Update on Common Core Stuff

The Dancer has told me that one of her recent Spanish assignments was to pretend that she was a girl from Costa Rica, and write a letter to one of the other girls in class, who was pretending she was a girl from Colombia. They were to learn some facts about the country and then write a letter describing some of what their country was like. Mind you, my daughter is in Honors Spanish III. Both the Musician and I agreed that an assignment like that is pretty Spanish I type of stuff. Does anyone have any input on this? Obviously, it depends to an certain extent on the complexity of the writing required, but this doesn't seem to have been a very complicated letter. I know the Dancer thought it was kind of a silly assignment. She has been keeping me up on things, now that she has seen my previous post on Common Core. By Honors Spanish III, one is generally getting into the more difficult parts of grammar, and learning more advanced vocabulary. This assignment doesn't seem to have fit that bill.

I heard from the one mom I know well enough to contact about this. She said she didn't know what we could do about it. Hmmm. I have heard that there is an Ohio House Bill under discussion which would repeal Common Core for the whole state. I already called my State Representative and told him that I support it, even though it's still just being talked about. That may sound silly, I suppose. I wanted to let my rep know it was already being talked about by the larger community, and that there are people that support it. Ironically, I heard about this bill when I put up a Tweet with a link to my previous Common Core post. I also heard about Ohioans Against Common Core this way. The Evil Genius in me wants to buy an anti-Common Core shirt and wear it to home football games.

At least my daughter's AP US History class seems to be going the same way it was when the Musician took the course, BCC (Before Common Core.) They are using the same textbook, which I think was older already when the Musician used it. I am keeping an eye on anything they might be using outside of the textbook. Also, Mr. BTEG was a chemistry lab assistant in high school, and minored in math in college, so he is knowledgeable enough on both of those subjects to make sure the Dancer is getting a solid foundation in those courses. I wish every student was so blessed.

Common Core Is Rotten

I'm sure you've already heard a bunch of other people express frustration with how poor the Common Core curriculum is at actually teaching kids. I knew Common Core was not a good educational system, but was hoping that since my daughter was a sophomore in high school this year, she wouldn't be affected much by the issues. Fortunately, it doesn't seem to be showing up in her math, science or AP US History classes. She is having to read some worthless non-fiction books for English. Their reading assignment over the summer was The Talent Code. Is that truly useful for the majority of 15-year-olds? What made this book stand out among the sea of self-help books out there, that an English teacher picked it out for my child? Now she has to go through a list of other books of this type, and pick out another one that she would be interested in reading. Fortunately, they are also reading the traditional fictional literature that has been used in English courses. I'm still displeased with what I feel is a waste of my daughter's learning time.

She also informed me tonight that her Spanish class is being changed by this stupid system also. They're not actually concentrating on learning vocabulary or grammar in class anymore, the Dancer says. They're supposed to be magically learning that at home, then spending class time applying it. What? My daughter is luckier than most, in that I studied Spanish for seven years, and my eldest daughter took three years of Spanish as well. We can help her if she runs into difficulties because she's not getting what she needs in class. But I want my daughter to be studying grammar and vocabulary in class! I shouldn't feel like I have to help her, or supplement her education, at home.

At certain blogs, in this era where educational standards are falling victim to political meddling, I've read that not homeschooling your child amounts to child abuse. I resent that bitterly, because I know my daughter better than anyone else. Homeschooling would not be best for her at this time, because of personal reasons that are none of anyone else's business. I'm going to start by talking to some of the other mothers that I know, and see if anyone else is unhappy with the way this school year is starting out. Depending on whether I get a positive or negative response, Mr. BTEG and I will have to think about things from there.

Should I have tried to fight Common Core when our school district first talked about implementing it? Perhaps. To be honest, I don't have any friends that are fellow moms here in my town. I thought about joining the local PTA long ago, but decided not to when I started getting spammed with email from the national PTA, telling me to vote for things I would never have any intention of supporting. Even the PTA is all politics, all the time, and that disgusted me and put me off the entire PTA idea. So I definitely didn't feel like trying to lead what seemed to me at the time a single-handed crusade against our school board and superintendent, who described Common Core in gushing terms. If I can find some parents that are unhappy about how this is working out in practice, instead of theory, maybe we can band together to get something done. Or as I said above, Mr. BTEG and I will have to take a serious look at the rest of the Dancer's high school years.

Gifts

Do you ever feel that you have certain talents that you don't use? When I was in college, I loved studying foreign languages, German and Spanish in particular, and was fairly good at them. I also enjoyed the smattering of Hungarian I picked up from a Hungarian friend. I was sure I had been given these gifts for a purpose, to make use of them in my future. Unlike Miss Kate, I don't have the gifts necessary to make a good teacher, so I gave up on that idea, but I still felt somehow something would come out of my abilities.

Well, here I am twenty years later, and I use a small bit of German when I talk with a friend who originated from Bavaria. I've started to pick back up on the Spanish since the Musician started it this past school year. Of course, after three years of Latin, Spanish was fairly easy-peasy for her. She'll actually be in Honors Spanish at the high school this year.

Of course, my German was extremely valuable when I visited relatives during a ten-week college trip to Germany and Austria. I spent a few days around Christmas with my mother's first cousin, her husband, children and grandchildren. Only one of the grandchildren spoke much English, and I didn't bunk at his apartment.

My Spanish brightened someone's day at a food trailer during that same trip to Germany. I can only assume this guy was a migrant worker from Spain who had come to Germany for opportunity, and he was buying something at the trailer. I don't know how I picked up that the guy was from Spain, probably something the food trailer guy said. They seemed to know each other. So I spoke to him in Spanish, and the man seemed thrilled with this little touch of "home." I can still remember him exclaiming excitedly to the man behind the counter, "She speaks Spanish!"

And I had a fun time on that same trip when the future Mr. Evil Genius and I ate dinner one night at a Spanish restaurant. The menu was dual German/Spanish, and I ordered in Spanish. The waiter began his very own version of Germish, along the lines of, "Gracias, Fraulein." Poor Mr. Evil Genius was very lost.

Who knows what the future holds? I'd definitely have to brush up on my foreign languages if I was to make use of them again in the future. In the meantime, I sometimes wonder, "Why?"