Conceptions of Curriculum Blog Post

 After completing the assigned readings, the following conceptions of curriculum became apparent: 

• The Development of Cognitive Processes – A conception of curriculum that focuses on building students' intellectual abilities through the teaching of individual subjects like English Language Arts, History, etc. Skills like “inferring, speculating, deducing, analyzing,” are emphasized so that students can grow their ability to learn about any subject area (Sowell, 2005, p. 45). 

• Curriculum as Technology – Learning is viewed as a process which is systematic and efficient (Sowell, 2005). All students learn the same way, so individual needs are not always valued in this approach. Teaching and learning should include technology which can be applied to teaching any subject matter.  

• Self-Actualization – This conception of curriculum values the individual student's personal growth. Learner independence is valued, and students are encouraged to study areas of interest through a discovery approach. A teacher's role is to facilitate learning, so that the individual student can grow to their best potential.  

• Social Reconstruction – The needs of society are put before those of the individual student. Education should either produce students that will participate fully in society or build the skills in students that are necessary to reform society (Sowell, 2005). School is viewed as an extension of society and should include topics like politics and economics (Ornstein et al., 2013).  

• Academic Rationalism – Cultural transmission of knowledge through the classics is valued in this conception of curriculum. Western ideologies are valued and should be passed down to students through education. A teacher should be a “mini-scholar,” in their subject area, so that they can help students to master the content of their course (Schiro, 2013, p. 4).  

• Curriculum for Personal Success – The future success of students is considered the forefront of this conception of curriculum. Education should foster skills in students that will enable them to become functioning members of society and/or obtain a job in the future.   

 

How can each conception of curriculum be used as a tool and/or framework to analyze planning, instruction, and assessment within your specific context of practice? 

• Cognitive Processes – Every Friday, our school has a block of homeroom time that focuses on cognitive development. The goal of this homeroom block is to have students begin thinking about their brains and how they learn best. Some topics that we have covered during this time include study skills, learning strategies, team building, lessons on the brain, etc. Our administration believes that by building students' intellectual understanding of their brains, it will lead to increased learning in the core subjects. If students can “analyze,” their learning and “deduce,” their strengths, then it ultimately should help them to learn better.  

• Curriculum as Technology – In my current practice at a STEM school, this framework guides a lot of the planning, instruction, and assessment that my Humanities 7 team completes. At the beginning of every planning session, we look for opportunities to integrate technology meaningfully into the content that we will be teaching. The SAMR model is used in our initial meetings to determine if we are simply substituting technology with no functional change or redefining learning through technology integration (PowerSchool, 2021). In our instruction and assessment, learning is not considered systematic or efficient as individual student needs are considered. Assignments with technology integration can be modified to best fit the diverse needs of all the students in our classrooms. The integration of technology is not often assessed in our Humanities classrooms as the outcomes for English Language Arts and Social Studies are what we are required to report on.  

• Self-Actualization – As a contemporary teacher, I think that we all value student success and strive to help students become their personal best. The projects that I include in my classroom often include an element of student voice and choice. For example, students can often decide if they want to complete a project by hand or use technology. At the end of Social Studies each year, we complete a project called Expo 67. During this project, students can choose their topic in Canadian history, the way they would like to present and an artifact that they will build. With specific learning outcomes that legally must be met, I think that it is difficult for teachers to give students full autonomy to discover their interests.  

• Social Reconstruction – One of the subjects that I currently teach is Social Studies 7. In Alberta, the Social Studies 7 curriculum is a deep dive into Canadian history all the way from Pre-Contact Indigenous Tribes to Pierre Trudeau’s policy of multiculturalism. Therefore, both politics and economics are already included in my practice through topics like colonialism, mercantilism, and assimilation. I find that the goal of History education is often to ensure that we do not repeat the same mistakes that have been made. So, I believe that if we can help students to understand past experiences, then it will impact our society positively in the future.  

• Academic Rationalism – In my school division, I am legally required to teach the Alberta Program of Studies to my students. I believe that the learning outcomes included in these curriculum documents were created to transmit western ideologies and cultural norms to students. Thus, the planning, instruction and assessment in my current teaching practice is completely impacted by the Academic Rationalism conception of curriculum. Over the past few years, there has been a shift in educational policies to include other cultural practices like Indigenous Ways of Knowing. I hope that in the future there continues to be a shift in thinking surrounding these curriculum documents, so that other cultures and diverse communities can begin to see their values reflected also.  

• Curriculum for Personal Success – The goal of my current practice is to teach students STEM skills, so that they can find careers in the technology sector in the future. As a teacher, I want my students to find their own personal success in any career that interests them in the future. This is why my planning, instruction and assessment includes many diverse strategies. For example, in my classroom you will find assignments that include technology integration, the dramatic arts and foundational skills like reading and writing. By introducing students to a variety of skills, they will be better able to find a career that suits their needs in the future. 

 

Why do some conceptions of curriculum continue to be used while others are not? 

Over the past few decades, I believe that there has been a shift in thinking about schools as a business style setting to one of a nurturing environment. When reading the article, Curriculum: Foundations, Principles, and Issues (2013) the terms being used like the “Managerial Approach,” or the “Systems Approach,” seemed to deal with education like it was a factory assembly line. Students could be mass produced by teachers throughout the school assembly line to include skills that benefit society in the future. Now, I think that conceptions of curriculum that deal with the individual students needs are becoming more frequently used.  

The Curriculum for Personal Success is one framework that I think is frequently being used in schools today. The individual child is considered and provided with an educational experience that in an ideal world will help them to succeed in society in the future. Students in this framework are given varying opportunities to find their passion through the core subjects, option courses and extracurricular activities. A great modern example of the Curriculum for Personal Success framework is high schools work experience programs. Through these programs, students are exposed to many careers, so that they can find personal success in a job later in life. Instead of simply focusing on the classics like in the Academic Rationalism approach, students are afforded the opportunity to experience multiple viewpoints, subjects and experiences so that they can grow as individuals.  

One insight that I particularly appreciated from the article; A Second Look at Conflicting Conceptions of the Curriculum (1986) was that our viewpoints on each of the conceptions of curriculum have begun to shift to include modern ideas on individual student needs. For example, the Self-Actualizing Approach was originally designed to include full autonomy for students. Although, I believe that all teachers want to include student voice and choice in their classrooms, I think that it is difficult because of the legal documents that bind us to specific learner outcomes like the Alberta Program of Studies. Instead, Vallance (1986) writes that the Self-Actualizing Approach can now be seen in Individual Program Plans or a teachers concern for an individual child (p. 26). The Individual Program Plan, for example, allows teachers to modify the curriculum to better meet students' needs. This is not what the Self-Actualizing Approach originally called for, but I believe that it does provide diverse students with the opportunity to meet their own needs.  

With the current political environment across the globe, I think that the Social Reconstruction conception of curriculum will become one of the most controversial frameworks in schools. Already in Alberta, the provincial government recently redeveloped the “Teaching - Code of Professional Conduct,” to include that teachers cannot take “ideological advantage,” of their students (Alberta Education, 2023, para. 16). This means, that while in a position of authority like teaching an educator cannot present information in a biased manner. Instead, a teacher must include information from multiple viewpoints, so that a student can come to their own conclusions on the content. So, it would be difficult for a teacher to reform students to fit a societal need under these new provisions unless it was specified by a governing body.  

 

References 

Alberta Education. (2023, January 1). Teaching – code of professional conduct. Alberta.ca. Retrieved January 22, 2023, from https://www.alberta.ca/code-of-professional-conduct.aspx#jumplinks-3 

PowerSchool (2021). SAMR Model. Resource Library. Retrieved from     https://www.powerschool.com/blog/samr-model-a-practical-guide-for-k-12-classroom- technology-integration/ 

Ornstein, A. C., & Hunkins, F. P. (2013). Curriculum: Foundations, principles, and issues (6th ed.). Boston, MA: Pearson. Read part of Chapter 1, pp. 1-8. 

Schiro, M. S. (2013).  Introduction to the curriculum ideologies.  In M. S. Schiro, Curriculum theory: Conflicting visions and enduring concerns (2nd ed., pp. 1-13). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. 

Sowell, E. J. (2005). Curriculum: An integrative introduction (3rd ed., pp. 37-51). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson. 

Vallance. (1986). A second look at conflicting conceptions of the curriculum. Theory into Practice, 25(1), 24-30.