layers of meaning in a text: Can a student interpret one layer of a text meaning, or multiple layers?
- The clarity and structure of a text: Can a student make a judgement on the clarity level of a text? Is the text clear, or vague and misleading? Is the writing style classical or contemporary? Is the voice and tone casual or academic? Can you see a consist style throughout the text?
- How many topics does the text cover? Are there multiple topics? How many points of view does the text provide? How many external sources are cited in this text?
- How is the text structured? Does it follow a chronological order or another? Is the text casually organized or highly structured?
- How are images and graphs incorporated in the text? How much does an image or a chart support the goal of the text?
Part 2: CCSS (Common Core State Standards)
At a primary school level, what are the main skills required by CCSS?
Today, the increasing importance of the CCSS initiative is evident in private school curricula, reading and writing systems promoted by major publishing houses, and nonetheless, in most premium extracurricular academic centers.
Behind this heated attention to “standards”, the main drive is a “sense of crisis” coming from the astonishing gap between the high-level skills required for comprehending complex text at a college level, and the casual treatment of the same set of skills at both primary and middle school levels. Among all of the performance-focused schools and families, “career readiness” has never been as hip of a term as it is today.
What is “career readiness”? It is a remote prediction on whether or not a kid will meet the college-level reading requirements at the age of 18, when this kid is 7, 9 or 12 years old. In other words, by promoting “career readiness”, the education system is sending a heads-up to the parents of younger kids: What is the likelihood of your kid making the cut to get into a dream college? You can compare his/her current performance with the CCSS criteria, now.
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