Arizona educators get ready for the CCSS

While many K-12 students throughout Arizona have begun their summer vacation, their teachers still have a lot of work to do. This is true of educators in the Deer Valley Unified School District and the Peoria Unified School District, the Arizona Republic reported.

This summer is a crucial time for Arizona educators, as schools need to have the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) fully implemented by the beginning of the 2013-2014 academic year, according to the Arizona Department of Education's website. For this reason, teachers in the two school districts are working hard this summer to make sure they are ready for the CCSS.

For example, Melissa Malmos, a math teacher within the Peoria Unified School District, has been learning how to integrate the Common Core into her classroom lessons. This has helped her become better prepared for this coming fall.

"As with anything new, knowledge comes with experience," Malmos told the news source. "The patience in working with the new Common Core Standards is going to be essential for teachers."

Meanwhile, other educators, such as Gayle Galligan, the Deer Valley Unified School District's head of curriculum, are rethinking their approach to education due to the CCSS. Galligan believes that during this implementation period, her District's curriculum document should become a living one that can continually be revised with input from teachers.