Common Core Standards Grades 3-5 and High School

Contrary to my prior post, I now see the differences in the Common Core Standards and the CEF Benchmarks put in place by the Clark COunty School District.  Upon further examination I see that the Common Core Standards state the objective clearly and give examples.  In addition to this there are differences in the actual standards themselves.  For example, one of the fourth grade Common Core Standards calls for students to decompose fractions.  They are to understand that 3/8=1/8+1/8+1/8.  This standard is absent in the CCSD or NV State Standards. 
In examining the standards I chose one math objective, Fractions, and followed it through grades 3-5.  In addition I also examined the High School math standards that were the "culmination" of the fraction standards for the primary grades, Statistics and Probability.  After reading the presententation by Dr. Hung-Hsi Wu, I realized he was a proponent of the CCSS, but was not of the California State Standards, or the lack of higher order thinking skills involved in any of the current state standards.  The CCSS uses specific verbage that lends itself to be taught as a collection of critical thinking skills and not rote memorization.  For example, in the each of the standards, students are to model thier answers using fractionlal models.  In addition to fractions, the authors of the third grade standards call for the the students to express thier knowledge of the properties of multipilication and division.  At no point does it say that students will memorize math facts. 
I do believe that rote memorization of the math facts, especially multiplication, is essential. However, the authors of the CCSS standards strive to have third grade students understand the concept prior to memorization.  What I believe Dr. Wu was trying to say was that we have these great standards being proposed but the teacher education was lacking.  He wasn't bashing teachers by any means but he was expressing the lack of understanding and proffesional development on the part of teachers and state educators.
There are many entities that are supporters of the CCSS for several reasons.  One of the arguments is that this is a better culmination of standards that will better prepare students for college level courses.  The way that the fractions standards are laid out in my examination of grades 3-5 and the High School Statistics and Probablities shows that this is a true statement.  There seems to be an enhanced idea of the sprialling curriculum.