William Gotsch, a fourth-grade teacher at Madrid-Waddington Central School in Madrid, N.Y., is urging the state to revisit its new education standards, after determining that the common core sample math question on the Education Department’s website are too difficult for fourth graders, the Watertown Daily Times reports. New York is one of 46 states and the District of Columbia to adopt the Common Core State Standards, a set of national guidelines aimed at teaching a narrower spectrum of subjects but in greater depth. The standards also require teaching some concepts in earlier grades than they were previously taught — a stipulation that has proved challenging for teachers transitioning to the Common Core. According to Gotsch, fourth graders will be expected to form algebraic equations from multi-step problems and calculate geometric angles at a level “too high for fourth-graders to complete,” the Watertown Daily Times reports.

“I had an advanced eighth-grade student take the test. The student could not get through the first two questions,” Gotsch told the paper…

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