Sustaining professionalism: Teachers as co‐enquirers in curriculum design

Abstract

In England, the development of teachers' curriculum design capabilities has been identified as a ‘challenge remaining’ (Department for Education [DfE]. (2022). Opportunity for all: Strong schools with great teachers for your child. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/opportunity‐for‐all‐strong‐schools‐with‐great‐teachers‐for‐your‐child). A recent White Paper (Department for Education [DfE]. (2022). Opportunity for all: Strong schools with great teachers for your child. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/opportunity‐for‐all‐strong‐schools‐with‐great‐teachers‐for‐your‐child) offered access to a publicly funded online platform as a solution. Drawing on Stenhouse's concepts of teachers as researchers and curriculum as an inquiry process, this article argues that such a policy initiative restricts both curriculum and professional development. An alternative approach to curriculum design, one based on Stenhouse's conception of the iterative development of teachers' professional and curriculum knowledge is profiled. In this article, we, as four teacher‐researchers, analyse a project which featured the Curriculum Design Coherence (CDC) model. We share insights gained from our involvement, both in relation to our professional learning and the impact of our curriculum design work on our pupils. We argue that the ‘othering’ of teachers in research contributes towards the under valuing of practice‐informed evidence in policy making. We draw on the work of Lawrence Stenhouse to inform a different means of generating educational research evidence, one that sustains teacher‐researchers through engagement with principles and concepts so as to inform policy and curriculum development.