New Year’s Day is not far behind us, that’s true. In the scheme of fighting Common Core, however, each day is a new one to experience consistent progress in our battle for our students. So, how do we BEST plot out our course from here?
Some ideas:
1) Remember, new warriors are joining the anti CCSS movement every day. We must encourage them, not overwhelm them. In supporting existing warriors, we must remind them periodically with fact based articles, research, and some sort of ‘high five’. Why? It can help not only refresh perspectives for them, it can keep information fresh in their minds, arsenals. We can’t be effective if something we know well, gets garbled up in the delivery.
2) For those of us with students experiencing CC every day, we need to continue to supply them with information they can use and share in the trenches. If you’ve not had the “CC Talk” with them yet, now’s a great time to do so.
3) For those of us without students and fighting: continue to speak out, attend, and represent your peers. Many in this situation are the grandparents, concerned citizens, or those who are beginning to see in encroach their student’s lives.
For example, there are plenty of Facebook pages against Common Core. “Grandparents Against Common Core” (see: https://www.facebook.com/GPACC); those who are fed up with traditional schooling and CCSS are “Crossing Over to Homeschooling” (Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/groups/CrossingOverToHomeschooling/). Note: membership for this page alone is almost 9,000 strong. Then there’s the US Homeschoolers Against CC and Agenda 21 (see: https://www.facebook.com/groups/HSagainstA21CC/)
4) If you’ve not found a higher education anti CCSS group (and if you’ve followed me for long you know I’ve exposed several locations of where higher ed aligned CC is; as have other researchers/writers against CCSS), then begin one! There are anti CC groups for little learners, gifted learners, special needs learners, etc. Yet, almost nothing can be found in a general internet search for professors/students/parents of higher education students who are finding CCSS in their domain! I did find an article from 2013 (in the frame of fighting CCSS, that’s great background, but more current information is desperately needed!!) See: http://whatiscommoncore.wordpress.com/2013/09/07/top-ten-professors-calling-out-common-cores-so-called-college-readiness/)
5) We must continue to help guide our legislators in the truth about the Common Core Machine, too. Wait, if you’ve not followed my blog for awhile, you may wonder why I refer to CCSS as a ‘machine’. In my research, I’ve found that CCSS is SO all-encompassing, that it resembles a giant machine churning away, destroying all those in its path. If you’ve run across a legislator who isn’t aware of all the ins/outs/ups/downs involved with CCSS, you have a fantastic opportunity to show them!
Many sample letters, videos, cheat sheets, and other helpful information in contacting these leaders can be found on your ‘Stop CCSS’ state pages or go to a National website and search there. (See: http://fightcommoncore.com/)
Like any competition, this battle against all that seeks to ruin education is ours to win…or to lose. Together is the ONLY way we can win!
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Olvv0iNEIt8&w=560&h=315]
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