This past week I was able to share with my team the concept of enchantment and its implications on curriculum. The conversation was based on Guy Kawasaki's new book, Enchantment: The Art of Changing Hears, Minds, and Actions.
As an educator, how do we enchant our customers with curriculum? Our immediate customers, such as parents and community; and our ultimate customers which are students?
It really is a simple concept: establish likeability, trustworthiness, and great service. In practice it already seems much more difficult to achieve.
In Texas we use a standards based curriculum. The name in itself breeds contempt. It invokes the notion of resistance and lack of autonomy based on bad experiences with curriculum. Teachers are required to teach and students are required to learn the district curriculum. Not really enchanting, eh?
So, how can educators create an enchanting curriculum service? Three words come to my mind: trust, direction, and autonomy.
Trust comprised of credibility, reliability, and care. When these three attributes are aligned, then magic happens. Trust becomes a two way, interdependent process. When educators and students believe the curriculum is based on profound knowledge and skills (profound meaning relevant, practical and meaningful) it implies that it is the foundation and the floor for present and future success and key understandings. Notice it is the floor and not the ceiling. The sky is the limit with learning and the curriculum implies this notion.
The curriculum provides direction. I remember the good ole' days as an educator when the teacher was the curriculum. If you were lucky, you had a teacher edition of the student textbook for the courses you were responsible to teach. Yes, I did say lucky. Textbooks are not curriculum. In other words, every learning experience had to be designed both for the short term and for the long term. Before I even began teaching,I had to map out each course before school started to be sure I covered all the state learning standards. Wow, this was a long and arduous task. Once each course was mapped, then the lessons could be created. In one day, students needed to cover over 10 standards to mastery. As an elementary teacher, I had to really be creative and combine them for simplicity. Now that I know what I know about curriculum development, I was doing well for my students with horizontal alignment. I did not know what the teacher had taught the prior year, nor did I know what the teacher needed the students to learn in preparation for the next year. There was not a curriculum other than the hidden and taught curriculum.
Therefore, today, curriculum provides direction so every student has the opportunity to learn the guaranteed and viable curriculum without gaps and redundancies. The curriculum is the written documents that are both horizontally and vertically aligned by expert teachers for teachers. It has the standards clarified so that any teacher can teach it and any student has the opportunity to learn what he or she needs to know and be able to do.
So where does autonomy come in? With a well written curriculum, the teacher does not need to develop curriculum, but rather design engaging work for students that is relevant, meaningful, and challenging. The teacher has the professional autonomy to do what is best for the students. In this mindset, the student also has the autonomy to help the teacher design the work. Together, the teacher and the student are designers, learners, and creative thinkers. The teacher has the autonomy to work and collaborate with others, especially the teacher next door or even across the world. Educators are preparing students today not knowing what the future offers, because our technologies and information are expanding exponentially each day.
This mindset does not follow the notion of prescribed lessons for teachers where the teacher teaches all students the same way every day. It does provide guidance with exemplar lessons for the hard to teach and hard to learn concepts along with ideas on the most effective ways to present the material, especially for the new educator to the field.
With all this said, I do believe a well developed curriculum and it services is enchanting. As educators, the best way we can become more enchanting with our services is to become deeply involved with curriculum. As educators we can participate in curriculum development. We can serve on state committees where the standards are written. We can serve on local district committees that create the curriculum written documents. We can participate in professional learning communities, both in the place where we work as well as on the internet to discuss curriculum implications, deconstruct the learning standards, and gain insight from others. We can study our curriculum documents, both vertical and horizontal, to try to understand the intended outcomes for the graduate profile of the learner and the daily performances and content that learner needs to know and be able to do for the courses in which you teach. The possibilities are endless. Every day I see and experience curriculum opportunities.
As educators, we have lots of power to influence our students to a meaningful future where they can explore, experiment, and be confident in each learning experience they face. To help support his/her learning, we must have enchanting curriculum which starts with us. Go ye therefore and continue to make curriculum conscious to you and your students.
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