Common Core So Far

Last week I had two days of in-service training getting us ready for Common Core.  In Washington State, we will be tested on CCSS in 2015.  There was a little too much reading from the PowerPoint if you ask me.  (Shoot me now.)

We also watched a couple of videos where the people who worked on Common Core told us how wonderful the new standards are. (Good lighting + Smiles = Credibility.)

I sat in the back for two days wondering when I became so cynical.  I'm usually a positive person, but here are some questions I have:

1.  Is setting higher standards the same as ensuring all students will reach them?  Will this really make a difference?
2.  Don't we have to address the obstacles students have between them and education first?  I'm thinking poverty, violence, and lack of access to books and technology.
3.  Why do administrators get us all together, read us a script and think they have "taught" us?  Children don't learn this way. Adults don't either.
4. Why do curriculum specialists murder the English language by adding suffixes to perfectly harmless root words and interchanging nouns and verbs?  (Last year I sat and edited an evaluation form when I was supposed to be filling it out.  It asked if I had any noticings or wonderings.  I wrote what I "noticed and wondered."  I don't thing they are hiring me for an instructional coaching position any time soon.)
5. Has anyone else noticed how much J. K. Rowling criticizes education reform in the fifth book of the Harry Potter series?  I kept reading passages aloud to my husband and laughing.

At least someone gets it.