Have academic standards changed over the years?

Factual Questions
1

Not talking Common Core.

In this thread about kids being held back from starting school (redshirting) the point of KG today having curricular standards and expectations more of first grade a few decades back came up.

I think the question is a GQ one. If KG is now teaching what was taught in first grade, then second grade should be teaching what was third grade and so on. Has there in fact been any advancement of the curriculum? Or are kids just now being exposed to the first grade material for two years instead of one?

2

NCLB strongly emphasized getting all children to read on grade level by 3rd grade. My very strong impression is that this is what drove the shift. Left Hand of Dorkness is who we need in here, though.

3

Calculus comes to mind as a subject now taught at high school level. It was college a half a century ago.

4

Many districts also use a spiral curriculum so kids are exposed to a concept perhaps in first grade and will see it again in 2nd, 3rd, 5th and so on. That’s fine except I think the writers of the curriculum really need to consider exactly how much knowledge kids need of a certain concept at certain grade levels.

5

If we want to talk about expansion at the far end, then certainly the number of kids taking AP courses (and the number of AP courses taken per kid) has exploded, as has the number of kids in IB and dual credit/early college programs. AP exams have basically doubled in the last decade, and average scores have stayed about the same (I am on my phone, can link data later).

I’m not sure this is really connected to the change in kindergarten, except that borh are driven by data about benchmarks that predict long term success (reading on level in the third grade; at least one rigorous course before college)

6

In some ways the curriculum is more advanced and on others it is not.

There is more to know. Computers were much more basic when I was a young student and there was no app for that. We had high expectations and plenty of homework. No one I knew spent five hours a day watching screens. We played outside and socialized face to face.

When I studied engineering at a good university I had seen roughly half of the first year material already. No one I knew had firm ideas of what they wanted to study on university or had a specific job in mind. Students today seem more serious and focused, and know more about less.

7

Not in my high school. Or in any other high school I knew of. Or in the expectations of the college I attended.

The more general answer to the OP is that yes, academic standards have changed over the years. Academic standards change every year. On the simplest level, there’s 100 more years of American history to cover than in 1917 and what kids are expected to know about that history is drastically different. Penmanship used to be a huge subject and now is probably mostly ignored while computers have become ubiquitous.

We forget that it wasn’t until 1940 when more than half the population even graduated high school. Only a small percentage of those who did went on to college. Elementary schools normally featured the most basic ABCs and arithmetic. High schools had small college-prep classes and taught the majority a few classic books and propagandistic hero-based history. The gap between high school history textbooks and college textbooks was enormous, as I found when we used the latter in AP American History in 1968.

The OP’s question is too general to be answered. We have to at least specify how long a time period we are we talking about. I guarantee that over a generation expectations have risen and that over two or more generations classes would be unrecognizable.

8

Have they changed? Yes
For the Better? eh maybe not.

I see they make them do calculus, which was normally a college thing, and something you would not get much use out of unless your profession called for it, but…

They toss this higher end math at them, and let them out the door totally unable to do
your simple basic things, things you need regardless of profession.
They dont know how to balance a check book, do their taxes, do a household budget, figure and plan for loans and interest.

That stuff used to be taught, now it isnt.
You need that no matter what you do, you dont need calculus if you are going to culinary arts school.

History?
They appear to skip over what they seem to think is not PC, or too traumatic.
I am amazed how many kids know nearly nothing of the revolution or the civil war.
WWI is something that happened in an alternate universe, they know next to nothing of WWII, the Holocaust is some nondescript thing that happened to someone else.
Vietnam? forget it…

If they arent taught these things, their causes, what happened etc
How are they supposed to see them coming in the future and try to prevent them?

But they will spend 3 weeks learning about a 6 thousand year old chinese dynasty.

They also now teach some really bad lies and faerie stories
I notice that anything that has to do with teaching that the US did this, and it was wrong and we should not have done that, is changed into how it was a heroic thing.

Custer?
We were always taught he died at little bighorn and got most of his men killed because he was an idiot, and he wasnt a hero, and that we killed a lot of native americans including women and children and old men, and how the soldiers would sometimes dismember the bodies.
(No we didnt have hero based history, that must be a new school thing? We got heroes in literature class, they all had names like herecles or perseus or arthur etc)

Now? in the schools around me he is some american hero BS and died bravely blah blah blah, maybe schools somewhere else are better, hopefully.

Our teachers didnt play games, or sugar coat stuff, and they didnt purposely make stuff up.
The whole point of teaching the bad exactly for what it was is so you dont repeat it.

I am not so sure the new school standards are better at all, i think too many people that couldnt teach a kid if they had to have too many fingers in the in the pot?

9

This shows the growth in AP over the last 20 years or so–it’s sustained growth over time, and the trend goes all the way back.

10

I taught kindergarten, as a matter of fact, during most of the 1980s, and primary grades (1st and 2nd) through the nineties. (After many years in K, I was deemed knowledgeable enough to finally move along.) Since about 2000 I’ve been in schools part-time as a specialist teacher. I also work in educational publishing, mainly as a writer of textbook chapters, study guides, workbook pages, etc., and I have taught in education departments at the college level.

So I have some expertise in this area.

The basic answer to your question is YES, academic standards have changed. That is particularly true at the beginning and the end of K-12 schooling.

Kindergarten is in many ways what first grade used to be–my wife, also an educator, and I like to call it “kindergarten bootcamp.”

Very roughly, back when I was a K teacher the expectation was that kids learned “about” letters and sounds and words in kindergarten, but did not begin the process of formal reading instruction until first grade. Today, though, those simple primers we used to use in first grade are now standard in kindergarten. Kindergarteners are responsible for knowing all kinds of letter-sound relationships, blending skills, sight words, etc.; it’s not just “print awareness” any more. The same is true of writing–I’ve written “writing guidebooks” for K that begin more or less where I used to begin writing instruction in first grade, with labels, captions, etc., and end with what we used to do probably in Feb or March of grade 1.

The changes are a little less noticeable as you move through the rest of elementary school–the difference in second grade is not as obvious, for instance, and I believe the difference in fifth grade, say, would be less obvious still. So it isn’t that what used to be fifth grade is now fourth grade in the same way as what used to be grade 1 is now part of K. Nonetheless, there have been changes. Kids are asked to analyze literature (including nonfiction) in more sophisticated ways than they were 20 years ago, for example. That’s true in primary grades and upper elementary alike. Kids are expected to write, in general, more and longer paragraphs at any given grade level than they used to. In math, there’s more of a push for multiplication concepts in second grade than there used to be, though it’s fair to say that the formal work of multiplication facts and strategies remains more of a third grade thing. Some of this is Common Core. Some of it is not. I worked at one point on a Georgia math program, pre-CC, which reflected new state standards and introduced multiplication in a formal way in grade 2. (I believe it was not a success and things were scaled back, but not returned to what they had once been.) Some algebra concepts are being pushed down into elementary grades as well, in a way they once were not.

As for the HS level, with AP and IB and the rest of the alphabet soup, Manda Jo has that covered. Not really my area of expertise anyway, but there’s no question that the expectations of success (for “high achievers” anyway) are higher than they used to be. I took one AP test back in the late seventies; I think my school offered three, and it was an academically-inclined place. My son, in the 2000s, took four, I think, and could have taken more. My niece, graduating this year, has taken I believe six already, with one or two more to go. Big differences, and the level of knowledge and skill needed to succeed on the test in my limited experience, at least, has not gotten any lower.

So, there you have it, from this corner of the education universe anyway. Hope this is helpful.

11

When were you taught this? That Custer wasn’t a hero was inconceivable 50 years ago when I was in school.

12

Academic standards have changed over the last 50 years, and continue to change. Kindergarten has been especially impacted, to the point that the old half-day K is on the way out in most places, replaced by full-day Kindergarten. At the other end, it isn’t so much that high schools teach more than they used to (in 1977 I could have taken Calculus my senior year of high school, though admittedly it was done by taking it at the local JC then, rather than by AP). Physics was available the same way senior year, if you wanted (serious Physics, not the baby-version taught at some high schools as a way to get the football players a science credit :mad:). Now, you can still take Calculus and Physics senior year. SOME districts have admittedly started teaching Algebra in 7th Grade for advanced math students, and that’s an acceleration.

But the main change at the upper end is that what used to be taught to 25% of students going on to college is now taught to 85% or more of students. Thus, at the school I taught at up until last year, the math sequence for the average student was Algebra (9th), Algebra II (10th or 11th), Geometry (11th or 10th; we tended to go back and forth on whether it was better to run both algebra classes back to back), and Prob. and Stat. (12th). Accelerated students did Algebra I in 8th, then Alg. II, Geo., Pre-cal., and either Calculus AP or Prob. and Stat. AP. Students who struggled with math in middle school, or who had trouble passing Algebra, were enrolled in a second-year of Algebra, then did Geometry and Prob. and Stat.

When I was in high school, it wasn’t even required that the normal student take Algebra. I personally think teaching each and every student who comes through the school Algebra II is not the best use of their academic time, and most high school mathematics teachers in my state agree. However, we don’t really have any good alternatives that will still allow a rigorous 4-yr. mathematics sequence. And rigor, combined with an extended number of courses, is what is demanded today.

13

I went to school in the 80s, and that’s when, at least around here, half-day kindergarten was on its way out. By the time my brother with in school, in 1986 or 1987, it was full day around here. What amazes me is that I know pretty much no one who went to preschool when I was a kid, and now pre-K3, pre-K4, kindergarten is pretty much the normal/expected way of schooling. My kid starts next year, she’ll be 3, and it’s a full day program (8 a.m. - 3 p.m.) And this is in a normal working and middle class neighborhood, so not some fancy pants part of town where everyone is fighting to get their kids into the best schools at an early age to start their academic career or anything. It feels really odd to me, given my academic background, but that seems to be the new normal here.

14

It wasn’t college for me (c. 1980s) or for my parents, (c. 1950s), but my father had it in what was called the “superior baccalaurate” (which ended at age 17); my mother only needed an “entry baccalaurate” (ending at age 14) to attend normal school and that didn’t include calculus.

A lot of the stuff I studied in Chemistry and Physics in the equivalent of Middle School hadn’t even been discovered when my grandparents were in school.

School levels themselves get restructured, all over the world. Have American high schools always had AP courses? Special Ed? The question of interest isn’t so much if school systems change, but how and why and what the effects are.

15

There are a few things that complicate matters. The OP’s title is not the same as the question. Academic standards are not the same thing as curriculum.

I have been at the receiving end of a changing set of both standards and curriculum, and can say with some certainly that both curriculum and standards have changed here in Oz. Mostly for the worse. Mathematics is the area that most concerned me - as at university we would be teaching based upon the capabilities that students out of high school had. There was a time when the school curriculum was matched to the university curriculum for those expecting to matriculate (and the exam and certificate were called the “matriculation”.) No more. Despite ever more students moving on to a university education, there is now a significant disconnect. The first half a year of first year mathematics is now becoming remedial mathematics, to take students to the point where 20 years ago they would be expected to be. This has a knock-on effect. It is particularly hard for physics, which was always of the ragged edge of needing more maths than high school provided - and sometimes had to either delay subject matter until the maths classes had taught the needed tools - or take time out to teach the basics needed before teaching the physics.

Even when I was finishing high-school it was apparent that the maths curriculum was being watered down from where it had been. We did calculus, but not to the same level of difficulty as years gone by. Going back more than five years with the exam papers became very difficult. And the watering down has never stopped.

Standards are the other problem, and the core problem is of course the issue of teaching to the exam or teaching the fundamentals. Now, here, the tail wags the dog. The exams have become the de-facto curriculum. Teachers teach what appears in the exams, and they teach how to pass the exams. In the worst case this becomes rote learnt pattern matching. Teach students to recognise exam questions and how to regurgitate answers. This has all the down side you would expect.

Really smart students are able to shine no matter what, but the normal level students (by which I mean tomorrow’s engineers and the like) are short changed, and given a time limited university curriculum, something has to give.

This is clearly a mix of fact and IMHO. But there it is.

16

When I was in high school (NYC suburbs, late 60s) only 2 or 3 years of math were required, but for the college-track kids who took 3 or 4 years, the sequence was algebra, geometry, trigonometry, calculus.

17

I did it, or at least some form of it, for what in England was then called Additional Maths O-level, in 1964 at the age of 16 (and I was an arts rather than science student). But listening now to my niece’s husband, who’s head of maths in a tough inner city secondary school, I’m lost. Whatever they’re teaching now as basic maths seems to be much more demanding, or at least very different from anything I remember (not that that’s much).

With arts/humanities subjects, there may be less of an advance in the volume of required knowledge, but the system has changed so much to ensure that a single exam system fully tests a wider range of abilities than was thought practicable when I was doing school exams. All I can say is that I did look up the latest equivalent in English Literature to the exams I did , when the exam was designed only for the top 15-20% of the ability range, and at their most advanced and demanding, they struck me as well up to the same standard.

So yes, standards have changed as society has changed (the days of assuming that the not obviously academic children would always be able to find a job in their local basic industries are long gone), but not necessarily for the better or worse. I get the impression that it’s harder for an imaginative teacher to teach outside the prescriptive curriculum, and easier to teach to the test and no more; but equally, far more youngsters are achieving more than their predecessors were ever expected to.

18

I apologize to all if my title and op were less than clear.

This I think most answers what I was trying to ask:

To fumble out what I was trying to ask another way … my impression has always been that standards had always been to have kids spend the one through three learning to read, and that by four they classwork was on using reading to learn, and finishing that stretch in math with the standard class having basic math skills of multiplication and division up to 100 and understanding the relationships of the two, and knowing how the basic properties work. Science and social studies covered in very basic ways. 4th those ramp up.

It does not seem that that has changed much overall.

The older approach to that was to have KG being a year to make sure that all the kids who would be in the first grade classroom were ready for the academic approach for learning those skills that began in first grade so that first grade could have the teachers dealing with a group that was ready to work together as a class in a classroom setting, sitting at desks, raising hands, taking turns, with the basic fine motor and social skills needed such that the focus could be not on those skills but on learning the reading and writing skills. Many already had it before KG and for them it was a chance to solidify those skills and have some exposure to first grade concepts by play while the others caught up.

What seems to have changed is that the approach to getting to pretty much that same point by 3rd, MandaJO’s noted stronger push to accomplish getting there particularly in reading, has been to try to start the more traditional academic approach process a year earlier, with many states moving the age bar such that kids were a bit older at start because many kids that age are not developmentally ready for that approach. And as per the thread linked to in the op some have held back their kids as well such that overall more kids are starting KG older by a few months than they used to be. (Statistically something that happens more commonly among White students of relatively higher SES than in those of lower SES or of Black or Hispanic populations.)

In terms of results (not what I asked in the op I know) by nine years old we have the [to go by, and can at least compare the early '70s (testing between 1971 and 1973 apparently) to 2012. Mind you the above has not been the only change over that time, we also had the Head Start program getting expanded significantly in the '80s giving more lower SES children some of the quality preschool benefit that higher SES kids already had, and many other social changes. But it’s what we’ve got.

Reading scores by age 9 have improved, more in males than in females (up 17 and 10 points respectively), more in Blacks than Hispanics than Whites (up 36, 25, and 15 points respectively) with a resultant narrowing of the gaps.

Math scores by age 9 have improved, with the only significant group difference being a greater increase of Blacks compared to White (up 36 compared to 27 points).

That same assessment shows no significant changes overall at age 17.

Interestingly [URL=“Why Kindergarten in Finland Is All About Playtime (and Why That Could Be More Stimulating Than the Common Core) - The Atlantic”]Finland](NAEP - 2012 Long-Term Trend: Summary of Major Findings[/URL), noted for generally being at the top of the international education rating comparisons at age 15, has kept with what is now quaint in America: the “KG is learn by play” approach. And they start that approach later.

But that begins to digress into GD discussions. Thank you for the answers.

19

Heck. A whole section I wrote there had been eaten by the hamsters! (Or a klutzy finger …)

The long term results we know by NAEP assessments which have tracked since the early '70s to most recently 2102. Mind you lots of other changes have happened too, not just more academic KG, including but not limited to the major expansion of the Head Start program in the '80s. But the best we’ve got to go by.

There have been improvements on the score at 9 years of age.

In reading at 9 overall improvements, more in males (up 17 to females up by 10 points) and Blacks more than Hispanics more than Whites (36, 25, and 15 points up respectively).

In math at 9 overall up as well with the major group difference being White and Black (up 36 and 27 points respectively).

The scores at 17 y.o. have not significantly changed overall.

From there I had gone into Finland which holds off on beginning the academic approach until later.

Sorry 'bout that. Makes my op seem clear in comparison though! :slight_smile:

20

Since you mentioned Finland, I’m going to put on my Professor of Education hat (it’s an automatic response).

For those who don’t know, Finland placed very well a few years back on some international tests of educational achievement. (The two biggest are the TIMSS, which tests 4th and 8th grade math and science, and the PISA, which looks at 15-year-olds in reading, science, and math.) Finland placed much better than the US, to be specific. In 2012, for instance, Finland was 12th in math, 5th in science, and 6th in reading among 15-year-olds, or so said the PISA; the US ranked 36th, 28th, and 24th. Finland roolz! The USA droolz! How can we let a little country like Finland beat us? What’s going on???

Part of the problem is that we generally hear about these tests only when they show distressingly low results for the US. Some influential Americans are very invested in demonstrating that the US has a bad educational system—some education reformers, some politicians, some folks in the business world—and when Bad News like this comes out, they are quick to grab onto it. We don’t hear so much about when the US does well. (See below.)

The other part of the problem is that it’s really hard to justify making sweeping comparisons about countries based on these tests.

*In reading, it’s difficult to get texts that are functionally equivalent. You’re going to use augury rather than predictionin an English passage? Fine. Now, write a comparable passage in Swedish that uses the more difficult of a similar pair of words. Now write one in Arabic. In Korean, in Spanish, in Flemish…in Finnish. There’s no way of ensuring the task is equivalent across these language groups—and no way to ensure that any differences even out.

*The US tests a broader, sometimes MUCH broader, range of students than some other countries. We routinely include learning disabled students and non-college-bound students in our pool of test takers, for instance; not all countries follow suit. (I honestly don’t know if Finland is one.)

*The US has a significantly larger group of low-SES students than most other comparable “developed western” countries. Pretty much everywhere, low-SES students do worse on these tests than high-SES students from the same country. Our high-SES students do essentially as well or better than high-SES students in Germany, Canada, Australia, Finland, etc. The education we offer seems to have about the same outcome; the demographics are what’s different.

+Finally, results like these are prone to great fluctuation. Among the most recent of these tests to be published was a TIMSS math test for grade 4, administered in 2015. Finland scored a 535, which ranked it above the Netherlands, Germany, Sweden, Australia, Canada, Italy, Spain, and well above New Zealand and France. Many of those differences are statistically significant. As for the US, well, many people looked for it down at the very bottom of that group, dogpaddling along just above the Omans, the Indonesias, and the Moroccos of this world, and these people were…well, they were wrong, as the US actually scored 539, *above *Finland (though not a difference that is statistically significant). Oh. Doesn’t fit the narrative that Finland is way outperforming the US, does it?

I don’t say that the results of these tests prove that the US educational system is WONDERFUL! AMAZING! THE ENVY OF THE WORLD! Because they don’t, and because our system could stand plenty of improvement. But TIMSS and the PISA tests don’t indicate disaster, either—or Finnish superiority.

Professor of education hat OFF. (About time, huh?) Anyway, as to the OP, the international tests don’t support (or reject) the notion that Finland’s less intensive approach to academics pays off down the road. It might be the way to go, but it’s not a good idea to try to use TIMSS and PISA to justify that approach.