Chapter 1 The Teacher and The School Curriculum

Curriculum Essentials
Module 1 The Teacher and the School Curriculum

Module Overview:
Module 1 is all about school curricula and the teacher. This
introductory module identifies the different types of curricula that exist
in the teacher's classroom and school. Further, Module 1 describes the
important roles of the teacher as a curricularist who engages in the
different facets of curriculum development in any educational level.

Lesson 1.1 The Curricula In School

Desired Learning Outcomes

Discuss the different curricula that exist in the schools
Analyze the significance of curriculum and curriculum
development in the teacher's classroom.

Take Off
Have you read "The Sabre-Tooth Curriculum by Harold Benjamin (1939)?" Take some
time to read it and find out what curriculum is all about during those times.

Start here and enjoy reading. A man by the name of New-Fist-Hammer-Maker knew how to do
things his community needed to have done, and he had the energy and the will to go ahead
and do them. By virtue of these characteristics, he was an educated man. New-Fist was also a
thinker. Then as now, there were few lengths to which men would not go to avoid the labour
and pain of thought

... New-Fist got to the point where he became strongly dissatisfied with the accustomed ways
of his tribe. He began to catch glimpses of ways in which life might be made better for himself,
his family and his group. By virtue of this development, he became a dangerous man..
New-fist thought about how he could harness the children’s play to better the life of the
community. He considered what adults do for survival and introduced these activities to
children n a deliberate and formal way. These included catching fish with bare hands,
clubbing little woolly horses, and chasing away-sabre-toothed-tigers-with-fire. These then
became the curriculum and the community began to prosper-with plenty of food, hider for
attire and protection from threat. “It is supposed that all would have gone well forever with
this good educational system, if conditions of life in that community remained forever the
same. But conditions changed.

The glacier began to melt and the community could no longer see the fish to catch with their
bare hands, and only the most agile and clever fish remained which hid from the people. The
wooly horses were ambitíous and decided to leave the region. The tigers got pneumonia and
most died. The few remaining tigers left. In their place, fierce bears arrived who would not
be chased by fire. The community was in trouble.

One day, in desperation, someone made a net from willow twigs and found a new way to catch
fish-and the supply was even more plentiful than before. The community also devised a system
of traps on the path to Snare the bears. Attempts to change education system to include these
new techniques however encountered "stern opposition.”

These are also activities we need to know. Why can't the schools teach them? But most of the
tribe particularly the wise old men who controlled the school, smiled indulgently at this
suggestion. "That wouldn’t be education... it would be mere training". We don’t teach fish
grabbing to catch fish, we teach it to develop a generalized agility which can never be
duplicated by mere training and so on.

"If you had any education yourself, you would know that the essence of true education is
timelessness. It is something that endures through changing conditions like a solid rock
standing squarely and firmly in the middle of a raging torent.

The story was written in 1939. Curriculum then, was seen as a tradition of organized knowledge
taught in schools of the 19 century. Two centuries later, the concept of a curriculum has
broadened include several modes of thoughts or experiences.

Formal, non-formal or informal education do not exist without a curriculum. Classrooms will be
empty with no curriculum. Classrooms will be empty with no curriculum. Teachers will have
nothing to do, if there is no curriculum. Curriculum is at the heart of the teaching profession.
Every teacher is guided by some sort of curriculum in the classroom and in schools.
In our current Philippine educational system, different schools are established in different
educational levels which have corresponding recommended curricula. The educational levels
are:
1. Basic Education. This level includes Kindergarten, Grade l to Grade 6 for elementary; and for
secondary, Grade 7 to Grade 10, for the Junior High School and Grade 11 and 12 and for the
Senior High School. Each of the levels has its specific
recommended curriculum. The new basic education levels are provided in the K to 12 Enhanced
Curriculum of 2013 of the Department of Education.
2. Technical Vocational Education. This is post-secondary technical vocational educational and
training taken care of Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA). For the
Tech Voc track in SHS of DepEd, DepEd
and TESDA work in close coordination.
3. Higher Education. This includes the Baccalaureate or Bachelor Degrees and the Graduate
Degrees (Master's and Doctorate) which are under the regulation of the Commission on Higher
Education (CHED)

Content Focus
In whatever levels of schooling and in various types of learning environment, several curricula
exist. Let us find out how Allan Glatthorn (2000) as mentioned in Bilbao, et al (2008) classified
these:
Types of Curricula Simultaneously Operating in the Schools
Are you aware that in every classroom, there are several types of curricula operating at the
same time? Let us study each one.
1. Recommended Curriculum. Almost all curricula found in our schools are recommended. For
Basic Education, these are recommended by the Department of Education (DepEd), for Higher
Education, by the Commission on Higher Education
(CHED) and for vocational education by TESDA. These three government agencies oversee and
regulate Philippine education. The recommendations come in the form of memoranda or
policies, standards and guidelines. Other professional organizations or international bodies like
UNESCO also recommend curricula in schools.
2. Written Curriculum. This includes documents based on the recommended curriculum. They
come in the form of course of study, syllabi, modules, books or instructional guides among
others. A packet of this written curriculum is the teacher's lesson plan. The most recent written
curriculum is the K to 12 for
Philippine Basic Education.
3. Taught Curriculum. From what has been written or planned, the curriculum has to be
implemented or taught. The teacher and the learners will put life to the written curriculum. The
skill of the teacher to facilitate learning based on the written curriculum with the aid of
instructional materials and facilities will be necessary,
The taught curriculum will depend largely on the teaching style of the teacher and the learning
style of the learners.
4. Supported Curriculum. This. is described as support materials that the teacher needs to
make learning and teaching meaningful These include print materials like books, charts,
posters, worksheets, or non-print materials like Power Point presentation, movies, slides,
models, realias, mock-ups and other electronicillustrations. Supported curriculum also includes
facilities where learning occurs outside or inside the four-walled building. These include the
playground, science laboratory, audio-visual rooms, zoo, museum, market or the plaza. These
are the places where authentic learning through direct experiences occur.
5. Assessed Curriculum. Taught and supported curricula have to be evaluated to find out if the
teacher has succeeded or not in facilitating learning. In the process of teaching and at the end
of every lesson or teaching episode, an assessment is made. It can either be assessment for
learning, assessment as learning or assessment of learning. If the process is to find the progress
of learning, then the assessed curriculum is for learning, but if it is to find out how much has
been learned or mastered, then it is assessment of learning. Either way, such curriculum is the
assessed curriculum.
6. Learned Curriculum. How do we know if the student was learned? We always believe that if
a student changed behavior, he/she has learned. For example, from a non-reader to a reader or
from, not knowing to knowing or from being disobedient
being obedient. The positive outcome of teaching is an indicator of learning. These are
measured by tools in assessment, which can indicate the cognitive, affective and psychomotor
outcomes. Learned curriculum will also demonstrate higher order and critical thinking and
lifelong skills.
7. Hidden/Implicit Curriculum. This curriculum is not deliberately planned, but has a great
impact on the behavior of the learner. Peer influence, school environment, media, parental
pressures, societal changes, cultural practices, natural calamities, are some factors that create
the hidden curriculum. Teachers should sensitive and aware of this hidden curriculum. Teachers
must have good foresight to include these in the written curriculum, to bring to the surface
what are hidden.
However, in every teacher's classroom, not all these curricula may be present at one time.
Many of them are deliberately planned, like the recommended, written, taught, supported,
assessed, and learned curricula, However, a hidden curriculum is implied, and a teacher may or
may not be able to predict its influence on learning. All of these have significant role on the life
of the teacher as a facilitator of learning and have direct implication to the life of the learners.
Now, let us observe further if these curricula are existing in a teacher's classroom. Do the
activities that follow.

Take Action
Activity 1- Think-Pair-Share
1. Get a partner (A and B).
2. Discuss the Sabre-tooth Curriculum and answer the following:
a. Does the sabre-tooth curriculum still exist at present? Give examples of your evidence.
b. Describe the kind of curriculum that exists as described in the article.
What does the author mean, when he said "A curriculum should be timeless?" Explain.
d. What is the difference between education and training?

Activity 2- Observing a Curriculum in a Classroom

Visit a classroom other than your own with permission from
the teacher. (Elem, High School, College).
Do the two activities:
1. Observe the classroom situation.
2. Interview the teacher.
Focus your observation and interview on the presence or absence of the seven types of
curricula and their descriptions.
3. Record your observation and interview on the matrix provided.

Guide questions for Observation and Interview

1. What curricula are present in the classroom from my observation?
2. What curricula are present in the classroom from my interview?
3. How do I describe what I observed? Interviewed?
4. Is there a type of curricula not present in the classroom?
Identify,
Types of Curriculum What observation/information did I get? or what answers did I get
from my interview
Recommended
Written
Taught
Supported
Assessed
Learned
Hidden

Self-Check
I. Spin a Win: Agree, or Disagree
Read each statement and decide whether you Agree or Disagree
Write your answer before each number.
______________1. In the Saber Tooth Curriculum, learning is experiential
and authentic.
______________2. It is a reality that there exist more than one curricula in
the teacher's classroom.
______________3. A teacher can say with confidence that learning has
occurred, if the curriculum has been assessed.
______________4. Some curricula in the schools/classrooms are unwritten.
______________5. To establish national standards, teachers should be
guided by recommended curriculum in basic and higher
education.
______________6. Teachers should expect that school curricula are dynamic
and changing.
______________7. Evaluated curriculum makes judgment about learning.
______________8. Textbooks and modules are written curricula that
represent the recommended curricula.
______________9. Only the Department of Education can recommend a
curriculum.
______________10. In the heart of all the types of curricula, the teacher has
a major role.

Self-Reflect
1. Is it necessary for teachers to learn about school curriculum? Why? Write your answer
on the space provided below.
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Lesson 1.2 The Teacher as a Curricularist
Desired Learning Outcome
* Enhance understanding or the role of the teacher curricularist in the classroom and
school

Take Off
What specific roles do teachers play as a curricularist? Should they do these roles?

This lesson will bring all of you to an enhanced understanding and realization of the
multifaceted roles of the teacher which relate to the curriculum. Let us find out!

Look at the words inside the box. Read each one of them. Which
one describes the teacher as a curricularıst? Circle the word.

Facilitating Knowing Exciting Planning Frustrating Growing

Initiating Evaluating Innovating Growing Broadening Building

Rewarding Believing Recommending Showing Copying

Are you aware that the teacher's role in school is very complex? Teachers do a series of
interrelated actions about curriculum, instruction, assessment, evaluation, teaching and learning. A
classroom teacher is involved with curriculum continuously all day. But very seldom has a teacher been
described as curricularist.
Curricularists in the past, are referred only to those who developed curriculum theories.
According to the study conducted by Sandra Hayes (1991) the most influential curricularist in America
include John Dewey, Ralph Tyler, Hilda Taba and Franklin Bobbit. You will learn more of them in the later
part of the module.

Content Focus
In this lesson, we will start using the word curricularista to describe a preofessional who is a
curriculum specialist (Hayes, 1991; Ornstein & Hunkins, 2004; Hewitt, 2006). A person who is involved in
curriculum
knowing. writing. planning, implementing, evaluating, innovating, and initiating may be designated as
curricularist. A TEACHER'S role is broader and inclusive of other functions and so a teacher is a
curricularist.

So what does a TEACHER do to deserve the label curricularist? Let us look at the different roles
of the teacher in the classroom and in the school. The classroom is the first place of curricular
engagement. The first school experience sets the tone to understand the meaning of schooling through
the interactions of learners and teachers that will lead to learning. Hence, curriculum is at the heart of
schooling.
Let us describe the teacher as a curricularist. The teacher as a curricularist. ..
1. knows the curriculum. Learning begins with knowing. The teacher as a learner starts with knowing
about the curriculum, the subject matter or the content. As a teacher, one has to master what are
included in the curriculum. It is acquiring academic knowledge both formal (disciplines, logic) or informal
(derived from experiences, vicarious, and unintended). It is the mastery of the subject matter.
(KNOWER)
2. writes the curriculum. A classroom teacher takes record of knowledge concepts, subject matter or
content. These need to be written or preserved. The teacher writes books modules, laboratory manuals,
instructional guides, and reference materials in paper or electronic media as a curriculum writer or
reviewer. (WRITER)
3. plans the curriculum. A good curriculum has to be planned. lt is the role of the teacher to make a
yearly, monthly or daily plan of the curriculum. This will serve as a guide in the implementation of the
curriculum. The teacher takes into consideration several factors in planning a curriculum. These factors
include the learners, the support material, time, subject matter or content, the desired outcomes, the
context of the learners among others. By doing this, the teacher becomes a curriculum planner.
(PLANNER)
4. initiates the curriculum. In cases where the curriculum is recommended to the schools from DepEd,
CHED, TESDA UNESCO, UNICEF or other educational agencies for improvement of quality education, the
teacher is obliged to implement it. Implementation of a new curriculum requires the open mindedness
of the teacher, and the full belief that the curriculum will enhance learning. There will be many
constraints and difficulties in doing things first or leading, however, a transformative teacher will never
hesitate to try something novel and relevant. (INITIATOR)
5. innovates the curriculum. Creativity and innovation are hallmarks of an excellent teacher. A
curriculum is alwavs dynamic, hence it keeps on changing. From the content, strategies, ways of doing,
blocks of time, ways of evaluating. kinds of students and skills of teachers, one cannot find single eternal
curriculum that would perpetually fit. A good teacher, therefore, innovates the curriculum and thus
becomes a curriculum innovator. (INNOVATOR)
6. implements the curriculum. The curriculum that remains recommended or written will never serve its
purpose. Somebody has to implement it. As mentioned previously, at the heart of schooling is the
curriculum. It is this role where the teacher becomes the curriculum implementor. An implementor
gives life to the curriculum plan. The teacher is at the height of an engagement with the learners, with
support materials in order to achieve the desired outcome. It is where teaching, guiding, facilitating skills
of the teacher are expected to the highest level. It is here whereteaching as a science and as an art will
be observed. It is here, where all the elements of the curriculum will come into play. The success of a
recommended, well written and planned curriculum depends on the implementation. (IMPLEMENTOR)
7. evaluates the curriculum. How can one determine if the desired learning outcomes have been
achieved? s the curriculum working? Does it bring the desired results? What do outcomes reveal? Are
the learners achieving! Are there some practices that should be modified? Should the Curriculum be
modified, terminated or continued? These are some few questions that need the help of a curriculum
evaluator. That person is the teacher. (EVALUATCR)

The seven different roles are those which a responsible teacher does in the classroom everyday!
Doing these multi-faceted work qualines a teacher to be a curricularist. lo be a teacher is to be a
curricularist even if a teacher may not equal the likes of John Dewey, Ralph Tyler, Hilda Taba, or Franklin
Bobbit. As a curricularist, a teacher will be knowing, writing implementing, innovating, initiating and
evaluating the curriculum in the school and classrooms just like the role models and advocates in
curriculum and curriculum development who have shown the way.

Take Action
Activity 1: Let's Do a Simple Survey

Have you done a survey before? In this activity you will gather information direct from tcachers
to find out what curriculum activities they are involved in.
Here are the steps. Follow these.

Step 1- Form two groups in the class. Group A will survey elementary teachers, and Group B will survey
secondary or high school teachers.

Step 2- Each group will look for at least 30 teachers coming from one or different schools and are
currently teaching either in the private or public schools.

Step 3- With the use of the Teacher Survey Tool below, conduct the survey during your vacant periods.

The Teacher as a Curricularist Survey Tool

Name of Teacher: ________________________________________________

School: ________________________________________________________
Grade Level Assignment: __________________________________________
No of Years Teaching: ________________ Degree Graduated: ____________

Circle YES or NO that will correspond to your self-assessment. Then rank the items which you answered
YES. Which activity do you do most of the time? What activity do you do least of the time?

As a school teacher, Answer &

Rank

1. I master the subject matter that I have to teach. Yes No

2. I implement what I have planned for my teaching. Yes No
3. I monitor and assess if my students are learning Yes No
4. I modify my activity to suit my learners in my classroom Yes No
5. I lead in the implementation of a new curriculum in my school. Yes No
6. I write instructional materials based on the recommended school curriculum. Yes No
 7. I look for other ways of doing to improve teaching and learning in my classroom. Yes No
8. I participate in community activities as a good citizen. Yes No
9. I disregard the needs of my learners and focus only in my lesson. Yes No
10. I teach my plan for the students to learn. Yes No

Step 4- Consolidate the data of 30 teachers in a matrix found in then Appendix 1.

Step 5- Report the result of your survey to the whole class.

Self-Check

I am a Teacher! Who Am I as a Curricularist?

Instructions: Identify on the blanks provided who am I as a Curricularist based on the cases presented.

Case 1: I have a good idea on how to make my learners pay attention to the lesson. I will use the new
idea and find out if it will work.
_________________________________________

Case 2: DepEd sent the standards, competencies and guidelines in teaching the Mother Tongue in Grade
1 in our school. I will study and use it in the coming school year.
_________________________________________

Case 3.: There is so much to do in one school day. I seem not able to do all, but I have to accomplish
something for my learners. I have made a daily activity plan to guide me.
_________________________________________

Case 4: I need a poem to celebrate the World Teachers' Day. I composed one to be used in my class in
Literature.
_________________________________________

Case 5: My class is composed of learners from different home background and culture. I cannot use a
"one-size-fits all strategy" in teaching so I can respond to the diverse background. In my readings, I
discovered that there are ways of teaching. I tried one myself and it worked.
__________________________________________

Case 6: Knowledge is limitless. What I learned in college is not enough. I need to know more, so I
enrolled in the graduate school to advance my learning.
__________________________________________

Case 7: At the end of the year, my performance as a teacher is reflected

in the school performance of my students. So I need to provide a monitoring tool to measure how they
are progressing. The result will inform me how I will address my learners weakness and enhance their
strengths.
__________________________________________

Case 8: I am teaching in a very far away barangay with no electricity yet. Many of the instructional aids
for teaching sent to our school are films and video tapes which need power. I cannot use them, but the
lessons are very important. So I thought of making an alternative activity. I took my class to the river and
waterfall instead of doing the lesson.
__________________________________________

Case 9: My principal asked me to attend a writeshop to make the lesson exemplars in the teaching of
science in Grade 7. In the workshop, I used my experiences as a science teacher for ten years, and my
knowledge of the subject matter. At the end of three days, I was able to produce lesson exemplars
which I am proud of.
_________________________________________

Case 10: From grade 7 to grade 10 of the K to 12 Enhanced Curriculum, science as a subject is presented,
taught and learned in a spiral manner. This is part of the DepEd implementing guidelines of the
curriculum. I am Biology major, and I have insufficient knowledge about the other areas of science such
as Physics and Earth Science. Because of this dilemma, I have to request the principal that we have team
teaching. Which role of thecurricularist, amI trying to do?Did you learn more from the cases?
_________________________________________
Self-Reflect
Choose one from Case 1 to 10 above. Reflect on the case you have chosen and write your reflections on
the box below. Ask your classmateto read and comment on your reflections. Both of you, discuss your
answers.

Name:________________________________________________ Case No.________

A. My Reflections on Case No _____ (refer to cases 1 to 10 above)

B. What my partner said about my reflections:

Name of Partner: _____________________________________________________