Q: In what ways do you use your department's curriculum? Line for line? As a basic guideline? Don't use it at all? How helpful is it to you? Did you receive it before you started teaching, or did you have to seek it out?
A: In regard to the history section of my curriculum, I use it as a basic guideline for my lessons. I was given the curriculum a couple of months into my first year, which isn't exactly the way it's supposed to be, is it? To be honest, I haven't looked at in in about two years, but I did have a hand in writing the most recent version, so it is actually modeled after my own lessons already in place. As for my Contemporary Social Issues course, I do not use it at all. Half of the writtten curriculum is for psychology and the other half for sociology. About 2 years ago, my administration told me I could not teach the psychology component because I do not have a degree in psych. (But, I don't have a degree in sociology, either?!?) So, then I needed to "stretch out" the sociology component to fill up the rest of the semester. Instead, I have added more units of study and expanded on what was already in place. I have added a significant writing aspect to the course, as well. It is a completely different class than what is in our curriculum. I expect I will be re-writing the curriculum for this course when the time comes, and I will model it off of what I already teach.
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Beth, I agree you should have had the curriculum given to you as part of your orientation into that school. Unfortuantely, that is not always the case. You are actually lucky you received a curriculum at all (even if you haven't looked at it in a while). Keep working hard to meet their expectations! I guess it's up to administation to decide what it is that you should teach, so just try your best.
ReplyDeleteThe head of our union was place into a compter class but had a science degree. Someone decided that wanted to get rid of him and said that he was being fired because he was teaching a subject that he was not qualified to teach. They actually escorted him out of the building with no heads up. However, they had no leg to stand on and he was brought back. Apparently, because he was qualified to teach science, it was up to the administration to place him in a classroom that he was qualified to teach....so don't sweat it, I don't think you have much say in where you go.