I have spent countless hours thinking about curriculum and discussing it with anyone who was willing to listen. Recently I had a friendly debate with a non-educator who expressed their views that not everyone needs to go to college and that the problem is that too many people go. I quickly put together some research about the income disparity between college educated and non-college educated and tried to explain that, for those that want to and can go, they should be encouraged to as that can provide social mobility that otherwise may not present itself. That brought me to another point. Is the overall goal of schooling-k-12 and above, to be preparation for employment? I argued that a well-rounded liberal arts program is worthwhile. Even if you never “need” the course content on sociology in your actual day-to-day work life, it would be valuable to have been exposed to the content. Then there are the times when my 5th grade son asks why again he has to write another story. “I am not going to be a writer, mom,” he says. My answer, “it’s good to stretch your brain and practice writing techniques. You also get to share your creativity.” I am not always sure I buy into this but the answer works for the moment.
Schools are challenged to educate by providing meaningful, relevant content to the masses.
It is impossible to write curriculum unless you have a clear-cut concept of the purpose. If you don’t know where you are going, any way will get you there. So knowing where you are going is a critical component of any curriculum design.
What does it mean to be educated? How is being educated different from being trained? Are both important? What does it mean to be knowledgeable? And what should we be knowledgeable about?
Working in the schools for over 20 years, I have occasionally wondered why this, of all things to know, have we deemed so important to spend weeks teaching about. The truth is we can put whatever goals and objectives we’d like into a curriculum. It does not mean that the goals are achievable, feasible, appropriate, necessary or even important. That is why it’s so tricky.
And that’s just deciding the “what to teach.” We haven’t even begun to consider the “how to teach” (in terms of organizing the content, the classroom, the strategies, the grouping, the scope, the sequence, etc.) This is no easy task.
I was trained extensively in cooperative learning and utilized the concept as the framework for my classroom structure. I also worked on the writing and design team to redo the middle school social studies curriculum. I was privileged enough to get to work directly with the legendary Grant Wiggins. I worked with a team to write curriculum using Backward Design. That experience forever altered my thinking about what I was teaching and why. I was also trained in Problem Based Learning and developed many units where this strategy was utilized.
For many of my students, it appears that getting through k-12 schooling will most likely be their most difficult challenge. Once they get into the world, they can find their niche and be successful. Schools feel outdated for these students in particular. They are skilled in so many areas not valued in current school curriculum. The technological changes and demands in our world are happening so quickly. It is crystal clear that schools are not keeping up.
Still, after all my pondering and questioning and dissecting, I still have no clear conclusions.
As Dewey says, “education is to develop the mind not shape or mold.”
I want it all. I want my students to be educated. I want them to know psychology, and philosophy, biology and chemistry (and physics) I want them to learn algebra and geometry. To read and write. To learn civics. To solve complex problems. To think critically. To be creative and empathetic. And to be kind and open minded. Is that too much to ask a public school k-12 education for?
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