Two months into the new school year, students in Oak Park’s public schools have been experiencing the new Common Core state standards in the classroom.
It’s been a difficult adjustment for some, as previously reported for a portion of District 97 students. At Oak Park and River Forest High School, not so much, say division chairs Dan Cohen and Claudia Sahagun.
For the freshmen and sophomores, where the standards have been implemented this school year before expanding to the upperclassmen, it’s been a smooth transition, according to Cohen, who chairs the English division. For his 30-plus teachers, the implementation has involved much preparation prior to this school year.
“Over the last three years, we’ve spent our summers trying to align our curriculum,” said Cohen, a 20-plus year veteran teacher and chair of the English division since 2010. “And when we talk about alignment, we’re talking about what should students know, understand and do at each grade level, and try to build some consistency in that grade level.”
And that, Cohen said, began with digging into the standards themselves.
“Part of it was what are we currently doing that we say is non-negotiable — kids should know, understand and do this based on our year’s experience in the classroom, and how does this align with the Common Core,” Cohen said, noting OPRF’s increased focus on reading prior to implementing Common Core.
For ninth and tenth graders, the English language standards, with respect to reading, includes students being able to “determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in the text, including figurative and connotative meanings.”
“Because it’s been embedded in much of their curriculum, I don’t know if students are necessarily noticing a difference,” Cohen said of the transition. “Teachers have been engaged in, I think, some pretty strong reading instruction at all levels. And so, I think because we’re conscious of where we want to go, we’re building the steps for kids to get there, and getting there is always hard because you have so many kids and they’re all learning in different ways.
“I think it’s probably been better because teachers are collaborating more, using common text and using common assessments among each other,” Cohen added. “That helps a teacher do a better job I believe. So kids [in different ninth-grade English classes] are reading similar or maybe the same books and we’re doing similar assignments, so it’s actually tightened things up and made things more consistent.”
While English and math is Common Core’s main focus, the individual standards include the subjects of history and science.
For foreign language, Sahagun, a 17-year veteran teacher, says students at the high school have been well prepared from their classroom experiences in the grammar schools.
“The students, especially coming from [districts] 90 and 97, both districts — they have the opportunity to, maybe, take Spanish, French and Italian. When they arrive to foreign language class here, they’re very well-prepared, and the focus is more on using their skills and building on that,” she said. “So, speaking is more on their mind, like ‘OK, I’m going to read this and I’m going speak.’ And they get there. So, from my perspective, it’s a positive experience, because in the middle school, and some even before that if they’re in an immersion program, they’re ready when they get here.”
OPRF faculty has also worked more closely as the new standards have been implemented, though Sahagun and Cohen noted that faculty has always worked collaboratively there. And for some faculty, Common Core was both a mystery and something many were familiar with, the two division chairs said.
“Teachers may have had personal feelings about the standards — who wrote them and those kinds of things,” Cohen said. “I think the greater challenge is working to build a more consistent curriculum that’s aligned. And that’s asking teachers to do things that they may not have always done. So how to engage, in my case, over 30 teachers in that process; it requires trust and collaboration. It requires some risk-taking. And since the standards are pretty consistent with what we already believe is what’s important, the larger challenge is building a learning community among teachers where they can grow together.”
Sahagun added: “I’ve had young teachers share, ‘This is what we use to do, and, ‘I recently graduated from high school and, yeah, I’m use to this.’ It’s not as new for the younger teachers, or it doesn’t feel that way for them.
“In my department, speaking from what I hear my teachers saying is, finding different ways and opportunities to meet the student where he or she is at, and then bring them to where they should be,” Sahagun said. “And that’s the challenge because not one student is the same. So it’s finding those strategies to help students be where they’re supposed to be in building on their language skills. And those are the conversations that a lot of my teachers are having.
“One of the connections with foreign language and Common Core, from my understanding — Common Core is trying to build global citizens,” Sahagun said. “And in foreign language, one of the communication skills that we are building upon is talking about different cultures, and that helps our students hear the global perspective. So in that sense, there’s a connection with learning foreign language, hearing the multiple perspectives within the classroom, and then the perspective of the country that they’re studying.”
