Curriculum in its Social Context

At my school, students K-6 th take an Outdoor Exploration class for 1 hour per week. Last year, I had the privilege of subbing many times for this class. At first I thought it was a not a worthwhile class, but I have very much changed my mindset of the class. Where I work, most of the students live in Washington D.C. and many have never been out of the Washington DC metropolitan area. I was just spending time with a student who has never been to the beach, though we are close to the beach. She also has never experienced a night under the stars. She told me about all the places she wanted to travel. I was sad, thinking about the life I had growing up compared to my students. I grew up in the suburbs with parents who were very intentional about having my sisters and I play outdoors. We did trips as a family that were spent primarily in nature. Learning about nature and enjoy the beauty of the Earth has taught me so much about the world we live in and has made life much mor...

Many would say that curriculum encompasses all the material students learn, the methods used to teach the students, and the order the material should be taught. However, one teacher told me that good teachers understand that “you are the curriculum”. The teacher, with their knowledge and expertise, paired with their knowledge of the students and their background knowledge, can put together a much better curriculum than one that is mandated by the school or the county. Teachers are teaching students, not the material. Each student is unique and may need something different. Ideally, all students should be challenged at the level they are at: the curriculum should not be too challenging or too easy.  Of course, this is difficult to attain with one teacher and many students in a classroom, but teachers should have that mindset in order to serve the students best. If teachers consider themselves as being the curriculum, they will be pushed to consider what they know and what th...