At Considerable Cost

Common Core: What Is It? There are SO many articles and videos warning people of the dangers of the Common Core State Standards Initiative, or CCSSI .   That's right, that's the official name: it's Standards, not Curriculum.   Standards are a part of a curriculum.   They simply state what each student should be able to demonstrate, with mastery, by the end of a school year.   Standards are important as they guide curriculum and the instruction in classrooms. There are currently Standards for Mathematics and Language Arts, Kindergarten through Grade 12 and they are all available for inspection on the official CCSSI website: http://www.corestandards.org/ For example, in Mathematics, there are Standards for Mathematical Practice , which are the general  "varieties of expertise that mathematics educators at all levels should seek to develop in their students..."   These Standards are to be developed across all grad...

Like everyone else, I can say my parents weren't perfect and my childhood was not idyllic, but I had a great childhood.   There were many things that made it so and I think part of it was because my parents were older (although they would not be considered so today). In our neighbor's garden.   Mama once pulled back the leaves of similar plants in this garden and found a copperhead snake coiled.   The garden was planted by an elderly gentleman who worked and lived on the neighboring farm.   He was always called Preacher.   He called the snake a pilot snake.   He told Mama that in a few weeks a rattle snake would come through, on the same path.   Sure enough, he showed Mama the dead rattlesnake a few weeks later.   Mama did a little research and found out that copperheads and rattlers often den together.   The copperhead often goes out a few weeks before and the rattler will follow the same path...