Month: October 2021

In the article Culturally relevant pedagogy and critical literacy in diverse English classrooms: A case study of a secondary English teacher’s activism and agency it clearly outlines the important aspects of culturally relevant pedagogy while explaining what it could look like, sound like, and feel like. To begin, it’s important to note that one of the most important of using culturally relevant pedagogy is to want to create a socially just society. In the reading, Lopez explains a secondary highschool English teacher and how she used culturally relevant pedagogy. This teacher had her students engage with performance poetry while encouraging each student to share their thoughts about topics surrounding the social issues that students in their school face everyday because of their race. My future classroom will be a secondary science highschool setting, so introducing culturally relevant pedagogy will definitely pose a slight challenge. I think that allowing each student engage in a variety of cultures is vital to their success and their sense of belonging. In science classes, I believe it will be very important to include the Indigenous narratives of science, and to push that their way of knowing has just as much value as the Western ways of knowing. It’s important to teach students in meaningful ways, and to include a culturally diverse way of understanding the world around us, is just as important as the Western scientific way of knowing. Hopefully, this will allow students to feel more comfortable with their identities and view their culture in a positive light.

The second article that I read was Placing elementary music education: a case study of a Canadian rural music program. The author discussed the importance of place-based education and looked at this through the lens of music education. In the article the author explains “Connecting to the local gives students agency to showcase positive aspects of their places to the larger world, thus strengthening their connection to their local place and strengthening their connections to the various performance places”. The importance of including place-based learning is imperative to creating a sense of place for students. Although this article used music as their lens, I would like to consider this through the lens of a future science teacher as well. Luckily, science is all about learning about the world, so what better way for students to understand the world around them then actually experiencing their community and surrounding areas. Including items such as field trips and even just doing classes outside will help students create a better sense of belonging in their community. Additionally, combining culturally relevant pedagogy with place-based education will allow students that are culturally diverse to get an even deeper sense of connection with the material and the land. It’s beyond important to give students the chance to feel connected with their communities in ways that supports each students’ diverse background.

References:

Brook, J. (2013). Placing elementary music education: a case study of a Canadian rural music program. Music Education Research, 15(3), 290-303. 
Lopez, A. (2011). Culturally relevant pedagogy and critical literacy in diverse English classrooms: A case study of a secondary English teacher’s activism and agency.English Teaching: Practice and Critique, 10(4), 75-93.

After reading John Dewey and the Challenge of Progressive Education, there is a lot to realize about how educational trends relate to the global network. A good way to view this trend is by beginning with the Industrial Revolution global context. During this time, education was formed and shaped to create good workers which meant that classrooms were designed similar to a factory setting: desks are in rows, a focus on authoritarian settings, and enforcing passive activities. While this education system was effective for its goal, Dewey had greater aspirations for what the classroom could look like. He says “A progressive education would thus require a thorough transformation of space and time utilization, authority relations, and design of school plants and learning activities”. Furthermore, his vision was a school design that focused on social and environmental factors with a wish that teachers would then criticize and redirect rather than instruct and monitor students. Unfortunately, due to the global network context at the time, this school system was never able to be implemented fully. Even though Dewey had a large influence, the only changes to the system often were to incorporate “active learning” practices by teachers. There were some changes to the education system, but these changes often came with new technological advances in society. For example, we now are able to use technology in the classroom as a tool for student learning. Using technology in the classroom does hold some criticism as there are individuals who feel as though when used too much, students are missing out on valuable environmental learning. These changes that have happened in the education system only “succeeded only in bringing education into line with the antidemocratic, hierarchical structures of industrial society”. 

As stated in the paper:

 “Economic globalization, information technology networks, and postindustrial “knowledge” workplaces have prompted new trends in education – cooperative, collaborative, and other forms of active learning; interdisciplinary group projects; Internet-based curricula; charter schools, and even virtual schools, school districts, and universities.”

As economic globalization has changed, so has the education system. However, due to the corporate nature of the Westernized world, there seem to be some developmental blocks in the education system. We know that “Schooling as a public enterprise advancing common goals is getting shoved aside by a neo-liberal regime seeking to privatize public education and impose corporation-operated charter schools emphasizing rote learning and standardized testing”. If we allow the global network to completely take over the education system, we will be denying individuals who live in poverty or simply can’t afford a privatized education system a chance to be a part of it. The education system is greatly influenced by government factors, but unfortunately there is a new trend where we choose to overlook the influence that corporate powers have over the government and therefore the public. Since we know that those in power have great influence over the education system, we also know that these are the individuals who need to be convinced to make positive changes within it. All current and future educators need to band together to ensure that the school systems are able to reform and develop in positive ways, rather than taking steps back. 

Waks, L. (2013). John Dewey and the Challenge of Progressive Education. International Journal of Progressive Education, 9(1), 73-83.

As Levin explains in his paper Curriculum policy and the politics of what should be learned in schools, “Curriculum decisions and choices are shaped in large measure by other considerations – ideology, personal values, issues in the public domain, and interests”. To begin, Levin offered a description of what curriculum is: “Curriculum is defined as an official statement of what students are expected to know and be able to do”. With this definition in mind, we are able to look into all of the considerations and inputs that the government and public has on policies. One of the quotes that stuck out to me was Lasswell’s definition of politics “Who gets what?”; furthermore, this means that the political world is all about power and this power means they must determine who gets what and who doesn’t receive their request. In terms of education and curriculum development, this means that in some cases there may be funds removed from this area to give more attention to a different area of government. Each of our elected governments are pressured and also constrained by many things including the voters preferences, the timing of the election, and the views of key interest groups. Levin goes on to explain that “When a government does something people do not like, whether popular or not, it tends to get labelled as ideology rather than political will”. This then means that every step a government takes is scrutinized by the public eye, so they must pick and choose which items they truly want to pass. Additionally, educational policy is under a higher watch due to the fact that the majority of the public has been through the education system. This then causes people to form strong opinions without a large understanding of how the education system and policies should be working. Furthermore, The preferences given by the public may not always align, for example, in education people may desire more testing and more creativity or thinking they want tougher standards and more individualization all at the same time. Governments must find a way to accommodate these inconsistencies in some way. The media also has a large influence on government policies, as things that are played up in the media, whether it’s true or accurate, must be addressed quickly by the government and may lead to a policy or plan created. 

There is also a belief that education policy should be based around the knowledge and experience of educators themselves. Unfortunately, as Levin explains “from a political perspective, however, evidence and experience are not enough to drive decisions, and they may be among the less important factors”. There are a lot of factors that go into curriculum politics due to the discussions surrounding what subjects should be included and the content that should go into those subjects. There is also increased interest for schools to be teaching students about types of social ills, bullying, equity, and many other societal interests. Oftentimes, people hold a belief that experts should be the creators of the curriculum; however, Levin explains why that isn’t the best idea. By using experts on a subject in the creation of curriculum a problem can arise. This problem is that the product may only be used by people with high levels of expertise, but most teachers will only have a limited background in that subject. I hadn’t given much thought to this previously, but what Levin is explaining makes complete sense. Teachers, especially those in elementary education, teach a variety of subjects which doesn’t allow for the expertise necessary to teach a curriculum created by experts on a subject. I previously thought that the creation of curriculum policies and education policies couldn’t be “that hard”, but after reading this article, I have realized that there are so many pieces that go into a slight change it seems impossible that curriculum reform and updates are even able to happen. There’s pressure from the government, experts, the public, and teachers which may not ever align with each other. It’s hard to choose who is “right” or what mix of ideas would make the best learning experience for students. 

In The Saskatchewan Way: Professional-Led Curriculum Development there was a lot of discussion about the best way for curriculum to be made, and contrary to Levin’s beliefs, the Saskatchewan way believes that curriculum success lies in the hands of teachers. As it was put in the article, “The success of curriculum reforms largely rests on the shoulders of teachers, since they are the ones who put reform ideas into practice … [and] successful implementation of reforms depends on teachers’ ownership of and their knowledge and reform ideas”. This explanation makes a lot of sense considering the curriculum is the tool that teachers use in their classrooms to guide almost every lesson. They go on to explain that the degree of success that a curricula reform has is dependent on how involved the teachers are. The collaboration between teachers and other professionals in the development of curriculum allows for teachers to visualize that curriculum isn’t simply a “decision made from above”, but instead that it is a dynamic and relevant document that holds value in their classroom.

Levin, B. (2008). Curriculum policy and the politics of what should be learned in schools. In F. Connelly, M. He & J. Phillion (Eds.), The SAGE handbook of curriculum and instruction (pp. 7 – 24). Los Angeles, CA: Sage.

The Saskatchewan Way: Professional-Led Curriculum Development. Available on-line from: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1FwQqfod6RqG_c73DP7a2kZGttSjDwghP/view