Ahead of the Game: Proactive Transparency in Curriculum Reaps Major Academic Reward
Curriculum transparency is looming in legislation across the United States. With the amount of policy being pushed onto the public-education system, it is crucial for educators to be proactive. If educators stay ahead of the legislative game, they will reap incredible benefits for students, parents, and teachers. Here are three rewards from having a transparent and documented curriculum.
A United Front Through Curricular Cohesion
Education is evolving to include new forms of teaching. These instructional approaches often encourage teachers to improve their teaching strategies through collaborated revisions and peer evaluation. There are two recent approaches that have been suggested to promote these collaboration efforts; vertical alignment and horizontal alignment.
Vertical alignment is the attempt to create cohesion in each subject as students transfer from one grade level to the next. Horizontal alignment, on the other hand, ensures that same-grade classrooms are teaching the same material in each subject. Ideas such as vertical and horizontal alignment have hopes that collaborative efforts could help with academic success if routine documentation can be set up.
Sherry Wolfe-Elazer, a teacher in Manitoba, Canada understands firsthand that “collaborations are integral to curating and mapping” a school’s curriculum. This collaboration “will enhance everyone’s experience in education” from the students and parents to the teachers and administrators.
An enhanced education can be made tangible through the benefits that collaborative efforts among educators bring. The National Education Association explains that “the best way to improve an educational experience is to work together.” For example, peer-to-peer collaboration allows teachers to expand their creativity when covering curriculum. It can “catapult [an educator’s] thinking and develop ideas” that seem impossible to make reality. Collaboration will also allow teachers to “dig deeper” into their own identities as educators, creating a system of reflection and growth.
This cohesion in curriculum and teaching strategies promotes consistency for the student that positively affects academic achievement. On top of that, collaboration and cohesion allow educators to form a united front that reflects a school’s mission and its goals for education.
Mastering Controversial Content with Curricular Clarity
In recent years, schools have been placed under extensive supervision by the government and the community. No instructor should be forced to undergo this amount of oversight while teaching. However, given the rise of controversial topics, it is crucial that schools take the initiative to protect their teachers.
Independence Institute notes that “expanding transparency around educational materials has been a topic of great —and often highly political discussion—nationwide.” In Denver, Colorado, parents who are concerned about specific content being taught in the classroom must first raise those concerns with a teacher. Considering that many of these topics are likely to trigger heated emotion, it can be dangerous for a teacher to deal with these critiques singlehandedly.
Obviously, conversations on controversial issues need to be discussed to show students how to approach these topics. How else will they learn to develop insightful opinions? Parents and guardians also must step up and share the responsibility for their children’s education. It is unjust to place the entire burden of education of a student on the teacher. Parents and guardians should take advantage of the discussions happening in the classroom by continuing the conversation at home.
With a curriculum that is clear on the topics being tackled at school, parents and guardians can collaborate with the teacher through active discussion with their child. In instances where a member of the community disagrees with what is being covered in school, they will not target a single instructor. Instead, they will be able to supply critiques to the school, allowing better mediation and lower chances of heated conflict.
Customizable Curriculum Opens the Door for Constant Improvement
When it comes to supplying a quality education, curriculum needs to be in a continuous state of development. Modern technology and scientific advances should be reflected in how a school’s education can adapt and change with new innovations. Maintaining the documentation of curriculum allows educators to constantly review what is being taught in the classroom and make necessary changes for their students.
If educators aspire towards improved student performance, school districts must “create systems and sources that help align forces around the child,” “supply access to prompt information, data, research, techniques, and best practices,” and use these tools to pursue constant progress for the betterment of the student.
In a paper issued by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization and the International Bureau of Education, it was reported that “good quality school curriculum” cannot “afford to be static.” This is in part due to the massive amount of transformation happening in instructional approaches.
In recent years, knowledge-based models of curriculum have been steadily declining. At first, content “perceived as lists of ‘facts’ or information” was often considered successful. However, this model has many disadvantages, the largest being that this approach simply does not prepare students for future livelihoods. To combat this issue, it is encouraged that educators view curriculum as “a cycle of development, implementation, evaluation and revision,” and use their documentation to assist instructors in making content relevant. The documentation itself must be “written with clear structure and purpose,” “send consistent messages” on instruction, and “be user-friendly and accessible.”
How Educators Can Achieve This Goal
While having a cohesive, clear, and customizable curriculum has amazing benefits for all who participate in education, the documentation process can be intimidating. Fortunately, there is a digital platform available to K-12 schools that can assist educators in achieving these advantages.
Embarc, powered by Education Advanced, is a digital curriculum management platform that connects “learning objectives to a continuous cycle of development, delivery, assessment, and refinement” through collaboration in the instructional environment. This contemporary technology supplies an “alignment with state and national standards” and a straightforward display of content that allows educators to “analyze curriculum and address issues raised in standards-based assessments.” The program’s organizational tools enhance the sought-after “coordinated educational experience” while being a “transparent curriculum that guarantees ongoing and systematic growth” With the constantly changing environment of school, educators can “[e]asily make incremental changes at any time” and publish curriculum “through an online public portal,” promoting the relationship between teacher and parent.
Embarc allows educators to have a curriculum that promotes collaboration, masters controversial content, and maintains constant improvement. Using Embarc, educators can successfully stay ahead of the game.