Curriculum Development: A Guide to Practice (6th Edition)

Rating:
Summary: Think Big
Review: The authors of this long-running text are way out front in focusing on the Internet as curriculum's future. The entire first
chapter is dedicated to what a technological district might look like and how curriculum decisions will shape that future in schools. Further reading brings the reader face-to-face with
the complexities of such value decisions.

I use this text in my classes and find that students usually
select to keep it ater the class ends. What greater testimony to
this book's use as a desktop resource could be made?

Rating:
Summary: Think Big
Review: This book looks promising, but the authors seem to be writing about recent-past trends in curriculum as if they were the waves of the future. They seem to have a strong bias for unstructured classrooms and postmodernism, even though those ideas appear to have reached their peaks and begun to decline in the real world. They talk at several points on the uselessness of standardized testing, but the consensus these days is it is an abdication of responsibility to omit verification of results in the classroom.

The book also adds new sections on technology and here again I have my doubts that the authors really understand the topic. For example, in chapters one and six they write about the rise of the internet and it's effect on the classroom learning environment. Sound promising? I thought so and was sorely disappointed. They write about the internet as the vanguard of the unstructured classroom of the future, but provide little evidence to back it up. They write that it will usher in a future time when students will guide their own learning and, through self motivation, study the things they are supposed to study. They will do this because they are motivated to learn. Have the authors been near any children lately? It seems highly debatable that kids will find learning "cool" and pursue it on their own simply because they can do it at a keyboard. I suspect they'll do what they do now and pick games over information. Wiles and Bondi argue that children have never had the opportunity to study what they want to study when they want to study it; but there have been public libraries for centuries. One can learn whatever one wants there, and in any order. Little evidence of enthusiasm for them on the part of students has been seen thus far. In truth, kids rarely use the internet for learning. They use it for entertainment, and the authors don't seem to understand this. In fact, while arguing for unstructured learning, the authors state that the biggest problem with the internet is it's lack of structure! They are right about that one.

There is another problem in the book, and it is most disturbing. There seems to be a radical leftist bias in parts of the book. At one point they state that the internet will level the playing field in learning so much that the role of teacher will whither away and students will be in charge of their own learning. Eventually the schools themselves will whither away and unstructured learning will dominate in the future, producing an equal environment for all. They appear to be advocating this strongly throughout the book. This idea sounds distinctly Marxist, and I question strongly whether it belongs in teacher education in the United States of America.

The book does well where it sticks to the facts, but these facts are drowned in a sea of opinion and debatable conjecture. In my opinion there are better choices available in the field of curriculum development.

Rating:
Summary: The 6th Edition Tries Hard, but Falls Flat
Review: This book looks promising, but the authors seem to be writing about recent-past trends in curriculum as if they were the waves of the future. They seem to have a strong bias for unstructured classrooms and postmodernism, even though those ideas appear to have reached their peaks and begun to decline in the real world. They talk at several points on the uselessness of standardized testing, but the consensus these days is it is an abdication of responsibility to omit verification of results in the classroom.

The book also adds new sections on technology and here again I have my doubts that the authors really understand the topic. For example, in chapters one and six they write about the rise of the internet and it's effect on the classroom learning environment. Sound promising? I thought so and was sorely disappointed. They write about the internet as the vanguard of the unstructured classroom of the future, but provide little evidence to back it up. They write that it will usher in a future time when students will guide their own learning and, through self motivation, study the things they are supposed to study. They will do this because they are motivated to learn. Have the authors been near any children lately? It seems highly debatable that kids will find learning "cool" and pursue it on their own simply because they can do it at a keyboard. I suspect they'll do what they do now and pick games over information. Wiles and Bondi argue that children have never had the opportunity to study what they want to study when they want to study it; but there have been public libraries for centuries. One can learn whatever one wants there, and in any order. Little evidence of enthusiasm for them on the part of students has been seen thus far. In truth, kids rarely use the internet for learning. They use it for entertainment, and the authors don't seem to understand this. In fact, while arguing for unstructured learning, the authors state that the biggest problem with the internet is it's lack of structure! They are right about that one.

There is another problem in the book, and it is most disturbing. There seems to be a radical leftist bias in parts of the book. At one point they state that the internet will level the playing field in learning so much that the role of teacher will whither away and students will be in charge of their own learning. Eventually the schools themselves will whither away and unstructured learning will dominate in the future, producing an equal environment for all. They appear to be advocating this strongly throughout the book. This idea sounds distinctly Marxist, and I question strongly whether it belongs in teacher education in the United States of America.

The book does well where it sticks to the facts, but these facts are drowned in a sea of opinion and debatable conjecture. In my opinion there are better choices available in the field of curriculum development.