The Common Core--Sounds Great Tastes Terrible

Just about every parent of an elementary school student has heard of the Common Core. It is based on a federal mandate designed to put in place higher standards for grades K-8. That means the work gets harder and there's more of it. It's particularly difficult right now because the kids are 'supposed to catch up' so that their learning is up to snuff with the core standards.

And that brings me to the "Tastes Terrible" part. The five-year old Cutie who I watch three afternoons a week, is stuck with a pile of worksheets each night, along with a book and sight words once a week or so. It's too much work for him even though he's a super smart little guy. School must be taxing when you're that little--especially for boys. It must be hard to sit still and stay focused. Then you get home and all you want to do is sit back and watch "The Regular Show" or maybe a little bit of "Sponge Bob". Then you play some Lego with some make-believe battles between some Star Wars guys and some amputee Lego guys....and forget about school.

But school never really goes away and that thought must niggle at them. It's just like an adult who comes home after a hard day at work to relax with a drink and some  tablet surfing--but there are still some really tiresome spreadsheets to review once the kids are in bed.

The worksheets are completely humorless in tone. I don't know why. Why can't you have flying pickles in a circus troupe that fall off a high wire and then have the kids measure the distance from which each performing pickle fell? Why can't "Rod" and "Todd" fish for tadpoles but instead hook a talking marlin? There is one sop. They do use little cartoons next to the word set for deconstruction..e.g. a tiny drawing of "Tod"doing something that clues the kid into the missing word. I can never tell what the heck is going on in the drawings but Cutie can. They're not clever though. They look like an after thought.

It's really a double dose of terrible-tasting medicine when you think about it.  A trio of dull, repetitious worksheets every evening and you don't even get to have a beer as you're doing them. Right now, the Common Core for five-year-olds just seems to mean more worksheets and less time for Lego.