Determining Curriculum Content

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DeterminingCurriculum Content
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What Must Be Dealt With

• Time and money
• Emotional concerns
• Pressure from different groups

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What Must Be Dealt With

• Content requirements- ex. completer courses in a
  career pathway
• Skills needed by employers-ex. future careers
  will require more specific and employment skills
• Content concerns-ex. integration

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Types of Content Determination Strategies
Subjective

• Philosophical Basis
• Introspection
• DACUM
• Task Analysis
• Critical Incident Technique
• The Delphi Technique

Objective
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Philosophical Basis

• most subjective but the most commonly used in
  academic areas
• belief or mission statements of the organization
  should be reflected in the course- ex.
  preparation for gainful employment all content
  should relate to the workplace

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Introspection

• most expensive
• carried out by an advisory committee made up of
  members in touch with the related occupation
• used to create a framework or blueprint

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Introspection

• examination (often including interviews) of
  existing literature and programs
• a group process where members are asked What
  do I feel should constitute the content of the
  curriculum?
• often requires further decision making processes

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DACUM

• a variant of introspection
• single sheet skill profile- that presents the
  skills of the entire occupation
• see sample on p.145 in text

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DACUM

• An expert committee made up of 10-12 people is
  guided through the 2-4 day process by a
  facilitator
• Committee members are often nominated by
  employers as being experts in their skill
• Instructors/teachers are not involved in this
  first step of the process they come in later to
  take skill statements and organize them in a
  framework

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Task Analysis

• Task of workers (work activity units)
• are identified and verified.
• Consists of surveying workers and collapsing
  data.
• Steps
• review relevant literature
• develop an occupational inventory
• select a worker sample
• administer the inventory
• analyze the collected information

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Task Analysis

• V-TECS- a cooperative effort between state
  agencies to create catalogs of performance
  objectives

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The All Aspects Approach

• Based on the concept that we must train students
  for broader workplace context
• Exposes students to a broad predominant theme
• Content should be linked to the school, workplace
  and community

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The All Aspects Approach

• Themes might include technology, planning,
  management, finance, safety, and environmental
  issues.
• Model- p.39 Figure 2-8
• Decisions based on consideration of contextual,
  organizational and delivery options ex.
  Biotechnology for Plants, Animals and the
  Environment

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Critical Incident Technique

• Limited use but can be used to isolate important
  values and attitudes (affective education)
• Involves employer reaction to poor performance of
  employees
• Data is gathered and grouped in categories- ex.
  An employee is late to work three times in a week
  would be put in the category of punctuality

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The Delphi Techniques

• Useful in creating curriculum based on new
  occupations/ no other data is available
• Consist of a series of mailed questionnaires/inter
  rogations
• The group is not biased because they never meet
  face to face
• Time consuming

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The Delphi Techniques

• Four rounds
• Request participate to send in a list of skills
  or objectives
• Each participate receives a total list and asked
  to rank them all
• Participates are asked to revise their first
  choices based on others opinions
• Review consensus rating and make final revisions

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Analysis of Content Strategies

• Review all processes in Figure 6-6 p.161 of the
  text
• Which process allows the quickest collection of
  data?

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Making Curriculum Content Decisions
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Consider Constraints

• Student Entering Characteristics
• General and applied skills
• Interest and motivation
• Maturity levels
• Special needs
• Other
•  

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Other Constraints

• Instructors and Support Staff
• Content instructors can teach
• Provision for teaching supporting coursework
• Provision for integrating general and vocational
  education content
• Availability of support staff (e.g., guidance,
  placement)

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Other Constraints

• The Curricular Arrangement
• Time available to teach students
• Required vocational content coverage
• Required general content coverage
• Funding available for equipment, resources, and
  supplies
• Other

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Other Constraints

• The Employment Setting
• Minimum expected employability level of graduates
• Employment areas graduates will be prepared to
  enter
• Teaming experiences best obtained in employment
  settings
• Other

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The Curriculum Framework

• In N.C. we call this the blueprint.
• A document that serves as a means of
  communication to all those involved.
• Needs to provide detail.
• Pulls it all together.