Posts by hiddendriver34

Karen Richardson3 said:I was chatting with one of your colleagues the other day, and his take on this is pretty different from yours.
For instance, he’s skeptical about all those phrases like "teachers will have more freedom to design their lessons," because he feels like even now, there’s plenty of room to basically wing a lesson whenever you feel like it.

That really got me thinking, so I’m curious—what has held you back from doing more project-based learning or collaborative group work so far?
Was it just a matter of trying to squeeze everything into an already jam-packed daily schedule?

I'm guessing the differences between subjects are massive; like with American history classes, you might finish the core lecture in ten minutes and then the rest of the period is entirely up to your own creativity or whatever mood you're in.
(Thinking about it that way, I realized my high school history teacher, who was super strict and always grilling us with questions, was actually just being lazy. Since he didn't want to bother prepping for class at home, he'd just read the chapter straight from the textbook and spend the rest of the hour interrogating us).

He also mentioned that while there are various professional development seminars available for teachers to sharpen their skills, hardly anyone at his school actually takes advantage of them.

And he's convinced we won't see any real overhaul of the school schedule—like cutting down hours for certain subjects—because the internal resistance within the system is just too intense.

Exactly. Honestly, we have a unique headache because we're expected to squeeze a five-hour weekly lesson plan into just four hours.🙂.

But if you ask me, the big flaw in the current American curriculum is that it's obsessed with memorizing facts. It focuses way too much on rote knowledge and not nearly enough on building actual life skills and competencies. It wouldn't be such a tragedy if that factual stuff didn't vanish from your brain so quickly; otherwise, you walk away from school having learned almost nothing of substance.

The staff will get some training. As for whether they'll actually get a raise, who knows?

The proposal is officially moving into the public comment phase.

Speaking from my perspective as someone working right inside the education system, let me tell you: the current curriculum hasn't changed since my grandmother was in school, and frankly, it’s broken. It’s so outdated that it doesn't just kill the motivation for the students—it drains the teachers too.

I have to tip my hat to whoever had the guts to dig this deep and attempt some real, fundamental changes. We haven't seen anything this transformative in... what, a hundred years? Okay, maybe I'm exaggerating, but it feels that way.

Look, some parts might not work perfectly out of the gate, but hey, that's how we learn, right? The most important thing is just to get moving.

The absolute worst thing we could do is just leave these kids stuck memorizing useless facts without changing a single thing. At least now, they're learning *something* new.

Karen Richardson3 said:Susan James hit the nail on the head. It’s just that people rarely realize their own personal biases and worldview actually constitute an ideology. 😁

Like I said before—there is so much spin flying around regarding this whole situation.

Honestly, I haven't been able to find a single clear-cut article that actually highlights the core changes they're planning for the school system; it's all just vague, empty rhetoric about how we "need to become a knowledge-based society."

In my opinion, these reforms always end up being purely cosmetic—like debating whether grades should be issued mid-term or quarterly, or if we should switch from letter grades to descriptive feedback—when what we actually need is a total paradigm shift. We're talking about things like letting students actually choose their electives, completely restructuring class schedules, or moving away from traditional lectures toward more interactive learning models.

But let's be real, there’s neither the political will nor the budget for that. Apparently, even the teachers are pushing back hard (or at least that's what the news is saying, though I don't know if it's the full story).

I honestly can't tell if this curriculum overhaul was ever intended to bring about any meaningful change.

Are there any actual teachers in here who could break down what the most significant shifts would look like within their specific subjects?

As for whether they'll scrap it or pause it, I'm just waiting for a serious statement from the new administration. First, the word was they were halting everything, then they said it would move forward with some modifications, but nobody has a clue what those changes actually entail.

So... here we go.

The way our current school curriculum is set up feels like a massive data dump. Most subjects are just a endless stream of facts that kids are expected to swallow whole, memorize, and then spit back out during a test. It’s basically rote learning at its worst. The real problem? All this information is served up as absolute gospel. Students aren't really encouraged to pull anything apart, ask "why?", or apply a bit of critical thinking to what they're being taught. They're just expected to accept it all without question.
School curriculum is basically just a massive pile of extra data. Most of it is totally useless. It’s actually pretty ironic when you think about it—so many practical life skills that people actually need are completely ignored in the classroom. Take high school seniors, for example. You’ll see these straight-A students sitting in the hallway, feeling completely helpless because they want to file an appeal against their state exam results. They’re stuck waiting around for a teacher to draft the formal complaint for them because they have absolutely no clue how to write one. It's wild. These kids can tell you exactly what an onomatopoeia is, who Vladimir Mayakovsky was, or define imagism in their sleep, yet they're totally lost when it comes to navigating a basic administrative process.
Let’s be honest: most teaching ends up being front-facing because, frankly, there just isn't enough time to do anything else. If you try to get fancy with it, you'll never finish the curriculum.
Project-based learning is basically a ghost in our schools right now. It’s almost non-existent, and even when people do talk about it, nobody actually takes it seriously. It’s like everyone knows it's a great idea on paper, but when it comes down to actually implementing it in the classroom, they just shrug their shoulders and go back to the old ways. It’s a total missed opportunity.
I’ve always been a huge believer that project-based learning is hands down the best way to teach anything. But if you stop and think about it, what does that actually look like in practice?
So, I decided to try something a little different with my students recently. I gave them this assignment: go out into the real world and find someone whose life story or personality mirrors one of those Romantic era characters we’ve been dissecting in class. Then, they have to film an interview with them. The catch? The interview itself has to be so well done that you can actually figure out which literary figure they're channeling just by listening to the person's story.
But honestly, aside from a handful of true enthusiasts, nobody’s actually putting any real muscle into this project. It’s just the way it is—students in our current school system don't exactly treat project-based learning like it's anything serious. They just don't buy into it.
So, this year, a colleague and I had this big, ambitious idea to pull off an "Avant-Garde Day" at our school. The whole vision was to give our seniors a platform to showcase their most experimental art pieces and put on some wild, boundary-pushing performances. We wanted it to be this huge, creative explosion for the students. Sadly, the principal shot us down completely, so the whole project just went up in smoke. Total bummer.

Under this new curriculum, project-based learning is taking center stage. It’s easily one of the most important teaching methods they're rolling out. Basically, we're looking at dedicated "project weeks" being organized several times throughout the school year.

The scope of what we’re covering is shrinking, but honestly? That’s actually a good thing. Instead of just skimming the surface of a thousand different topics, we’re finally diving deep. We’re taking a much smaller amount of material and really tearing into it—looking at it from every possible angle and exploring it through different lenses. It’s all about quality over quantity now.

So, instead of forcing them through ten different realistic authors just to check a box for a reading list, they’ll focus on maybe two or three—whatever the professor picks (and hey, they could even let the students vote on it). By really diving deep into those few, doing the actual legwork of researching, writing papers, thinking critically, and tackling hands-on projects, the students will actually grasp what realism is all about. It makes way more sense than just skimming the surface of a dozen books.

At least, that's how I'm reading the situation.🕺😁

Susan James said:I caught a segment on NBC 3 last night, and honestly, I get the feeling they’re trying to stall the whole reform process... it feels like we're seeing those same old reformers from back in 2003 🤮

Paar seemed to lose his way a bit during the debate, though he stayed pretty stubborn about claiming that Jokic is pressuring the expert team to follow his lead 😢
He seems to think—probably based on his own past experiences—that if everyone doesn't think exactly alike, then the entire team is useless 🤣

And to top it off, he actually had the nerve to complain that since he’s leading the expert group, he doesn't have enough teaching experience, implying it's somehow insufficient compared to the other 400 participants involved in the reform 🤣

It really looks like they're just clearing the path to oust Jokic and slide in one of the President's buddies to take over.

At this rate, the entire curriculum overhaul is going straight down the drain. 😢

silentraven6 said:Okay, looking at this now, I realize I picked the wrong word. I really should have said "protest" instead of "strike."

I mean, I don't even see any sign of teachers planning a protest over the repeal of those reforms. Is that better?

Personally, I think parents are going to be a much bigger force for protesting because this is about their kids' future.

But look, I’m ready to show up too—both as an educator and as a parent.🎉

Even if I have to do it with a broken leg. 😬

Does anyone have a recommendation for a solid trauma surgeon? I'm looking for someone who specializes in rib injuries.

Word on the street is that Ilinčić is tearing into the selection of experts behind the reform, claiming they were picked based on their political leanings rather than actual skill.🤦

From where I’m sitting, this whole project is seen by the public as the one thing in this country that’s actually decent and hasn't been tainted by partisan politics yet.

If they try to kill it off or start turning it into an ideological weapon, we are looking at a massive, absolute clusterfuck.

Did anyone catch Jokić's interview on CNN? Honestly, the guy is a total genius. He’s usually so incredibly articulate, but you could tell he was rattled here because he couldn't stop using his little verbal tic—that "you know" thing.

I really, truly hope people wake up and demand that this reform stays on track. It looks like the new folks in Washington are already planning to shut it down, all under the guise of fixing some supposed "mistake" in the process.

urbantinker8 said:

I guess I should probably start by saying that I don't really have much to add to this particular thread, though I suppose there's always a way to look at things from a different angle, if you think about it long enough. It’s funny how certain topics just sort of drift into the conversation without any real anchor, almost like how people talk about a rhinoceros—just this massive, heavy presence that doesn't quite fit into the delicate ecosystem of a standard debate, I suppose. Maybe it's just me, being overly cautious with my thoughts, but I find myself wondering if we're all just circling the same large, blunt object without actually knowing what to make of it, which is a bit of a strange way to spend an afternoon, isn't it? kaže:
It’s honestly kind of tough for me to say whether it’s actually doable or not, I guess, since I didn't make it to those training sessions myself, so I'm really not quite sure what exactly they're covering in there.
It seems like people are moving on, I guess, and getting paid for it too. $833 I suppose it’s more of an upward trend, if you want to look at it that way, though I can't say for certain.
It seems like I can't go anywhere without being bombarded by advertisements for those courses; they really are shouting at you from every single corner these days.
And then you have this whole mass of parents who seem to firmly believe that this is just the way things have to be done, I guess.
I guess they'll just end up taking out loans if they don't have the cash on hand, maybe.

It feels like people are constantly shelling out money for things they don't actually need, mostly because there's this endless, aggressive barrage of advertisements screaming at you from every single corner of the internet and the streets. I guess we're all just being bombarded by these loud, relentless commercials that seem designed to trigger an impulse buy, and maybe that's why everyone ends up spending so much on stuff that doesn't really matter.
And even then, I suppose that doesn't necessarily mean what we're paying for is actually essential, or high-quality, or even remotely worth the price tag we're being asked to shoulder.
I guess most people just don't quite grasp that, though. Maybe they see it, or maybe they don't, but I suspect a lot of folks are missing the point entirely.

I suppose there isn't much to say about a rhino, really, unless you're looking at it from a certain angle, I guess. It’s just one of those creatures that exists, sort of lumbering along with its own heavy sense of purpose, which is something I find myself contemplating more often than I probably should. Maybe it's just the way they move—that slow, deliberate weightiness—that makes me think about how things just sort of happen, whether we're ready for them or not. It’s a strange thought, I know, but sometimes you just look at something like that and realize how much space it takes up without even trying. kaže:

So, I was sitting there during seventh period physics today, and I couldn't help but notice that some of the kids walked in without having any idea how to actually simplify a fraction. It’s one of those things where you just assume they've mastered the basics by now, but I guess math skills can be a bit hit or miss depending on what they picked up in elementary school, maybe. It makes things a little more complicated than they need to be when we're trying to get through the actual curriculum.
Well, I suppose you could say it’s about half the class.
It’s all the way from first grade up.
And then you've got those other two classes just absolutely tearing the place apart, I guess.
It seems like my colleagues are all staying quiet on this one.

It’s never really that black and white, I suppose, especially when you start getting into the weeds with something like mathematics.

👍
I have a close colleague who works at one of those schools, and she swears the results from these kinds of courses are mostly just psychological. It's basically just a placebo effect where people think, "Well, I took the prep course, so now I feel ready."😁

It’s honestly delusional to expect some random "cram school" to get kids ready for their SATs regardless of what they actually picked up during their years in the classroom. unicorn, are you seriously suggesting a kid can make up for twelve years of missed lessons in just three months? In my book, prepping for an essay-based exam starts back in elementary school when you're first learning how to put a coherent sentence together. Anyone who thinks a student can be ready for a major national standardized test after just ninety days of intense studying probably thinks these exams are just about memorizing trivia. But that's not how it works. Take the English composition section, for example—it's designed to test critical thinking and reading comprehension, not just whether you can recite facts from memory.
What these prep courses are actually good for is reviewing material (if you weren't disciplined enough to do it yourself) or maybe filling in a few tiny gaps, but there is absolutely no way they can replace a full K-12 education.

I’m a huge supporter of having a standardized national exam system, regardless of any flaws it might have or how much work still needs to be done to get the implementation perfect. I love the concept of a uniform state test for every single student, and honestly, I don’t feel undermined or slighted by its existence at all. If anything, introducing a national standardized test takes a massive weight off my shoulders. It shifts the heavy burden of responsibility away from me; my own classroom grades matter so much less when compared to their performance on a national exam. Grading has always been the toughest part of being an educator because you can never truly be perfectly objective—it’s impossible. I’ve always said that I’d much rather just focus on teaching them and let someone else handle the final evaluation. Now, in a way, that’s exactly what’s happening.
And—when we look at the core subjects required by Meta—I think the results from Meta are a far more accurate reflection of a teacher's impact than academic competitions. Those competitions only measure the top tier of students, whereas a national exam evaluates everyone.

Jonathan Ortiz2 said:It’s honestly hard to tell if we’re actually incapable or if we just don't give a damn, or maybe both... but that pretty much sums up everything in this whole country.

besides, kids aren't going to fail because they have a crush on some professor, they'll fail themselves.
and since nobody wants their kid to fail, mom and dad will just pay for private tutors.

The real point is that we should be grading the professors too... somehow. Even if we have no clue how many students are paying under the table just to pass their class.

plus, let's face it, we're Americans—no parent is actually going to go up against the school system or report a teacher for being lazy, they'd rather just pay some guy 🥳
to get those grades up, and honestly, some kids and parents actually prefer it when teachers slack off so passing is easier.

I guess parents don't always know what's best for their kids...

Is there actually a better way to handle it? Or do you think this whole mess is just unnecessary?

From what I’ve gathered, this is actually already happening. Basically, if a teacher's students keep turning in subpar test scores year after year, the school board sends in an inspection team to figure out what's going wrong. It's like when a manager at a Starbucks sees sales dipping every single month—eventually, corporate is going to show up at the door to audit the books.

wanderinggardener12 said:In an elementary school setting, both summative and formative assessments should exist—or at least, they ought to. Yet, formative tracking of progress is frequently missing altogether, or it’s treated as something arbitrary, a secondary concern that people claim isn't particularly vital.

The grading criteria themselves are often so vague that neither the parent nor the child receives any real sense of what is actually required to earn a specific grade. The core issue here is that the Department of Education mandates that the Criterion documents be drafted by individual school teams or subject departments rather than being standardized at the federal level—a task that really should fall to the specialists at the Department of Education. Because of this fragmentation, you end up with a situation where a grade in one school might be based on one set of standards, while in another, the rules are similar but perhaps slightly more lenient or significantly more punishing.

Ideally, collective professional meetings—ranging from district-wide gatherings to national conferences—should establish some sort of unified stance, but in practice, that simply hasn't happened. There is very little discussion regarding formative assessment; instead, these meetings tend to obsess over summative evaluation, and even that lacks consistency, given how much educational achievements and the depth of conceptual mastery can fluctuate from one school to the next.

Furthermore, the specific types of tasks used in oral and written exams should be transparent to both parents and students. Why on earth should the format of an upcoming test be kept a secret? A few weeks ago, children in after-school programs were working through sample problems that mirrored what they would see on their actual exams, yet they weren't allowed to bring those worksheets home. To what end? Any parent would gladly sit down and practice those specific question formats with their child. What is the harm in that transparency? And what about the kids who don't attend after-school care?

Parents and students alike deserve to know the "rules of the game." It is the only way to possibly mitigate the mounting pressure and stress.

I remain firmly opposed to grading in the lower grades because it serves absolutely no purpose. Don't let anyone tell me that life is harsh and that children just need to get used to it. Why should a seven or eight-year-old have to learn that even if they grasp the material, they might still receive a failing mark, or worse, feel shamed because they haven't mastered reading or writing quite yet—skills they might perfectly well develop in just a few months?

No one, especially not first graders, should be subjected to the stress of grading, particularly when there isn't even a clear consensus across the entire USA regarding what constitutes an "A" grade.

Once a child's self-confidence and self-esteem are crushed during those early years, they may never truly recover.

It happens in high school, too, but at the end of the day, the final GPA is still just a summative measure. 😉

Jason Morgan said:The questions are phrased quite poorly, I'll give you that.
Instead, they really ought to ask, "By what name do we refer to the day that preceded today?"
If a student has actually been paying attention in class and listening to the teacher, they'll realize the expected response is "yesterday."
And that's precisely where the catch lies—it isn't about finding some absolute, cosmic truth; it's about meeting the specific expectation set by the prompt.

I run into this exact same frustration when I'm studying a foreign language.
We all know there can be multiple grammatically correct tenses to use in a given sentence.
Yet, if I'm tasked with converting a passage into one specific tense, people start complaining because I didn't choose the *one* version they had in mind, even though my choice was technically accurate.
But then again, if you hadn't been listening closely to the instructor, trying to solve it would be an absolute nightmare.

Personally, I’d just look at this and say: Monday (since today is Tuesday, right?). 🤣

wanderinggardener12 said:How much weight do grades actually carry for a first grader? How many are even necessary? And more importantly, what kind of message are we sending to the child versus what we’re telling the parents?

Consider this scenario: a first grader is halfway through the second semester, and all they have to show for it in English Language Arts are two grades—a C in reading comprehension and a B in literature. The reason for the C? When asked which three stores Pale visited, the student answered "a toy store" and "two grocery stores," whereas the answer key expected "a bakery, a fruit stand, and a candy shop." Where is the evaluation of oral expression—the discussions about the books they read, their ability to articulate thoughts, their creativity, or their reading fluency? Where is the assessment of their handwriting, the heavy workload they complete, the development of fine motor skills through writing, or any meaningful verbal testing?

A friend of mine shared this specific situation with me. Her son started the year barely recognizing letters, struggling with phonics, but he has progressed to reading quite steadily; he reads slowly, but he reads independently, tackles literature, writes, understands everything he reads, and expresses himself well above his age level. He’s even independent when it comes to his homework. So, what is the underlying message being sent here? And what are the long-term implications if those C's and B's
What if this same child also has a single B on a math quiz?
That’s it. No other grades exist. His mother attended the parent-teacher conference, and now they are stuck in a dilemma: should they enroll him in extra tutoring after a grueling school day that runs from 8 AM to 5 PM, or should they just let things play out naturally?

I’ve known this little boy since the day he was born. In preschool, he could count to ten without a hitch, he draws beautifully, he’s organized, he’s inquisitive, performs science experiments at home, builds things, and explores the world around him...

I honestly don't know what to tell her.

She mentions that he hasn't really cared about grades until now, but now... she’s unsure whether she needs to confront him about them or simply allow him to develop without the unnecessary burden of academic pressure.

Of course she should! Do those grades actually say anything meaningful about who he is? About his intelligence? About whether he'll be a good student in middle school, high school, or college? They don't! He'll have to face the reality of grading sooner or later; they should just be glad he hasn't had to yet.
I can't stand grading.😠

rowdypanther12 said:I'll let you know once I find out; a friend of mine just signed up for 😁
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By the way, this little group they're running sounds pretty promising.

He actually stopped by my faculty lounge today to set up some sit-downs with the teachers. I’ve been working in education for a while now, and let me tell you, we’ve seen plenty of "education reforms" come and go, but this is the first time an actual reformer has walked into our workspace to actually talk to the people on the front lines about how things work.
For what it's worth, I'm also a huge advocate for getting rid of letter grades, even at the high school level. I truly believe I could provide a much more holistic and nuanced look at a student's progress through descriptive feedback rather than just slapping a grade on them. Using a narrow scale—like a 1 to 5 system—is such a blunt instrument. Believe me, trying to squeeze a complex human being into one single number within such a tiny range can be a total nightmare sometimes.

Honestly, I don't see any reason to hold a kid back from starting school if they're actually ready.🤷 If they've got the maturity and the independence down, then they're good to go. If you're pushing to make them even more mature or independent, isn't that just us trying to pave a smoother path for them? It’s like we're trying to give them an extra year of cushion just to make life easier—both before they even step foot in the classroom and once they're actually there. This article really calls out that exact mindset of constantly trying to make things "easier" for them.

hiddendriver34, look, I’m not talking about those kids who aren't ready for school because they haven't hit the right emotional or intellectual milestones according to the experts. I’m talking about children who *are* actually ready, but their parents decide to hold them back an extra year. Or even those kids who are right on the edge of the cutoff age and pass all the readiness tests, but most parents still opt out, thinking, "Why put them through the ringer if we don't have to?" or "They'll have plenty of time for responsibilities later; let's just give them one more year of being carefree." Isn't that basically just a way to make life easier and less stressful for the kid?
Don't get me wrong, I'm not judging here. These are caring parents doing what they think is best, and honestly, I can see some of those same traits in myself—even if I wouldn't dream of delaying school enrollment 😁. But maybe, despite having the best intentions, they're actually doing their kids a disservice in the long run.

I’m starting to feel like pushing back the start of school is just another way we try to smooth out the edges of life for our kids. We want everything to be easier, more comfortable, and totally stress-free for them—but honestly? In the long run, I think we’re doing them a massive disservice. It’s like trying to protect someone from a scraped knee by never letting them walk; you end up making them weaker. I actually stumbled upon this article that really drove home that point for me: link.

Maybe it’s just a little too early to call it, don't you think?

I’ve actually got the exact opposite example from my neck of the woods. I just found out that in our crazy school system, kids born on March 31st and April 1st of the same year are treated as if there’s an entire year between them. The kid born on March 31st is supposed to start kindergarten a full year earlier than the one born on April 1st. If they both end up starting at the same time, then either one started way too early or the other was held back a whole year. It makes zero sense.
A friend of my son’s was born right at the beginning of April, and now his mom is asking for him to be tested for school placement because she truly believes he’s ready. She lived abroad for a long time, so her parenting philosophy is a bit different from the typical American approach. She isn't interested in keeping him in this bubble of a protected, perfect little world where everything is smoothed over—which includes delaying school—because she thinks that kind of upbringing won't prepare him for the "real" world. You could argue about that philosophy all day (maybe in a different thread!), but what really floored me was how the entire preschool staff basically revolted just to stop this "crazy" mom from enrolling him a year ahead of schedule. Everyone is completely shocked by her request; they’ve never dealt with anything like it in their lives. But here’s the kicker: if the kid had been born just a couple of days earlier, it would have been totally normal for him to start school, and if the mother didn't want him to go, she’d just have to file for a deferment. Isn't that absolutely absurd?