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Ashley Johnson
UWRITE 1103
Cambell
30 March 201528 April 2015
An Uncommon Approach to the Common CoreI Am Not Common
The teacher slammed down the fresh white paper, filled with carefully written words,
stained with that horrible red ink. Amy reluctantly looked up from her massacred paper to her
teacher Mr. Miller. He was a round, old, white haired man, well whatever hair he had left, with a
peculiar smell of tuna and cheap cologne, jaded from his years of teaching the standards. Mr.
Millers merciless, piercing eyes met Amys soft vulnerable ones. This is not the way I taught
you the teacher growled, the sound emanating from deep within his chest. Amy caught a whiff
of that peculiarly familiar smell. But its so much easier my way, Amys sheepishly low,
smooth, voice contrasted to the teachers growls of disappointment, This Thatsis the way my
mother taught me and shes a professional writereveryone else would write their papers, so I
thought Amys soft words were trampled by the teachers loud howl of agitated bitterness,
This is the way the system teaches! No more questions, youre wasting the five minutes I have
allotted to pass out these essays before we do our fifteen minutes of daily grammar practice.
Amy could feel the wet, warm tears swell in her glassy eyes as the teachers cold, deathly glare
passed from her to the student behind her.
I hate these standards! Amy thought to herself as she threw her book bag onto her
bedroom floor with a loud thud complimented with the sound of her plopping on the bed. She
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breathed out a deep sigh, letting go of the troubles and frustrations of the day. Looking out her
window she saw the wind blowing through the jade colored leaves and rich, strong branches. A
flurry of light pink flower petals danced across her sight, and she opened her window just in time
to allow a few delicate petals to venture into her room before they rested peacefully on the floor.
No one ever asked for MY opinion before forcing the standards on me! Besides why do we all
have to produce the same work? Amy sighed frustratingly as she let her elbows slide along the
windowsill, allowing her head to rest on her arms. The wind carried the sweet smell of spring
cherry blossoms, fresh grass, tulips, and roses gently through her window. Come to think of it
she thought I dont really know what the standards are. They never allow us to ask questions
about why we do what we do in class. Amy passed quickly from her window to her desk with
curious intent. Im sure Google will tell me! She thought proudly Google knows everything!
She carefully lifted her sleek, white Mac Computer out of her book bag and set it tenderly on her
desk. The familiar home screen of her and her best friend making a weird face into the camera lit
up the screen. Amy gave a small chuckle as she counted the number of chins present on her face.
She pulled up the Google homepage and took a second to marvel at the new logo. It was in honor
of the birthday of one of her favorite artists, Frida Kahlo. I wanted to write about her in my
English class so bad! Amy pouted, But the stupid teacher said the standards made it clear the
artist had to be a nonfiction writer between 1947 and 1956from the list of five authors we were
given. Who comes up with this stuff?! Amys fingers flew into action over the keyboard, typing
memorized letters across the flat plane forming the question What is the common core? The
first website to appear atop the list of many was the common cores main website,
corestandards.org. Amys eyes skimmed the first sentence, The Common Core is a set of high
quality academic standards in the Mathematics and English Language Arts and Literacy.
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Thats a lot of big fancy words for something that doesnt allow us students to use our full
vocabulary. She scoffed in response. She continued reading Ensures all kids graduate high
school with the skills necessary to succeed in college, careers, and life. Yea, doesnt feel like
it. The standards are research and evidence based,based; the standards are built on the
strengths and lessons of the current state standards. Amy had read enough and closed the tab.
She didnt understand. The way this website puts it, the standards are the best thing since sliced
bread. Then why was she frustrated in all her classes because she still wasnt doing well?
This makes me wonder if the standards really are research and evidence based? Amy
pondered. She reluctantly went back to the core standards website in search of her answer. Oddly
enough, she never found it. They never say who conducted the research, only the persons
involved in writing the standards. Amy saidsaid, confused. Her eyes slowly opened in shocked
surprise as she read that only surveys were used to conduct the research. And it doesnt even
say the population of the group sampled by the surveys! There could be so much bias in favor of
the standards! she exclaimed, outraged. In order to find her answer, she had to dig deeper.
Again she typed her question into the well-known search engine, but this time a different title
caught her eye. Common Core Validation Committee Member: Nobody Thought There Was
Sufficient Evidence for the Standards. Amy curiously clicked the link and urgently read the
article in search of her answer. One statistic stood out to her, Of the George Washington
University compendium of sixty plus research on the common core, only two focused on the
impact of student achievement, and even then the results were mixed. Amy was relieved to
know she was not the only person struggling to pass, but then became very disturbed. How can
they still enforce the standards if theres no clear correlation between the common core and
student achievement? she thought, Even after they flaunted on their website ensure all kids
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graduate with the skills necessary to succeed in college, careers, and life? Something is
definitely wrong here. She continued reading. Her eyes came across two unfamiliar names. The
article said they were authors of the American Journal of Education. Sounds fancy! Amy
thought, Im sure theyre a reliable source. She read that Weatherford and Mcdonnel, the
authors of the American Journal of Education, say that the evidence scrounged up by researchers
of the Ccommon Ccore was mostly used to identify problems in the standards or to generate
different hypothesis. The two authors summed up their research by asserting that during the
writing process of the core standards, there was no large pool of empirical evidence on what does
and doesnt work. So basically theyre just guessing what works and what doesnt Amy
concluded in dismay. The next statement she read solidified her inference, We wanted to be
able to cite non-peer reviewed research because theres not enough research available, and often
the findings are inconclusive, iIndicated one common core developer. With little to no research
surfacing by the proponents of the common core, Amy wondered what education specialists had
to say. The first specialist to come to mind in her research was a woman known by Nancy
Carlsson-Paige Ed. D. I remember seeing her name and research cited in other passing by
articles. Amy stated, She must be someone worth looking into. Amy quickly scanned and
analyzed the many articles of arguments, research, cited authors, and statistics and found that
two of Carlsson-Paiges research studies had showed that direct instruction actually limited
young childrens learning. Again Amy saw Carlsson-Paige repeat the same theme Amy had read
in the other article, At best, the standards reflect guesswork, not developmental science. Amy
stared blankly into her computer. Her mind swiftly filing all the information she had taken in.
Minutes felt like seconds as her mind churned to wrap itself around the absurdity of what she had
discovered. But she had found the answer to her question. The common core was not only not
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research and evidence based, but research that had been done using the standards came up mixed
and inconclusive at best. This put Amys mind swirling into a shocked state of comatosefor
answers. An icy breeze quickly reawakened her. She turned to the her source window only to
discover the pitch black shadows of the night had over taken her window to the outside world.
When did it get so late! she exclaimed as she quickly but gently closed the stubborn window
sill with a thud. And theres still so much I want to know! But I suppose it will have to wait
until tomorrow. She yawned doggedly as she looked at the piles of homework still yet to be
done.
The next day after school ended, she burst into her room and excitedly jumped onto her
desk chair. Miscalculating the strength of her jump, she sent herself wheeling out of her chair
onto the floor with a loud BOOM. Mother Fer! She exclaimed, I guess the quest for
knowledge really is painful. She giggled at her quick, witty response. She readjusted herself and
her chair and set her laptop into place ready to get back to business. That day in class, her teacher
Mr. Miller had assigned a research based paper on a relevant topic. The perfect opportunity.
Now I can finally write my opinion and continue researching the common core! Amy smiled
excitedly. I suppose since the last question ended in a dead end, I should start from the
beginning again. Amy established. So the core standards website said that the standards were
based off the strengths and lessons of the current state standard. I wonder what that means? I
should first find out how they measure that., sShe resolved. Flipping through the core standards
website, she again found out little. One important detail however did stick out. Testing is the
only way the standards can measure anything at all, Amy understood, again disappointed, and
heavy testing at that. I wonder what the education specialists have to say about this heavy
testing?testing. Theres no way that this can be a strength. This time Amys research turned up
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the education specialist David Green, a teacher in Greenburgh N.Y. and supervisor of Fordham
University. Mr. Green must bring a first-hand perspective to his argument, I gotta read this!
Amy excitedly thought as she tirelessly scanned his article in the US News website. He says that
in order to cope with the standards, practical wisdom and creativity had to be thrown out of the
classroom. How sad. I suppose its happening everywhere, not just here. She said, discouraged.
Uniformity really has sucked the life out of teaching and learning, just look at Mr. Miller!
Amy chuckled lightheartedly, slightly lifting her spirits. She saw the education specialist she had
read the day before, Nancy Carlsson-Paige, was again cited, this time by David Green. Curious,
Amy went back to Carlsson-Paiges website in search of new answers. Carlsson-Paige had more
information on other things lost in the classroom due to the standards. The drill and kill
methods of teaching are quickly pushing active, play based learning out of the classroom.
Carlsson-Paige argues. Thats so sad, some of my fondest memories are playing on the
playground or with the assortment of toys in each classroom. Amy nostalgically remembered.
Wait a minute, in order to do the drill and kill methods mentioned by Carlsson-Paige, doesnt
that mean schools must intensify the amount of testing performed? But Amy already know from
her research that the tests are unreliable. I wonder why they only use testing to calculate a
students ability? Where did that come from anyway? Amy knew if she could find the answer to
such a deep question, Mr. Miller would finally be proud. Either by pure luck, or keen research
skills, she found the article that held her answer. The author, Ethan Heitner, had an extensive
article between the correlations between the No Child Left Behind project and testing used in the
Common Core curriculum. He also has an immaculate blog. The No Child Left Behind project?
Wasnt that started by President Bush during his presidency? I remember my parents talking
about what a huge failure it was to help students. Amy recalled. Luckily for Amy, Heitners
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article expanded on the No Child Left Behind project. President Bush passed this legislation to
increase testing and their standards so that children in lower income areas would get higher test
scores. However, this only backfired as it caused several schools who could not meet the
standards to shut down. The No Child Left Behind project was a ten year failure that our society
is still recovering from today. Heitner concludes. As Amy continues reading, something else
interesting surfaces; its the answer shes been looking for. The Common Core Standards are
based on the No Child Left Behind project testing standards. Not only that, but the Common
Core standards are more rigorous than those set by the No Child Left Behind legislation. I
suppose that makes sense, Amy thought woefully, since I already know that the writers of the
Common Core have strong connections to various testing companies. Somehow this whole
process seemed so corrupt.
I Am Not Common. That has a nice ring to it Amy thought. She now had
sufficient information to write a fine, well-polished research essay for Mr. Miller. She
remembered back to the beginning of her research and how the proponents and exponents of the
core each defined the Common Core. She remembered how proponents of the core did not put
forth any research, and she had found out that it was because the standards themselves were not
actually research and evidence based. She thought about how this was a massive hole in the
argument for the core, and that despite the writers being well educated, the writers had other
agendas as well. These agendas being the ties to testing companies around the U.S. She
followed this thought to how it lead her to the massive amounts of testing being the only way the
core can measure on the strengths of the current state standard. Amy remembered how this was
because of the good in theory but not in practice No Child Left Behind project to raise testing
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and testing standards. Then the Common Core being based of these standards, with the addition
of more rigorous testing. With complete thoughts, Amy began to write.
A week had passed since she had written her research paper. She sat at her regular
desk in Mr. Millers class. This day was different, it was the day he was going to hand back their
papers. Amys insides felt like jello, as she waited nervously for Mr. Miller to hand back her
paper, which she expected to be just as massacred in the same red ink as the last. Amy, Dr.
Miller voice snapped Amy out of her daydream. She reluctantly looked up to the old mans face
as he gently put her fresh, white paper on her desk. Im counting on you to bring our education
system out of the pits of despair. He whispered, a small gleam of hope in his eyes. As Mr.
Miller passed, continueing to hand out papers, Amy flipped through her research paper. She
expected to find it torn about, but only a few simple grammatical errors were circled. This is
unexpected, her concluding sentences were circled with the words Good end! Dont stop here.
Thats the first time Mr. Miller ever complimented anything on any of her works. She reread the
last sentences he had circled, My name is Amy Jones. I am not common. So why is my
education?
Conclusion sentence: the one final question she had, she had to ask herself. Now that I
know this information, she pondered What will I do with it?
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Works Cited
"About the Standards." Common Core State Standards Initiative About the Standards Comments.
Common Core State Standards Initiative, 2015. Web. 22 Apr. 2015.
Carlsson-Paige, Nancy. "A Tough Critique of Common Core on Early Childhood
Education." Nancy Carlsson-Paige Ed. D. Nancy Carlsson-Paige, 2010. Web.
Greene, David. "The Long Death of Creative Thinking." US News. U.S.News & World Report,
17 Mar. 2014. Web. 22 Apr. 2015.
Heitner, Ethan. "The Trouble with the Common Core." Editorial:. Rethinking Schools, June-July
2013. Web. 22 Apr. 2015.
Richwine, Jason. "Common Core Validation Committee Member: Nobody Thought There Was
Sufficient Evidence for the Standards." National Review. The Agenda, 03 Sept. 2014. Web.
Formatted: Centered