Common Core State Standards: Plant a Garden, Don't Install a Scale

“Michelle Obama did not put a scale in front of White House; she planted a garden.” Doug Reeves shared this analogy in Denver several weeks ago at the Leadership and Learning Conference on the Common Core when urging us as educators not to focus on effects or test scores but on instructional causes.

Michelle didn’t line up children in front of a scale and weigh them and then create a statistical table about how fat or how skinny our kids are. Isn’t this what we have done with so many of our state tests? Much of our work around standards has had everything to do with the test and performance and little to do with the richness of the standards and curriculum.

We make sure our very best teachers are in teaching the grade in which children are tested. During those testing years (as well as other grade level curriculum sometimes) what is taught revolves around what is tested. Take writing instruction for instance. No matter the research that tells us that in order to create successful and capable young writers, students should be motivated to write and that involves choice of topics. Instead, many schools and districts advocate for teaching children using isolated prompts in order to prepare them for the writing test.

Obama, rather than weigh children and chastise parents about how fat their children are, instead encouraged us to begin eating healthier by planting a garden. So, how can we use that metaphor for the Common Core? Perhaps we need to embrace the rich, spiraling standards and unpack them so that we can effectively teach kids across grade levels? We will need to avoid creating a “cookie-cutter assessment” (as the Center for Leadership and Learning says) that doesn’t take into consideration individual needs. According to Michael Moore at Georgia Southern University, “Looming on the horizon is the multi-billion battle for common core assessments.” Let’s be thoughtful as we wage the good fight and keep our mind on the garden—not the scales.

Isabel McLean is a National Education Consultant at Developmental Studies Center