Why is curriculum planning so hard

After my first semi-failed attempt at curriculum mapping I have realized why it is so hard to get teachers to talk about their curriculum, they are scared. I think it all boils down to nobody wants to take a hard look at their personal curriculum because it means opening themselves up for critique. I tried to get my department members to simply looked at what they teach each year so that we could re-align our curriculum to make sure that we are all teaching the same things at the same time but instead I got excuses. The most common reasoning is that we don't have set curriculum that has been handed down so left to our own devices we could not possibly set a curriculum tight enough to all follow it together. I think this is just another excuse and that if we were to work together as a team we could set up an amazing curriculum because I know I work with talented teachers who are brilliant. Maybe it is the extra work or the fact that we have written and rewritten curriculum year after year to meet the newest trend but for once I feel that this writing of the curriculum is the right thing to do. I am going to try to sit down again this time one on one to assess were we are so that we can really do the students the justice they deserve.

expecting more then the basics

There are some days when my students surprise me in a way that make me want to run out and tell everyone how amazing they are and how much they are learning. Of course there are other days when I want to bang my head against a wall because I can't seem to get them beyond the basics of the lesson. I have so many students who are willing to just get by with their learning and it is so frustrating to me to constantly watch bright kids settle for so little.

It was after a particularly hard day of teaching or more like preaching about a concept in chemistry that I decided to stop in the middle of one class and ask them why they did care to reach beyond the basics. The response I got was one of those surprising moments, "because nobody cares if we do." Which I immediately knew was false and so I asked why my students felt that way and that answers was just as surprising,"because teachers move on to get through the material no matter what." I never really thought about it that way before, it was never because I did not care if the student undstood it is was more about my thinking they did not care so they blew me off.

While reading this book and that conversation I decided to take a new approach...talking more with my students than to my students. I do not accept the blank stares or the shrugs, I ask them to teach me the concepts and to try new projects that the students decide. I am more class led than teacher driven. Who knows if this will work but I figure it is better to try everything rather than to constantly fail and complain about students lack of learning.

The science curriculum flow

So somewhere along the way it was decided that students should take earth/physical science, biology, chemistry, and physics in that order for all college bound students. While many schools only require 2 or 3 science credits to graduate they still stick to this dogmatic approach to earning the credits. I don't believe that we are truly helping students making them take certain courses in a prescribed order.

My suggestion is to give students more of a choice in their selections. I think earth and physical science are a logical place to begin but maybe let them try physics as a sophomore. Many of the concepts while based in math are not so difficult that students could not understand them with an algebra basis. One of the complaints I get year after year is that they don't get enough say in their classes and if they got to make more decisions they would get more out of the process.

Another thought is to have students take integrated classes for earth science and physics and then their sophomore year have them take chemistry and biology integrated. This allows students to specialize their Junior and Senior years. Students become more invested in their education and thus gain more from the experience. I think that the most important piece of all of this conjecture is that we need to explore the best options for students to gain the best experience of science education.