The National Curriculum

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The National Curriculum Schooling Improvement

• For the Canterbury Principals Association
• Brian Annan
• March, 2008

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A little about BA

• A westie JAFA with a slash of Italian and African
• An ex-teacher and ex-principal
• A heretic in the Ministry
• A learnaholic
• Always looking for AFD

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What is a curriculum

• A statement of official policy relating to
  teaching and learning in English-medium New
  Zealand schools (NZ government, 2007)
• A set of discrete objectives and standards/levels
  (Bob Slavin,2008)

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Why have a curriculum?

• To set the direction for student learning and to
  provide guidance for schools to design and review
  their curriculum (NZ Government,2007)
• To create a road map for next steps (Margaret
  Heritage, 2008)

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5 things to get the road map right for your
schools

1. Sense making
2. Theorising
3. Inquiry-based curriculum design
4. Critically challenging talk
5. Seeking expert support

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The first thing you have to do to get it right?

• Make sense of the national curriculum for your
  student population

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(No Transcript)
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Second thing to get it right

• Theorise to get the right curriculum design for
  your student population
• A set of linked ideas that explain why you have
  prioritised some parts of the curriculum over
  others for your student population

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Lots of influences on next steps

• The law curriculum, self management
• National policies
• Assessment tools
• School-level policies
• Syndicate/Department policies
• Teachers units and workbooks
• Teachers snap judgements
• Students reactions to learning opportunities
  provided

Big theories for action Little theories
for action
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Espoused theories theories in use (Argyris
Schon, 1974)

• Often a difference between the two
• E.g. Im going to give up drinking wine during
  the week but friends come over on Wednesday. I
  cant help but be sociable!

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Theory competition (Robinson and Lai, 2007)

• People have different theories about how to solve
  practical problems
• Rival theories need to be resolved

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Explicit and implicit theories (Argyris Schon,
1974)

• Explicit ones are those that can be seen or heard
• Implicit ones are hidden

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New Zealand experience

• Implicit theories with little conflict
  resolution, because
• Locals are experts (self-management)
• No.8 Wire cultural norm - heavy investment into
  development little into programme evaluation
• Friendly and polite culture of schooling

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An espoused theory underpinning the national
curriculum

• Schools know best how to make links across the
  curriculum to suit their students. They know,
• how to connect various parts of the curriculum
• how to evaluate the success of their curriculum
  design
• how to make appropriate adjustments
• It is best to provide some general direction and
  lots of guidance from the centre
• It is ok for students to progress fast or slow

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A competing theory

• We have a serious underachievement problem

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Therefore,

• Schools do not know best (for the students in the
  tail). They need,
• To develop inquiry-based teaching
• Seek direction from centres of expertise to solve
  complex problems
• To develop strong evidence of effectiveness
• It is not ok for students to go slower than they
  are capable of going

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Third thing to get it right

• Developing inquiry-based curriculum design
  methods
• Inquiry practices
• Problem analysis methodology for complex problems

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Adaptation of schooling improvement inquiry
practices

• Collaborate to
• Agree on common assessment tools
• Analyse achievement information to identify the
  priority problem/opportunties
• Alter your curriculum mix teaching practices
  based on analysis
• Check for success

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Analysing problems

• Identification of a priority problem
• A set of practices to solve the priority problem
• Reasons for selecting those particular practices
• Expected outcomes from those practices

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Fourth thing to get it right

• Use Learning talk to make sure your
  inquiry-based curriculum design is robust
• Talk that helps change your practice
• Much talk is over rated

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Model of Learning Talk

• Learning talk
• analytical talk
• critical talk
• challenging talk
• Teaching practices talk non-learning
  talk
• School talk non-teaching practices talk
• All talk Non-school talk

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Analytical Talk

• Definition Checking things out - examines the
  impact on student achievement (teaching,
  management, governance)
• To do so participants have to
• examine data that counts, i.e. non-inflated
  student achievement information
• link achievement information to their practices
• seek support to make sense of the links
  (Spillane, Reiser Reimer, 2002)

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Critical talk

• Definition Looking in the mirror - evaluates
  the impact on
• student achievement (teaching, management,
  governance)
• To do so participants have to
• evaluate honestly the impact of their own
  practices on student achievement
• check their causal reasoning with each other to
  see if there are any other explanations
• seek support to -
• check their explanations
• check if others have found the same issues and
  how they dealt with them

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Challenging Talk

• Definition Doing it! Challenges participants
  to retain effective practices and replace
  ineffective
• practices (teaching, management, governance)

• To do so participants have to
• avoid fads, power and control issues,
  Smeagol-Gollum scenario
• check on one another
• seek support to
• check problem analysis
• select the right practices to solve the problem
• acquire the necessary pedagogical knowledge

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Analytical talk at a community level Reading
comprehension 2004 data Year 3 (NEAT TEAM
Mangere, 2004)

• Average stanine 4 (mean 3.99, std dev
  1.88).
• Tail at stanine one
• About 40 at stanine 5 or higher

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Critique talk - at a community level

• Senior managers realised
• they had a high tolerance towards the use of
  non-evidence informed interventions that got
  minimal results
• support services were too generalised - advisors
  and national literacy strategies focusing on
  developing teachers content knowledge

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Challenging talk at a community level

• Senior teachers and principals
• agreed they needed to
• learn how to analyse and use
• achievement information to
• support teachers and
• negotiate targeted support
• services

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Analytical talk at a classroom level
(Timperley, 2003)
3 class syndicate - 19 students below stanine
4 32 students above stanine 6
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Critique talk - at a classroom level

• Teachers realised
• they had been teaching without checking for
  evidence of effectiveness
• they lacked problem analysis skills and specific
  knowledge
• teachers missing critical teaching points in
  reading comprehension

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Challenge talk at the classroom level

• Agreed to check each others
• understandings of the problem
• and the best solution
• pedagogical content
• knowledge relevant to the achievement problems
• achievement results regularly

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A barrier to learning talk

• Traditional school culture
• polite acceptance of diversity regardless of
  effectiveness (Ball Cohen, 1999)
• talk about issues peripheral to teaching and
  learning (Timperley, Robinson Bullard, 1999)

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Fifth thing to get it right

• Seek support from centres of expertise to solve
  complex problems

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Centres of expertise can form in different places
Vertical learning dimension
National policy

School improvement initiative

School

Classroom
Horizontal learning dimension
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The English model
National policy mandates
National centres of expertise
L.E.As
International research team

School

Classroom
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The United States model
National policy
Local research team
DI/SFA centres of expertise
NY district 2 office
Co-ordinators
School
School


Classroom
Classroom
Independent scientific research
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New Zealand model

National policy guidelines
NDP
Schools
National policy developrs linked to local
officials
Classrooms
Horizontal learning dimension EHSAS, ICT,
Schooling Improvement clusters
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Advantages of NZs approach

• Schools and teachers are liberated to
  contextualise the national curriculum
• Curriculum design occurs within and around
  classrooms
• We avoided national testing (very little teaching
  to the test, shame and blame)
• Schools can group into learning networks to
  develop appropriate curriculum
• to solve common achievement problems
• to address transition problems