Since
teachers and administrators have primary contact with students in an
educational setting and are responsible for implementing the given curriculum,
one may assume that they are the ones making all of the curricular decisions. While this may be a reality in many
instances, I don’t think it is a wise decision.
Even though teachers are responsible for implementing the curriculum and
administrators directly oversee this implementation, I believe they should
never be given full control to determine what should be taught in the
classroom. Curricular changes should be
made by representatives of all of the vested parties including community
members, politicians, parents, administrators, and teachers in order to ensure
that students are provided with a balanced education.
Teachers shouldn’t have the only
voice in developing curriculum because they already have a significant amount
of power over how they interpret and implement a given curriculum. One problem that can arise is teachers
implement the given curriculum and students don’t make as much progress as is
anticipated. When this occurs, teachers decide
on their own what changes to make about what they will teach. Teachers begin to meet the needs of their
students, rather than following the curriculum.
While this is not inherently bad, it diminishes the integrity of the
curriculum because it is no longer being fully implemented and therefore any
conclusions drawn from testing results are invalid. When teachers begin to modify the curriculum,
inconsistency develops and soon it’s possible that every teacher in a building
is teaching something different. The resulting
problem is that there is no way to determine if the given curriculum is
effective or not because it hasn’t been implemented with integrity. Because teachers already have so much
authority over what is taught in the classroom, I don’t believe they should be
able to determine what should be taught in the classroom without input from
other stakeholders.
There are many stakeholders in
education and all of the different members should have a voice. Teachers and administrators may have a
greater say in what decisions are made because they are in the classroom on a
daily basis and can help make logical curricular decisions, especially about
the scope and sequence of skills, but they also need input from those outside
the classroom. Parents, politicians, and
community members are also vested in the education of children and should have
a say in what is taught. Amy Gutmann
(2005) describes this ideal of all groups coming together as “conscious social reproduction.” This idea is a form of democratic education
in which all vested parties have a say in the decisions that are made about the
curriculum; it ensures that one group doesn’t have more power over
another. This setup allows all parties
that have an interest in education to provide their input without allowing one
group to dominate the others.
Though the editorial “Who
should plan the curriculum” was written in 1961, it is still quite relevant
for this discussion and aligns well with Gutmann’s ideal. In this article from Educational
Leadership C. Glen Haas determines that in order to develop a quality
curriculum, the curriculum development team must include scholars who are
knowledgeable about the curricular material, parents and other public citizens,
teachers and students. He believes that
all of these stakeholders deserve to have a significant say in the development
of a schools’ curriculum. I agree; when
all of the above parties have input we are more likely to have a well-rounded
curriculum designed to meet the needs of our students.
Gutmann
places teachers in the “State of Individuals”
when she categorizes those vested in education.
She commends teachers for their ability to promote the “dual goals of opportunity for choice and neutrality among disputed or
controversial conceptions of the good life” (2005). Teachers, in general, are able to provide
students with information from multiple points of view and then allow the
students to make up their own minds.
They don’t try to push their own agenda, but instead provide all sides
of the issue so students can be informed.
The downside to the “State of Individuals,”
according to Gutmann, is that we live in a society that pushes political
agendas and that it is nearly impossible for anyone to be neutral because of
our society. Teachers may try to be
neutral in their presentation of material but our students are not likely to
respond in a similar fashion. Teachers
and administrators need input from other interested parties to ensure that
students are provided with information that allows them to participate in the
larger society as informed citizens.
Unfortunately,
it seems that many teachers and educational institutions do not see curriculum
development the same way I do. Turning
Points- Transforming Middle Schools (http://www.turningpts.org/pdf/Curriculum.pdf)
is a curricular program developed to help middle school faculties improve and
enhance their curriculum. The program’s
five main principles, which I fully agree with, are that a curriculum should be
grounded in understanding middle school students, should be based on what the
students know and can do, students should be engaged in authentic work,
assessments should show students can do important work, and the curriculum
should be school-wide. The issue with
this program is that it only involves teachers and administrators. Parental involvement is mentioned, but it
does not seem to be a vital component.
State standards and the input of the greater community are not mentioned
at all. A school in the United Kingdom
boasts that they use a team-based approach to curriculum development (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8UlzXSiD8FE)
but upon further review, its team members are made up of only teachers. In both situations, I find it difficult to
believe that students are prepared to join the greater society if the
curriculum developers are not getting input from society about what should be
taught in the classroom. Curriculum
development needs to be founded on the decisions of multiple stakeholders.
Yes,
teachers need to be part of the curriculum development process. The knowledge they bring from working in the
classroom is invaluable. However,
teachers and administrators should not be the only ones developing
curriculum. The curriculum development
process needs to be a team effort involving teachers, administrators, community
members, politicians, and parents. When
all parties are involved the likely outcome is a more well rounded curriculum
than could be developed if only teachers were involved, which is more
beneficial for our students.
References:
Gutmann, A. 2005. The
Authority and Responsibility to Educate. Randall Curren (ed.) A
Companion to the Philosophy of Education (Malden, MA:
Blackwell).
Lisa, I wonder what you think of the idea that a more thoroughly democratic system, such as the one you describe, might generate very different curricula in different places or for different students. I ask because you seem to place a lot of value on commonality of content and execution in your criticism of a 'state of individuals' system. But don't answer the question just yet! For the next Theme, we'll learn about how something like Gutmann's system can function as a system of accountability. So the idea is that you could have accountability in a democratic system, one generating different curricula in different places, without the need for the sort of standardization that seems to drive your argument against a state of individuals. So maybe my question for you could be rephrased: What matters more, standardization or stakeholder responsiveness?
ReplyDeleteI find your premise regarding curriculum development to be very interesting. I do agree that placing all of the power in one group’s collective basket is never wise. You bring up valid concerns about teachers being too close to the situation and therefore not the best equipped to make the important curricular decisions.
ReplyDeleteHowever, it has not been my experience that teachers and administrators themselves have much say in the curriculum that is taught. The Michigan Grade Level Content Expectations were developed at the state level by politicians and major players in the Michigan Department of Education. I could be wrong, but I do not believe too much input from educators at the local level was sought. Additionally, the Common Core State Standards were developed by Governors from several states and leaders from those states in their respective departments of education. It seems to me that these curriculi are simply handed down from the powers that be and that the teachers/administrators at the local level do not have too much choice in the matter. This is not necessarily wise, either, because placing curriculum decisions completely out of the hands of those directly involved in teaching it does not bode well. In recent experiences, with the GLCEs, we were given very low standards as compared to other states, seemingly to get around the constructs of No Child Left Behind.
But, before we get completely off track, let us return to the role of teachers and administrators. Currently, teachers must teach to the standards given to them or risk losing funding if their students do not do well on state mandated evaluations. In my experience, the only choice that teachers and administrators do have is the ability to choose HOW to implement the curriculum given to them. This is accomplished through the choosing of textbooks, programs and other material to support student learning. I do agree with you that teachers and administrators should not be the only ones choosing these materials. But, when we give the choice to those who are not inside the classroom, we are not necessarily guaranteed the best results, either. What if we let the parents in each local district decide how the school taught their children? I can imagine we’d end up with quite different materials in my rural districts than would be seen in metro Detroit. What would happen if parents in a small community, predominantly made up of people who were members of the same conservative religion, decided that they didn’t want evolution taught in their children’s science classes?
My point is, that when we start involving so many people, we begin to create individualized programs. This certainly will have a few advantages, but I think it may have more disadvantages. Students in one state will come away from school with vastly different educational backgrounds. Clearly, it is not wise to place too many eggs in one groups’ basket when it comes to decisions such as these. But, to play the devil’s advocate, how do we ensure that all students are presented with equal opportunity to learn and excel if we do not have a unified curriculum?