Mirrored by Kathryn Merrifield

The yoga teacher today at Bikram distracts me.  The characature of him, that is:  Martin Short impersonating a gay, Latin man, with Duran Duran hair sans Aquanet and with rosey cheeks. 

But, here’s the deal.  I laid my mat on that Flotex floor, grasped my hands together under my chin to start the first round of two sets of breathing.  Three quarters of the interior walls are covered floor to ceiling with mirrors and I opted for the front row where anyone whose attended a few classes can, um, perch (I later executed a Bird of Paradise that the last person in the room, said, “Wow.”  His name was Julio.  I told him that my anatomy and practice allows for that, and that is a function of focus more than anything, which is why I life the sweaty mess of this yoga).

I digress…  Well, there’s something new.

(sigh)

So, I’m thinking about the mirror in front of me.  How I have to look myself in the eye for every posture of the entire class.  My mind is scattered so I try to skip over the second set of breathing into a side bend, hands together to form an arrow, index fingers pointed and arms precisely straight.  My eyes are red.  Mostly, because I’ve been sad and discouraged of late, despite the goodness of one door closing and others swinging open as if by magic.

On that particular day, I didn’t want this particular yoga instructor.  I wanted to hear what Jean had to say.  I wanted to get what I needed.  Assurance in her words that come with a fresh class every day despite what could be monotony after something like ten years of ownership.  The same class but different every day.  Do you know how difficult that is?

Very.

So, that’s what I wanted.  But, I got Latin Martin Short.

But, by the time we arrived well into the floor series, the second half of the class, our instructor began talking about Kung Foo Panda and the postures of the class - the way he says it, it sounds like “posters” and it took me a while to understand what he was saying…  Now I consider that my problem, not his.

He talked about how the evil tiger finally snatched away the sacred scroll.  When he finally got it, he unrolled the scroll to find no words – just a mirrored, empty but for the reflection of his face, scroll.

The message was that the power of the dragon warrior is to be found inside. 

It’s where transformation begins.  I stayed another thirty minutes after class in that room with its near silence, using the heat to ply my body to do what my mind needed to do, if anything, to know I tried, and that I could do something.  Right now, any self care – yoga, running, swimming… - is the easiest thing I do all day, even when it feels like the most difficult, it shows me that I can show up and do something.

Shaking Out the Common Core by Kathryn Merrifield

When asked to write an blog post on the topic of The Common Core for weareteachers.com, I realized that I did not know enough about it to form an intelligent opinion .  So, I went to work, backstopping where I first heard of the controversies surrounding the Common Core - not all curriculum-centered, but encompassing the roots of educational programming and the information issues that filter from our government, into our schools, businesses, and what used to be, our private lives.

The seed was first planted in September when I attended the kindergarten principal’s coffee.  Dr. Peter Mustich, the Rye Neck School District Superintendent, spoke briefly about the iBloom system that the state was mandating through federal incentives.  While federal educational incentivizing mandates are against the law, state funding as reward, is not.  With corporate-backing, districts are being asked to provide student academic and behavioral data and possibly released or sold to third parties for research or marketing. 

That lead me to a bit of an information tirade of my own – asking that our PTSA provide more information on data collection, which lead to more research about the Common Core.  Oddly, the only way that I can seem to convey this information is in a timeline of my experience with it.  Perhaps, in hopes, that you’ll understand better that I am a parent who knew nothing, but was prompted into advocacy because now I do know something, thanks to a handful of incredibly knowledgeable parents who are also obsessed with reforming reform.  Parents, who, as you will see from their comments below, are educators and are wholly informed on this topic that takes the our trust from teachers and puts it in the hands of state legislators.

In a nutshell, legislators and corporations are leading this academic reform movement to capitalize on a misperception:  the misperception that ALL American schools are failing, that we’re falling behind internationally and the only way to enforce teaching standards is to test kids to the point of exhaustion. Accountability is placed in the hands of the teachers, though the tests come from a private publishing company capitalizing on the government’s misperception.  But, where did this start?

Thankfully, in my research, I came across a book recommended by a former teacher:  REIGN OF ERROR:  THE HOAX OF THE PRIVATIZATION MOVEMENT AND THE DANGER TO AMERICA’S PUBLIC SCHOOLS by Diane Ravitch.  I’m still slogging through the book because it is packed with information that needs to be digested in pieces so that my emotional reaction to those pieces does not block continued absorption.  There’s a lot there and it’s shocking. 

There are a few episodes of the TWILIGHT ZONE that would clarify this shock.

One of the points that the book made was that the impetus for educational reform came from the 1983 publication of a report called A Nation at Risk.  “It’s basic claim,” reports Diane Ravitch, “was that the American standard of living was threatened by the loss of major manufacturing industries – such as automobiles, machine tools, and steel mills – to other nations, which the commission attributed to the mediocre quality of our public education system; this claim shifted the blame from shortsighted corporate leadership to the public schools.”

While I’d like to distance myself from this comment to say that it doesn’t break my heart to hear that highly paid corporate leaders are placing greed first, driven by the need to capture more profits without consideration to quality or national loyalty, and placing blame on badly paid, badly treated but passionate and caring individuals assigned to care for and guide our children for more hours in the day than most parents, working or not working, can attend to them in a meaningful, instructional and creative way.  I am ashamed at these individuals – the corporate entities leading reform - because they replace substance with ego and a broad and profitable agenda.

Really, the only thing that can push forward a program that has no grounds in educational research or pragmatic thought is money.  The aforementioned book and my research goes on to explain that the impetus of this Common Core and data collection, is leading toward the privatization of schools.  The privatization of schools means that children will not be granted  “a free and appropriate education.”  The twist – because there always is one – is that these private charter schools, won’t have to subscribe to the standards required by public schools.  They will have no Common Core.  Conspiracy theories aside, it sounds like a hoax meant to make public schools fail so that privatization is the only clear path for a solid American education.

And, guess what.  Someone profits.

While these realizations have been hitting me in waves, I have to say that this year my family did not travel to see extended family outside of the state.  We were home for Thanksgiving.  After the holiday passed, I realized that the kindergarten Thanksgiving feast did not happen.  I was told by a parent and friend that it was cancelled the year prior when the kindergarten aides were let go.  And, one of my children’s teachers said that they built a curriculum around the feast and that the Common Core no longer allowed time for it.

During this conversation, I managed a simple smile and nod to a kindergarten teacher who I’ve known now for years – a teacher who always offered a warm, sincere smile in return for the haggard-grin of a parent juggling three young children.  What I see now, is a look of defeat trying to cheer itself out…  in a kindergarten teacher.  One that is solid and steady and loved.  I am not the only one who finds it terribly wrong to treat our teachers this way, in our free country that allows for creative expression and individual success but takes away… creative expression and individual success.

I’m not the only one who finds it wrong because I did the research and I showed up and I signed my letters, and now I’m left with this little crusade among the informed who want to inform you.

Teachers are required to give tests in a sequence.  Tests, like the kindergarten gym test  created with age-inappropriate questions children cannot answer simply because a publishing company that creates the tests, needs a baseline to gauge a child’s progress. 

To teachers, it’s a waste of time.  All of the time testing to satisfy Pearson Publishing’s focus group responses required to build curriculum, takes away from meaningful classroom instruction.  Teachers and students are being forced to change direction entirely and quickly, without allocated transition time.

Legislators have linked failing schools to circumstances that fail children.  The circumstances are not teachers.  Failing schools exist in troubled communities, and though our successful school mothers are now being called spoiled brats by legislators for wanting to opt out of this curriculum and incentivized academic performance, and instead funnel it into the needier schools, while keeping a curriculum that already works, our school district and others suffer because some need more help and this is the only way legislators without teaching backgrounds, could not create anything else.

In terms of data collection:  data collected through iBloom ranges from student behavior to academic achievement and is stored to be used without parental controls.  What is important to remember here is that these students are minors, but this does not resonate yet as a legal matter.  It should.

Pearson Education is failing.  Legislators are failing.  Who's making anyone of them accountable for the harm that data collection can cause to a child who slipped up once or twice?

And, why is a curriculum mandated to schools that already exceed national standards?  Not that it would work anywhere else, mind you.  But, I think I already covered that.

Since I am not a teacher, but know many educators who are also parents, I collected opinions from them too.  We’re all not know-it-all helicopter parents orchestrating the minutia of our children’s lives, but concerned parents and educatorss who understand what works and what doesn’t.

As of yet, our legislators are not listening.

It seems like a mixed message to me – one being that kids should not be given choice.  That teachers should instruct with myopic tunnel vision, teaching age-inappropriate content to children who should take what’s given to them.  I make the connection between a generational argument – a criticism of modern parenting.  I’ve been told that young children should not be given choices.  I’ve been told this by my mother, who grew up in an era where choice was limited.  You bought a pair of sneakers of the few brands and styles offered.  You followed a particular route.  You want to talk to someone – pick up the phone or speak face-to-face.  Life events had a certain map to them.  Even employment at the same company for years offered a reciprocal loyalty and security. 

While it can be argued that we are fortunate for a vast array of options now offered to us, I fail to understand how any child will grow up with the ability to navigate choice if they are offered none.  Discrimination is a skill that teaches people to choose based on areas of talent and interest, of ethics and societal mores. 

But the creation of curriculum that adheres to a one size fits all standard, does not take into account choice.  I am not one to pander to the fickle needs of children.  I do not subscribe to the practice of we are all winners and everything deserves a reward.  I do not spoil. 

But, teaching a circumscribed curriculum that doesn’t take into consideration difference, learning styles and the obvious need to teach children how to sipher through massive amounts of content, is short-sighted and misdirected. 

We live in a free country that allows us to choose our content, but we offer no plan to help the future of our country to use it wisely and to good effect. 

Test taking is not a life skill.  Teaching to a test is not a lesson in discipline, it’s a lesson in getting through.  It is not a lesson of mastery or mining talent, it is a lesson that education has nothing to do with anything real in life.

To put it into an internet perspective, we allow corporate executives to dictate a movement toward charter schools – privately-funded schools that do not have to follow any such standards like those mandated now.  It makes absolutely no sense.  Zero. 

Funny thing is that Bill Gates is one of those people spearheading this campaign – a successful and incredibly wealthy man who dropped out of high school is one of the largest backers of the Common Core and iBloom. 

No one is thinking about our children.  It’s just money their pockets.  That’s all it is.  Argue what you want.

- Anonymous

I think the amount of assessment the teachers are required to do now is absolutely absurd.  It unnecessarily takes away from teaching time.  I understand as a parent and a former teacher that occasional assessment is useful to see individual needs, but I can state from experience, most teachers know the strengths and weaknesses of their students within the first few weeks of school without doing any formal assessment.  

True individual assessments take a good amount of time and it is impossible to do it correctly with the limited time these teachers already have.  Again, it takes away from valuable teaching time, including non-academic teaching time, such as special projects or creative free time (the things that keep many of the students interested :-)

So basically, although I do think individual assessments are helpful and needed occasionally, possibly 3 or 4 times throughout the year, it is a hinderance the way it is being used now and discouraging to many of the children.  

- Marla Schneider, former teacher, mother of four elementary-aged children

As a parent of 3 children, aged 13-18, I have seen all walks of my kid's education. As a teacher for over 20 years, I have also experienced all walks of public education trends throughout the years. I can honestly say, that at this point in time, morale for both teachers and students is at an all time low. While the Common Core may have started out with good intentions, it has spun wildly out of control, and can quite possibly be the demise of our feelings of self worth, and our passions for both learning and teaching. Teachers and students are feeling frustrated and under-valued by the over emphasis that testing has in the classroom. Curriculum is test driven, results have high stakes, and the enthusiasm and love of both teaching and learning is quickly being squeezed out of the classroom! No longer is there an emphasis on creating life-long learners who are bright and inquisitive.  Today, education is more focused on the end result of a poorly formulated state test, which is not an accurate reflection of what is developmentally appropriate for children. Between the implementation of tests that are too challenging, and the combination of raising the bar for meeting grade level expectations and the lowering of the bar for assisting students who struggle, there are no winners in this vicious cycle of assessment.

My own children are all different types of learners, and for the most part have always met with success. My youngest, however, is a struggling student who will probably never meet grade level expectations. She is in "nomads" land; she doesn't meet the benchmark for success, but doesn't qualify for support services either. How, with the rising level of expectations, is she to catch up? Homework is a tearful event, and preparing for subject area tests are even worse! At this point, I am just hoping that she doesn't fail anything, and will actually graduate on time in 2018! Maybe by then, the state, in their esteemed wisdom, will realize that they have successfully created students who do not have a desire to learn. Then, perhaps we could go back to the way things used to be... happy kids, in loving school environments, with teachers who care and kids who actually want to be in school, learning!

- Betsey Ensign, 5^th grade teacher and mother

Education at its best should be rooted in child developmental theory.   Children are born curious and eager to discover the world.  Schooling should simply provide an environment to nurture these innate qualities.  

Play is the foundation for children's learning.  While children play they develop relationships, learn to negotiate, develop cause and effect, count, sort, recognize patterns, become dexterous and coordinated, make sounds that turn into letters, words, then stories.  The amount of learning that happens within a day is almost immeasurable.

Unfortunately, education as I describe it is under attack.  Corporate education reformers say that we must now adopt a rigorous curriculum to make young children college- and career-ready. It is not only inhumane to force children to learn material for which they are not developmentally ready; it is futile.  

We see a trend towards rote lesson plans and high-stakes testing as a direct result of pushing children in ways they are not meant to learn.  Consequently, there is the need to repeat and retest because it does not make sense to them.  

When children's curiosity is engaged and the material comes from their own play, learning happens with minimal effort.  Stop the hours of mundane lesson plans, stop the testing, and watch the learning that happens.  

--Gina Tampio, mother of two elementary-aged children

As a teacher, I see the stress and frustration that the rushed and bungled implementation of the Common Core curriculum and the new teacher evaluation requirements has caused for teachers and administrators, especially at the elementary level. It is nothing less than heart-breaking to be forced to teach in a way that does not engage you or your students, that you know is often developmentally inappropriate, that doesn’t allow you to address the individual needs and ability levels of your students. It is infuriating to know that under the new APPR evaluation system, the only thing that really matters is how your students perform on a poorly-constructed standardized test that sets kids up to fail (an evaluation system under which the New York State teacher of the year was not even deemed “highly effective”). It is sad to see administrators removed from their work from students because their jobs have been reduced to dealing with the enormous bureaucratic task load that Albany had dumped on them.

But I’m an adult. I can handle whatever Albany sends my way. And if I decide I can’t handle it, or don’t want to handle it anymore, I can quit my job and pursue another field, difficult as that might be. My 8 year old son does not have that luxury. In the past year he has gone from someone who loves school and is excited to wake up in the morning, to a child who says almost every day that he hates school and just wishes that he could have “one good day.” There is no longer any room in his day for the kinds of creative projects and lessons that used to engage him. Science and Social Studies are barely touched upon anymore. ELA and Math instruction, despite his teacher’s valiant efforts, have been reduced to tedious test prep. He comes home from school defeated, only to face an hour or more of homework - always worksheets from engageny or his Common Core-aligned workbooks. And he is not alone; I often hear similar stories from other parents. What can my son do? He can’t quit third grade. We’ll never get his third grade year back. So I feel like I have to speak out for him. I don’t want him to hate 4th grade and 5th grade -- I teach at an alternative high school -- I see what happens when students become disengaged. So I am speaking out for him, because he has no voice in Albany. Parents have to fix this. School boards and administrators are trying, but Albany isn’t listening to them. Parents have the power of numbers -- we are constituents -- we pay taxes, we vote. And no one can accuse us of being self-serving, of not wanting what’s best for our children (accusations frequently made against educators speaking out). Our only interest is our children. And we can’t afford to be patient.

- Jennifer McGrath Fall, teacher and mother