Curriculum 21 - Chapter 4: New School Versions

Curriculum 21: Essential Education for a Changing World   by Heidi Hayes Jacobs

Chapter 4 New School Versions: Reinventing and Reuniting School Program Structure

We shape our buildings: thereafter, they shape us. -Sir Winston Churchill

·         Imagine a 100 years from now, thinking back on your time in school.

·         Possibility of new kinds of form

·         New versions of software=platforms

·         New versions of schools = versioning

1.  Form should always follow function

2.  The whole is the sum of the parts

Curricular Destiny:  Schedules, Grouping Patterns, and the Use of Space

·         Schedule (long term and short term)

·         Grouping Patterns of Learners (institutional and instructional)

·         Grouping Patterns of professionals (multiple affiliations)

·         Space (both physical and virtual)

To move our school structures into more open, fluid, and correspondingly inventive forms, we need new form, not reform.

Essential Questions

·         What type of both long-term and short-term schedules will best support our specific learners?

·         What various ways of grouping our learners will assist them in their learning experiences?

·         How should faculty be configured to best serve students and to assist one another?

·         In what ways can both physical and virtual space be created and used to support our work?

Schedules

·         Graduation

·         Time:  Let function lead form

·         Heroic Schools

http://metcenter.org/

Rhode Island Met Center 

Thinking and Planning Outside the Scheduling Box: Virtual Space

American students videoconferencing in their tech center  -Advanced French class in

Paris Advanced English language class in their tech center

VLM – Virtual Learning Magnet- connects cyber space with physical space

·         Link our finest cultural and scientific institutions directly to the student in a focused experience using internet-based tools.

CCSSO Council of Chief State School Officers 

http://vimeo.com/47025452

Grouping of Students

·         Institutional - gender, age, developmental spans, function, proficiency based

·         Instructional – skill grouping (constant), skill grouping (immediate needs), cooperative, competitive, individualized

·         Independent – clubs, online courses, internships, work experiences, travel abroad, community service and projects

Grouping of Professionals – The need for multiple affiliation

Consider:

·         Vertical teams

·         Vertical strategic teams

·         Cross disciplinary teams

·         Internship supervisors

·         Task force study groups

·         Data analysis teams

·         State education network teams

·         National network team

·         Global peer coaching team

·         Global network team

Social Learning Frameworks

Leveraging social production, social networks, new modalities for discovery, media grids, and an organic learning process

New Versions of Physical and Physical Space

DesignShare

www.designshare.com

1.        Whom the building is to serve

2.       What the building’s function will be

Form should follow function.  The whole is the sum of the parts.

Could your Curriculum 21 review team generate a version of school that had both flexibility and regulation in long-term and daily schedules, supported multiple professional affiliations, offered a wide range of student groupings, and used physical and virtual space in direct response to the actual students you have been charged to educate?