Sifting through North Carolina’s common core document for world languages to find what I need in order to plan a unit or course is an absolute chore. And so I present the quick and dirty version of what you need to get out of the document, at least if you teach Spanish.
It’s somewhat heartening that the common core proficiency standards are based on the ACTFL proficiency standards, so they are not completely out of touch with research in our field. Below is a nice visual from the NCDPI document to show about how far we should expect students to be at each level:
Basically: students should achieve Novice Mid by the end of their first year in everything except presentational speaking, then move up a sub-level each year in everything.
I’m a little ambivalent about how Common Core breaks down the 5 C’s (Communication, Culture, Community, Connections, and Comparison). On the one hand, they went and made the whole thing WAY more complicated than North Carolina’s Standard Course of Study, where there was basically one competency goal for each of the 5 C’s, and the whole thing was broken down course by course. On the other hand, the Common Core really attempts to dissect where the rings intersect as well. Furthermore, the continuum is much more realistic, more descriptive, more in-line with how language is acquired than a bunch of disparate blocks.
Strangely, the standards are broken down into only 3 strands: CLL (Connections to Language & Literacy), COD (Connections to Other Disciplines), and CMT (Communities), and each of those is broken down into the SAME FOUR standards:
Engage in interpersonalcommunication
Understand words and concepts (interpretive)
Present to an audience in the language (presentational)
Compare student culture and target culture
What you’ll find is that the standards ARE differentiated by the Clarifying Objectives, which, though often repetitive, are more specific than previous NC standards. Each standard gives specific subgroups that should be covered.
For example, Novice Low-Connections to Language & Literacy 1.1 (NL.CLL.1.1) suggests “needs, preferences, and feelings,” much like. That is, you still teach kids to say “Me gusta, no me gusta” and “¿Cómo estás?” first thing.
So as near I can figure it, here is what you need to cover at the Novice levels (ie Spanish I and II):
Novice Low
CLL: memorize phrases, questions, greetings/courtesy (see Linguafolio Novice Low); recite
COD: topics/simple processes/common themes of other disciplines
CMT: target culture traditions, arts, sports, games, media–DESCRIBE, COMPARE (simple phrases, short sentences; key characteristics); conversations about family, friends, activities
Of course there are a lot of other things you have to work in along the way, like identifying/understanding/using cognates and loan words and presenting information to an audience, figuring out how the culture’s products, practices, and perspectives change the world. You know, the usual.
All in all, I think the Common Core Essential Standards for World Languages are pretty much as doable as the state standards they replaced–at least here (I still resent being the only discipline that is REQUIRED to stage school-wide and/or community-wide activities as part of our curriculum). At the same time, they’re more descriptive, enough to kind of keep a department or district on the same page–without a mandated lock-step verb form by verb form pacing guide.
It’s a lot to digest, but you’ll be happy to know that the aftertaste is pretty tolerable.
Laura Sexton is a passion-driven, project-based language educator in Gastonia, North Carolina. She loves sharing Ideas for integrating Project-Based Learning in the world language classroom, including example projects, lessons, assessment tips, driving questions, and reflection.
Thanks for posting this. Do you (or anyone you know) have a list forming of the vocab you'd teach in each level? I know a list seems to emerge as you look at the different goals you summarized, but I am big lover of lists! Any resources out there yet?
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1 Comment
Fisheroflapaz · April 16, 2013 at 11:06 am
Thanks for posting this. Do you (or anyone you know) have a list forming of the vocab you'd teach in each level? I know a list seems to emerge as you look at the different goals you summarized, but I am big lover of lists! Any resources out there yet?
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