A presentation "New Opportunities Presented by Common Core: Deeper Learning, Open Educational Resources, and Increases in Long-Term Student Success" presented at NSBA in Boston on April 21, 2012

1. New Opportunities
Presented by the
Common Core:
Deeper Learning,
Open Educational Resources,
and Increases in Long-Term
Student Success

2. Introductions
Karen Fasimpaur
President, K12 Handhelds
karen@k12opened.com
Barbara Treacy
Director, EdTech Leaders Online, Education Development Center
BTreacy@edc.org
Dr. Geoffrey Fletcher
Deputy Executive Director, State Educational Technology Directors
Association
gfletcher@setda.org
www.k12opened.com/nsba2012

3. Common Core State Standards
Overview
 Standards for students to reach college
and to be career ready
 Build on strengths and lessons of
current state standards
 Key goals: coherent, clearer, fewer,
higher, measurable and internationally
benchmarked

4. The Potential
To give students the knowledge and skills
they will need to succeed in a rapidly
changing world
Deeper learning = Content mastery + 21st
century skills
 Critical thinking
 Problem solving
 Collaboration
 Communication
 Real-world application
 Self-directed learning

5. Common Core + Deeper Learning
“Rigorous: The standards will include
high-level cognitive demands by asking
students to demonstrate deep conceptual
understanding through the application of
content knowledge and skills to new
situations.
High-level cognitive demand includes
reasoning, justification, synthesis, analysis,
and problem-solving.”
- Common Core State Standards Initiative Standards-Setting
Criteria http://www.corestandards.org/resources

6. Cross-grade learning progressions:
Organization for Deeper Learning
 ELA
• Designed as a “staircase”
• Anchor standards in Reading,
Writing, Speaking and Listening,
and Language
• Media and literacy throughout
• Increased focus on
» Informational text
» Informative/explanatory writing
» Domain specific vocabulary

7. Coherent Organization
for Deeper Learning
 Math
• Standards for Mathematical Practice
» Consistent across all grade levels
» Describe mathematical habits of mind
• Standards for Mathematical Content
» Organized in domains that progress
over several grades
» High school standards presented by
conceptual theme

8. Professional Development: Geometry
• Barbara – Insert screen (screen shot?) of what
“deeper learning” under Common Core might
look like ??

10. NGLC: Louisiana Algebra 1 Student Course

12. Common Core State Standards
DO NOT DEFINE:
Curriculum
How teachers are to teach
DO CREATE:
A huge need for curriculum materials
A huge need for teacher professional
development
A huge opportunity for OER materials to
meet these needs

13. SIGNIFICANT CHANGE
IS DIFFICULT.
If new “Common Core ready” materials don’t look
much different, they probably don’t really reflect the
Common Core.

14. The Perils of Planning with
Cross-Walk Documents
Credit: Kyle Gradinger, CC BY SA

15. The Perils of Superficial
Alignment
Common
Core
Aligned!
Credit: Alberto G.

16. ARE TEXTBOOKS THE
BEST SOLUTION?

17. Credit: Jen Hegna

18. Open Educational Resources
Free, open, and digital resources that can
be remixed, modified, and redistributed
A way to share
• Open textbook projects
• P2PU School of Ed
• NY project to develop open-licensed
professional development and curriculum
resources geared to CCSS
A wise use of public funds

19. Utah Open Textbook Project
• Pilot with 2,000 students
• Open textooks were printed at a 50% savings
• Additional benefits
 Yearly updates
 Curriculum customization
 Students can take books home and highlight and
annotate them
• Expanding statewide

22. Sites for OER
• OER Livebinder –
http://content.k12opened.com
(includes many of the resources below as well)
• CA Open Textbooks – www.clrn.org
• Free Reading – www.freereading.net
• CK12 – www.ck12.org
• Curriki – www.curriki.org
• OER Commons – www.oercommons.org
• P2PU – www.p2pu.org/school-of-ed

23. The Age of the Waterbed
Credit: Robert Paprstein, public domain

24. Today’s Summative Assessments
1. Don’t measure what matters
2. Feedback isn’t actionable
3. Results aren’t specific enough at the
student level to guide instruction
4. Are a one-day snapshot

25. RTTA Consortia
SMARTER
Balanced
Assessment
Consortium
(SBAC)
Approx. 27 states
Partnership for
Assessment of
Readiness for
College and
Careers
(PARCC)
Approx. 24 states
Credit: K12 Handhelds, CC BY

26. The RTTA assessments are
supposed to:
 Be online
 Have optional interim assessments
 Cover a full range of standards,
including critical thinking, problem
solving and communication
 Be interactive and have complex student
demonstrations of knowledge
 Use technology to develop, administer,
score and report
 Produce sufficient information to guide
instruction
 Use technology for new, innovative item
types

27. Assessment the Traditional Way
Credit: College Board

28. Assessment for Deeper Learning
Credit: College Board

29. Where We Are in the RTTA
Development Process
 SBAC’s assessment is computer-
adaptive
 PARCC’s will have a major performance
task
 Both consortia have schedules of RFPs
 Technology Readiness Tool

30. What We Need for Success
 Professional development
• Use of the readiness tool
• Use of tools for online assessment
• Deeper understanding of CCSS
• Different approaches
» Instruction
» Curriculum
» Instructional materials
 Adequate devices and bandwidth
 www.assess4ed.net

31. Beyond Textbooks - A Case Study
Credit: Vail School District, all rights reserved

32. While CCSS brings some challenges,
it also brings great opportunities for
deeper learning.
Questions and comments
Thank you