Anxieties Of The Curriculum

The origins of the word curriculum date back to ancient times and in fact the work comes from the Latin word of currere: a course or race or to run (Smith, 1996,2000). Over many decades, people have argued over the various definitions. Tanner (1980) defined it as “the planned and guided learning experiences and intended outcomes”, whilst Pratt (1980) defined it as a written document describing goals planned, objectives, content and evaluation. So s it a course of study? Or can it be defined as content or a product( Marsh, 2008). Marsh (2008) goes on to include that at a variety of learning sites are a set of objectives for student learning. We can also relate this to Tyler’s objective curriculum model being that the first step to curriculum is always to set the objective. The Model of Taba from 1962, is the same model at Tyler’s but includes interaction and flow between all four stages, so we do not always need the objective before we start writing the content to the curriculum.

Curriculums are the roadmaps for schools which provide purpose and direction for administrators, educators, parents, and students. Curriculum typically refers to, “the knowledge and skills students are expected to learn, which includes the learning standards or learning objectives they are expected to meet; the units and lessons that teachers teach; the assignments and projects given to students; the books, materials, videos, presentations, and readings used in a course; and the tests, assessments, and other methods used to evaluate student learning.” (Curriculum, 2015, para. 1) Curriculums may come in many shapes and forms, whether they’re purchased as a package at the school or district level or they’re created or refined by educators and

Ralph Tyler (1957) describes curriculum as “. . . all the learning experiences planned and directed by the school to attain its educational goals (Glatthorn, 2011, p.3). Going by this definition, one can regard curricula as encompassing what is taught in the classroom, as well as

The Australian Curriculum basically makes sure that it is setting out the essential knowledge, understanding, skills and universal competences that are very essential for all Australian students. The Australian Curriculum makes sure that it defines the learning power of students as groundwork for their future learning, development and vigorous contribution in the Australian society. It makes obvious what every young Australians need to learn as they advance through their schooling. It is the basis for high worth teaching to come across the requirements of everyone of Australian students. Curriculum is intended to progress fruitful learners. Secure and resourceful persons and functioning and informed people (MCEECDYA, 2008, p.13). In 2008, the Australian Government swore to distribute a reasonable and just curriculum for the national's educational system, pulling the job away from the Local and State Governments. The drive of this was to generate a smooth phase of education all the way through the nation, and to also safeguard their countries locus into the 21st century. This essay will reveal the Nation's curriculum, its organization and development that had already been implemented for its initial opening in 2011.

A curriculum In practice, though is more than this. it is useful to think of it as being much wider. As a working definition of a curriculum I would say that it is the sum of all the activities, experiences and learning opportunities for which an institution or a teacher takes responsibility – either deliberately or by default.

This chapter is all about redefining curriculum themes. The themes teachers do is just topical themes that actually may not benefit the students at all when it comes to development. We need to observe the children and find out what is their interests and use that to expand their learning. If we are going to have a curriculum it should be focus on were the kids are at and not from just a textbook. We need to go from traditional theme planning to developmental theme planning which is focused on the students and helping to develop them. This developmental theme planning will help when students are asking questions, their curiosity, their strengths and interests and their play. Children love to play whether it is pretend, exploration (they want to see how things work, feel, taste and etc.), construction or playing games with rules. Also, using things like birthday parties, fears of children like floods, earthquakes, cleanup, and setup to help provide developmental themes for the systems. It is important we have props beside toys that children can use when it comes to playing so they can explore different things. We should make themes off of observations that we see from our students.

A study conducted in 2003 by Ofsted that involved England, Denmark and Finland, showed England’s national curriculum compared to the other two countries was:

Schools are always changing and evolving with new students every year; so why not change some other things to benefit the school system. Changing and adding different curriculum in the school environment, is something that should be considered to benefit Streator High School. For example, changing the school starting time to give students more time to prepare themselves for another day at school. Another change that would be advantageous to be brought into Streator High School is to add open campus lunch. Changing up the curriculum would also be obliging. Adding a sign language class would be beneficial to staff and faculty. This would be for students to be able to interact with others that use that for their only communication with others, resulting in a closer, more friendly school environment. There would be an overall positive impact in the school community by adding these changes. More involvement, improvement in the the economy of our town, and improving the overall academics at the high school would be the result of these changes.

He suggests that we focus more on individual progress instead of societal progress. Many could interpret his view as an absolute separation of the individual from the rest of the world. I, on the other hand, contend that he simply believed that we should not allow society to overbear on us and drew a line between appreciating solitude and pursuing absolute aloneness. With a weak individuality, conformity becomes oppression. We must believe in our own ideas because we are unique. We cannot feel fulfilled or successful in our lives if we live the life of someone else.

This passage was difficult to follow due to a missing definition of instrumental rationality and my lack of background in philosophy. There were conflicting definitions of instrumental rationality. Instrumental rationality is set by expectations of people and the expectations for ways of achievement of the person’s logically thought out ends (Wikipedia, 2017). This definition fits reasonably well to the passage, but also difficult to interpret in itself. Another, theory is that instrumental rationality is the most

Educational fears are lack of ability, not belonging, and failure. Jonathan Kozol explores these fears in “Still Separate, Still Unequal: America’s Apartheid”. Lack of ability is an example of an educational fear, as Kozol says that about minorities not having prior experience in school, so they don’t have the same ability as other students. Not belonging is another example of an educational fear, Kozol says these minority students feel like they don’t belong, when most of the school’s population has more students of a different race than theirs. Failure is the last educational fear Kozol explores, he says some students are afraid of doing bad in school because they really want to go to college. I am now going to talk about how educational fears haunt me in many different ways.

In the opening of his selection, he talks about the notion of individuality against collectivism. He states that as man completely isolates himself from society, he is in complete dilemma because he is not aware of what is good from bad. Furthermore, he does not have any identity because he cannot distinguish himself

According to Max Weber (2017), instrumental-rational social action is boiled out of necessity to achieve a goal. We all endeavor to achieve a result for every ounce of effort we put into actionable course. We do something to achieve a result commensurate to what we put into it. One may go to medical school to become a doctor, because he or she likes to save life and at the same time earn top dollar that is attached to become a doctor, and to be able to achieve that a college degree is required. The modern society is engrossed with the ideology of the instrumental rational social action because of her desire for efficiency and effectiveness, we seek for ways to help streamline things therefore making it sufficiently convenient.

Curriculum is a term often highlighted during discourse about education and most commonly understood as a policy with overt leaning outcomes for teachers to apply and achieve. Ornstein and Hunkins (1998), as cited by Selvaraj (2010), defined curriculum based on two lenses; micro and macro, which identify the term as both policy towards certain goals and what students experience with consideration for relevant theories and principles central to its development and implementation. However, Wilson (n.d.) argued that curriculum is not restricted to certain individuals, subjects and environments, since teaching and learning can also occur beyond the scope of official curriculum (Ebert & Culyer, as cited in Marsh, Clarke & Pittaway, 2014). I believe this interpretation is the closest to the true nature of curriculum, or education, as there are more complex layers to curriculum than just a written guideline. For example, not one curriculum is similar to another because it is subjected to influences from continuum number of factors, such as politics and economy. Hence, it is wise to conclude that curriculum could not be defined based on a singular perspective due to its dependability on context.

The meaning of the term’ curriculum’ is difficult to define. For school, Pratt (in Brady and Kennedy, 2014, p. 3) argues that curriculum can be ‘an organized set of formal educational and training intentions’. For students, Marsh and Wills (in Brady and Kennedy, 2014, p. 3) maintain that curriculum is ‘an interrelated set of plans and experiences that a student undertakes under the guidance of the school’, while for teachers, the challenge is to develop curricula that will cater for the needs of all students (Ah Sam & Ackland, 2005). There are various meanings attached to the term’ curriculum’. My personal definition for school curriculum is that schools develop programs of different study areas basing on the content of the national curriculum document; teachers plan their teaching basing on the programs; eventually, students experience the curriculum by engaging in diverse teaching activities. In this essay, I will be discussing The Early Years Learning Framework (EYLF) in relation to the strategic plan and teaching philosophy of Hampton Park East Kindergarten.