Question
How would you describe curriculum?
Answer
Curriculum is not necessarily something that you have to follow exactly. In the textbook by Hendrick and Weissman (2011) called Total Learning, they say, “A curriculum needs to be thought of as everything and anything that a child experiences throughout their day at school.” They also talk about curriculum being a design of experiences or something that happens anytime during the day.
An example of this would be in a daily schedule where a teacher will have written group time or circle time or lesson time. Then they have outdoor time and snack time and all the things that are in a daily schedule. But when a parent or other viewers look at the daily schedule, it appears the only learning that is taking place is when the teacher has the children at this group time or circle time. We want to make sure that curriculum is understood as everything that happens all day. When we are transitioning from indoors to outdoors, we should have curriculum planned because otherwise children will be just running all over the place. There has to be a plan. Every single thing the child does during the day at school is full of teachable moments. Those are also known as curriculum.
This Ask the Expert is an edited excerpt from the course, Developing a Yearlong Curriculum Guide, presented by Robin Fairfield, EdD.
