The best way to design a curriculum would be developing an initial perception of how the curriculum is viewed. For instance, a curriculum can be viewed as a product or a means that produces something out of the people who go through it. It can also be viewed as a process; meaning that there is no clearly defined content that learners are expected to know.
The content can be adjusted any time depending on the need of the learners. However, having an integrated approach to designing a curriculum is more effective than dealing with individual models of curriculum design. Since the aspects of each model are very important, then combining them into one would yield more efficient and effective curriculum.
Resources have to be considered in the designing of a curriculum. The resources are aligned with the curriculum in sense that each of the identified learning experiences and teaching lessons would require the aid of learning resources to enhance learning process. For instance, sometimes it requires instructors to use external teaching aid in order for a concept to be understood by learners.
A good strategy has to be used to ensure that the curriculum is implemented effectively. The first thing is that the instructors and the school heads have to be in serviced since they are the main agents of implementation. The purpose of in servicing is to update the main implementers on any changes, discoveries and new knowledge that the curriculum will contain.
This is necessary since in this time and age, the world is experiencing a revolution in Information technology. There are new discoveries and innovations that can be custom made to fit the needs of an educational system within a district or an individual institution. In servicing is also good for instructors since it helps them to overcome some of the cultural limitations that they may have.
Another way in which implementation of the curriculum is done in the school is actual teaching. Here the teacher communicates the content of the curriculum using the recommended methods of teaching.
The quality assurance education officers from the city or state government would also visit the school once in a while to ensure that the actual process of instruction is done accurately and that the instructors are observing all the requirements for maintaining high standards. In cases where the instructors have little bit of limitation, the officers would offer suggestions for positive adjustments.
In order for curriculum to measure up to standards by yielding the intended results, it has to be evaluated constantly. This is done by the implementers of curriculum especially the instructors. The instructors are the ones who have the greater responsibility of implementing curriculum since they are the ones who interact with the students.
The performance of the students is one of the ways in which the curriculum is evaluated. The process of evaluation that was conducted in the school involved the following evaluation principles: continuity, comprehensiveness, consistency with the objectives, and validity and reliability.
Continuity implies that the curriculum continues from one level to another. The contents of one level must be linked to the contents of another level, by offering a foundation. The process of evaluating the comprehensiveness of the curriculum involved finding out the level, depth, and breadth of its coverage.
Validity as one of the principles of assessments, is finding out whether the content presented by the curriculum is relevant in the society. In order for the evaluation to be effective, both summative and formative evaluations have to be done. The agents involved in the both implementation and evaluation include learners, instructors and government education agencies.
Based on the interview, there were several things about curriculum development design and evaluation that one could learn. For instance there is a need for learners to be actively involved in the process of curriculum development. Despite the model that should be selected for curriculum design, the learners should always be included in the picture.
Learning process is based on the needs of the learners since they are the ones being trained. Therefore the curriculum selected within a learning institution should be one that focuses on the needs of the learners. It is important to first of all evaluate the learners and note their diversity in terms of social and experiential background, developmental levels, motivational levels, and entry knowledge level.
The needs of the learners can be identified and then set the ground for selection of the curriculum objectives. Similarly, once the objectives are set, the content can easily be picked that would meet the goals and objectives set.
The deployment or implementation of the curriculum is vested upon the instructors, the school leadership staff, and the some of the subordinate staff. The instructors are the ones who play a key role in the implementation process. They interact with the learners directly and get to learn more about each of their learners on daily basis.
They are supposed to conduct formative evaluation regularly to determine the progress of the learners. At the same time they are meant to conduct summative evaluation to determine whether the goals and objectives that were initially set have been achieved. In order to be accountable for the implementation process, the instructors are also required to be evaluated based on their methodology and how they interact with the learners.
Subject matter experts are essential for the delivery of the expected content in curriculum design. The district specifically uses them for secondary level of curriculum mapping since the learners at this level are more advanced and require subject matter experts in order for them to effectively learn the advanced content in the curriculum.
However in elementary level, the content is very basic and therefore the subject matter experts are not necessary. Funding curriculum is important for sustaining the process of implementation. It impacts implementation in the sense that some of the learning experiences require money in order for effective learning to be achieved.
Curriculum mapping is gathering all the information that relates to curriculum, identifying all the important content and skills that need to be taught, coming up with an appropriate instructional method that will be employed, and designing an effective and efficient means of assessment. A curriculum map is very useful as it is able to identify all the important activities for curricula.
It is in fact an effective guideline for an instructor to use in the classroom to effectively cover all the important content and classroom activities that are needed to complete a program.
It provides a clear range or scope of the knowledge and skills that the learners have to gain over a specific period of time. Through the designing of a curriculum map, the necessary resources can be linked and used appropriately for the effective delivery of subject content.
Following the assessment that was conducted on my instructional unit learners, the model for curriculum implemented at the school is the Tyler model. The diversity in the learners contributed to the selection of the Tyler model. It is based on the view of curriculum as a product where there is an agreed content of knowledge that each of the learners is expected to gain.
In addition to knowledge, there are also specific skills that the learners have to master as well. With this model, the skills and knowledge that the learners are expected to gain are viewed as a product that is manufactured in the learning process. The learners have to first gain the knowledge and then transmit the knowledge into action.
This means that they have to apply the knowledge they gain. Curriculum theory that views learning as a product is one that is quite organized in the sense it has stipulated steps that needs to be accurately followed in order achieve the ultimate product manufactured from learning.
References
Bloom, B. (1986). Taxonomy of Educational objectives: the classification of educational goals. New york: David Mackay Company.
Gerald, B. (1999). Curriculum development: a text book for students. London: McMillian Publishers.
Kerr, J. (1996). Changing the curriculum. London: University of London Press.