Just got my first
complaint about Common Core from my granddaughter in Nevada, when I
asked her the usual grandmother question, “how are things at
school?” Both the grandtwins are good middle-school students, both
write excellent essays that I love to read; her complaint was about
the constant testing. She is looking forward to high school: when I
asked if they won’t still be doing testing then, she said yes but
implied at least she’s moving in the right direction, away from it
all!
There might be a
resolution sooner than graduation: I found a website “Nevadans
Against Common Core” which shows people organizing in opposition
just as they are here. My son told me the problem is that Nevada
doesn’t want to lose the federal money that comes with compliance.
Yes, we know about that federal trap too.
Having been a student
myself (Catholic school 1-12), the parent of a Massachusetts public
school student, and now a grandparent of public schoolchildren, I
recognize the efforts that have been made over the decades to find
some system that works to educate all children. The nuns taught
phonics, which worked for most, not for all; I suspect that dyslexic
kids didn’t get the assistance they needed.
Fortunately we weren’t
national-tested on science, as much of what we learned in the ‘50s
was wrong.
When my son started
school, reading was taught by memorization, and math with a frog who
jumped forward for addition and backward for subtraction. I’d taught
Lance phonics with Dr. Seuss but he had a hard time with subtraction
because he couldn’t imagine how a frog can jump backwards; someone
finally told him the frog turns around. Still, he never really
caught up with math.
We took Algebra in 9th
grade, Geometry in 10th: the grandkids have already taken both. This
may be a good thing but I can’t comment on teaching math, since I
can’t balance my checkbook without counting on my fingers.
It’s true that over the
years, educators needed more testing to determine what was working,
which communities were doing better than others and why; MCAS seemed
to be a good tool for comparison here. I understand why some
national educators then thought it important to compare the states
by using federal standards, but it’s becoming obvious that the
federal government meddling in state and local education doesn’t
work.
Because it’s Mothers’ Day,
I’ll tell you what does work, in the non-math arena, based on my
experience as a child, a parent and now a grandparent. What works is
what my mother did for me and I then did for my own child: teaching
reading at home.
Of course it was easier
when one parent didn’t work, was home during the day with the pre-schooler.
My mother recalled my toddling behind her with a Little Golden Book
in my hand, as she did housework, asking “What’s this word, mommy?”
I didn’t go to kindergarten, but started first grade reading at a
third grade level, impressing all the nuns who thought I was a lot
smarter than I am – an assumption that followed me to graduation.
When I became pregnant, I
vowed that I would teach my child to read, never to assume any
school system will perform this essential task. I read poetry to the
infant as he lay in his crib, showing him the rhythm of words; when
we got tired of baby books, his dad and I read our own novels out
loud. On weekends we read in bed, our pre-schooler snuggled between
us with his own little book, learning that reading is a wonderful
grown-up thing to do.
When living in Greece, we
mail-ordered children’s series like “The Happy Hollisters”, and the
Madeleine L’Engle books. When Lance started school, he was reading
at a 6th grade level. We continued to read books together, him
dramatizing the children’s parts in, for example, “To Kill a
Mockingbird”. He still reads voraciously, we share favorite books,
he thanks me often for this one great gift.
Best thank-you of all:
passing it on to my grandchildren, who already read at an adult
level. For their entire lives, the twins will be able to teach
themselves, by reading any book on any subject. This benefit was
passed down from my mother, who always stopped to tell me the word I
wanted to learn in “The Little Red Hen”, and my mother-in-law: when
I met Lance’s other grandma, she was sitting in a laundry basket
filled with clothes, reading “The Velveteen Rabbit” to her youngest
child.
One reason I chose this
subject was something I heard on the Rush Limbaugh radio show last
week that I thought was a joke. However, I checked it out, and WND
Education reports that there really is a British philosopher who
claims that reading to children gives them an unfair advantage over
less fortunate children.
A story on the website of
the Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s website raises the
question “Should parents snuggling up for one last story before
lights out be even a little concerned about the advantage they might
be conferring?...
British academic Adam
Swift told ABC’s Joe Gelonesi “Evidence shows that the difference
between those who get bedtime stories and those who don’t – the
difference in their life chances – is bigger than the difference
between those who get elite private schooling and those that don’t,”
Swift said.
In his article, Gelonesi
added: “This devilish twist of evidence surely leads to a further
conclusion that perhaps – in the interests of leveling the playing
field – bedtime stories should also be restricted.”
Well, that’s sick. Glad
it’s coming from Australia rather than anywhere in the United
States. Yet.
This week, because of
Mother’s Day, I’m celebrating mothers who teach their kids to read,
though of course it’s just as good when fathers spend that quality
time with their children. Even Common Core, as annoying as it is to
youngsters like my granddaughter who would rather be reading or
writing than taking tests, won’t keep them from becoming educated
adults.
Barbara Anderson of
Marblehead is president of Citizens for Limited Taxation and a Salem
News columnist.
