international curriculum at the primary level

Dear All,
Sorry for late entry!!!!........I have been doing some research in the interest of making my essay meaty and fact-based!!.....here are some resources the people working on this topic can look into.Firstly, the library have proven to be a rich claudron of information .Several books on international curriculum floating around( currently two good books are with me!!!).Secondly our very own Hema Mandana's essays on international curriculum have been a saving grace.Fourtly , the other articles given to us , can also add a lot of value to our essay. I found the Howard Gardner's article "Cultures Educate" very useful .Last but not the least ,the net has proven to be pretty helpful this time around, especially with case studies!!
After skimming through the Kevin Bartlet article I got the idea of developing a questionnaire which (hopefully)seeks to answer the question : Is Developing an international curriculum at the primary level a possibility ?.

I would appreciate it if people would kindly revert back with their suggessions and comments on the same.

Regards,
Anu

Science for me now and then

Science has been a subject where i had no specific reason as to why i was learning it whether it was in school or in college. It had no practical application in my case. Science teaching had no experiments to relate to practical application. But on the physics day in Aditi i could see how much science had made sense to them. They are able to relate to various examples, experiment the same. When i visited the physics day show. I felt that if we had been taught science like aditi teachers teach then i would have been more into science today.

'An Approach to Life-oriented Education'

I have mainly three articles in my mind( How Cultures Educate, International curricula and Texts in context: An EFA 2000 Review) that are interlinked in more than one ways and strengthen my convictions of perceiving learning as life oriented by making education socially, economically, and culturally relevant and nurturing a questioning mind that refuses to conform.

These three articles tender a School Vision that is akin to my thinking and provide the philosophical imperative for both national and international realms of teaching and learning.

The title of my essay would probably be as follows:

'An Approach to Life-oriented Education'

Adding to Tara's tips on formal writing

One more for the list...

Please avoid the use of he/she/it or other similar options separated by forward slashes ('/'). Formal writing usually involves the use of 'or' in such situations.

Some points to note

Now that some writing is appearing in this blog space, I would like to draw the attention of all PPSEites to some rules of formal writing:

• Avoid the use of short forms like i.e. and etc.
• Use a space after a punctuation mark, not before
• Avoid redundancy of words and phrases, like "sufficient enough" "In order to" "Needless to say". Keep the style crisp.
• Every time you quote an author, attach the date of the publication in brackets. Use the surname of the author, with the first name as an initial. For example, when you quote Anita Rampal, you would write: Rampal, A. (1997) states that.......
• In the bibliography or reference list that is mandatory at the end of the essay, the author's name would appear in alphabetical order in the same fashion.

I may add to this list as I read formal writing from you, so please watch out!! Do add to this list and if you disagree with any of these 'norms' we can always talk it through!

A link

Please read most of my essay here: http://www.ppsekoshyav.blogspot.com . Thanks.

School Science - emphasize on skills?

These are the ideas that struck me on the articles by Rampal, Bartlett and Gardner. All of them in a sense talk about having a curriculum that is in a sense"life-oriented"- All learning international, domestic, culture specific- all should have its roots in real life contexts and situations. How far this is possible in various societies is the question. In an academics driven(or should I say examination driven) society like India- how much is and can be done to increase context or skill based learning is open to discussion.Is content more important than context, is it less important or are both on par with each other?Hope to hear views from others.

A few thoughts emerging from a reading of Anitha Rampal's "School Science in Search of a Democratic Order"


Changing social, political and economic scenario dictates content and methodology of science.

New discoveries/knowledge - rapidly changing perspectives- have we kept pace?

Science in Aditi- more lateral than vertical – progression of skills/concepts?

Skills to be taught in primary- communication, group work, information retrieval and time management - skill application not in isolation

Context related science teaching –problems in high school where content is master to great extent?

Technology/ integrated curriculum frameworks and roles in Science education- How far are we and how can we make it better?

What is Assessment?

The following is an effort to redefine 'Assessment' for my understanding and clarity. This is a sequel to the Assessment workshop we have had. I shall continue to write and elaborate on the theme.

Assessment is a continuous process of student evaluation by means of varied mechanism intended to bring about excellence in learning and teaching of the entire curriculum and enable sharing of meaningful feedback among the students and teachers and parents.

International curricula more or less important in Primary level

Introduction

The first few years in school are most important in a child’s life. I believe that, most minds respond to a variety of learning at that age group. So it is important that the curriculum is also developed in a manner that prepares the child to respond to a variety of learning strategies in later part of life. In a situation were the world is globalizing rapidly and opening up to dramatic developments in all walks of life, a global outlook and a philosophy is necessary, taking into considerations the local cultural flavor. A serious concern among educators across the world is a certain lack of philosophical thread across organizations providing International education, and most learning curriculums are adhoc and lacks a vision that threatens to prevent a harmonious integration of the primary years with the further learning. The problem is further compounded by the primary teachers lacking in training in curriculum development. So invariably the primary teachers function as deliverers of learning modules rather than co-owners of learning curriculum. This lack of an organic bonding with the curriculum development mostly ends up in a sense of helplessness and frustration. Also until recently there was no International curriculum that was acceptable across the international teaching and learning community.

Importance of International Curriculum

The above back ground does portray clearly that the teachers as well as the schools must free themselves from the burden of producing their own curriculum. Even in situations were the curriculum was relevant and borne out of pragmatic needs. They were so far and rare that few benefited from the positives. Also in a scenario were many schools worked with many different curriculums, evaluation of learning became very difficult or at times impossible as essential learning across schools or across curriculum could rarely identified. In this light the evolution of a clear, coherent curriculum for international primary schools becomes a choice less necessity.Also considering the fact that I am a PE teacher, I could say with confidence that Physical Education is one subject were International Standardisation is possible and very relevant. An Internationally acknowledged PE curriculum could definitely raise fitness standards amongst learners and also different game skills and activities that could ultimately reflect on other spheres of their life.

My Journey towards a structured curriculum

When I started a career, I never thought that the school should have a structured curriculum for PE. The students should go to the ground and play. This is the exposure and experience I had in my initial years. The reason behind this was diversity of the strength that each class had. As a teacher I did not have a constructive program to accommodate the multiple strengths that a batch of 50 – 60 students exhibited. Even though the students were asked to work on fitness and games, there was no planning and documentation.
And so, the program was free flowing or rather more appropriately said, unstructured. The other reason, I was sub-ordinate to another teacher and so changes in program or novelties were not well appreciated.
Alkhor International School, Qatar showed me a new way as I was the only anchor. Though I would not say that PE program as the best structured program, my first step towards a better structured program was taken with a serious intent there. Neither this stint, I would say was truly satisfying. Yet a constructive first step was taken.
It was newly started school. Space, time and resource for new initiatives were abounding in the new setup. In this school for the first time in my practice, in my mind, I had scheduled timing for different games and different skills. The students as a result of this small initiative from my side took a lot of interest in learning different skills and activities that would help them play many games. This had not only given a great confidence boost to my learners, but the abounding interest levels also made me think further on bringing in new skill-based PE activities. None of the above details though had a document form to it.
Mallya Aditi International School really gave me exposure to documented planning. This is due to the practice already existing in the school, the team teachers who really believe in planning and documentation. The extremely supportive administration and timely expert inputs is best in the field which really help me as a teacher to work on a structured planning and documentation. This also helps me to work more efficiently. The other aspect that worth mentioning is the professional development programmes the teachers were exposed too is a fantastic part of any teachers’ career. In this way the school helps the teacher to update their knowledge in the field of education. This development programmes helps me to work as a confident teacher. Here I have really understood the importance of the structured planning and documentation of the curriculum.

Bloggin' PPSEites (pronounced PIPsites?!)

SO good to see this common group blog 'in action'! I hope it helps at least some, if not all, members of the PPSE team, as you all aggregate, sort, evaluate & sift your thoughts for the essay.

Neela, those questions you raised reminded me of an exercise I did during my Ed.M. and have often discussed with Tara. The assignment was to write a paper on the "Purpose of Schooling" (note: Schooling NOT Education). We had to deliberate on the topic and articulate a purpose (it was a very personal and soul-searching exercise). But it did not end there. We had to also describe how our "purpose" translated into pedagogy and school practice AND also give an example of a real school that reflected (at least to some measure) our purpose in action.

It was probably the most difficult but also the most relevant piece of writing I did during my Masters - and it's not hard to see why.

My point is, it's hard to answer the questions you raised, but a very worthwhile endeavour to mull over them and see what answers you - as a practising educator, come up with for yourself (not necessarily to share with others).

Good Luck!

Hello

I was reading Neela's entry and my rough draft and want to rewrite what I have written. My feeling is that writing about Education is becoming a bit too theory oriented and is developing its own fixed jargon, which is probably a good thing. It helps us to hold discussions when we use the same terms. But the jargon is becoming too complicated because of too much research being done in the field, whch is probably a bad thing. I want to try and recast my essay in a simple way so that even those who haven't been given a brief on what we were supposed to do will understand it. Many of us want to write on Bartlett and Gardner becasue they write in a manner that is easy for comprehension. That seems to be a point I need to think much about. Any comments?

Made it!

Finally , I'm there!!!! Thanks Neela for the tech support.

Call of the pedagogue

I have counted eight members of the PPSE clan who have made it to this blog. That leaves 13 more out in the cold. Do rush in at least with one line to start with and make sure you post your thoughts or responses to the readings for this assignment by the end of this week - that is before you surface on Monday to be precise! Those who have made good headway in your essay, please spare a few minutes to respond to the posts that your colleagues put up.

A new door of dialogue and togetherness is open

testing

hi everyone. this is good. now i can discuss editing my article and also other people's stuff on this ppse group blog. everyone please join in and make it proactive. koshy

How to post your comment

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For all this you can use your existing username and password that you have for your own blog.

Tara