Teachers’ accounts of their curriculum use: external contextual influences during times of curriculum reform

Abstract

Curriculum reform is often described as being dependent on teachers’ advancement of reform principles. Many studies report the reasons for whether teachers engage with a new curriculum, and these reasons have focused on internal, personal influences including disconnections between curriculum and teachers’ beliefs and practices. This study investigates nine Australian primary teachers’ accounts of their use of a new English curriculum from data obtained through semi‐structured interviews. A thematic content analysis approach was used to analyse the interview transcripts, illustrating significant differences among the teachers in their use of the intended curriculum. The analysis provided four distinct influences on their curriculum use: the provision of professional development; curriculum and leadership roles; use of alternative or additional materials; and schools’ prioritisation of particular learning areas. The findings demonstrate that the consistent use of these curriculum materials, as intended by designers, was appreciably influenced by factors external to the teachers. Implications for curriculum designers include the need for greater consideration of external contextual influences, such as: opportunities for teachers to access professional development, consideration of curriculum roles within schools, the thoughtful provision of additional or alternate curriculum materials, and recognition of the prioritisation of particular learning areas by schools.

Persepsi Guru terkait Perubahan Kurikulum terhadap Pembelajaran Sekolah Dasar

“…Namun adanya ketidakpuasan terhadap tujuan yang telah ditetapkan, perubahan kembali terjadi pada penggunaan kurikulum yang sekarang disebut sebagai merdeka belajar, dengan mengusung konsep merdeka belajar, dan merdeka bermain. Selain itu, penilaian guru terhadap kurikulum membuktikan potensi kesulitan dalam memberlakukan apa yang disebut sebagai "Alat Pengajaran" (Bradfield & Exley, 2020).…”

“…Sementara kurikulum memiliki dua peran yaitu sebagai proses pengembangan profesional dan sebagai hasil dari perubahan yang merupakan pengembangan profesional (Moore et al, 2021). Guru dapat melakukan analisis dan beradaptasi terhadap bahan ajar secara konsisten melalui pengembang kurikulum jika guru memiliki pengetahuan tentang kurikulum itu sendiri (Bradfield & Exley, 2020). Dari pernyataan tersebut menunjukkan bahwa seorang pendidik memiliki pandangan yang menyangkut wawasannya terhadap kurikulum, di samping itu kurikulum juga berperan menunjang profesionalitas pendidik.…”

Engaging Parents in Inquiry Curriculum Projects with Social Media: Using Metalogue to Probe the Methodological and Ethical Dilemmas in Literacy Research

“…Since the release of the inaugural Australian Curriculum: English in 2011, Australian elementary school English teachers have been stymied by a lack of professional development opportunities for this new curriculum (Bradfield & Exley, 2020). Research has also documented the unintended consequences and unhelpful pressures of high-stakes national literacy assessment in Australia.…”

Understanding curricula as theories of action

“…They failed to have the desired impact because these new curricula, aiming to introduce more progressive models of education, were implemented by teachers who largely approved of them in principle yet persisted with their existing practices. Even where reforms were well‐resourced with a coherent system‐wide approach featuring extensive opportunities for teacher learning and collective sensemaking (for example, see Coburn, 2001), the outcome was, in many cases, the extension or elaboration of existing practices (Bradfield & Exley, 2020; Cave, 2011; Hawe & Parr, 2014; Hoadley, 2011; Priestley & Minty, 2013), and in some cases outright rejection of new practices (Bjork, 2015; Coburn, 2001).…”