Cookie Cutter Schools

It was a recent conversation with a mom from Pennsylvania (let’s call her Laura) that brought me to a better understanding of America’s “one-size-fits-all” schools and the stratifying effect they have been having on our society.  This lady lives in a very affluent, suburban neighborhood outside of Philadelphia and has 15-year old twin boys.  She described her children’s schools as “very good”, (and I thought, “Wow how lucky!”) – and then she began the litany of complaints. 

She started with how her sons were taught Math.  When they were little, the boys would come home with these bizarre homework assignments that neither she nor her husband could figure out how to help them with.  These are both college-educated professionals.  Have I seen the lattice method?  Sure have. Laura and her husband bought supplementary Math work books that had practice sheets.  Then the parents took turns almost every school night plus many hours during weekends and summer vacations at the kitchen table teaching them the correct way to solve Math problems.  Laura described these correct methods as the way they themselves had been taught which were, of course, the Standard Algorithms. 

I nodded my head – it’s the same down here.  As a tutor I have spoken to many, many parents about this same thing.  The kids would be trying to solve a division problem, for instance, and the first thing they did was start drawing all these bubbles all over the paper.  Laura saw that in her sons’ school as well. 

Or they would try to solve fraction problems, but had forgotten their multiplication facts.  About two years can separate the schools’ work on the tables (3^rd grade – and we’re talking about an all too brief attempt at rote memorization) and the introduction of fractions (5^th grade).  During this time, the material covered is so fast-paced, over-loaded with disconnected skills, and poorly sequenced that the gradual building of complexity in using multiplication appears to have been lost in the crowd.  Almost never do I meet a student of any age who has had enough (or any) practice in using two and three digit multipliers, while the neglect of the Standard Algorithm in division can apply to simple one digit divisors, let alone two and three digit divisor problems.  (The absence of division instruction was one of the most criticized points in the NCTM-written standards of the OBE days.  They’ve effectively done away with this function anyway, despite all our protesting.)  Once the connection between multiplication, division and fractions is demonstrated to my tutoring students, they are astonished!

It’s the logical, building-block sequencing in the practice of increasingly complex operations that helps a child internalize the basics, such as the multiplication tables or the step-by-step procedures used to solve elementary arithmetic problems. Many parents know this and believe strongly in the importance of plenty of paper and pencil work despite - or maybe because of - their not having Education degrees.  Too often, however, when these parents try to show their kids how to solve Math problems, the kids will protest that that’s not how they do it in school.  But the kids can’t do it the way the teacher showed them either, nor can they explain this new way to their parents. The books, when they come home at all, are poorly written and will have only one or two examples showing procedures which will not even cover all the different quirks and ramifications of the exercise problems the kids have been assigned to figure out.  (This is experience speaking here.)  It is lose/lose.  The end result is usually a build-up of frustration on both sides, and the child’s loss of respect for the hapless parents.

The Pa. schools don’t teach cursive anymore either.  Laura believes that cursive is very important – how can anyone sign their name if they haven’t learned cursive?   I nodded - it’s the same in Fl. They pretend to teach cursive for like two weeks or so, then it comes to a screeching halt, and the kids go right back to printing.  The printing is illegible because many schools don’t teach how to hold a pencil and, if the kids start at the wrong place and head in the wrong direction, they are not corrected.  (Dyslexia is such a lucrative little diagnosis.)  The kids end up trying to invent how to write the letters themselves which is usually backwards, upside down and in the wrong positions. 

Laura said they had the same situation up north.  Plus there is no keyboarding instruction.  She was very indignant about this.  The reason the schools give for not bothering with cursive anymore is because everyone will be typing everything.  But then they do not provide any kind of formal training in keyboarding.  In their earliest days of school, this mom took on the task of teaching her sons how to print and write cursive correctly, plus made sure they knew how to keyboard better than the default, two-finger hunt & peck.  It’s a good thing she started this so soon, because once a child has a few years practice forming their letters wrong, it’s a horribly difficult habit to break.

Spelling?  Spelling tests are gone in the schools she knows of in Pennsylvania, while in Florida, they are sometimes still seen in the earlier grades.  They are pretty hit or miss though – I’ll ask my students how they’re doing on all their subjects, and they’ll tell me they haven’t had a spelling test for a while.  I told Laura that back in the late 90’s, when my kids were still in a public middle school, the tests had devolved into a multiple choice format.  When I complained to the principal, he told me that that’s how he did it when he was a teacher.  Plus there are a lot of times where spelling is seen as unimportant, like in the kids’ daily journals.  Laura hadn’t seen any multiple choice spelling tests, but she remembers being appalled by her sons’ daily, error-filled journals and also complained about all the “rough drafts” the kids are always writing even now when they are in high school.  No one ever used to turn in rough drafts.  We turned in the best work possible, and if there were errors, the teacher marked them – in red – and we would take the papers home, fix them and turn in the corrected paper the next day.  This is how kids learn – and this has not been happening in America’s public schools for quite some time now.

Neither the rich Pa. nor mixed-income Fl. schools of our acquaintance spend significant time teaching grammatical rules, parts of speech or variety of sentence structure.  I’ll have a student recite that a noun is a person, place or thing, but be unable to identify the nouns in a sentence.  They won’t know what a verb is until reminded – but helping verbs, adjectives, adverbs – nada.  Prepositions? Please.  Verb conjugations?  Subjects and predicates?  Compound sentences?  Comma placement?  Not that either of us have seen.  There wasn’t anything she could do about her kids’ journals since they stayed in school, and she only got to glance at them during parents’ nights.  But as often as she could get her hands on her sons’ written work, Laura has been doing the correcting herself, from elementary school and right up into their high school years.  Lucky you, I said.  The Florida parents I know of almost never get to see their children’s work.  When they do, it’s the same story.  If you ask the teacher why none of the mistakes are marked, it’s to save the child’s self-esteem.  Right – like illiteracy is good for self-esteem.  And whatever happened to diagramming sentences?  Gosh – who isn’t asking that question?

We must have compared our respective school experiences for an hour.  Skimpy phonics instruction – check.  Called “coincidental” by the pro-Phonics millions, this is known as “eclectic” in Florida.  Having higher achieving children tutor lower achieving children without first instructing the little tutors in how to teach?  You bet.  Group seating and group projects – check.  They call it cooperating and collaborating in school and cheating everywhere else. 

The homework brought home veered from none at all to infantile nonsense to pointless, time-consuming “projects”.  Laura said she would prefer no homework at all to the stuff her sons spend so much time trying to get done.  I told Laura about one high school Senior I knew who spent hours designing a color chart – for her Honors English class.  This was a very intelligent young woman, but her English SAT scores were awful.  Go figure.  Sadly, she wanted to be an English major. 

Laura told me she worried about how well many of her children’s friends would do in college – the kids who did not have their parents spending so much time with them or even getting them tutoring.  Together we wondered how the kids could be learning much about History or Science when no books ever come home, and homework projects don’t seem to be teaching them anything either.  She actually has no idea what her boys have been studying in those subjects.  It is certainly hard for me to believe that schools that do such a poor job teaching the most basic of skills and knowledge would suddenly become terrific at imparting thorough, accurate, engagingly presented and politically neutral content in these areas.  According to college and university professors, as well as the American population at large, these bodies of knowledge are also being neglected in our public schools.   Generally, parents who do much of the teaching at home are hard pressed to keep up with the dearth of grade-level basic skills, and will not think to read History and Science text books with their children.

Finally, I pointed out that while we were both describing almost identical schools, I described them as “really crappy.”  What was it that made her think of them as “very good”?  Laura answered that the schools where she lives are considered excellent because all the kids get high SAT & ACT scores, and every single kid gets into a prestigious college or university.  There is no lower income cohort that does more poorly?  No flunking?  No dropping out?  No.  Every single child gets into a good college.  Wow.

I hearkened back to a couple experiences I had when my kids were still in the public schools during the beginning of OBE.  At an open house at my son’s middle school, one of his teachers and I started talking about all the changes going on, and she kept repeating the phrase, “Everything depends on the parents.”  She was staring at me intently, so I stared intently back at her and said, “If it takes a village to raise a child, when are the schools going to be kicking in with their part?”  (Hillary’s village was HUGE back then.)  “Everything depends on the parents.”  She was a good teacher and retired shortly after.

There was also the time I spoke with a representative of the Federal Department of Education.  He was down in Sarasota investigating claims of discrimination, and I was positive that the withholding of skills and knowledge from young school children was definitely discrimination.  He kept asking me if I knew of any instance of different treatment and, of course, I didn’t.  No one was being taught phonics or grammar or anything else, at least not in the public schools.  Then there was nothing he could do because, according to the law, as long as all students were receiving the same treatment, there was no discrimination.  So discrimination for all is OK?  He shrugged his shoulders – there was nothing he could do.  I yelled, "You’re getting blamed for this, you know!"   And, indeed, he did know.

This, then, has been - and continues to be - the true essence of Outcome-Based Education. With the input of this nation’s cookie-cutter schools held constant - as identical and as inferior as possible - the basis of the schools’ reputations has become the outcomes, and those outcomes will depend on how well the students’ families overcome the deficiencies of their children’s schools.  In fact, the modern school’s biggest accomplishment has devolved into an assessment of the parents’ performance.  This explains why poorly performing schools so often whine that their students’ parents are just refusing to do their jobs. It’s why one of the biggest arguments against objective teacher evaluations is that the schools can’t be held responsible for their students’ test results.  They say stuff like this with conviction!  Of course, the way things are now, the schools are all too sadly correct.

 This Darwinistic, family as destiny, survival-of-the-fittest structure has been assuring the perpetuation of an ever more rigid class system.  To a certain extent, this outcome dichotomy will break along income lines simply because higher earning parents have more of the skills and knowledge necessary to help their kids through the morass.  The illiterate, the innumerate, those whose schools have treated them shabbily in their own turn are not only unable to do the teaching themselves, but are also less likely to be earning enough to hire tutors let alone afford private school.  Our illustrious Educrats do want us to believe that everything hinges on money – because they want tons more of it.  But this is the Information Age, so it’s the families with the necessary “information” who will have the children who at least appear to be thriving in America’s cookie-cutter schools.

Why the American school system has become one where teaching is so degraded rather than one where all children receive equally effective books and teaching methods is the topic for another to handle.   For now, I can state - with conviction! - that Common Core is more of the same shabby treatment.  We need Parents’ Choice.

Common Core Elementary Math Standards

Let’s get this out of the way right now – the criticisms complaining that the Common Core Standards are the Federal government’s taking over of the schools - and the loss of local control - are completely moot.  That happened ages ago!  The 1990’s OBE/Blueprint 2000 goals for Reading, Math, History and Science were written by various committees at the Federal level.  That’s why the states all have such similar stupidities written into their current Math standards.  The states’ DOE’s took the Federal money along with the Federally written goals, tinkered with them enough to make them even worse and called them their own.  There was a huge uproar over Whole Language and the History standards so there have been rewrites of them, and Science is apparently still a battle ground, but the Math standards of today pretty much date to the horrific ‘90’s.  There are plenty of books and articles written about the history of education in this country which explain how and when this happened far better than I could.  What I’m doing here is examining these new standards from my perspective as a tutor, mother and grandmother in order to judge them on their own merits.

They Make It Sound So Good

At first I found myself liking the new Math standards quite a bit.  After the confusing, overwrought hodge-podge of current standards, they are almost poetic in their simplicity.  In fact, the authors mention their intent to correct the “mile wide/inch deep” errors of today’s goals.  If you click below to the 2nd Grade standards, for instance, you will see a much more realistic, pared down and far more grade-appropriate list of goals that are separated into four main areas of study.  http://www.corestandards.org/Math/Content/2/introduction  

These standards appear much more successful at assigning reasonable goals arranged according to the logical, building block sequences that would be recognized as normal by most parents.  In fact, there is a chart in the “Publisher’s Criteria” section of Resources (pg 9) that lists topics that should not be assessed before certain grade levels.  Parents will be surprised to learn that Symmetry in Geometric shapes should not be assessed (nor taught, it should be assumed) before Grade 4, and Probability should not be assessed before Grade 7.  These topics are currently to be found at much earlier grade levels in many text books, and have served to be major distractions from what should be the main jobs at the Elementary levels.  The Core authors go to great lengths emphasizing what the main topics should be in the younger grades.

The misuses of number models such as those shown in my previous blog are also addressed:

“Research indicates that students’ experiences using physical models to represent hundreds, tens, and ones can be effective if the materials help them think about how to combine quantities and, eventually, how these processes connect with written procedures.” (Adding It Up, p. 198,…). For example, base-ten blocks are a reasonable model for adding within 1000, but not a reasonable method for doing so; nor are colored chips a reasonable method for adding integers. …. The word “fluently” in particular as used in the Standards refers to fluency with a written or mental method, not a method using manipulatives or concrete representations.”

http://www.corestandards.org/assets/Math_Publishers_Criteria_K-8_Summer%202012_FINAL.pdf

It’s always interesting to come across evidence that the Experts have been running experiments on children instead of educating them.  The above is but one example of the Core writers citing research that that has been subjecting multitudes of students to an obvious, ineffective use of manipulatives and “models”, as well as several other instructional errors, that I’ve heard parents complaining of for years.  I’m sure that besides the report Adding It Up (published in 2001 by the National Research Council), there have been many other reports, books and articles published on this subject.  I wonder how many kids were labeled as learning disabled as a result of never being adequately taught the correct way to add and subtract just so the alleged “Experts” could find out what everyone else already knows?  But I digress.

The Core authors also criticize what became known as “aspiral Math” which covered the same material year after year.  The review, or teaching, of earlier material while also teaching grade-level skills is something I deal with on a daily basis as a tutor.  I’ve had so many students come to me needing help with fractions who do not know their multiplication tables nor, of course, their division facts.  (In the quote below, I see a problem with the expectation of proficiency with the standard algorithm for division coming as late as 6^th Grade.  Plus, the problem with division is not a problem with place value knowledge in my experience.  I deal with this further in my “So Bad” section.)

“The basic model for grade-to-grade progression involves students making tangible progress during each given grade, as opposed to substantially reviewing then marginally extending from previous grades. Grade-level work begins during the first two to four weeks of instruction, rather than being deferred until later as previous years’ content is reviewed. Remediation may be necessary, … but review is clearly identified as such to the teacher, and teachers and students can see what their specific responsibility is for the current year.”

“… materials often manage unfinished learning from earlier grades inside grade-level work, rather than setting aside grade-level work to reteach earlier content. Unfinished learning from earlier grades is normal and prevalent; it should not be ignored nor used as an excuse for cancelling grade level work and retreating to below-grade work. (For example, the development of fluency with division using the standard algorithm in grade 6 is the occasion to surface and deal with unfinished learning about place value; this is more productive than setting aside division and backing up.) Likewise, students who are “ready for more” can be provided with problems that take grade-level work in deeper directions, not just exposed to later grades’ topics.” (pg. 12)

http://www.corestandards.org/assets/Math_Publishers_Criteria_K-8_Summer%202012_FINAL.pdf 

It is great to see the end of measuring using “non-standard” units of measurement which had some lesson plans wasting students’ time measuring large lengths – such as room perimeters - with paper clips or pencils – this explains so many kids’ lack of skill with rulers.  In the measurement and data sections, there is mention of learning the smaller units within the larger units and using this knowledge to solve various problems (i.e. there are 12 inches in a foot, etc).  It would be refreshing to begin meeting students who know measurement facts to the point where students could add and subtract units of time, length or weight, etc.  How long has it been since kids were taught how to add 2 yards, 1 foot, 6 inches to 3 yards 2 feet 10 inches and convert the sum to the proper units?  The authors also specifically mention telling time using both digital and analog clocks – many of today’s teachers are under the impression that children do not “need” to learn to tell time with analog (face) clocks.  

The solving of word problems is given a great deal of attention.  So many of today’s children have a deep fear of these problems, which inundate the FCAT and many other state tests, because they are not explicitly taught the “clue words” to look for.

“The language in which problems are posed is carefully considered. Note that mathematical problems posed using only ordinary language are a special genre of text that has conventions and structures needing to be learned. The language used to pose mathematical problems should evolve with the grade level and across mathematics content.”   (pg 17)

http://www.corestandards.org/assets/Math_Publishers_Criteria_K-8_Summer%202012_FINAL.pdf

The authors address the need for a math curriculum to be fully balanced between the practical and conceptual aspects of math and spend a great deal of time and effort in explaining exactly what they mean.  They make distinctions between practice exercises and solving problems while stressing the need for both.  I included the second paragraph below primarily for their examples of “conceptual problems”.  Today’s standards also make much of bringing about a student’s conceptual understanding of math, but the actuality of what is presented under that category has been so detrimental to achievement, that the phrase is starting to make people cringe.

“To date, curricula have not always been balanced in their approach to these three aspects of rigor. Some curricula stress fluency in computation, without acknowledging the role of conceptual understanding in attaining fluency. Some stress conceptual understanding, without acknowledging that fluency requires separate classroom work of a different nature. Some stress pure mathematics, without acknowledging first of all that applications can be highly motivating for students, and moreover, that a mathematical education should make students fit for more than just their next mathematics course. At another extreme, some curricula focus on applications, without acknowledging that math doesn’t teach itself.

http://www.corestandards.org/assets/Math_Publishers_Criteria_K-8_Summer%202012_FINAL.pdf

“Materials amply feature high-quality conceptual problems and questions that can serve as fertile conversation starters in a classroom if students are unable to answer them. This includes brief conceptual problems with low computational difficulty (e.g., ‘Find a number greater than 1/5 and less than 1/4’); brief conceptual questions (e.g., ‘If the divisor does not change and the dividend increases, what happens to the quotient?’);”…(pg 10)

http://www.corestandards.org/assets/Math_Publishers_Criteria_K-8_Summer%202012_FINAL.pdf

This Is Going To Be So Bad

Once I noticed that the NCTM was involved in the writing of the Common Core Math Standards, I knew it wouldn’t do to assume the best intentions based just on the simple listing of grade level goals.  The NCTM (National Council of Teachers of Mathematics) wrote the current standards that have been wreaking havoc with American students for at least the past twenty years.  So, a-wandering I went through all the various sections:  the Key Points, the Standards for Practice, the Standards by Domain, the Resources – including the Publishers’ Criteria (very important) and so on. 

As it proved with the current standards, the authors do not often lie outright, but use misdirection, the distortion of definitions as normally understood, and very carefully worded statements designed to placate the reader (including me for a short, happy time).  The Experts are very talented and well-practiced at telling the public what they know we desperately want to hear.  It is such an old tactic - much that the Core authors have written will have us nodding in agreement so often that our inclination is to keep nodding and nodding in approval even after we sense that we should begin to question or object. 

The problems begin with their seeming to state that they have adopted the goals of countries well known for their prowess in math.  In fact," International Benchmarking" and "International Best Practices" are the by-words of this latest set of standards.  This would naturally lead us to believe that our students will be taught just like the Asian whiz kids are, but that is not exactly what the authors are saying.

“The composite standards [of Hong Kong, Korea and Singapore] have a number of features that can inform an international benchmarking process for the development of K–6 mathematics standards in the U.S. First, the composite standards concentrate the early learning of mathematics on the number, measurement, and geometry strands with less emphasis on data analysis and little exposure to algebra. The Hong Kong standards for grades 1–3 devote approximately half the targeted time to numbers and almost all the time remaining to geometry and measurement.” — Ginsburg, Leinwand and Decker, 2009

http://www.corestandards.org/Math

“International benchmarking provides an additional tool for making every state’s existing education policy and improvement process more effective, offering insights and ideas that cannot be garnered by examining educational practices only within U.S. borders.  State leaders can use benchmarking to augment their “database of policy options” by adding strategies suggested by international best practice to the range of ideas already under consideration. Indeed, international benchmarking should not be a stand-alone project, but rather should function as a critical and well-integrated component of the regular policy planning process.” (pg.23)

http://www.corestandards.org/assets/0812BENCHMARKING.pdf

We are NOT getting the Singapore Math standards! The Core authors are almost clear in stating here and in other sections of the Common Core site that they have chosen only a select number of educational features of higher-performing countries which “can (not “will”) inform” the states’ process of developing K-6 Math standards.  They have opted to focus on the grade-level topics that these other countries target, but that does not mean that our public schools will be using any of the other academic features of these countries.  Culling inappropriate topics will do our children no good without all the rest that these other nations employ to assure their students’ success.  However, the Core folks clearly state in more than one area that the Core Standards do not adhere to International Standards to the point of mandating any particular curricula, materials nor, even more importantly, teaching methods which are very much a part of intensive teacher training and evaluation in the more math-proficient countries. 

“These Standards do not dictate curriculum or teaching methods. For example, just because topic A appears before topic B in the standards for a given grade, it does not necessarily mean that topic A must be taught before topic B. A teacher might prefer to teach topic B before topic A, or might choose to highlight connections by teaching topic A and topic B at the same time. Or, a teacher might prefer to teach a topic of his or her own choosing that leads, as a byproduct, to students reaching the standards for topics A and B.”

http://www.corestandards.org/Math/Content/introduction/how-to-read-the-grade-level-standards

The phrasing makes it seem as if the benchmarking in the USA is to act more as a reference than as a mandate to the states – somewhat interesting reading, in other words.  (And, really, The Feds aren’t allowed to mandate, are they?)  The most we can expect from the statements above is that the various states will be spending gobs of taxpayer money doing (allegedly their own) Standards rewrites that will include the phrase “International Benchmarking” a lot, but won’t be actually making much use of those much better International Standards.  This becomes obvious as we continue our reading.

Another very strong clue to the bitter disappointment we and our children will be experiencing with these Common Core Standards is the severe restriction in access to the Standard Algorithms for basic arithmetic operations.  Looking at the 2nd grade goal dealing with adding and subtracting, we find:

“CCSS.Math.Content.2.NBT.B.5  Fluently add and subtract within 100 using strategies based on place value, properties of operations, and/or the relationship between addition and subtraction.”

This is misleading; the public will assume that this indicates the learning of the Standard Algorithm because that method uses place value as well as the relationship between adding and subtracting to solve problems. The truth lies in the distinctions the authors themselves apply in their use of language.  Accordingly, our public school 1^st, 2^nd and 3^rd Graders are to be subjected to the same confusing, ineffective, multiple-strategies methodology that our students currently struggle with.  The actual wording: “Fluently add and subtract multi-digit whole numbers using the standard algorithm,” is not seen until Grade 4.  Multiplication using the Standard is delayed until 5^th Grade, division until 6^th Grade.  All four basic operations using decimals wait for the Standard Algorithm until 6^th Grade.  The grade level sections on fractions – and all the “conceptualizing” that goes with them – I found very confusing as I searched in vain for any mention of the use of the Standard Algorithm.  Far from being balanced in juxtaposing procedure and concept, as claimed by the authors multiple times, the Core tilts so far toward “concept” for so many years that procedure is in grave danger of ever being achieved.  Surely many 4th Graders will have given up hope of ever performing the super complex function of - adding.  Are we really supposed to believe that the Experts think it takes four years to grasp the ideas behind adding and subtracting?

Much like today, students are also to try to figure out how to solve problems on their own without benefit of explicit instruction.  According to the Experts, this will take a great deal of perseverance on the part of the students – students must not be allowed to give up, which of course they would be pretty likely to do since they are not to be taught the skills nor knowledge it would take to solve them.

Under CCSS.Math.Practice.MP7  “Look for and make use of structure:

Mathematically proficient students look closely to discern a pattern or structure. Young students, for example, might notice that three and seven more is the same amount as seven and three more, …”  

Very young students struggling to add - because of teachers insisting that they use ten different, inane methods to do so- might Not notice the above fact.  It would be far easier for a student to “notice” patterns such as this if taught the Standard Algorithm from the beginning, but that is not to be.  It would be even better if an instructor would point this out to the kids explicitly using several different examples which would naturally lead the students to find similar patterns on their own.  We wish.

 Below is another indication of the same as the authors distinguish between problem-solving and practice exercises.  The only thing students learn from trying to solve problems they lack the skills and knowledge to solve is frustration and a hatred of Math

“…. in working exercises, students apply what they have already learned to build mastery. Problems are problems because students haven’t yet learned how to solve them (Italics are mine); students are learning from solving them. Materials use problems to teach mathematics. Lessons have a few well designed problems that progressively build and extend understanding. Practice exercises that build fluency are easy to recognize for their purpose. Other exercises require longer chains of reasoning.”  (pg 17)

http://www.corestandards.org/Math/Practice

The most chilling statements I found on the entire web site, however, were these:

“…. each standard in this document might have been phrased in the form, “Students who already know A should next come to learn B.” But at present this approach is unrealistic—not least because existing education research cannot specify all such learning pathways (Italics are mine). Of necessity therefore, grade placements for specific topics have been made on the basis of state and international comparisons and the collective experience and collective professional judgment of educators, researchers and mathematicians. One promise of common state standards is that over time they will allow research on learning progressions to inform and improve the design of standards to a much greater extent than is possible today. (Italics are mine.)  Learning opportunities will continue to vary across schools and school systems, and educators should make every effort to meet the needs of individual students based on their current understanding.”

“These Standards are not intended to be new names for old ways of doing business. They are a call to take the next step. It is time for states to work together to build on lessons learned from two decades of standards based reforms. It is time to recognize that these standards are not just promises to our children, but promises we intend to keep.”

http://www.corestandards.org/Math/Content/introduction/how-to-read-the-grade-level-standards

What kind of "lessons learned" would have these folks withholding skills and knowledge for even longer than happens now?  Put another way, why does this look like dumbing our kids down even more?  Because this isn’t about education – this is about the states getting big bucks to do yet more experimenting.

There are plenty of mathematicians, other education experts and no small number of parents who know exactly how to successfully teach math and in what sequence.  They know that the Standard Algorithms for the four major arithmetic operations can be successfully taught at grade-appropriate levels beginning with 1^st Grade with no sacrifice to the understanding of the concepts of numbers or functions.  But apparently they were not the ones in charge of writing the Common Core Standards.  Despite all the yammering by everyone from President Obama on down about the importance of the STEM skills and knowledge, these Core authors are not in the least interested in educating our public school children.  A large percentage of our children are not to have access to a future in STEM-related jobs, and the United States is not to have access to the majority of its children's highest potentials.  The  Educators are far too busy doing research – and not in a way that will help this nation at all.  

There is, of course, even more being written on the Core’s errors in teaching Math at the higher levels which I’m not qualified to address.  There's quite a bit about the Language Arts Standards also.  I’ve read very good articles on this topic at Education Views.org.  While some states have spurned the Common Core, many states have begun using the new standards, and the detrimental effects are being described in detail by experts and by parents of suffering children.  Please especially see:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mark-rice/common-core-math_b_2781092.html?view=print&comm_ref=false