I am and I know that many of you are too.
None of us wants to fall short and embarrass ourselves or do a disservice to our students. My parish, and many others, is creating a toolbox of items to be used for research, resources and continuity. These toolboxes have information available on ways to get faculty buy-in, how to explain the differences in the CCSS and our current GLEs, how PARCC assessments will look, how to develop new Unit plans and much much more.
I have taken numerous webinars/seminars, read many books and articles, participated in many Twitter chats, joined numerous online study groups and thrown pennies in fountains in hopes that I would be able to successfully implement these new standards.
What stands out to me most is not that I have to do many things differently BUT that I have to create opportunities that require my students to create and respond in ways that go beyond pen and paper responses. I currently teach AP Literature and the key to providing successful experiences for my students is to raise the bar and require them to analyze the ‘hows? whys? and what fors?’ that authors use in their selection of character deeds, plot element turns and figurative language used.
CCSS expects that these strategies and requirements be used for all students, not just the ones taking AP classes. Duhhhh. I have started feeling a little stupid. If we are given the charge of preparing these kids for successful college experiences we must treat them like they are mini college students. THAT DOESN’T MEAN THROWING WORK AT THEM and watching them fail. We first must create an atmosphere in which they take the baby steps of analyzing primary documents, writing in response to text, etc.
Below, I have listed many links for resources that can be reviewed, downloaded, adapted, adopted, ignored, shared, ……… This is just my first listing of items to look at. So, if you don’t see anything here that might be of use to you, wait for it…..
Resources used by our Team Leaders for CCSS training
The Gettysburg Address: Literary Nonfiction and the Common Core Article by Todd Finley that discusses how we will ‘teach’ differently
National Math and Science Initiative free resources
Articles on Education Week to peruse
Resource-A-Day calendar by Tech with Tia
Into the Common Core: One Classroom’s Journey
Articles on Edutopia to read
