Uncommon Core: Leveraging the Best of Our Individuality to Succeed in a World of Standards

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steve-peha
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I support the Common Core. But I am concerned about how I experience it's implementation in my consulting work and what teachers tell me about how it being implemented in many schools and districts around the country. "Uncommon Core" is my idea for improving implementation at the building and district level. I see it as a way to come together around standards and excel at meeting them through the excellence we find in ourselves, our students, and our colleagues. In the new world of the Common Core standards, many teachers are being asked to "standardize" their teaching. Often, this means that the very best teachers, using their very best methods, are directed to teach like others in their building or districts, instead of like themselves. New teacher evaluations are being used as tools to further encourage conformity. While I believe that all of this is well-intentioned, I also believe that much of it is ill-advised, especially when conformity is valued over quality. By definition, when we attempt to find a way of doing something that everyone in a group can do, and we demand that everyone within the group conform to it, we end up implementing changes that represent the lowest common denominator. When this happens we lose innovation and diversity of problem-solving potential. Perhaps worst of all, we lose the ability to change rapidly to meet the needs of rapidly changing circumstances because we have no idea what to change to. If everyone in a building is doing the same thing, and that thing doesn't work, we have no internal models to leverage. Every change, then, is high-risk "all or nothing" experimentation with little chance of applying what we learn in the process to future iterations of our work. When it comes to teaching, this doesn't serve anyone, least of all our kids. "Uncommon Core" is a view of standards-based teaching that champions the the best of who we are and encourages each of us to from the core of our individuality. It is not a repudiation of standards. It is an affirmation that the best way to succeed in a standardized environment is, by definition, to be non-standard in constructive ways. The Common Core demands high performance. The best way to achieve this is by doing our best work. We do our best work when our work comes from the best parts of who we are. The best parts of who we are differ from person to person because we are each as unique as our students. The best way to succeed in an era of standardization is to dig deeper into our individuality and teach from our uncommon core.