Last week, I shared that the Core Knowledge Foundation is seeking a courageous district to partner with. A district that will push back against pressure to teach to the test, and instead commit to a content-rich, coherent, cumulative curriculum (including art, music, civics, and all the other important things that are too often neglected) in all of its elementary schools. The response has been heart-warming; I’m having a wonderful time getting to know districts with a passion for closing the achievement gap. (If you would like to work with us, please get in touch: lhansel@coreknowledge.org.)
This week, as we look forward to celebrating Martin Luther King Jr.’s life, I’d like to explain a little more about our dream of partnering with a district to collaboratively develop and implement a well-rounded elementary curriculum. A rich curriculum creates a magical—and empowering—childhood. From ancient civilizations to faraway galaxies, our universe offers wonders that children eagerly explore if they are given an opportunity. Too often, social inequities are blamed for the achievement gap, even as curricular inequities are overlooked. Social inequities are deep and real; they must be addressed. At the same time, schools are part of the solution—especially schools that focus on equalizing opportunity to master academic knowledge, vocabulary, and skills.
The elementary grades are perfect for introducing students to our fascinating universe. Image courtesy of Shutterstock.
While Core Knowledge already works with well over 1,000 schools, some that use our materials to deepen and round out their curriculum and others that teach the full preschool through eighth-grade Sequence, we believe children would benefit even more if schools worked together. Imagine all of the elementary schools in a small district, or a coalition of schools in a larger district, co-constructing their curriculum—voluntarily. If administrators create sufficient time for teachers to collaborate, teachers’ collective wisdom grows as they share expertise and materials. Teachers’ collective impact grows too, as they now have the opportunity to support learning across several schools, not just inside their classrooms.
In far too many elementary schools, teachers are not given opportunities to work together. Two fourth-grade teachers may teach totally different content—they don’t know what the second- or third-grade teachers taught, so they can’t reliably build on what students already know. Some topics get repeated in two or more grades; other topics are never taught. Grade by grade, students study an array of different topics, leaving little for the class as a whole to build on together. In such schools, each teacher must build each lesson from scratch. It’s exhausting and inefficient. Having to plan the whole curriculum alone, teachers don’t have enough time for diagnosing and addressing individual needs. And since they often teach different topics, teachers can’t easily share their materials.
Contrast this with schools that do have a schoolwide curriculum. Students’ knowledge and skills grow predictably and reliably year to year. Teachers know what to build on, are able to share lesson plans, and can help each other refine best practices for the specific content they are teaching. The common curriculum should not be a rigid script; teachers ought to have the freedom to extend topics that their students love and pause when needed to reinforce knowledge and skills. But with an agreed upon set of topics for each grade, teachers get the benefit of working as a team—and students get the benefit of a well-rounded, coherent education.
Sounds pretty good. So good that some elementary schools have done the hard work of developing their own schoolwide curriculum.
Things can get even better when several nearby schools create a common curriculum. More teachers working together means more expertise to share. If students change schools, they will not fall behind or disrupt their peers’ learning. Because of the common curriculum, the receiving teacher will be able to get very detailed information on the student’s knowledge and skills. And if teachers change schools or a new teacher is hired, the common curriculum creates a strong foundation for excellent instruction.
But wait! What about choice? What about schools with special themes? There’s room for those. Currently, nearly 40% of schools using Core Knowledge are charters. We’d love to partner with a district that has charter and neighborhood elementary schools—and to involve all the schools that are interested in collaboratively developing a common curriculum. Likewise, we’d welcome schools with special themes.
Just as the shared curriculum should give individual teachers room to breathe, it should give schools the flexibility to customize. The shared curriculum could be designed to take two-thirds of instructional time, leaving teachers and schools ample time to pursue unique strengths and interests. In fact, once the shared curriculum is in place, teachers and schools will find they have more time for such customization. Knowing that the shared curriculum gives all children a well-rounded education in literature, history, geography, the sciences, mathematics, and the arts, educators will be able to give more attention to how they want to extend children’s learning.
Together, we can achieve Martin Luther King Jr.’s vision of a “complete education.” Writing for Morehouse College’s Maroon Tiger in 1947, King called us to duty:
It seems to me that education has a two-fold function to perform in the life of man and in society: the one is utility and the other is culture…. The function of education … is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically. But education which stops with efficiency may prove the greatest menace to society…. Intelligence plus character—that is the goal of true education. The complete education gives one not only power of concentration, but worthy objectives upon which to concentrate. The broad education will, therefore, transmit to one not only the accumulated knowledge of the race but also the accumulated experience of social living.