The Hidden Standards

Most of the country is moving to the Common Core State Standards. They can be found here. While it is important to teach these standards, we need to understand that teachers will not be judged only on whether they teach these standards but on how their students do on the Common Core standardized tests. This means that in addition to teaching the written standards, we will need to teach what I call “hidden standards” that will enable students to do well on these tests.

Some of these, I have discussed in earlier posts. Students will need to be comfortable with basic computer skills such as click and drag, keyboarding, scrolling, and highlighting text. To get an idea of the computer skills your students will need, check out these practice tests.

You will need to prepare your students to meet other “hidden standards”. For example,for some of the multiple choice questions your are instructed to select two answers. This is not necessarily difficult, but it is different from the multiple choice tests your students will have taken in the past. You will need to have your students practice with this type of test if they are to do well on the end of the year tests.