Perceptions+and+Comparing+&+Contrasting


 * The NCTE/IRA standards:** When I first looked at these standards, I wasn’t sure that I was on the right page. I was expecting this long, detailed list of everything that students are expected to know by the time they finish a certain grade. Instead, it was just a single list of twelve questions. There were no grade designations, so I assume that these standards apply to all grade levels. The standards do not seem to be very specific either. They simply state a couple of related ideas, and this is it. None of them seem to fit together in a whole “big picture” aspect.

**Common Core standards:** Right off the back, this is what I was expecting when I think of looking up learning standards. The lists are extremely detailed, broken down by grade and various aspects of reading standards. Within the various reading standards aspects, there are several key concepts, and what kind of work would show the comprehension of the specified concept.

**Compare/Contrast:** I don’t think that there is much comparing to do when it comes to the two sets of standards. With the NCTE standards, they only look at what a student should be able to do as a final product. The Common Core ones actually look at the individual parts that a student should learn in order to have a basic understanding of the main concept. I think that the NCTE focuses on the student, but from a distance. The Common Core standards are definitely teacher and student focused due to the intense amount of detail in them. Teachers know in what ways they are supposed to help the students, and the students benefit from this directly. I really don’t see the two of these working well together due to their extreme differences. If anything, I think that the standards listed by NCTE would fall in to describing one of the concepts that are in Common Core. As a future teacher who will be using Common Core, I think that it will definitely be useful in my lesson planning to ensure that I am covering all of my bases in helping my students learn and succeed in the proper way.