Summary and Synthesis

So far in this course, I have learned a ton of new things about the standards that teachers are required to meet. In other methods courses I have always been told just to meet certain standards; never why the standards are written the way they are or other sources that could be used to make sense of the standards. It was interesting to learn that the state standards were recently implemented. I guess I constantly thought that teachers were ALWAYS required to meet state standards in the past.
Also, becoming aware of national standards such as NCTM has opened my eyes to the fact that there are other resources that teachers should be using when choosing content or activities for their classroom. One thing that came to my mind today during discussion was how those who contribute to the state standards are the teachers who know what the expectations are for the standardized state tests. It seems like if they are always teaching towards the standards, which are formed to meet the state tests, then they are going to get what they’ve always got as far as results and student knowledge are concerned.