For those of you who teach in South Dakota, what do you think about this article?

www.argusleader.com/article/2011112...nav%7Chead

Are any of you slated to attend the January one-day meetings for math that are referred to in the article? If so, I hope you will report back on what helpful insights you gain. The mention of the "gap maps" reminded me of the concern expressed just the other day on the forum asking why the transition doesn't involve a phasing in of the new standards over time.

I'm one of those SD teachers that will be attending the one-day meeting in January. The emphasis of those workshops will be the 8 Standards for Mathematical Practice. At the high school level, our Algebra 1 teacher is attending the 4-day workshop on the Common Core Standards. I'm not sure how many are attending from our elementary and middle schools.

I just sent the link from the SF Argus Leader on to my colleagues. I know that finding out that the "big" school district in the state is acknowledging a tough transition and looking to the state's DOE for help with the process eases my anxiety just a little.

I am also concerned about the time this conversion will take, although in the end, it will be beneficial.

Jan, thanks for the feedback. If there's any comfort to be found, it's that no one is alone in this process! I hope the workshops are helpful, with practical materials and ideas for making the conversion work.

I am also attending the workshop in January. From the article it does not seem like it will be a seamless transition to the new test. This will create a lot of schools not making AYP and sending administrators over the edge. The burden looks to be in the 6th grade where the amount of content to be covered is almost doubled. I am not sure our students are mature enough or academicly ready for the new standards. I t won't matter how much training we receive if the students are not "ready" to receive the knowledge. Are we expecting too much from our children at an earlier age?

That's a good point, Stacy. And 6th grade will require a greater variety of teaching strategies simply because the students are younger and will benefit from more *active* learning in the lessons. When I do LTF training, I love to show teachers that the middle grades lessons (especially the 6th grade ones) involve not just analytical content but also much more hands-on and experiential learning. My favorite LTF lessons to do with my high school students are often the middle grades and Algebra 1 lessons for exactly that reason!

The article is archived and behind a paywall now, so I'm wondering if this training has already happened. SD teachers, how did it go?

The SD training happened . . . twice for me! Last Friday for an inservice day, our school district brought the training in for all k-5 teachers, paras, and administration, and all the middle school and high school math teachers. The inservice day was listed as an Inservice/Snow Make-up Day, however, on our calendar. Afraid that making up a snowstorm day would prevent us from receiving the training, we three high school math teachers were proactive and attended a regional training the end of January. It didn't hurt me at all to sit through the training about the 8 Standards of Mathematics Practice twice.

In both trainings, a critical factor emphasized has been that "time" must be allowed . . . students need time to think about, struggle with, and then have conversations about the concepts in order for deeper understanding to take place. So my question or concern hasn't changed . . . spending additional time means that some content will need to be sacrificed. I need something to tell me what content to leave out from that which I currently teach. At this point, I am reluctant to change how I am doing things when it seems to be working . . . if the fact that my students that go on technical school or college tell me they were well prepared means it's working!

Jan, did anyone raise that point at either training? I'm curious as to what the gurus would say, because yes, things like "perseverance" and critiquing others' reasoning require lots of extra time.

I raised the point and didn't get an answer. I raised it again in writing when filling out an exit card after the workshop. In the interest of fairness, to answer that question the person would need to have a conversation with me about the content I am currently teaching!

And the irony is, there was no time for that!

Time seems to be of great concern for a number of people in the implementation of the Common Core Standards, but honestly, I have another major concern. I have spent 4 days in face to face training and several dozen hours doing online work, revisions, etc for disaggregation of the CCSS. While at these trainings, i discovered that some of my colleagues viewed these days merely as days off from school. Some of them spent time playing on the Internet, or planning sports strategies for upcoming contests. No wonder the standards we had (have) as state standards are so hard for new teachers to understand. They probably had similar groups of people in the work groups to "unpack" them the last time around. No offense to those who worked on unpacking last time, or to those who are working on them again this time around, but it seems that teachers need to take it more seriously if we truly want to be able to grow as a state. The standards need to be clear and ACCURATE in their interpretation. I'm afraid we don't completely have that.

Wendy, is this something (the "unpacking" of the CCSS) that is being done locally? Regionally? Is it something that will be ongoing, or are you expected to have some sort of finished product for everyone to follow ASAP?

Groups of SD teachers are disaggregating the standards. I think the plan is to have all standards disaggregated by this summer. The usefulness of the final product will certainly depend on its quality. I share some of the same concern that Wendy expressed. However, I think most teachers in the group I was in took it seriously.

We have several teachers helping with the disaggregation as well. I think they are taking their job very seriously. They have returned to the district with good information and also questions for other staff.

I would love to see a sample of what this "disaggregating" looks like. Are you working to assign different portions to particular subjects? To align your current curriculum? To give some examples of what a particular standard "looks like?"

I too am part of the SD Math teachers' groups that are disaggregating the CCstandards. Here is a link to see our work so far:

sdccteachers.k12.sd.us/home/9-12-math

Currently, Algebra I and Geometry standards are being worked on.

Our work group (I'm in Dustin's group) has been productive and professional.

LuAnn, thank you so much for sharing that link! Wow!! There is a lot of detail going into the disaggregation process. I enjoyed checking out a few of the google docs and seeing the various comments people had noted in the margins.

Wow! This is terrific work you guys are doing, LuAnn. Like Melissa, I looked at some of the google docs and comment streams (which seems to be part of the editing process). Thanks so much for sharing the link. I hope you'll keep the forum updated on your progress.

I am a "day late and a dollar short"! I tried to click on the link and it was no longer available. Can someone give me a summary of what it said? I also went to the workshop in January and I am curious about the article. It seems like all of the posts, articles and conversations that I have about CC are all rooted around TIME and SUPPORT! Kinda freaks me out thinking about it sometimes!!

Karyl, I'm not sure why the link doesn't work for you. I just tried it again (from LuAnn's post on Feb 20). It took me to the document, and the links to the documents for the individual standards still worked as well. Summarizing "what is said" is difficult -- it's a document listing all of the CCSS standards for a particular course, and clicking on a particular standard takes you to another document where the meaning of that particular standard is "fleshed out" in all sorts of ways.

Karyl, the original article was about the January offerings of workshops to try to clarify the CCSS timeline and to talk about resources. It quoted various people who expressed concerns about there not being enough support for teachers on the front lines and not enough time or clear direction on how to implement the CCSS.

I even tried the way back machine, but it wasn't archived there.

Marilyn, I think Karyl was talking about the link to the newspaper article in the Sioux Falls Argus Leader in the first post. That article has been archived and is no longer available to read.

I also attended at Common Core: Standards for Mathematical Practice. We covered the 8 standards that are needed to deal with word problems. It was a good day and important for the new Common Core standards coming up.

Scanning over the replies since I attended the one day training and I see the word "time" repeated over again by different people. This is a major concern, because the test cuts us off by the beginning of April. Has is it ever been mentioned to delay testing till the end of April or beginning of May to give us more instructional days? The cc standards will require more from our children and they will need as much time as possible to process the content.

Great point, Stacy! Our math end of course state exams at my school in TX aren't until the second week of May. I'm feeling very fortunate to have the time to finish the course this week and then review for the month of April. I can't imagine sending them in next week to test, since their benchmark scores have definitely shown me we have some gaps to fill.