English Language Arts: Philosophy and Ideology

Philosophy and Ideology

The program at hand is aimed to develop successful, creative, informed, and active individuals having profound knowledge and advanced skills in English Language Arts. Consequently, reaching consistency between schools’ needs, ideology, and philosophy has to be prioritized by an educator.

It is widely known that attaining to the goals mentioned above is associated with a plethora of challenges. In this case, understanding school’s philosophy along with relying on a unique blend of theories can help reach the consistency and promote creative learning. When referring to school’s needs, the most relevant framework is Ross Philosophical Inventory, as similarly to the organizational goals, it seeks a balance between idealism and pragmatism (Joyce, Weil, & Calhoun, 2015). These principles revolutionized the overall philosophy and processes in the educational sphere while making changes to it was rational due to gaps in the traditional educational system such as limited freedom of students and their passivity in decision-making (Kumral, 2014). In this instance, schools’ objectives address these issues, as giving students more freedom helps promote these ideas.

The school views philosophies of idealism and pragmatism as essential approaches to develop capabilities and analytical skills of students and integrate them into society successfully. For example, the concepts of idealism assist the school in cultivating the importance of morale while establishing a sufficient knowledge base with the help of studying philosophy and having continuous discussions (Ravi, 2015). Both Plato and Emerson suggested that the idea of the development of inner self should be one of the educational priorities, and school regarded them as important (Ravi, 2015). On the contrary, pragmatism implies that students should learn from examples, and Dewey suggested that ‘learning by doing’ is one of the most effective practical models (Ravi, 2015). In the context of English Language Arts, relying on art, organizing activities outdoors, and integrating into nature and community are some examples of such activities. Only a combination of these theories can help the school reach its organizational goals such as making students adaptive to the fluctuations of the social environment and developing well-established knowledge base.

Overall, English Language Arts will need to take into consideration the nature of young generation, their values and views, as well as obstacles and challenges that will be encountered in the process of teaching and learning. Since expectations of the society are changing and accumulating rapidly, young students will need not only to develop an abstract philosophical perception of life, education, and communication but also receive an adaptive set of practically applicable skills to be able to answer modern expectations and make their contribution to the creation of a more sustainable, diversified, and supportive community. High-performing countries must be able to set high levels of expectations and meet them in all subject areas of education through high-quality teaching, strong leadership, collaboration with families, social agencies, business, and industry activists, etc. Implementation of a successful English Language Arts curriculum largely depends upon the support of school administration, parents, and all those stakeholders fostering favorable learning environment for literacy development (Pinar, 2013). In the end, only working together as a team can assist in developing sustainable learning environment to promote creative thinking and contribute to the growth of diversified and educated community.

Before developing the curriculum, it is important to identify what needs an education institution has in terms of its philosophical views and values for them not to be contradictory.

In terms of ideology and philosophy, the school needs to:

• give all students a solid foundation in background theoretical knowledge and practical skills that will their way to the future;
• foster students’ creativity allowing them to translate their innovative ideas into practical application;
• develop students’ general capabilities in terms of analytical thinking, the ability to cooperate with other learners and to acquire diverse experience moving across various subject disciplines.

Pragmatism Relation

According to Zappia (2017), “schools should break down social barriers across socioeconomic, gender or racial and ethnic barriers. Despite the material that the students need to learn and educator’s ambitions, the pragmatic approach to education would suggest that students must solve problems from their own experience. It would be most unfitting for them to solve simple problems from their textbooks. A pragmatic approach to ELA allows focusing on multiple disciplines both exact and liberal sciences. If Dewey’s progressive ideas are applied to the ELA curriculum, it becomes rather evident that student experience is a means of forming a curriculum (relating activities to students’ current lives). A thematic approach might be employed in terms of curricular units as well.

There are a number of reasons as to why pragmatic approach is widely used in the modern education. It allows for engagement and forming a curriculum that is focused on students’ needs, etc. However, it also comes with requirement of problems from personal experience. Thus, progressive pragmatic approach would function best when applied to such disciplines as mathematics, physics, chemistry, biology. Simply put, pragmatism is best used in the framework of exact sciences. Moreover, one of the main focuses of education is to ensure that students are able to cope with unforeseen challenges they have never faced before. In other words, students are expected to develop adaptive skills. The pragmatic approach does, in fact, allow for that, especially if pragmatic approach is adopted directly. With establishing proper pragmatic approach to curriculum development, adaptation to new situations is also very likely to be established and adequately developed. Thus, a new program for English Language Arts classes must be developed with pragmatic methods taken into account.

Curriculum Theory

The importance of education in the globalized society has made a curriculum the heart of any educational institution providing formal education since it defines all aspects of the learning process and reflects students’ experiences. Furthermore, the notion has come to designate not only a set of standards but also a dynamic process owing to the fact that the modern society is changing rapidly (Tyler, 2013).

Curriculum development is a purposeful, systematic, and highly organized process aiming to improve the quality of education. Regardless of the content area, for which curriculum is designed, it must be responsive to all changes and developments happening in the educational system. It is crucial that any curriculum should encompass theory, philosophy, and instructional models to be profound and comprehensive. Thus, the process of its development consists in (Tyler, 2013):

• establishing clear and consistent philosophy, values, and goals that will determine the direction of the learning process;
• elaborating sequences and transitions within and between levels in order to ensure smooth progression from one level to the next one;
• outlining a general framework of activities, ways to perform them, and timelines;
• developing interdisciplinary approaches;
• choosing proper assessment tools to track achievements and provide regular revisions;
• providing proper direction of resources procurement (including financial, material, and human resources) and their distribution.

The major philosophy underlying this curriculum is pragmatism or progressivism. which is based on the assumption that learning occurs only when students actively participate in the process of generating new meanings and knowledge instead of unidirectional transition of information from teachers to learners. The above-enumerated needs of the school for creating knowledgeable, responsible, diversely educated, creative, and active citizens can be satisfied only under the condition that students are allowed to become the makers of meaning and provided with a variety of activities to achieve this (Pinar, 2013).

The advantage of constructivism over other educational theories consists in the fact that it is not just a philosophical position but rather an epistemology and a pedagogical approach (Noddings, 2013). Yet, no matter under which category it falls, the major premise remains the same: Knowledge should never come as a result of passive perception since it can be effective only if it is constructed.

The theory traces its roots to Jean Piaget, who was striving to find out what structures of human mind determine cognitive behaviour and how its characteristics change at each state of mental development. Piaget focuses on an individual student leaving social aspects of learning unattended. On the contrary, social constructivists emphasize that learning is a collaborative effort. These different understandings of the theory should not hinder educators wince only the most preferable practices can be adopted without any necessity to accept extremes of the philosophy. This particular curriculum will use constructivism as a way to acquire knowledge from interactions between already learned facts and new information. One of the major goals is to foster critical thinking and learning experiences for students to be able to open new boundaries instead of unquestioned acceptance of the common knowledge. The key idea of the theory is that knowledge cannot be neutral. On the contrary, it is dynamic, which implies that the ways of creating it are no less important than knowledge itself (Noddings, 2013).

Although many scholars indicate that constructivism is typically applied to mathematics and science education, there is still evidence that the theory is also quite influential in teaching of English Language Arts and its presence in ELA classrooms is on the rise. The suggested curriculum recognizes that although a teacher may decide what issue, problem, topic, or question is going to be addressed, students should always have an opportunity to enact conversation domains, dispute, collaborate, disagree, and give their own interpretation of the information received. Teachers and students must be able to get engaged into a meaningful conversation, read, discuss, write, and come out with their conclusions together. This allows making independent decisions and thereby construct experience-based, student-oriented curriculum that will not only meet educational standards but also appeal to learners making them more interested and committed. They learn how to use their existing knowledge on any topic in order to transform new information in such a way that it will be directly applicable to their personal experience (Deane et al., 2015).

Another reason to opt for constructivism is that the theory supports linguistically and culturally diverse learning environment. All students are perceived as people with different and unique social, intellectual, and cultural backgrounds, each deserving separate attention and respect. Teachers do their best to incorporate the knowledge about students into their daily classroom practices. It is a deeply constructivist idea to believe that learners’ cultural identities and life experience must be included in the classroom, changing traditional approaches to ELA curriculum development (Deane et al., 2015).

Curriculum Design Model

The English Language Arts curriculum will be developed on the basis of Know-Do-Understand design model that promotes a competency-oriented, concept-based approach to teaching and learning experience. The model includes three major elements that work together to ensure deeper learning (Serbati, 2015):

• Content (Know): The first element identifies learning standards and identified what topics are to be studies at each level. Content decides what knowledge will be acquired at each grade in ELA for student to be able to master Curricular Competencies. Each topic included in the Content can find practical application in Competencies. Student continue building on their knowledge passing from one grade to another and studying particular texts, in which they find required topics, some of which may re-appear at the next level since they require more thorough studying. Yet, in case identical topic are studied several times, it means that Content has to be elaborated to make these topics deeper and broader.
• Competencies (Do): The second element encompasses all strategies, activities, and skills that students have to cover for a certain period of time. The Curricular Competencies determine how learners must implement knowledge that they have gained, which is highly significant for ELA since this area of learning is action-driven. The initial goal of every ELA student is to become efficient and competent in generation of oral and written texts on a variety of topics. Students must be able to present their ideas clearly and confidently to ensure meaningful communication. Competencies are built on successively while students are moving through grades.
• Big Ideas (Understand): The third element of the design model includes principles and generalizations that students have to develop. In general, it implies what students will understand when they complete the curriculum for their level and how their knowledge will contribute to their future studies. Some of such ideas become deeper and more complex over time whereas others may remain unchanged.

The major reason to opt for this model is because it supports and reinforces competency-driven, concept-based curriculum–the two features that are absolutely indispensible to 21^st-century education that must provide multi-faceted theoretical knowledge that can be applicable in real settings. These two approaches perfectly complement constructivism as they are both focused on engaging student in the process of active knowledge (“doing”) rather than passive perception. When learning is competency-driven, it ensures that students will perform authentic tasks teaching them to link abstract learning to the real settings (Joyce et al., 2015).

Dewey’s Theory

Dewey’s theory refers to the idea that “learners construct knowledge for themselves—each learner individually (and socially) constructs meaning—as he or she learns” (Hein, 2017). The significance of this theory in the framework of this program lies in the fact that it is important for English Language Arts classes to establish a linguistically diverse and involving environment that allows students to face their own challenges, develop solutions for themselves and, generally speaking, make progress based on their abilities and ambitions.

It is also important to take advantage of the students’ ability to take an interest in various fields of knowledge. If students are encouraged to participate in every activity, they will have higher chances of developing required competitions. Subsequently, specific curriculum must be developed that would allow successfully adopting Dewey’s theory.

Curriculum Organization and Instructional Models

Design Model Relation

Know-Do-Understand model is closely related to self-directed learning curriculum design. The reasoning behind that is that this model is mostly designed to help students develop competencies on their own using variety of challenges as milestones to track their progress. Additionally, there is no focus on group work which may be for the better as the students’ questions, problems, and challenges may interfere with each other. This will create an unhealthy atmosphere in which students’ interests may conflict and affect the outcomes. Furthermore, if students are only monitored by the educator with nobody else to provide possible solutions to them, they will most likely be able to develop required set of attributes in much shorter terms. Thus, the design model should be modified to incorporate both Dewey’s theory and progressive ideas of social interaction. All in all, this curriculum design model is likely to have significant results due to its focus on forming a variety of competencies that will help students better understand material as well as process it much more efficiently.

The curriculum will be organized around the following guiding principles. English Language Arts are aimed to encourage independent thinking as well as interactive and collaborative learning when appropriate. An effective ELA curriculum is organized in such a way that it ensures development of students’ literacy and oral speech by creating conditions for challenging learning experience. A variety of literature of many genres, cultures, and time periods are to be used within the framework of the curriculum in order to promote diversity and reflect students’ common heritage. Writing must be emphasized as an essential skill needed to clearly communicate ideas in any type of discourse (narrative, expository, expressive or persuasive).

An effective curriculum involves all types of media in education as it makes the learning experience diversified. Students are to receive explicit and precise skill instructions in all competencies. All kinds of students’ personal experiences must be included in the curriculum to make them more involved and motivated. ELA curriculum must include strategies for gaining knowledge and meeting standards while preserving learning individuality and creativity. Each student must be able to develop his/her own writing and speaking style. An effective curriculum promotes respect for representatives of all backgrounds and nurtures the sense of commonality of purposes and values.

The curriculum will offer a set of units and lesson plans, including tasks on speaking, writing, listening, and grammar. The following goals are to be achieved:

• reading a wide range of print texts (fictional and non-fictional), understand them, and select new information;
• reading various literature works belonging to different periods and genres;
• applying strategies to understand, interpret, and assess texts relying on personal experience;
• communicating effectively with different audiences adjusting personal language style and vocabulary;
• using writing process elements to reach different readers;
• using grammar conventions, media techniques, and figurative language in discussions and writing;
• conducting research, generating ideas, and solving problems;
• using all modern educational technologies and information resources to collect, generate, and transfer knowledge;
• participating in active discussions and group projects;
• achieving personal goals through the effective use of language.

As far as an instructional model is concerned, it would be reasonable to choose the process model as the most action-oriented of all. The model suggests that the curriculum should be limited by studying units and lesson plans and is not determined by texts. On the contrary, it encourages language processes that enhance competencies, in which students and teachers are interested most. This means that instructions on writing, reading, listening, and speaking will differ considerably across classes and will be personalized to the maximum.

Evaluation

The use of the process model requires non-traditional approach to assessment of the curriculum success. The major rule of such classrooms is authenticity of evaluation methods since real language work cannot be objectively estimated using classical formal tests. Since the process model makes the curriculum more varied and flexible, it implies that assessment tools will also differ across classrooms. The model does not allow rigid and unresponsive methods that do not acknowledge students’ differences. Traditional tests may still be applied for evaluating students’ competences in grammar and essay writing but they cannot be decisive in determining how advanced a student is in terms of his/her ability to establish successful communication and achieve communicative goals. In the world of information sharing, it is the major competence that should be evaluated using practice-oriented tasks.

An authentic assessment is a form of evaluation where students are required to cope with real practical tasks that show that they can properly apply their skills and theoretical knowledge. Their performance is graded by a rubric. The curriculum also allows changing tasks according to individual peculiarities of students (Pinar, 2013).

Thus, the curriculum effectiveness must be assessed based on how well the students advance and how their progress manifests. In order to properly evaluate curriculum, a number of procedures are required. First, it is necessary to determine whether or not the current curriculum’s overall class distribution allows students to receive and process material correctly. This may be done in real time by slightly shifting the study load and monitoring results. When the optimal distribution of classes is determined, the curriculum will be most effective.

Next, it is important to understand if students’ individual needs are taken into account since the focus is partly on involvement. This may be achieved by interviewing students or asking them to write short essays on the topic of how they perceive their curriculum and what they feel lacks in it, etc. This will allow both evaluating the curriculum and monitoring students’ progress in learning the discipline. Students’ feedback must then be researched to find the way to organize the curriculum in a way that would better involve students and allow them to study without experiencing unneeded stress. Naturally, it would be impossible to fuse every opinion into one final form of the curriculum, so it is up to the educator to find a compromise.

Finally, the teacher may seek for feedback regarding possible innovations in the curriculum. By allowing students to think about how the curriculum may be improved, the educator will stimulate them to be involved in the study while also taking note of required adjustments that will be added to the curriculum. All in all, most curriculum evaluation forms that will involve students in the process of adjusting the curriculum may prove very successful if implemented correctly.

References

Deane, P., Sabatini, J., Feng, G., Sparks, J., Song, Y., Fowles, M.,… Foley, C. (2015). Key practices in the English Language Arts (ELA): Linking learning theory, assessment, and instruction. ETS Research Report Series, 2015(2), 1-29.

Joyce, B., Weil, M., & Calhoun, E. (2015). Models of teaching. Boston, MA: Pearson Education.

Kumral, O. (2014). Philosophical change in education: A desired primary school model of primary school student teachers. International Online Journal of Educational Sciences, 6(3), 524-532.

Noddings, N. (2013). Education and democracy in the 21st century. New York, NY: Teachers College Press.

Pinar, W. F. (2013). International handbook of curriculum research. London, UK: Routledge.

Ravi, S. (2015). Philosophical and sociological bases of education. New Delhi, India: PHI Learning Pvt. Ltd.

Serbati, A. (2015). Implementation of competence-based learning approach: Stories of practices and the tuning contribution to academic innovation. Tuning Journal for Higher Education, 3(1), 19-56.

Tyler, R. W. (2013). Basic principles of curriculum and instruction. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago press.

Hein, G. E. (2017). Constructivist learning theory. Web.

Zappia, S. (2017). The relationship between pragmatism & progressivism in education. Web.