CORNPEG Illiteracy

I’ve been buried under wave of teacher observations, annual summative evaluations, writing an online AP Euro course and the annual Spring race through cub scouts, boy scouts and baseball.  But I was shocked out of my grindstone lethargy by a message send to the College Board’s AP European History teacher list serve:

I’ve never heard of CORNPEG either, but based on the fact that it is associated with AP Euro it’s probably something like SOAPS (Subject Occasion Audience Purpose Subject).  Just another acronym tool we use with students to help sharpen their essay writing skills.  Then again it could have been an obscure agricultural tool.

I was just as ignorant and just as curious as the teacher who posted this message.  The difference between us is that I knew that I could find the answer in less than a minute, she thought her only option was posting to the listserve.  I threw “CORNPEG History” into Google and found a syllabus from a teacher in Oklahoma that gave me the answer.  Thanks to Earl Dalke at Mustang High School, I now know what CORNPEG is.

What’s the moral of the story?  Thousands of dollars of professional development and drive-by “look what I can do!” presentations don’t have half the effect of a simple habit of mind. Giving a teacher a SMART Board and a Skype Account doesn’t necessarily change anything.  You can have all the Twitters, Twibes, and Twines you want, but if you don’t have the simple understanding that time between asking any basic question and finding the answer is virtually zero, you missed the boat.

Funny thing is, we now know what CORNPEG is but the teacher who sent that message is still waiting for someone to answer it and then will have to wait for that answer to make it to the listserve and for the listrserve to send it back to her.