As with the draft version that was discussed a while back, the Standards are still confusing ³what students do² and ³what they can talk about,² although this may be strategic. ³Using simple tenses² is slated for 3rd grade, for example, but native-English-speaking students will have been using simple tenses since kindergarten at least. Knowledge about tenses would logically go in ³knowledge of language,² but the Standards seem the reserve the latter term more for stylistics. This kind of confusion could allow school systems to imply they¹re ³teaching about² tenses, while only having to demonstrate that yes, their students use the kind of English pre-schoolers are capable of. There¹s no requirement that the students identify a verb form as present, merely that they use some simple present verbs (note that I¹m not saying that the students should or should not be able to label verb tenses, only that as worded, the standards don¹t really ask for what one might think they¹re asking for). I suppose that could be a feature, not a bug. But it would be very hard to defend if someone questioned them about it directly. --- Bill Spruiell To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web interface at: http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html and select "Join or leave the list" Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/