The purpose of this article is to provide guidance on the implementation of the Common Core State Standards for English language arts (CCSS-ELA). Toward this end, suggestions and cautions are provided that focus on understanding the vision, understanding the anchor and grade-level standards, and understanding the implications for instruction. In…

Despite the need for writing competence in and out of school, writing has been deemed the neglected "R" in educational practice. Moreover, many students do not meet expected standards of writing performance. The Common Core State Standards (CCSS), adopted by 45 states, provides an opportunity to change the state of writing instruction on…

In light of the changing ethnic, racial, and cultural demographics in U.S. schools, there is a growing need by scholars and practitioners for teaching practices that are informed by cultural knowledge possessed by students. This comes at a time when standardized testing of student achievement has been given a central role in efforts to improve…

The concept of close reading is an important consideration when addressing the Common Core State Standards. In addition, "close reading" permeates the CCSS and suggests a particular way of reading and responding to texts. Trying to help students become successful readers in both school based settings and in the world outside of school is…

This article examines methods of teaching students immersed in online media to write extended persuasive text. Specific examples for the writing classroom are outlined to engage students in persuasive writing through the use of online media. The persuasive writing examples are linked to the Common Core State Standards.

In 2003, accreditation standards were revised to require coverage of management science (MS) after previously removing it in 1991. Meanwhile, increasing awareness of the value of business analytics stimulated a renewed interest in MS. To examine its present status in undergraduate core business curricula, the authors conducted two studies to…

There is a growing imperative to prepare MSW social work students for trauma-informed evidence-based practice. Given strong recommendations and promising developments within social work education and practice in this regard, a clinical elective for the advanced-year MSW student that combines the guiding principles of trauma theory and…

In this essay, the author argues that English language learners (ELLs) can meet and exceed the Common Core State Standards, and that more complex materials are in fact precisely what they need. Lack of access to such materials is what prevents ELLs from attaining full proficiency in English.

The purpose of this article is to describe the stances put forward by a selection of professional development resources interpreting the Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts (ELA) teachers, and to analyse where these resources stand in relation to research in ELA. Specifically, we analyse resources written by English educators…

The Common Core State Standards (CCSS) were published by the Council of Chief State School Officers and the National Governors Association in 2010 as part of a widespread standards-based reform movement in the United States. The education marketplace has responded with CCSS-aligned products, including standardised tests, professional development…

Drawing on sociocultural perspectives and New Literacies Studies this study uses Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) as a tool to closely analyse one way the Common Core State Standards in the United States are being produced, disseminated and consumed. The analysis focuses on a section of the CCSS, a model lesson given by one of the primary…

This article explores the relationship between federal and state educational policymaking and classroom reading instruction. The past 50 years of federal literacy education policy is summarized, particularly emphasizing the connections of these policies to reading curriculum and classroom assessment. The paper concludes with a discussion of the…

This study investigates how and to what extent preservice and inservice early childhood educators are being prepared to develop mathematics skills and processes in young children, age birth to five, in one southeastern state in the United States. Utilizing a multi-phase mixed methods study and a follow-up survey central to the research question,…

Performance-based assessment clearly represents an indispensable approach for assessing gifted student learning. Challenging performance tasks allow gifted learners to reveal their considerable intellectual capacity and energy. Through performance tasks, teachers gain insights into a gifted student's true level of capability in a domain of…

Growing concern about a shrinking cultural consensus on values, coupled with religious pluralisation and the realisation that schooling is not, and cannot be, value-neutral, have led to proposals to teach ethics in schools, interpreted as a contribution of the discipline of philosophy to the common curriculum. To the extent that this approach is…