CORE Knowledge...

any teachers have knowledge of this curriculum? Any input?
This is an option at one of our local schools we are trying to get DD into.

Re: CORE Knowledge...

I don't know too much- but I like the idea of it. My understanding is that it's big on content, which I think it very important. It seems now that we focus on skills, skills, skills in too much isolation without acknowledging the role that prior knowledge plays. For example, kids are able to manage increasingly difficult reading content in part by building skills but also by developing knowledge of a topic at an early age and building upon it.

I like this blog a lot, though it may go more into policy than you need, but the rest of the site is good as well.

core knowledge blog

Re: CORE Knowledge...

We were a CORE Knowledge school for about two years. It's basically a theme based approach to teaching and it exposes kids to classic literature that has a connection to their social studies or science units. The kids read and listen to a lot of nonfiction. We incorporated a lot of art into our teaching as well. So when we taught about the Renaissance and Reformation, we read Don Quixote, listened to music, viewed artwork and the students created their own Sistine Chapel images by laying on the floor and drawing on paper taped under their desks (LOL!)

The problem we had in fifth grade was that a lot of the units didn't relate to the NYS Standards for Social Studies (England and the Golden Age, Japan, Russia, etc)
and some of the units we needed to teach, like Canada, were already taught in third grade. We also couldn't make use of the math units because we already have a program in place. Those problems aside, I really enjoyed teaching the units.

If a school actually teaches the units from grades K and up, I think the students would have an amazing knowledge base of American and world history.

Re: CORE Knowledge...