Concluding Post

To my students (past, current, and future),

            As part of the beginning of the year, I always make it a point to provide opportunities for you to learn about me, both as a teacher and not. While you learn basic information about me, my family, some of my hobbies etc. there are some things about me that I don’t tell you. These stories are personal and to put it very simply, were life changing events that helped mold me to who I am today. Because I want you all to have the experience to truly know me, here are some important life events of mine. Let me make note that each of these experiences individually helped me in my quest for self-discovery and figuring out who I am today.

One thing that you may not know about me is that I love to sing. I don’t just mean I love to sing in the shower or in the car, I love singing in front of people to make them feel good. From a young age, I knew that I had a talent, but for whatever reason, I held this gift back. I was worried that what I felt was a real talent was nothing more than mediocre, average, nothing special. I had my time in the limelight in 5^thgrade with a solo in Shh... We’re Writing the Constitution. I thought that this experience would finally motivate me to pursue other opportunities to sing. Unfortunately, that was not the case. Being the fourth child of six, I always felt invisible and would readily diagnose myself of having middle child syndrome. I wanted to feel accepted and for whatever reason, I never could find it. It wasn’t until five years later, at the beginning of my sophomore year of high school when I finally took the risk and joined choir.

My parents were hesitant as they were unaware of my interest in singing, but were eager in my excitement.  Little did they know that I was hiding something far within my vocal chords and my soul. My choir teacher Mrs. Freeman was a quirky teacher who did what she could to make me feel accepted in this bunch of choir geeks. In the fall of my sophomore year, my choral class was performing in an operetta. I did not audition in any lead roles as I felt intimated by the upperclassmen. Nonetheless, Mrs. Freeman wanted to have a couple of students sing solos/ duets before the play. I don’t know what it was that motivated me to volunteer, but I did. I decided to sing “Getting to Know You” from The King and I as I felt it was an appropriate song to sing for my singing debut. I remember singing that song for the first time with Mrs. Freeman with no reservations or worries. I also remember the look of amazement on Mrs. Freeman’s face when she heard me sing. All of those years of skepticism, doubts, and uncertainties melted away and I finally found like I found purpose. It was after this time that Mrs. Freeman made it a point to continue to motivate and inspire me to pursue singing as an extracurricular activity. I guess you could say that Mrs. Freeman’s drive and determination in some way inspired me to later become an educator because I wanted to make my students feel the way Mrs. Freeman made me feel, like I mattered and had worth. This was when I finally started to feel like I belonged.

 Believe it or not, elementary school was not the easiest for me. Reading was a struggle for me. I could read, but I wasn’t as good of a reader as my peers. I remember in third grade I was in a second grade reading group. I felt so stupid and embarrassed for being in the lower group. It was at this point in my life where I started to realize that I wasn’t really intelligent or really low I was just… average. Because of this, I never stuck out in my classrooms. The one major ‘in’ that I had was that I was an Everett; therefore, everyone seemed to know me. My older siblings were extremely smart and I wasn’t. A lot of the time, I felt like I was a disappointment to my family because I didn’t get straight ‘As’ or never made it into the accelerated courses.  I felt like an outsider.

Elementary school and middle school, to put it simply, were a blur.  High school, on the other hand, that’s where I really began to evolve into the person I am today. It was at the time I walked into high school where I decided to do more than just basic.  I am not saying it was easy; it took a lot of intrinsic motivation (motivation within myself) to get over this label that I had created of myself. I set my mind on getting better grades, making a strong effort in my studies, and finding extracurricular activities that made me feel proud of me (One in particular was choir which you read about above). I pushed myself to do better and while it took a long time, even into my collegiate years, I finally got a strong grasp for this whole education thing.

Why do you think that I am writing to you about this? Well, some of you struggle with school whether it be content areas (reading, math, writing) or fitting in. I am writing you about this because I want you to know that while it seems hard and you just want to give up, it gets better. You may feel like you don’t have friends and if you feel that way, find people who share similar interests. I made so many friends once I joined a group that had people that shared a common passion for. You may have difficulty with reading in elementary school and may be considered below grade level. That was me but because I motivated myself to read books that interested me, books that made me think,  I can honestly say that I now can read books far more complex than I ever thought I could.   This struggle that I had as a student was another reason why I decided to become a teacher; I wanted you all to know that sometimes it takes time for learning to really click. These trials that I experienced in my life made me fight to be the life-long learner that I am today and for that I am proud of myself.

So there is one more thing that I want you to know. Despite the conversations that you and I had, have, or will have that may make you think that I am mean or evil, please realize that I have these conversations with you because I see your true potential, something that you may or may not see right now. When I get ready for the school day every morning, while yes I may be making copies or writing what materials you need, without you all as my students, the copies and the materials would be meaningless. Let me say this in a more forward way, you all are the driving force of how and what I teach. I want you all to be inspired to learn, I want you to feel intellectually challenged and to feel like you can achieve anything you put your mind to. I know this is a bit cliché, but the words are true. Many of you live in a rough area where some of your parents or siblings or grandparents didn’t go to school. Despite what you may hear or think, you have the potential to DO GREAT THINGS! I want you to feel inspired and to be able to figure out what your niche (place) is.  It took me a long time to realize that my niche was to help you all find yours.

Learning is a journey. For some of us, it’s an easy course where we don’t experience many bumps or obstacles and our final destination is easy to spot out. For others, it’s a little difficult with some major curves and hills, but in the end, we figure it out. And then there are some of us where the obstacles and potholes and curves are so overwhelming that we think it’s easier to just give up than trying to figure out how to maneuver and persevere through this difficult course. You all have your own backgrounds and you are unable to determine where you live or who your parents are. Despite that though, you have the ability to determine where your future will go. While you have a support team cheering you on, it’s you who decides where you take the next steps.

If I have not said it enough, I am so proud of each and every one of you.  You all challenge me, motivate and inspire me to be a better educator FOR YOU and for that, I am thankful. As Dr. Seuss once wrote, “Today you are YOU, that is truer than true. There is no one alive who is Youer than You.”

Never lose sight of who you are and always remember that you matter.

Good luck to you,

Happy achieving!

-Ms. Everett

Cycle 5 – What Constitutes a Successful Curriculum?

             In our first cycle of this course, it was taught that the word curriculum was derived by many meanings that essentially described that of “a journey.” Throughout this course, I have analyzed the cycle’s focus with this idea in mind. As an educator, I am taking my students on a journey everyday, teaching them concepts and ideas that may or may not benefit these students long term. I would like to think that I have never questioned what I am teaching my students and even more so why, but since working as a certified educator, that is what I have find myself often doing. In our current curriculum, while the foundation of No Child Left Behind was pure, the end result of this act has prevented true authentic teaching and made teaching and learning much more challenging. Especially working in a Title 1 School, there is a higher level of stress to meet AYP (Annual Yearly Progress) and we lose sight of why we are teachers; in all the hustle and preparation of our state standardized testing, we forget about the students, the most important factor to the equation.

            Our current curriculum focuses on too many standards and indicators and this prevents mastery of material to take place. Would I say that the United States has a successful curriculum if asked this question? I would be quite honest and yell back absolutely not! We have forgotten about the journey of learning, of growing, of becoming and instead, we worry about data, data, and more data. While the readings were quite engaging, I found myself wondering if our nation will ever get curriculum to where it should be and to where I feel like I am making a true impact on my students. My county’s motto is Children First. This motto seems pretty ironic as our curriculum does quite the opposite.

            Diving into the readings, in the Otterman article, we see Geoffrey Canada have a vision for how to take Harlem schools from the dumps to the riches; it could almost be seen as a Cinderella Tale. While we see the immense amount of time and money that was put into these schools, we see the immense amount of growth and success that these students have made since starting The Cradle to College Program. Working in an area comparable to Harlem, I wonder if having a program like this would benefit my students. A lot of my students’ families are classified as low-economic status and therefore, many of them focus less on school and more on having street smarts. It pains to see my students who have such potential waste it because there is no one motivating or encouraging them to succeed at home.  While the program has done a tremendous job, do that many factors need to be put in place to make a school considered successful? Along those same lines, does that much money need to be provided in order to make a school or school district successful? All I will say is that it certainly helps.

            In Meier’s reading, we look at the idea of how students should be seen as individual students, where they can have the opportunity to choice what and how they learn. Her argument of kindergarten being the only grade that truly emphasizes self-reliance was quite an A-ha moment for me. It’s unfortunate that kindergarten has merged from an environment of discovery to the beginning stages of the rest of their primary and secondary career. Coming back to the idea of what makes a curriculum successful, it is prevalent to think about your class as individual learners, to learn about them: their interests, hobbies, favorite foods to make their learning environment more inviting, more engaging and safe. While I do my fair share of getting to know my students, with having too many students in my class and not having enough time to teach everything required to know for the state standardized test, I unfortunately don’t feel like I do know my students in a way that is going to benefit them as learners or me as an educator and that it is not something I like to admit.

            Along with looking at the individual student, Meier also stresses the importance behind a collaborative school; teachers and administrators who collaborate and learn from each other for the benefit of their students. I feel that this is CRUCIAL when thinking about being successful. If teachers aren’t able to work together, growth of the school will stay stagnant. Discussing content, students, etc are all ways to make the dynamic of the school stronger and beneficial for its students. Also connecting home life to school life is another huge component that could help build a strong positive community of learning. We emphasize the importance of parent involvement at my school, because there has to be a chain to connect parents to school. Without parents, we lose a huge piece to the puzzle to make our students successful.

            I found myself continuously nodding while reading Eisner’s piece because everything he said was true and are things that I readily see happening at my school. To put it simply, the state standardized test trumps everything. By everything I mean, behavior, authentic teaching etc. I have been told quite often to teach to the test without actually being told that. I have been told to stop teaching non-tested content and to do whatever I can to ensure that my students are proficient and/ or advanced. With this, we see that this one test prevents students from being reprimanded because they need to be in class, students are learning things that may have no value to them, and students are losing focus because they don’t see what the point of this standardized test is? What’s in it for them? I do feel that assessments are beneficial in reflecting in our teaching and to determine what concepts need to be retaught and what concepts have been mastered. With the MSA (Maryland State Assessment), there are no benefits for me as a teacher or for my students taking this. I can’t look at what areas of the test my students did well or areas that they still need assistance, it’s all one score. How is this going to help me or my students? It’s not and that in a large sense is what Eisner was trying to get at. Focusing on how to make our students successful adults, not test takers. That’s the mentality we as educators need to take in order to be progressive and not regressive.

            Lastly, Nodding focuses on the importance of aims-talk or as I refer to it as instructional outcomes. Why are my students learning this? It seems like a silly question but I know for a fact that many educators would have difficulty coming up with an answer that extends beyond the classroom. Especially with our curriculum society, we teach the standard because we are told to. Yes, there are some prerequisite standards that must be taught first, but that conversation isn’t always heard because it’s not asked of us. As stated about US’s 21^st century educational philosophy, “The under­lying aims seem to be (1) to keep the United States strong economically and (2) to give every child an opportunity to do well financially.” As we see here, neither one of these aims focus or emphasis the idea of discovery, learning, or benefits of this knowledge to the students. It all goes back to this component of standard-driven teaching and learning; a curriculum that we have established in not successful and is not benefitting the youth of America.

            In closing, what makes a successful curriculum is a vision, a journey that can be paved out based on students’ interests, hobbies, ideas that will inspire them to learn. Rigor must take place in the classroom that challenge and motivate them to learn and discover. Understanding why we must teach these concepts in a meaningful way is essential and should not be looked at lightly. Collaboration amongst colleagues and direct communication with parents is also vital in making a community of learning strong and positive. We are educators to teach children, we are educators to help children grow to be adults so it is our job to make what we teach authentic so our students can become successful men and women.

A feel good video to make us educators know that we do make a difference, even if we may not think it.

Related Articles:

US Educational System may cause national threat - An interesting article on how our current curriculum is preventing essential concepts being taught and may create negative impacts nationally or internationally

Principles of Effective Change - This article looks at ways to revise current curriculums to make a positive impact for our students. 

Cycle 4: How Should Curriculum Be Generated?

Throughout this course, we have taken a look at the reasoning behind what curriculum is, what content should be seen in a curriculum, and whether or not controversial issues should be implemented into a curriculum. This week, our focus is a bit different as we were asked to look at how curriculum should be produced. This is a topic that quite frankly boggles my mind as it is difficult to pinpoint the right or just way of generating a curriculum. It’s especially difficult to brainstorm and create a curriculum that meets the needs of a variety of learning styles, intellectual levels, socioeconomic statuses, age groups, genders, ethnic groups and the list goes on.  Therefore, it can be concluded that in order to generate a genuine and beneficial curriculum, a number of factors need to be in place to ensure authenticity within the curriculum.

In the United States, we have such high hopes for our students. We want our students to become successful citizens as adults. Currently though, our curriculum does not support this idealistic thinking as standardized testing and assessments run our schools. Students lack motivation and rigor because they don’t really see how a test is going to help them in life and I would definitely agree. To put it simply, our current curriculum is failing our youth.

The No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) was an act created not be teachers or people who have worked directly with students, but by politicians who don’t really understand what makes an effective curriculum. They have no idea what it means to teach students and yet they were the ones that created our entire curriculum, telling us teachers what to teach. Along with telling us what to teach, they also told us that this amount of students need to be proficient and/or advanced in math and reading or you will losing school funding or be closed down.. It always frustrates me when people who aren’t teachers try and tell me what I should do, when frankly, they have absolutely no idea. So why is it that people who are not directly working in the school systems are telling us teachers, principals, reading specialists etc. what to do?

In the article “How Christians Were the Founders?” we see a group of devout Christians working as part of the Texas School Board inevitably making decisions of what concepts are addressed and not addressed in their social studies curriculum. I couldn’t help but laugh while reading this article. I find it to be quite ludicrous that people who have no teaching background, but more notably are using their faith as the driving force as to what is taught in a public school system. In all honestly, I first thought that the article was a joke. While yes, our founding fathers were devout Christians, we can see that our current nation has quite a diverse population of races, ethnicities, religions, sexual orientation, genders etc. and therefore, it is quite “outdated” to create a curriculum that does not implement this mentality. Our nation is known as an American melting pot for a reason. Therefore, it is essential that the people who are brainstorming and creating the curriculum are people who have worked directly with students in a class setting, who understand the major components of pedagogy, and who come from a variety of diverse backgrounds to ensure that multiple student subgroups are thought of as the curriculum is being made.

Another major component that needs to be established is determining what the overall objective of this curriculum is going to be. Some questions to ponder when thinking about this are: What are the overall outcomes of this curriculum going to be? What do I want these students to know and be prepared with by the time they graduate? What ways can I motivate these students to want to learn this curriculum? In his article, Ralph Tyler brought up several ideas which address these questions above, looking at several methods to enhance curriculum production. A major idea seen in the article is “learning experiences.” As stated, “The term learning experiences refer to the interaction the learner and the external conditions in the environment to which he can react.” (p. 63) He captured this idea by bringing up the idea of how two students can be in the same classroom, learning the same concept and can have two very different learning experiences from it. He emphasizes that, “The problem, then, of selecting learning experiences is the problem of determining the kinds of experiences likely to produce given educational objectives and also the problem of how to set up situations which will evoke or provide within the students the kinds of learning experiences desired.” To put it simply, we need to make learning engaging and authentic for ALL STUDENTS. Differentiated instruction, while a very difficult philosophy to implement for every student, is and will always be the driving force of what will make a curriculum possible. Our current curriculum does not illuminate this philosophy and this is why so many students leave high school having to take remedial courses in college or who drop out all together. We want America’s youth to be successful so they can help us get out of our current mess.

As stated in my first post, the objective behind the Common Core Curriculum is to make students college and/ or career ready when they graduate from high school. There will be much more rigor in the concepts taught, but there will be less standards to teach each year leaving more time for true mastery of the concepts. Not only that, but these standards are known as anchor standards meaning these are what must be mastered by the end of the students’ senior year. The grade-level standards work as stepping blocks to help ensure that mastery is achieved. Along with this, people who work in the school system were among many represented in the planning process for this new curriculum. Not only that, I am apart of the team at my school helping educate my co-workers about the new curriculum to help make the transition less overwhelming. At the workshops, they asked for educators to give their input on the drafted curriculum to ensure that it’s as ideal as it can be. While I still have some skepticism towards this curriculum, it is quite a step up from our current curriculum and hopefully it will make education less about the data but more about the abilities of those individual students who represent that data.

Generating a curriculum should be seen as a long vigorous process. Firstly, the brains of the operation should not be random people on the street or people who are not experts in the field of education. I don’t go to court pretending to be a lawyer, so people stop acting like being an educator is easy. It’s a profession and a pretty complex one at that. Having educators from a variety of backgrounds should be apart of the planning in order to meet the needs of a multitude of learners. Along these lines, there needs to be clear outcomes for the curriculum and there needs to be a clear correlation between the objectives presented and the individual students who are learning them. Curriculum should not be scripted since every classroom dynamic is different; nonetheless, there should be clear guidelines to the curriculum to allow teachers to accommodate to benefit his/ her students. In conclusion, curriculum needs to be made for the students by the people who know them best.

Problems with Education - Very Funny Video

Additional Resources:

Common Core Standards This website provides further information concerning our new curriculum that will be implemented fall of 2013. 

Importance of Education An interesting article that focuses on where thinking should lie when it comes to what really matters in education.

Should the Curriculum Address Controversial Issues?

Let me first start by stating the fact that being an educator is a very challenging profession. (Well duh, I know.) As a teacher, you take on many different roles; you are mother, a father, a certified babysitter, a teacher, a counselor etc. It makes sense since, for many students, their teacher is the adult figure that they see more in the day than their own parent or guardian. Six and a half hours are spent everyday teaching them information; some of this information is helpful such as work ethic, how to read effectively, and basic math skills. Teaching to prepare for state standardized tests does not seem effective or beneficial, but for 3-12 teachers in Maryland, right that is what we are doing. We as teachers teach students all of these concepts that they may or may not remember and yet we tend to leave out the more important lessons; life lessons that need to be addressed and emphasized in order to help children become acceptable men and women in society or the real world. It’s funny to me that for as long as we have them, we guard them; we shield our students from addressing the real issues, the issues that they may be faced with now and/ or later.

We teach students, so why is that when a topic comes up that is not in the curriculum and could be considered controversial BUT effective and beneficial for my students to learn, why it is that I have to beat around the bush and not teach them at a time that would be ideal and an authentic teachable moment? Why is it that we shelter these students from real topics? Why do we shelter them from what lies beyond the school walls? These are questions I often think about but even more so while reading and reflecting on this cycle’s focus.

This cycle’s focus looked at whether or not controversial issues should be addressed in the curriculum taught. The issue that we mainly investigated was on the topic of homosexuality. As stated in earlier blogs, I currently am a fifth grade teacher in an inner city school. Many of my students have had to grow up way too fast and because of this, they know more than they should. An example of this happened a few months ago when I was explaining to students that they would be presenting their country projects and this would be a portion of their overall grade. When discussing the project, I said ‘oral presentation’ and two my students burst out laughing. It took several minutes to get these two girls focused again and when I asked them what was so funny, their response was Oh nothing. Students in this generation are exposed to far too much information whether it is from watching television, surfing the internet, hearing their parents, or hearing their peers. Yet so often these students misinterpret the facts and therefore, have a wrong perception about how it is really is. Allowing students to take on these perceptions seems wrong to me on so many levels, but there are certain topics of conversation that I have to stay away from because it’s not my place.

Many of the families and teachers in my school are very religious. It is obvious that bringing up a topic such as homosexuality would be blasphemy. Many of the teachers and parents that are apart of my school feel that homosexuality is not a lifestyle, but a choice. From generation to generation, people are taught from their mothers and fathers and grandparents etc about what they believe is true. There was a time in my life where I felt that homosexuality was a choice and that it was wrong. Growing up in a small town in Michigan would make it easy to take on such an opinion since in my town, everyone was white and everyone was religious and everyone was straight. However, as time went on and as society has became more accepting of homosexuality, all of a sudden there were homosexual people in my hometown. This isn’t to say that there never were homosexual people before, but now they are starting to feel okay coming out and being themselves.

Homosexuality is a lifestyle in my eyes. I am not one to force my beliefs on other people and I am not saying that everyone has to agree with homosexuality, but I will say that people need to at least recognize that it is a different type of lifestyle, not a choice and students need to recognize that understanding as well. As stated in the Eckholm article, the earlier children are given a positive perception of different types of lifestyles, the more willing they will be to accept it. The earlier that we teach our youth that homosexuality is another part of life, the better chance that it would be seen as a norm rather than abnormal.

This past Tuesday there was a new Glee episode. This episode conveniently focused in on bullying, specifically bullying students because of their sexual orientation. Basically, there was a football player who for a long time bullied another student for being openly gay. It ended up coming out that this football player was actually gay and he bullied the other student because he was envious of how okay he was with himself. He was bullied and decided it was best to move to another school; move to a city where no one knew that he was gay so he could continue to be his old jock self. Eventually, news got out of his sexual orientation and very quickly, the terms fag and gay consumed his facebook wall and text messaging box. The bullying got so severe that this man attempted suicide and would have been successful had his father not found him in time. I bring this example up because this emphasizes the point that people reject what they were never taught to be okay or normal and because of this, men and women attempt or successful with taking their lives because so many people can’t seen beyond the realm.

Bullying has become a nation-wide problem as every day men and women, boys and girls can’t take the name-calling, the teasing, the fighting, the facebook messages, the text messages and so they give up. My school is an anti-bully school and we do our part to diminish the bullying problems. Bullying has always been an issue, but as stated earlier, with the several ways to communicate, bullying is becoming more visible.  Bullying is also becoming a more personal issue as students are being teased not just for how they look, but for who they are.  Similarly to the Eckholm article in my hometown, the topic of placing sexual orientation in the anti-bullying bylaws was brought up and after several months, it was decided that it was not necessary, even though several students emphasized the mental abuse he or she received often because they were gay or lesbian. Even with concrete proof, it still wasn’t enough. This is another reason why many areas of the U.S.A are being counterproductive in exemplifying “an equal and accepting society.”  

          The article “Silence on Gays and Lesbians” really got to me on a number of levels. Firstly, I will be completely honest by saying that for a long time, I was under the impression that homosexuality was new, that it hadn’t been around for a long time. I guess growing up Catholic and living in a really small town would make such misconceptions apparent. Reading the article really opened my eyes to the idea that if homosexuality was brought up in social studies content as a mere part of the course (as pure fact) maybe so many of the examples brought up would seem okay.

The article addressed about the mistreatment of women in Afghanistan and how appalled people are of the beatings, but how men who are homosexual are mistreated as well, probably fair worse, but no one talks about this. For so long race and women were oppressed for equal rights in the United States. For a long time, these issues were not addressed in schools and were considered controversial. Enough people fought and fought to be treated fairly, despite race or gender. It seems that because sexual orientation is not a physical trait, but rather an emotional trait, people can’t accept its truth. Perhaps with time, people will be willing to do the same for sexual orientation. I know I know, easier said then done.

Just because students are not independent, does not mean that they are unable to take on opinions and beliefs of their own. As Eisner emphasized in his piece, “Yet if one mission of the school is to foster wisdom, weaken prejudice, and develop the ability to use a wide range of modes of thought, then it seems to me we ought to examine school programs to locate those areas of thought and those perspectives that are now absent in order to reassure ourselves that these omissions were not a result of ignorance but a product of choice” (pg. 83) We as a society need to stop bestowing our biased opinions on our youth and allow them an opportunity to make their own opinions and their own beliefs because without this thinking, we will continue to go in circles, rather than move forward and prosper.

From this week’s focus, it has opened my eyes to the possibilities that I have with my students, but because of politics and religion, we are limited with how much we say and how we articulate it. As stated in the Eisner article, “Sc Furthermore, it is important to realize that what schools teach is not simply a function of covert intentions; it is largely unintentional. What schools teach they teach in the fashion that the culture itself teaches, because schools are the kinds of places they are” (page 78).Television shows such as Glee and Real World have played a role in making homosexuality not about people with AIDS, but rather people who live the same life as us, just a little differently. My hope is that with time and continuous awareness, such topics such as sexual orientation will not be an issue, but rather an embedded part to the curriculum.

Stop Bullying This website looks at the awareness of bullying, different types of bullying. and ways to prevent and stop bullying in the United States. There are a lot of great resources that could be resourceful in the classroom.

Multicultural Education This website focuses on multicultural education and different resources used to make aware and implement a diverse mentality of learning and growing.

Okay to Be Gay This blog investigates the misconceptions of homosexuality and brings to light a positive, more realistic perception of people who are homosexuals and how it is okay to be gay.

Cycle 2: What Should the Content of Curriculum Be?

As we learned last week, curriculum can very much be seen as a journey; a path of learning, growth, and life. We teach to strengthen students’ minds with knowledge that may or may not be beneficial for the students in the long run, but nonetheless, is apart of that grade’s standards and indicators. This week, we took a step further and looked at what exactly do we teach? This is a question that even thinking about it now overwhelms me. There are so many areas of learning that could be taught in a curriculum and so many areas of learning that would benefit students. As I was reading, I thought about all the times in my three years of teaching where I found myself wanting to teach this or wanting to implement that, but when it came down to it, my brainstorming was much larger than the reality of my 6 ½ hour teaching day.  So the real question is… where to begin?

Since the origin of education, there has always been a purpose for why specific content was taught. For years, it was to produce literate men, then women, and then schooling became preparation for a future career. Our current curriculum, as stressed in my last blog, is anything but valuable to our students as it limits their thinking to what can be found on a multiple choice test. While some of the content taught to the students is resourceful and will help them later in life (how to read for meaning, how to add/ subtract/ multiply/ divide, and how to justify their thinking), a lot of it is unnecessary and redundant. As stated in my last blog, the Common Core Curriculum was created because politicians felt that our current curriculum was not doing the students justice. A major factor that sparked a red flag was the fact that students were being accepted into college and then having to take remedial courses because they lacked the knowledge to take the regular freshmen courses. Looking at the differing curriculums in the last twenty years, we treat it almost as trial and error. While this component may benefit the teachers as they can take professional developments and revamp their teaching (certainly not easy, but possible), it is much more intricate for those students who went through a particular curriculum as the guinea pig and it debilitated them academically. The concept of what to teach is so complex, but we need to take a step back and think not what to teach but more so who are we teaching.

In the Corbett article, we witness a New York school that is run by and through technology. Unlike the popular assumption that the students play video games all day, students not only play them, but create video games as well. Students are put in the front seat of their learning and use what they learn in video games and what they are taught by their teachers to create, investigate, and get messy.  As stated on page 2, “Quest to Learn is organized specifically around the idea that digital games are central to the lives of today’s children and also increasingly, as their speed and capability grow, powerful tools for intellectual exploration” (Corbett, page 2) One of the major components when lesson planning is how do I get my students to be engaged in what we will be learning today? Quest to Learn has taken the common hobby of technology and video games to engage its learners, make them want to learn, and then take it a step further and motivate and inspire them to apply their learning into a variety of methods.  We live in the technological era where we rely heavily on technology. Students grew up with technology and therefore, possess a stronger level of competency and literacy to technology.  Therefore, it only makes sense to create a learning environment that is centered on technology.

At my school, we continue to do what we can to promote technology in the classroom. It would be amazing to teach my students in a setting like the one provided in the Corbett article. Students today do not compare at all to students twenty years ago. While we keep making this idea known, we continue to teach students in a way that is very outdated and unbeneficial to society’s current youth.  An example of this idea occurred a few days ago when a question on my students’ homework asked them what the purpose of an encyclopedia was.  As a person who readily used hardcover encyclopedias and Encarta as a child, I was shocked to find that so many of my students didn’t know its purpose. As I was talking to a colleague about this, it dawned on us the fact that they don’t know because they probably have never seen or used one before. The internet provides enough resources to where an encyclopedia seems quite archaic to ever use; another reason why our manner of teaching is behind the times

In his article, Dewey brings up the idea of individual nature vs. social culture.  I find this theory to provide strong reasoning to the idea that students must be taught content that is applicable to their current society.  Students can’t sit in their seats for hours like was done in the yester years and why should they have to? Students should be taught meaningful and authentic information that will benefit them in the long run. Especially with a huge stress to get students engaged in the STEM (Science Technology Engineering Mathematics) realm where they are learning, moving, discovering and growing. It is evident that Dewey feels that children should learn what is most applicable to their natural world and what knowledge they will need to best prepare them for their future careers. As he states on page 108, “It is he and not the subject-matter which determines both quality and quantity of learning.” Meaning, it’s up to the individual student to come to a conclusion on what content is essential to grasp, process, and comprehend.

In contrast to Dewey, Hirsch takes on a very differing opinion mainly stressing the importance of traditionalism in the classroom. A s stated on page 113, “To miss the opportunity of teaching young (and older) children the traditional materials of literate culture is a tragically wasteful mistake… that deprives them of information that they would find later in life…and is a chief cause of illiteracy.” I find this to be quite a bold statement and while I agree that some aspects of literate culture are relevant in a classroom setting: teaching about our country’s history, reading fictional literature, basic math facts, US government etc. a lot of the content lacks appeal to the students and therefore, is irrelevant to teach. 

If I could create my own content to teach with no pressures of students having to learn this or that, I feel I would balance both Dewey and Hirsch’s philosophies. There are many components that can not simply be taught by saying, but rather by doing. Creating an atmosphere of learning that mimics much of the social constructivism elements would allow so many more opportunities for students to experience. Students would be in control for what they learn and what they learn because it is applicable to them and them alone.  In this type of environment, students would find a purpose for learning and self-reliance.

Content will continue to change and that is without saying. If only society would trust its teachers to do his/ her jobs and to teach to benefit their specific students; if only teaching was about individual student growth and not advanced, proficient, and basic; if only students were held more accountable for what they learn and why they learn it.  But alas, the daydreaming of what could be must cease and the reality of teaching must return.

Standardized Testing - Simpsons Style: Not the best quality, but I found this to be quite humorous when looking at the content of our current curriculum and how we teach to the test, leaving little room for true comprehension and retaining of information.

Multiple Intelligences This website goes into detail about Gardner’s theory about multiple intelligences and the idea that every student is a different type of learner; this relates back to the argument that students perceive and learn in different ways.

Learning Beyond Textbooks This website highlights the idea that textbooks are outdated and how there are more efficient ways to provide specific content to students via the internet. This emphasizes convenience and fast results; two ideas that our current society thrive on.

Experienced Based Learning This website brings to the light the idea of experience based learning, how authentic learning comes from practice.

Cycle 1: What is Curriculum? What is its Purpose?

I found this cycle’s focus to be particularly fascinating as I readily struggle with this big idea of curriculum and what the rationale is behind it. As stated in my introductory blog, I currently work in an inner city school where the driving force of our instruction is standardized tests; scripted lessons are prepared in advanced and while teachers are told to use their individual teaching styles and to be creative, in the end, you teach to the test. To emphasize this point, this morning I had my biweekly collaborative planning session. Typically, in these sessions we use it as a means of analyzing student data to determine: students of academic or behavioral concern, indicators that students are still finding difficult and still not grasping and lastly, teaching methods we can use to improve our instruction with the underlying goal of making AYP (Annual Yearly Progress). Today’s focus was analyzing our FAST (Formative Assessment Systems Test) #2 Results. For those not familiar, the FAST Assessment is a test given three times throughout the course of the school year that helps students prepare or practice wordage and text seen on our annual state standardized test the MSA (Maryland State Assessment) or the main event. Since FAST #1, the vast majority of my students made HUGE gains and I was very pleased. However, despite these huge gains, the focus was not on celebrating the large improvement of the students and rather was focused on how to bring the percentage up more.

The origin of where the concept of curriculum came from is quite interesting. As stated in the Schubert’s article, the basic meaning of curriculum is a journey of learning, thinking, and growing. The key when reading this meaning is the term journey and how there should be no specific deadlines or test dates; the emphasized idea is that there is growth and meaning in what is being taught. Unfortunately, there is not much time to have this perspective when indicators need to be taught and learned by March. It is quite discouraging to think about how students get so excited when they learn that they received proficient or advanced on their standardized test or cry if they get basic, as if that score dictates who they are as a learner, and more importantly who they are as an individual person who does not learn in a way that scores proficient or advanced on a standardized test.  As it may be, this is the current curriculum that I struggle with every day.

Now, I am not in any way saying that there is such thing as a perfect curriculum. There are some curriculums that have a stronger success rate than others, but not every student is going to get 100% out of one specific curriculum. Take Donovan, for example. A tragic accident as an infant left him cognitively impaired. Even as a twenty year old, he still struggles to comprehend basic skills that we learned at the age of five or possibly at a younger age. Yet, educators at his school still continue to work with him in the hopes that he will gain this knowledge at his own pace. One example was Donovan and his paraeducator came up with their own form of communication, not something that was taught in a teacher manual, but rather something that was adapted by Donovan and his aide. While there are concepts that must be taught (and hopefully learned), there is also a strong support group present to help him along on his educational journey.

In Nodding’s article, it was argued that liberal education is an impractical measure to teach students. I don’t think it’s so much the concept of liberal education, but more so the methods in which the content is taught and the content itself. As noted, Some will never understand the logic of the mathematical proof or the power and generality of its greatest products. I can say that I was one of those students who DESPISED geometry entirely. Throughout the entire semester, I struggled to manage a ‘C’ in the class. At that current time, I knew I needed the math credit in order to graduate. Aside from that though, the content never sunk. Now reflecting back, I find that the class was one of few that truly challenged me in a multitude of ways. My teacher, though many found mean and intimidating, was patient with me and provided extra support for me throughout the course. With this, I learned to not judge a book by its cover, a lesson that I try to teach to each one of my students. This class also taught me how to challenge myself and persevere. Though I did not end up becoming a prized mathematician, I did learn more about myself and what challenges that I could overcome.

Going back to Schubert’s article, four major types of curriculum were addressed. After careful reading and reflection of my own teaching, I find the most beneficial lessons are those not necessarily found in a textbook and rather those that can help the student become an acceptable member of society. With that I concluded that I integrate a little bit of all the strands of curriculum. There are times that I use a textbook as an instructional took and there are times where the lessons are beyond the classroom. The main idea here is that as a teacher, curriculum should be used as a means of guidelines. What worked in one class, may not work in another. Therefore, being able to think on your feet and adapt to a lesson is what can turn a dull, scripted lesson into a meaningful one because you are rewriting it for your students’ specific strengths and areas of concerns, for your students who can’t stay in their seats and for students who need to know why.  

In terms of where I hope to see our curriculum move, many bodies have seen the negative effects of “The No Child Left Behind Act.” Where students were once able to think outside of the box, with this curriculum students are to think around what four multiple choice options are listed below the question and using process of elimination to figure out the answer. I currently am one of three teachers representing my school to go to workshops to learn and teach the new ideas that come with the Common Core Standards. The Common Core Standards are standards that will be used across forty-five of the fifty United States. The main objective with this newly adopted curriculum is career and college ready. There are fewer standards which means more meaningful and authentic learning can take place in the classroom. Concerning the standards themselves, more vigor, complexity, and creativity will be possible. Teachers will be held more accountable with lesson planning and differentiating instruction to meet the needs of their specific students, not just specific learning styles. With this new curriculum also comes the new concept of ‘transdisciplinary’ in which teachers create the curriculum based upon the questions students have. This idea will be seen moreso in the STEM content, nonetheless, integration of subject matter will also be highly emphasized. Though still a rough draft, I have seen enough of it to know that the United States is moving in the right direction.

In conclusion, the progression of curriculum has taken on many faces. The main emphasis though is that curriculum can not and should not dictate what a teacher can and cannot teach in a classroom. In other words, curriculum should be used as guidelines. A teacher knows his/ her students so therefore, a teacher knows what lessons will stimulate and inspire and in contrast what lessons will bore and disengage. The paraeducator knew Donovan and therefore used Donovan’s strengths to help him learn and grow. We too as educators must have this same drive to make this journey of learning, thinking, and growing authentic to each and every student that walks into our classroom.

This is probably one of the most powerful videos I have seen highlighting what it means to be a teacher and bringing it back to how we inevitably do all of this for our students.

"Taylor Mali: What a Teacher Makes"

Other Resources:

What is Integrated Curriculum? This article highlights the concept of curriculum and how it is necessary to integrate how we teach to our students. This article also goes into more details about the three main approaches to integrated curriculum and comparing and contrasting the three to each other.

Common Core - The Basics This website provides more insight the newly adopted curriculum that will be implemented fully fall of 2013. At points, I highlighted some positive ideas of the curriculum in my article and I feel as a current educator, you need to begin to educate yourself on what is to come.

Your Education is Not an Equal Opportunity This article stresses the fact that every school district is not created equal and therefore, measures parents and guardians will take to ensure that his/ her son/daughter gets a meaningful education that allowa for a successful career.

Introduction

Hello all! My name is Sarah Everett and I am very eager to dive into TE818: Curriculum In Its Social Context and find a deeper understanding of both my students as learners and myself as a teacher.

A little bit about myself: I was born and raised in Ann Arbor, MI and graduated from Michigan State University in 2008.  I completed the MSU Teaching Internship Program the following year (in 2009). After receiving my teaching certificate, I moved to Maryland where I was able to successfully find a teaching position. I am in my third year of teaching at a Title 1 School in Capitol Heights, MD. In the three years that I have been at my school, I have taught 6th grade reading/ language arts, 6th grade science, 5th grade science, and currently am the 5th grade reading/ language arts and social studies teacher.

Like everyone else in the class, I am in the process of acquiring my Master of Arts in Education. Being that I received my undergrad degree with a concentration in language arts, my Master's concentration is in mathematics and science (in the hopes that this will make me more marketable once I feel that it is safe to start job searching again). 

In spite of my very chaotic life, I am in the process of training for the Rock 'N' Roll Half Marathon in Washington DC this March. I love to read, cook, watch movies, and venture to new exciting places! I look forward to a semester of learning and growing as both a student and an educator!