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The Common Core State Standards have been adopted by an overwhelming majority of states. They focus on conceptual understandings and procedures in Math and English Language Arts (ELA), and begin from a very young age. Coordinating classroom materials to promote the standards can be challenging and time consuming. Luckily, there are many online resources that can help teachers and curriculum developers understand and implement the Common Core State Standards.
The best place to start is the official website of the standards, which includes a map of which states have adopted the standards as well as additional resources. The common core math standards are organized in a way that makes it very easy to navigate among the different grades, domains, and individual standards. There is also a separate and helpful list of the Standards for Mathematical Practice.
Because of the nature of the ELA standards, they are organized a bit differently. The ELA standards are arranged by subjects, skills, and different grade levels. When you are learning the standards, you can refer back to this website to ensure that you have a clear understanding and are leading your students on the path to success.
After gaining an accurate picture of the standards, two resources that can help us implement them in our classrooms are learnzillion.com and illustrativemathematics.org. Learn Zillion has abundant examples of how to teach each specific standard, including multiple ways to access educational video demonstrations. Materials are organized in a variety of ways including ELA topic searches, grade level, strands and standards. While all of the resources on this site are useful, what I think is particularly helpful to teachers is the coach’s commentary. After watching the sample lesson, you can hear the coach’s pedagogical comments overlaid on the original video. This brilliant tool can help teachers understand the rationale behind the sample lessons so they will be able to implement these tools in the best and most effective way possible.
As its name implies, Illustrative Mathematics focuses on common core math standards. This well-organized tool has many excellent resources that can help teachers understand and implement the math standards. The practice standards are numbered, and come with examples of activities and videos showing the students working through problems which highlight specific standards. Since practice standards are so important and yet so tricky to truly understand, Illustrative Mathematics is a great place to turn to deepen your understanding.
Finally, there are special resources that can help those in charge of selecting new curriculum know what to look for when incorporating the new Common Core State Standards. Education Resource Center has a lot of great information on the standards including a helpful guide to selecting curriculum. There are a lot of useful tools on this site, including “Five Questions to Ask When Choosing a Common Core Mathematics Curriculum.”
The official standards website, Learn Zillion, Illustrative Mathematics, and Education Resource Center are some of my favorite resources for the Common Core State Standards. However, there are many tools out there and more popping up every day. With a bit of initiative and some great tools to help you along the way, you can guide your students toward academic success using the new Common Core State Standards.
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