EDUC471 Personal Narrative

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School

University of British Columbia *

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471

Subject

English

Date

Apr 3, 2024

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docx

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Uploaded by HighnessIce13343

Personal Story of your Educational Journey My formative educational experiences were shaped in Malaysia, where I attended kindergarten to Year 12. The overarching goal of education was to obtain a job and attain financial security, which was reinforced by schools and my community. I saw education to be an individualistic and economic-end-goal pursuit, although I believed there was an alternative, I was clueless as to what before entering the course. I’ve always felt that the curriculum I underwent was limited and could be improved on a personal, societal, and environmental scale. I enrolled in EDUC471 to deepen my understanding of curriculum development, expand my vocabulary on the subject and utilize the knowledge in a useful way. I would say I have been an adventurous hero. I’ve stayed curious to explore paths I never would’ve had by choice and stayed inquisitive to each rabbit hole the Modules have presented. I believe this adventurous spirit has opened the doors to the aha! moments I’ve had, which I will continue to detail below. The BIG Moments 1. The economic aim is just one piece of the holistic puzzle of education. Entering this course, I came in with the view of curriculum being very structural with economic aims taking precedence. When I was exposed to the different educational aims and asked to reflect on what mattered more to me, that was the moment my rigid view of curriculum melted. I hadn’t considered the variety that existed, the pros and cons of each one and how it could even be blended. Economic aims, for example, are useful for job training but the pursuit of the economic agenda is harmful to environmental sustainability in the long run (UNESCO, 2017). It serves a very individualistic development and if other educational aims aren’t integrated, it can lead to an unsustainable and inadaptable society. I was fed this

notion of a one-curriculum model growing up, as I was told to get an education to get a job. This created bias in science subjects and arts were seen less than. With no space for other educational modalities, bullying and racism were extremely prevalent in my school too. I believe if care and relationships, moral and civil education, for example, were prioritized in school, this would not have happened. Moving forward, I now see that education should encourage well-roundedness and this can only be done with a holistic integrated approach of mixed educational aims. 2. Citizenship education is important. I initially resisted the importance of civil education in the curriculum and wasn’t excited at all to be assigned it as my topic for the expert group discussion. Deep diving into citizenship education literature for my expert discussion taught me how valuable and undeniably crucial it was. Some positive strengths of citizenship education are to teach students skills to participate in democratic societies, make informed decisions that benefit the community, develop empathy for others with different backgrounds, overcome personal biases and have the knowledge to speak out against political extremism (Sears, 2014). This myriad of information was not present during my schooling years. Political ideologies and civil discourse did not once come up and there was prevalent racism against minority groups. The most my school did was carry out different cultural celebrations every year to promote ‘tolerance’. This was never enough, and I feel wronged by the educational system. The simple reason it wasn’t taught in school was that you could go to jail if you spoke out against the government. It’s an intentional tactic however I see through the fabric now. Education and curriculum don’t exist just to learn skills, but to learn to mobilize societies to stand up against injustices. If civil education was taught from a young, prejudice amongst groups would decrease as students would learn to empathize with each other and fight for more just societal structures (Brighouse, 2005). Before this course, I wouldn’t have given it a second

thought and now I cannot see education without it. I’m glad I had the opportunity to be informed about this. 3. How much I valued care and relationships as my main educational goal. At the beginning of the course, I had Care and Relationships as 4th priority and now I have embraced it as my main priority along with Autonomy. This is because I initially believed we couldn’t embrace other values in life if we hadn’t first developed critical thinking and informed decision-making skills. After several discussions with my peers, learning how educational values impact practical pedagogy and most importantly, interviewing an educator personally, I see now that they reinforce each other. A healthy teacher-student relationship can increase a student’s emotional intelligence which increases their cognitive development and, thus academic performance (Goldstein & Freedman, 2003). Moreover, a caring classroom increases a student’s mental health and ability to flourish, motivation, engagement, and sense of security within school walls (Cavanagh, 2008). I have come to embrace combining Autonomy and Care and Relationship as my educational priority because I see now how a positive learning environment and teacher-student relationships are the way to developing deeper personal growth and critical thought. This was a meaningful learning experience for me because teachers bullied and shamed me in classrooms growing up, and it was even normalized to get hit on your hand by a ruler when you made a mistake. If care and relationships were valued by my teachers and schooling systems, I believe I would’ve felt safer in school, not failed constantly, and had the freedom to explore the self and shape my critical thinking. A student’s emotional safety should be prioritized in schools moving forward. 4. The power of differentiation in lesson planning in promoting inclusivity. This aha moment grew from valuing care and relationships as I learnt that effective lesson plans are only as good as how well the teachers know their students. I previously couldn’t

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