Wednesday, 27 October 2010

Reflection on Module 1~2

A curriculum consists of the choices made by the teacher who designed it. While, on one hand and basically, I enjoyed having freedom to make choices in designing courses as the academic director of my own English language learning academy, on the other hand I often lamented too many choices. In a flood of ideas and resources, there was a question that kept arising endlessly in every stage: Is this the best choice? While following this lesson, I thought of the criteria of being the 'best’ in this old question in my mind.

Everything itself is right. As Graves (2000) said “there are multiple possibilities, multiple justifications, and multiple answers.” However, there are considerations that should be accounted for since a curriculum is not an assembly of random choices.
I agree that “designing a course is similar to designing a house” and “you need to have a lot of information in order to design a structure that will fit the context.” (Graves, 2000, p.14) I admit defining context helped me to make decisions about content, objectives, etc. in curriculums in my academy.
I have realized problematizing, though I didn’t know this term, played an important role to make the curriculum for my academy works. There were many constraints for a small private academy. I always tried to identify the challenges that can be met within the context and focus on them, which eventually became the strength of my academy. I think it’s critical to be aware of the context and to respond to it properly.
To me, the most meaningful finding of the lesson is that “beliefs provide a basis for making choices.” (Graves, 2000, p.26) By using Stern’s framework, I was able to articulate my beliefs underlying in curricula I designed, which I was not much aware of nor made explicit then, and surprised to see how much the curricula was affected by my beliefs about language, learning, and teaching.
In sum, I think Graves (2000) wonderfully summarized the formula for a curriculum, emphasizing all these aspects above: “your course design should marry your beliefs with the needs of the students within the context of the course.”

2 comments:

  1. Yes, I also enjoyed Graves's book.
    Like you did, I have owned a small private academy and I had planned the whole curriculum. It was long and hard work but I was very excited at creating by myself. However, I extended my academy with franchised program last June, and now I don't have any freedom to choose curriculum for my classess. It's kind of boring, thought. Fortunately, the franchised program doesn't offer middle school programs. So now I'm designing my own curriculum for middle school students and this course will be very helpful for it.

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  2. I heard that some parents to get involved in their child’s education to create curriculum from my friend who runs her own English institute. Ideas and beliefs about school held by parents can dictate the level of involvement they have in the curriculum and most importantly, the educational process of their child. The home and school, then, the parent and teacher, both have a role in constructing a cooperative relationship that works to facilitate the student with a consistent, encouraging message about learning. On the one hand, it would seem that just as students carry with them their own real suitcases full of their own experiences of school and individual ideas about school which can influence the level of involvement they commit to their child’s education. Now I am considering which way is good for students to design a course/ curriculum.

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