Dr. Stotsky in Indiana Critiquing Hoosier ELA Standards
“Meaningless verbiage… Empty skill sets…No progression from grade to grade… Too much emphasis on informational text… Absence of purpose.”
These were some of the comments made this past Saturday by Indiana high school English teachers about the latest draft of the Indiana ELA Standards at a workshop led by standards guru Sandra Stotsky. Professor Stotsky was in Bloomington for the 20th Annual Conference of the Association of Literary Scholars, Critics, and Writers. Many of Saturday’s conference speakers emphasized the decline of literature instruction in recent decades, a trend they said has been aggravated by the use of the Common Core in 45 states. Stotsky’s workshop brought together Indiana teachers and national scholars to examine the 2006 Indiana standards, the Common Core, and the latest draft of the proposed new Indiana standards. Stotsky said she planned to compile the comments into a report for Governor Mike Pence.
To hear more from Dr. Stotsky on the latest draft of the Indiana standards, be sure and tune in to WIBC tomorrow, Monday, April 7th at 11:30am, when she will be talk show host Greg Garrison’s guest. Those not in the Indianapolis area can listen to the show live online here.
I suggest that Professor Stotsky recruit some former Indiana school teachers who taught in the 1950s and early 1960s when education’s purpose was still to prepare the young for responsible adult life positions. Common Core would never have seen the light of day in Indiana had senior citizen former teachers – from the start – been involved. Education in Indiana public schools began a downhill slide in the 1960’s, after the prayer ban, again with textbook changes and again, by the end of the sixties, when School corporations began hiring only Baby Boomers and denying jobs to older, experienced teachers. The slide included both curriculum and student behavior So really, who’s left that has enough of an idea of the old way that worked so well other than former teachers ranging in age from mid-70 through eighties, even into their nineties?
Thanks for covering this conference, Heather.
I sent a notice to the EVSC (Evansville Vanderburgh School Corp.) school board members, to disseminate to the high school ELA teachers in the city and county, inviting them to attend. Hopefully some were in attendance…
Appreciate all you and Erin are doing.
Please keep it up!