LTPS Implements Common Core With Eye Towards Future

By Lawrence Township Public Schools

In the Lawrence Township Public Schools (LTPS) “Lead Achieve Succeed” is not just a tagline that sounds good and fits nicely on the district’s new logo. LTPS educators work hard every day to help students learn how to lead and achieve, whether it’s in the classroom, in a musical or drama production, or on the athletic field.

Additionally LTPS staff focus on preparing students to succeed, not just in the current school year or next grade level but with a look towards college and future careers.

For many years, LTPS educators fine tuned our district curriculum on an ongoing basis. Now we’ve taken an even bigger step in an effort to better prepare students for the future as our supervisors and teachers have aligned our district curriculum with the Common Core State Standards.

What are the Common Core State Standards (CCSS)?

The CCSS are a single set of clear, educational standards for kindergarten through 12th grade in English language arts (ELA) and mathematics that states voluntarily adopt. New Jersey is one of 45 states, the District of Columbia, plus U.S. territories that have adopted the CCSS thus far. 

These national standards encourage more working together and sharing knowledge across states, and there will be more research and resource development to support the standards.

Who developed the Common Core State Standards?

Teachers, parents, school administrators, and education experts developed the CCSS in a partnership between the states. The standards are not an initiative of the federal government.

What’s the benefit of the CCSS for your child?

The Common Core provides consistent, national standards that will raise the bar for learning in all grades to ensure our students receive a relevant and rigorous education. By teaching creativity, cooperation, innovation and problem solving, the CCSS mean your child will be better prepared to meet the demands of college and/or the workplace in the 21st century.

Has LTPS started using the CCSS?

Our teachers began using the ELA and math CCSS in the lower grades during the 2011-2012 school year. In 2012-2013 they implemented the ELA standards in grades K-12 and the math standards were used in grades K-5 and 9-12. Grades 6-8 will use the new math standards beginning in the 2013-2014 school year. For the implemented grades, the NJ ASK (state test) that was administered in May 2013 was aligned to the new standards. The NJ ASK 6-8 will be aligned for the May 2014 testing.

What do the standards look like in LTPS?

In the area of ELA, the CCSS establish a “staircase” of increasing complexity in what students must be able to read so all students are ready for the demands of college and career-level reading no later than the end of high school. The stan- dards require the progressive development of reading comprehension so that students advancing through the grades are able to gain more from whatever they read. The LTPS new writing program, Writing Fundamentals, addresses the new standards for writing at each grade level.

The CCSS for mathematics are organized by grade level in grades K-8. The LTPS new “Go Math” program for grades K-5 is aligned to the Common Core. Concepts are touched and built upon as students move through the grades. 

At the high school level, the standards are organized by conceptual category (number and quality, algebra, functions, geometry, modeling and probability and statistics), showing what students should learn in each category to be college and career ready, while preparing them to study the higher level mathematical concepts.

How do LTPS teachers know how to teach using the new standards?

Our teachers have had significant training in the CCSS. The standards establish what students should learn at each level, but they do not dictate how teachers should teach. Teachers will continue to devise lesson plans and modify instruction to their students’ individual needs.

What can parents do to help their child succeed?

We know many factors contribute to a child’s success in school. For academic success, within the district it at least takes dedicated teachers, hardworking administrators, adequate resources, and a rich curriculum. Parents and caring adults, as their child’s first and most important teachers, also play critical roles by supporting their child’s academic life.

Parents/guardians can help support their child and school through imple- mentation of the CCSS by reinforcing schoolwork at home. For example, the ELA new standards focus more on infor-mational reading passages. Reading more non-fiction (newspapers, magazines, etc.) will greatly help your child at all grade levels. The math new standards allow our students to learn math at a more complex level at a younger age. 

Even so, math facts continue to be learned best by repetition, through drills and practice, practice, practice. So please, work with your child.

To learn more about the Common Core, visit www.corestandards.org. If you have questions specific to LTPS and the Common Core, contact Andrew Zuckerman, director of Instructional Services, at 609-671-5410 or azuckerman@ltps.org.