Notes for Steppingstones to Curriculum: Chapter 1

Setting Out on the Curriculum Path framework.

- The Bible calls Jesus our great Shepherd (Hebrews
- This book, therefore, explores how worldviews 13:20).
affect school programs. - A Shepherd guides his sheep, using his rod and
staff to nudge them in the right direction. The
Is a Neutral Curriculum Possible? intent of such guidance is that the sheep go in the
"A curriculum must include a diversity of value direction where they will have food and be safe
positions without promoting any particular one from danger.

Neutrality: Teaching for Commitment in Christian Schools:

- You must avoid indoctrination.
- Students must draw their own conclusions from
their own explorations and constructions
Making Curriculum Decisions
Types of Curriculum:
- Government departments of education: the formal
or prescribed curriculum.
- Textbook publishers: the inherent or default
curriculum when teachers allow texts to determine
their curriculum
- Professional associations: the professionally
recommended curriculum
- School systems and schools: the intended
curriculum
- Teachers: the implemented curriculum
- Students: the experienced or attained curriculum
The Underlying Basis for Making Curriculum
Decisions:
Questions throughout the curriculum development
process:
- What are the overall aims of schooling?
- How can schooling help humanity work toward a
more just and compassionate society?
- What ought to be done in the curriculum?
- What is the right thing to do?
- How can the curriculum lead students to discover
meaning?
- How can it connect with their daily experiences?
- How can it link believing, thinking, and doing?
- How can it make them both more discerning and
more committed to a principled way of life?
The Teacher as Guide:
- develop their teaching skills reflectively within a
well-defined philosophical and religious
Christian school teachers need to remember three
key points as they formulate their classroom
curriculum:
1. They confidently initiate their students into their
cultural and Christian heritage.
2. They encourage their students to grow in normal
rational responsibility.
3. They teach with commitment since they want to
teach for commitment.
Teaching for Commitment in Public Schools:
- Public schools, like Christian ones, cannot be
neutral.
- At all grade levels teachers choose literary
selections that illustrate or promote discussion of
values important for a democratic society: respect
for human dignity, empathy for others, integrity,
perseverance, and fair mindedness.
Suggestions for Curriculum Planning that is fair to
all religions:
- Choose content that helps students to function well
in society and contribute to it. Such content should
call for personal response suitable for the students'
age and should encourage thinking about the nature
and purpose of life.
- Ensure that your pedagogy reflects the
implications of a biblical view of the person.
- Acquaint students with the Christian heritage,
especially in social studies and literature.
- Be balanced in your approach.
- Use the templates in chapter 7 for planning units.
- Adapt the unit examples in chapter 7 to public
school classrooms.
Public school teachers need to remember:
- Your beliefs implicitly color your teaching.
Carl Mendoza
Notes for Steppingstones to Curriculum: Chapter 1
- Your students need models in life that will show 2. To learn about God's world and how I humans
that beliefs are important and have consequences.
- Many questions students ask can be discussed
honestly only if teachers relate the issues to what 3. To develop and apply the concepts, abilities, and
they believe.
What Is Curriculum?
Curriculum
- meant the length of time needed to complete a
program of learning.
- The course of study in a school.
Further Definitions:
- Curriculum is what is taught, particularly the
subject matter contained in a school's course of
study.
- Curriculum is an organized set of documented,
formal educational plans intended to attain
preconceived goals.
- Curriculum is a dynamic, ever-changing series of
planned learning experiences.
- Curriculum is everything learners experience in
school.
Aims of the Curriculum
- Christian schools want their aims to reflect a
biblical worldview.
- Aims to prepare students for responsible and
responsive discipleship
Example of Aims or Goals of Christian School:
l. To unfold the basis, framework, and implications 4. The Kingdoms in Conflict
of a Christian vision of life
have responded to God's mandate to take care of the
earth.
creative gifts that enable students to contribute
positively to God's Kingdom and have a
transformational impact on culture.
4. To discern and confront idols of our time such as
materialism, hedonism, technicism, relativism, and
other "isms" in which faith is placed in something
other than God
5. To become committed to Christ and to a Christian
way of life, able and willing to serve God and
neighbour.
Justifying Curriculum Choices
- If we do not justify curriculum decisions and
choices explicitly, we allow others to make such
decisions for us.
An Example of Curriculum Planning
- . Students learn to see the connections between
themselves and the world around them by exploring
and examining their relationship with God, each
other, the past, their own and other cultures, and
creation.
The unit example:
1. Beginning of the Kingdom of God
2. The Kingdom Grows-Early Europe
3. The Kingdom of God-the Middle Ages
Carl Mendoza