Curriculum

Today was spent in a department meeting determining scope and sequence for our upcoming curriculum cycle. Basically, we sat around with the standards and benchmarks and tried to find out where they fit in and how we addressed them in our classes. Then when we found something that wasn’t addressed, we tried to find a place for it.

My random observations of the day are below --



One benchmark “Correctly use reflexive case pronouns and nominative and objective case pronouns, including who and whom”

Another “Correctly use punctuation such as the comma, semicolon, colon, hyphen, and dash.”

Now this is the nuts and bolts of curriculum building - to appease the state and other higher ups. But it’s my job so the kids never ‘see’ any of this crap. I want them to learn it without being bored out of their minds as I was going over some of this crap.

Maybe I’m a bloody liberal, but call me nuts - I’d rather have students write a damned essay full of blood and guts than give them a worksheet on (to quote from our curriculum map -- “Correctly use verb forms with attention to subjunctive mood, subject/verb agreement, and active/passive voice” or “Correctly use the possessive pronoun before the gerund.”

Now I’ve written more essays than the average bear. I’ve had a lot of success with my writing. And I’ve taken a lot of freaking writing classes. Never once - not from the remedial course I took at the local community college all the way up to graduate courses - have I ever been praised or honored for correctly using the possessive pronoun before the gerund. Let alone ever being docked or scolded for doing it incorrectly. Does this matter?


Another benchmark that we’re supposed to hit --

“Apply knowledge of Greek and Latin roots, prefixes and suffixes to understand content area vocabulary.” Are you kidding me. Someone said this helps them spell better. Hell, spell check doesn’t help some spell better. Will this help? I guess I have to find a way to get it across to my kids.

But will I ever get the rush out of watching kids mess around with Greek and Latin roots they way I do when a Sam lights up after reading his essay on being in a middle school “gang”? Or the way Brandon was pissed off at Shirley Jackson for writing “The Lottery”? No way. That is what I love about teaching - not all these Latin and Greek roots.