Back From NCTE Chicago Conference
I had a great weekend at the NCTE conference in Chicago!
But the conference was not without controversy. The National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) had the opportunity to take a stand against the movement for national common standards, but chose not to do so. There's an article on the conflict by Catherine Gewertz on the Education Week blog. Check it out HERE.
The good news is: Texas is one of only four states to not adopt the Common Core Standards.
So far.
Curriculum and assessment decisions need to be made at the local level, not in Washington, D. C. The pendulum is unfortunately swinging the other way.
In 2008, our SBOE adopted our current English Language Arts and Reading curriculum -- over the opposition of every professional organization representing teachers.
This giant misstep occurred when our SBOE handed the writing of our curriculum over to Susan Pimentel from StandardsWork in Washington, D.C.
Susan Pimentel is also one of the authors of the Common Core.
This makes me extremely uncomfortable. It should make every Texan uncomfortable.
And now our SBOE is rewriting our Math curriculum.
Will they ignore our Math educators like they ignored our ELA professionals?
We should call on our SBOE members to answer this question.