Share article Remove Save to favorites Save to favorites Print Email Facebook LinkedIn Twitter Copy URL Ilana Garon Ilana Garon (@IlanaGaron) is an English teacher at a public high school in

the Bronx, N.Y., and holds masters degrees in both English education and fine arts. In the past 10 years, she has taught every level of high school English, including ESL and AP, SAT Prep,

and even math in emergency situations. In addition to Education Week Teacher, her writing has appeared in Dissent Magazine, Huffington Post, PresenTense Magazine, The Guardian and Business

Insider. She is the author of “Why; Do Only White People Get Abducted by Aliens?": Teaching Lessons from the Bronx.

different subjects at all different grade levels--available to teachers in some sort of online database. The curricula would be designed to align perfectly with the CCLS (Common Core

Learning Standards). Then teachers would have the option of using the CCLS-aligned unit plans, or not using them and writing their own, or augmenting the pre-made materials to fit their

classes as they saw fit.

Readers wrote me personally and commented with a lot of constructive feedback, some of which I wanted to address here. The first, from a teacher named TJLockhart, was a comment in response

to my stipulation that the curricula should be designed by teachers who still taught, and thus had not lost touch with what “works” in a classroom setting. TJLockhart cautioned that while

losing touch is always a valid concern, I should not under-rate the skills of instructional coaches, particularly since some of them were themselves teachers for decades. Just as these

instructional coaches now are able to offer helpful guidance to teachers, so too could they be charged with creating high quality, user-friendly, CCLS-aligned curricula to be used en masse.

A valid point indeed.

Another reader, who then removed her post, suggested the importance of making curricula open and adaptable for teachers, rather than simply creating a script to be followed. Another great

point. This reader reminded me that it’s important to honor different teaching practices: While some teachers really like to create and invent, some are more comfortable using tried and true

practices that have served before, and do not want to reinvent the wheel. Both are valid MO’s.

Lastly, a teacher in the Cypress-Fairbanks district of Texas emailed me to explain how her school district has done what I suggested--creating a database of curricula for teachers--despite

not having adopted the CCLS standards (as Texas as a whole has not adopted them.) My teacher contact explained to me that CyFair--committed to improving student outcomes--has poured a great

deal of time and man-power into creating strong, rigorous curricular materials of their own, which despite not being CCLS aligned, are nevertheless fantastic. The materials are created by

curriculum specialists, many of whom are former teachers, and most of whom also work as “teacher coaches,” to ensure that the written curriculum matches what is taught and is teachable to

begin with. Additionally, CyFair testing data is made available online, such that if a group of students is having trouble with a certain skill-set, appropriate curricular interventions can

be made.

There are lots of good ideas here, many of which are probably relevant and replicable at the national level.

The opinions expressed in View From the Bronx: An Urban Teacher’s Perspective are strictly those of the author(s) and do not reflect the opinions or endorsement of Editorial Projects in

Education, or any of its publications.