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Sound It Out
Along with her background as a researcher, writer, and teacher, Joanne Meier is a mom. Join Joanne every week as she shares her experiences raising her own young readers, and guides parents and teachers on the best practices in reading.
Rethinking Literacy, a Common Core resource
For a limited time, Education Week is offering a free digital edition of Rethinking Literacy: Reading in the Common-Core Era. There are several articles within the edition worth reading, each taking its own look at how the Common Core State Standards are changing the way we think about reading and writing, with a keen eye on informational texts.
In the introductory article Common Standards Drive New Approaches to Reading, P. David Pearson sums up Common Core this way:
"I think these standards have the potential to lead the parade in a different direction: toward taking as evidence of your reading ability not your score on a specific skill test — or how many letter sounds you can identify or ideas you can recall from a passage — but the ability to use the information you gain from reading, the fruits of your labor, to apply to some new situation or problem or project," he said. "That's a huge change."
Huge change, indeed. As someone who lives in one of the (only) four states (!) that has not adopted the Common Core, I am having my own struggles and questions. Are my kids missing out? Will they be less 21st century literate? Or is this just another educational phase that we'll ride through? (p.s.: It doesn't seem like it.)
If you have time this week, head over to Rethinking Literacy: Reading in the Common-Core Era and read a few of the articles. I think you'll be glad you did.
