Balanced Curriculum
Creating a Balanced Curriculum for the 21st Century
Throughout history the purposes and components of a school’s curriculum have incorporated a variety of elements. The goals of education have varied from creating a productive citizen to producing a respectful and moral person to generating a basic knowledge of subject areas to preparing the student for skilled employment. With the fast paced changes in technology in the 21st century the need for a meaningful and well-developed curriculum has come to the forefront in the world of education. A balanced curriculum involves an instructional plan focused on skills and content as well as thinking skills, educational leadership programs that guide teachers to implement new methods of teaching, and effective style of assessments that measure more than just basic skills. One challenge of creating a balanced curriculum is the question of teaching basic skills versus the teaching of critical thinking skills. Throughout history education curriculums have swayed back and forth between these two different ideas. Today, our curriculum needs to be a balance of both. Students need to have basic skills in a variety of content areas, not just reading and math. But students also need to have the ability to apply these skills to numerous applications and situations. For example, knowing how to read words and decode them is an important skill but knowing how to read and evaluate when reading a newspaper article and understanding how the information affects a person is equally vital. The importance of critical thinking cannot be overlooked if the curriculum is to be balanced. Within the developmental process of a curriculum the team of educators must also be aware of a child’s growth stages. A child most likely won’t understand the theory of math without first understanding specific examples and skills of mathematics. Therefore, curriculum must not only address content it must also address the teaching methods to
Throughout history the purposes and components of a school’s curriculum have incorporated a variety of elements. The goals of education have varied from creating a productive citizen to producing a respectful and moral person to generating a basic knowledge of subject areas to preparing the student for skilled employment. With the fast paced changes in technology in the 21st century the need for a meaningful and well-developed curriculum has come to the forefront in the world of education. A balanced curriculum involves an instructional plan focused on skills and content as well as thinking skills, educational leadership programs that guide teachers to implement new methods of teaching, and effective style of assessments that measure more than just basic skills. One challenge of creating a balanced curriculum is the question of teaching basic skills versus the teaching of critical thinking skills. Throughout history education curriculums have swayed back and forth between these two different ideas. Today, our curriculum needs to be a balance of both. Students need to have basic skills in a variety of content areas, not just reading and math. But students also need to have the ability to apply these skills to numerous applications and situations. For example, knowing how to read words and decode them is an important skill but knowing how to read and evaluate when reading a newspaper article and understanding how the information affects a person is equally vital. The importance of critical thinking cannot be overlooked if the curriculum is to be balanced. Within the developmental process of a curriculum the team of educators must also be aware of a child’s growth stages. A child most likely won’t understand the theory of math without first understanding specific examples and skills of mathematics. Therefore, curriculum must not only address content it must also address the teaching methods to
References: Rotherham, A.J. & Willingham, D. (2009). 21st Century Skills: The Challenges Ahead. Educational Leadership, 67 (9), 16-21. Rothstein, R., Wilder, T. , & Jacobsen, R. (2007). Balance in the Balance. Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, 46 (5), 8-14.