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Common Core State Standards What they are! & How they came to be! Implications for New Jersey. New Jersey State Board of Education May 4, 2011 Dorothy S. Strickland. Overview. Why Common Core State Standards? Issues! Concerns! Goals! The Process: Development & Adoption
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Common Core State StandardsWhat they are! & How they came to be!Implications for New Jersey New Jersey State Board of Education May 4, 2011 Dorothy S. Strickland
Overview • Why Common Core State Standards? Issues! Concerns! Goals! • The Process: Development & Adoption • Key Features: English Language Arts & Math • What about Assessment? • Challenges & Cautions • Next Steps
Why Standards? Why Common Core State Standards? Standards provide a shared vision of what students, teachers, and those responsible for the supporting infrastructure should know and be able to do. Common Core State Standards -- Establish consistency across the states
Concerns about “current” standards • Equity • Efficiency • Expectations • International standing in student achievement
The Goals • State initiated and developed; Voluntary • Research-based • Address knowledge and skills necessary for college and careers • Benchmarked against standards from high performing nations • Rigorous! Clear! Focused
Development Process Leadership -- • Council of Chief State School Officers • National Governors Association Not the Federal Government Working Groups -- • Writing Group • Feedback Group • Validation Committee
Adoption Process • States adopt the entire document - may add up to 15% additional material • As of March 2011, 43 states, DC and Virgin Islands -- have adopted; plus -- MN adopted ELA only
Common Core State Standards forEnglish Language Arts & Literacy in History/ Social Studies, Science, & Technical Subjects Features: • Grade-by-grade (K-12) - based on 10 College and Career Readiness Standards - Grade levels for K-8; grade bands for 9-10 and 11-12 • Includes reading, writing, speaking, listening, and language • An integrated model of literacy • Shared responsibility (literacy & content area educators) for students’ literacy development • Research and media skills blended into the Standards as a whole
Common Core State Standards forMathematics Features: Based on college & career readiness standards • K-8 - organized by Domain, Clusters, and Standards Stress conceptual knowledge and understanding in addition to procedural fluency; Strong foundation in arithmetic numbers and operations • 9-12 organized by conceptual categories Stress number and quantity, algebra, functions, modeling, geometry, statistics, and probability Require the application of mathematics to real world situations and issues.
What about Assessment?? • Current administration has awarded $330 million toward development of assessments to replace individual state tests in English language arts and mathematics currently mandated by the No Child Left Behind Act. • The assessment consortia are charged with developing assessments aligned with the Common Core State Standards.
Assessment Governance & Membership • The Partnership for the Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) • The SMARTER Balanced Assessment Consortium (SMARTER) • PARCC and SMARTER consortia are voluntary membership organizations. Governing states are those which have fully committed to implementing their respective consortium’s assessment system by the 2014-2015 school year New Jersey is a PARCC Governing State
PARCC & SMARTER --are grounded in four basic principles • (1) Assessments are common across states and aligned to the CCSS • (2) Students take “performance-based” assessments for accountability • (3) The assessment systems are “computer based” for more sophisticated design and quick, reliable scoring. • (4) Transparent reporting systems drive effective decision-making
Challenges & Cautions Align CCSS with current standards Establish a long-term program of information; communication; and active collaboration with all stakeholders Beware of a crowded marketplace; mass delivery of standardized instruction Knowledge and Understanding of the Standards and the new Assessment Programs will be critical for good consumerism.
Next Steps -- Shared Vision! Multiple Pathways! The Common Core State Standards provide opportunities for New Jersey educators to take a fresh look at -- • Curriculum & Materials • Instruction • Teacher Education - Pre-service and Professional Development • Assessment - Including Benchmarking • Accountability - Student Achievement; Educator Evaluation
The Vision -- an unprecedented opportunity The New Jersey State Board of Education will provide the leadership and guidance needed for the successful implementation of the Common Core State Standards; this effort will serve as the catalyst for reform, leading to a more coherent and highly effective system of education for all of New Jersey’s children.