Jenna Wiebe (Blog 5)

Blog 5

            Chapter 5 explained the role of curriculum in the Canadian School System.  Understanding the history behind the way in which curriculum has been developed is important as it allows a deeper knowledge of curricular material. 

            It did not surprise me to read about the section of parental influence on curriculum.  I was interested to find out that one of the largest concerns parents did have was on the reading material provided to students.  I think that it is important that parents have a say in what their children are exposed to.  Chapter 5 stated “the Freedom of Expression Committee monitors censorship issues in Canada, including books that parents have made cases for removing from school curricula and libraries.  Jenkinson (1986) indicates that most advocates of banning particular books in schools are individual parents” (page 131).  Since there is such a wide spectrum of reading  material available, I think that parents should be alert and cautious of what their children are exposed to in schools, as the content may include various conflicting beliefs.  Regardless if offensive reading materials are banned or not, I think that parents should be made aware of what their child is exposed to in the classroom, and therefore can have conversations with their child about the material in question or with the teacher.

            I was unaware that the Fraser Institute in Vancouver was releasing “report cards” based on various schools, where “the purpose of these rankings, according to the Fraser Institute, is that by “combining a variety of relevant, objective indicators of school performance into one easily accessible public document, the school report cards allow teachers, parents, school administrators students, and taxpayers to analyze and compare the academic performance of individual schools” (page 137-138).  Perhaps this is helpful in ensuring that schools are following curriculum that they are supposed to, however, I feel that it would certainly put a lot of pressure on teachers to ensure their students are succeeding.  There can definitely be benefits to comparing schools on a level such as this, but I feel that this can certainly lead to a lot of unrest.

            Furthermore, the text went on to explain various national and international levels of assessment, and also stated that there is controversy with this sort of testing style, as “raw scores from such tests ignore how these and other factors influence how students do on the assessments, instead shifting the blame to teachers.  The outcomes of tests also fail to take into consideration that many schools and classrooms are greatly under-resourced.  Poor test scores may be attributable to this lack of resources experienced by many teachers” (page 144).  As a future teacher, I would have to agree that it is not fair to blame teachers for poor standardized test scores in most cases.  There are a lot of factors that contribute to test scores, as was previously mentioned.  I remember not enjoying standardized tests back when I was in high school—especially when it came to math.  I am not sure if standardized tests are quite the right way to go to see where students are at, especially since not all students thrive at taking tests.

Discussion Question:  What has been your experience with standardized tests?  Do you believe they offer an accurate view of a student’s academic knowledge?