Curriculum

"since curriculum involves putting a series of beliefs into practice, we need to examine and articulate our beliefs in order to explore ways of enacting those beliefs in classrooms with students."

from “Inquiry as a stance on curriculum” by Kathy G Short taken from Taking the PYP Forward, edited by Simon Davidson and Steven Carber, published by John Catt Educational Ltd, 2009.

What is your stance towards curriculum design?

Aims

• To be aware of your stance towards curriculum
• To consider how you put your beliefs about curriculum design into practice

Intended Outcomes

By the end of this module, participants will have:

• An understanding of their approach towards curriculum
• A deeper knowledge of the Victorian Curriculum and the Religious Education Curriculum Framework

Learning Experience 1: Curriculum Stance

1a: Before you begin, complete this short survey about curriculum design. When you have completed the survey, share your findings with your team on your google+ community:

• What do your answers tell you about how you approach curriculum?
• How do they connect with the responses from the rest of your team?
• How are your answers reflected across the school?

1b: Curriculum stance - Why do some teachers opt for developing curriculum, while others do not? Connelly and Clandinin (1988), Clandinin and Connelly (1992, 1998), and Shawer (2003) maintained that teachers approach curriculum in different ways: as curriculum transmitters, curriculum-developers, or curriculum makers.

• Read the three categories of teachers below considering the following questions:
  • What is your preferred stance for ‘curriculum work’? What aligns here to your beliefs/values?
  • What does this stance offer you in relation to how you go about your work? What do you recognise as the challenges or tensions of working from this stance?

Curriculum transmitters delivered prescribed curriculum materials and topics (the student’s textbook and the teacher’s guide) without introducing new materials or topics and without making significant changes or adaptations.

Curriculum developers developed curriculum through prescribed curriculum materials and topics, introduced new materials and topics, and made significant curriculum changes and adaptations.

Curriculum makers developed curriculum without reference to official curriculum materials and topics.

(Adapted from Classroom-level curriculum development: EFL teachers as curriculum-developers, curriculum-makers and curriculum-transmitters by Saad F. Shawer, Teacher and Teacher Education Journal, 26(2010) 173-184.)

• Reflect on the questions above on your team’s google+ community

Learning Experience 2: Exploring Formal Curriculum Frameworks

2a: View the following video:

[There are] concerns about the extent to which the current school curricula are developing the knowledge and skills necessary for work and life in the 21st century. Employers in particular, have expressed concerns about how well prepared school leavers are for today’s workplaces and have emphasised the need for employees who can work collaboratively in teams, use technology effectively and create new solutions to problems. These concerns have led to new levels of effort to identify, develop and assess a broader range of skills and attributes within the school curriculum … : ways of thinking (including creativity, critical thinking, problem-solving, decision making and learning); ways of working (including communication and collaboration): tools for working (including information and communications technology and information literacy); and skills for living in the world (including citizenship, life and career, and personal and social responsibility). Inherent in initiatives of this kind is the view that assessment has a pivotal role to play in focussing the attention of schools and school systems on the development of broader life skills and attributes. (taken from video above)

• How do our formal curriculum frameworks (i.e. Victorian Curriculum and Religious Education Curriculum Framework) enable teaching, learning and assessing of 21st Century knowledge and skills?
• How is this enacted in your school?

2b: Guidelines (VCAA) to inform curriculum planning and reporting were first published in February 2014, and have been revised to align with the Victorian Curriculum F–10. The revised guidelines provide advice for Victorian schools on the effective use of the curriculum to develop whole-school teaching and learning plans and to report student learning achievement.

The key points set out in the guidelines are:

1. Defined curriculum content is the basis for student learning
2. Curriculum planning will be based on two-year bands of schooling rather than each year level
3. Schools should develop and publish a whole-school curriculum plan that documents their teaching and learning program

The Religious Education Curriculum Framework had been through a process of renewal throughout 2015 and 2016. The renewed Religious Education Curriculum Framework has been designed to be interactive and practical.

• Dialogue processes and discussion questions are found throughout the document to promote on-going teacher professional learning about Religious Education.
• The framework includes learning progression and achievement standards that articulate clearly and document what matters for learners in a Catholic school community and assist teachers to make informed judgements in Religious Education against described learning progression Prep-12.

As a team, using either the VCAA guidelines or the Religious Education Curriculum Framework, choose a section to read to deepen your knowledge of curriculum. As you read consider what new understandings and connections you can make to your understanding of the way curriculum can be enacted.

2c: Read these statements from the guidelines and reflect on

• your own position about mandating curriculum
• the “twin demands” of core knowledge acquisition and individual interests?
• the balance between core learning requirements with opportunities for innovation and personalisation?

Learning Experience 3: Articulating your stance

Develop a statement that reflects your team's shared stance towards curriculum and informed by the Victorian Curriculum F–10 and the renewed Religious Education Curriculum Framework.

Who might you now share this statement with and how might you go about that?