奈良教育大学学術リポジトリNEAR
Reform Of Curriculum and Method by Educational Technology
著者 Ohta Shizuki
journal or
publication title
Bulletin of Institute for Educational Research of Nara University of Education
volume 19
page range 89‑96
year 1983‑03‑23
URL http://hdl.handle.net/10105/6537
Reform Of Curriculum and Method by Educational Technology Shizuki Ohta
(Department of Education)
I lntroduction
Curriculum and method are always related to each other and they separately do not work effectively. Whatever new curriculum may be developed, it will be only a desk plan without its relevant method. in the same way any method has no clear objectives or con- tents without its relevant curriculum. Thus they must always be considered integratively.
But owing to educational situation at the time, curriculum development may be ahead of method and also the reverse is possible. In any case, personnel organizations and facilities are naturally worth deliberation. Considering the above conditions, the educational techno- logy approach that researches various elements positively and composes them as a system, is necessary for efficient reform of curriculum and method. Various agencies of education are concerned with these matters and in this article the author discusses the problerns which must be dissolved by the agencies.
Recently new media have remarkably developed and had powerfu1 effect on contents and methods of education. For example,learning by broadcast, video taperecorder or com- puter is popularized more and more. This trend wil1 continue further in the future. This ar- ticle, however, considers mainly the problems of curriculum and method development.
II Problems
A varity of new curricula have been developed successively in America and England etc, during 1960-70 (a period of the word-wide development ofcurriculum). Also in Japan, new curricula have been developed under the influence of those situations and promoted ap- proximately in the following process. The Courses of Study are revised by the Mombusho (the Ministry of Education, Science, and Culture) and then new textbooks are made to be suitable for the revised Couses of Study and authorized by the Mombusho. These revisions have been done about every decade since 1958. Teachers generally have been accustomed to accept the central authority rather than strived for the reform of curriculum and method
and also from the fact that the Courses of Study have legal regulation, they resulted in the stiffening and standarization of school curriculum across the country. This is the reform by the governmental leadership, so to speak, `reform from above' which means here the reform imposed from upper agencies. Yasuo Saito (1979) explains that even in USA, in-service edu- cation courses tend to become administrative leadership-centered (i.e. guidance from above).
On the other hand, it is a matter of fact that educational movements by private groups which include the reform of curriculum and method, have arisen as `reform from below' (whjch means here the reform demanded from lower agencies). For example, in opposition to education based upon empiricism after the war which pervaded the whole country in those days, some private groups took more seriously the matter ofbasic achievement and systematic teaching in arithmetic and science educatjon, etc. They have obtained desirable results and have demanded the reforms of curriculum and method regulated by the Courses of Study. The methods and results oftheir researchesbecame the object ofpublic attention but were not reflected immediately on the Couses of Study.
It is necessary that the reform from above and below is suitably geared, namely, the circuit of guidance, practice and evaluation should be established as a circuit of feedback.
However, in the process, the reform from above has been more powerfu1 as yet, holding au- thority of centrai government, conversely, the reform from below has been week because of being local or private. This trend is undoubtedly not efficient and desirable.
III Persormel o!ganizations and educational facilities 1 Personnelorganizations
It is wholly the function of educational technology to reconstruct curriculum and method for attaming the purposes of new systems adjusting necessary conditions. Whether they have functioned effectively or what effect they have brought, must be evaluated posi- tively. There are some cases in which a school or a center practices a project or other cases in which several schools or centers conduct joint experiments. So as to manage the re- searches validly, personnel organizations such as committee, conferance and study meeting must be constructed to function optimally. This is quite similar in research institutes ofcol- leges or in primary schools. School projects generally take about two or three years and meanwhile there are personnel changes among the members every year. Thus the progress of project is eventually delayed. Especially when leaders of the project are changed, the project
itself frequently collapses and its equipment is left unused. In order to avert this, al1 mem- bers should tackle the project with fairy strong will and effort. Ifthey feel compelled to do so, the project study will not last long. Therefore even ifequipmnet is made enough in ad- vance by local government, the project may not succeed without teachers zeal for study, that contains an essential problem for teachers.
2. Educational facilities
There are two kinds of facilities for curriculum and method one for teacher's research
'
and another for pupil's learning.
(1) To what degreee equipment and materials are prepared is important for teachers to study. Particulary for project study, it is necessary to cumulate teaching materials of the past, and also those of other schools and regions. These would be available for teachers if the materials are well organized by subjects, school years and teaching units, but as it is, study rooms equipped with these materials are few. Futhermore what is required ofteachers for studying curriculum and method, is to produce teaching materials by themselves, which are suitable for being simple and not expensive. By repeating experimentally the process of practice, evaluation and improvement of materials, the development of curriculum and method could be possible. Those study rooms are naturally being set up in schools or re- gion, but there are few in reality owing to poor educational finance of local governments.
To supplement them, the educational institute of prefecture or the technology centers of colleges should have more close relationships with schools. For example, the prefectural institute ofeducation has practiced in-service education and exchanged researches with other institutes of the prefecture but the exchanges of personnel and studies between schools and the institute seem insufficient yet despite their efforts because there are generally only one or two institutes in the prefecture.
(2) As a pupil's learning facility, schools have a library in general. In schools as equipped well with audio-visual rooms, pupils are lively using audio-visual aids. Also other schools have a learning source center with abundant materials. In the present state, many schools have still only a library and no librrians yet, making up with substitutes.
Although that is admitted by a law (School Library Law, article 4 and 5) as for awhile, it
means poverty of the educational administration and fmance ( in either nation or local government). In another way, some schools have been provided with facilities 1ike broad- casting rooms and studios. Pupils are engaged in lively broadcasting activities in sehool.
There have emerged here new problems how to balance these facilities between schools or regions, which are also concerned with the admmistration and finance of government.
IV ReformStages
Four Stages of administrative and educational agencies are considered as follow:
1. national stage (the Mombusho)
2. college stage (research institute, educational teclmology center) 3. prefectural stage (board ofeducation, educational institute) 4. school stage
1. National stage
The Mombusho is the national government agency responsible for the educational administration and promotion of curriculum and method. It gives guidance and advice to local educational agencies and encourages schools to study and research. Collecting infor- mation about the nation-wide problems of education and the research outcomes, the Mombusho reflects them into its administration. It had once conducted by itself pulils' scholastic achievments of primary and secondary schools in the nation-wide scale for the promotion of its administration of curriculum every year (1956-65). As above mentioned, educational contents tend to be nationally controlled and standardized, but needless to say, education and research should be fundamentally liberal and not be restricted by the govern- ments (Nagao, 1982). There was once after the war a period of very active study of cur- riculum development when it seemed natural for teachers to organize the curricula on their own initiatives. Even now such vitality is being required ofteachers.
2. College stage
That teachers colleges themselves have research or training institutes and courses, is characteristic of this stage. In a short term prospect they enforces in-service education and in a long term prospect, they research the problem and method building up desirable teach- erers. Recently in the lectures of subject teaching method or study of teaching materials, students are exercising how to use some kinds ofeducational media and how to make teach- ing materials. But large troubles are about student teaching. Ingeneral, student teachers are being trained only once for 4-6 weeks before graduation in the attached school of the college or several cooperative schools. It has become more difficult to train students as a teacher with necessary competence for such a short period. It is for the reason that mutual cooperation between the college and schools is not close and the college is usually overload- ing schools and many student teachers are put in each class in spite ofthe lack ofpersonnel and equipment in the schools.
Educational technology centers research the reformation of student teaching as one of their works. Those centers have equipment of CCTV connected with the attached schools and have an advantage of observation and analysis of classroom teaching. Regarding student teaching, micro-teaching study has been stil1 more promoted. But in any centers they are suffered from lack of fu11 time teachers and they are assisted by teachers interested in micro- teaching. If these situations would continue, centers could not function effectively. But if study teams consisted of teachers of college and cooperative schools, use the centers' media systematically, provide a training course by microteaching and integrate them with student teaching curriculurn, they could probably improve student teaching (Ota, 1981). The
student teaching curriculum which is being practiced in colleges in European countries for a long term every year, is nearly impossible in our country, because our students must obtain many credits regulated by the Educational Personnel Certification Law. Thus they can not have sufficient training period and cooperative schools are not prepared enough to receive those students. This is the nation-wide, important task in teachers colleges with regard to teachertraining.
3. Prefectural stage
What characterizes this stage is that prefectural boards of education as administrative agency, guide, 'assist and entrust study to schools and also have educational institutes for research and teacher training. Both the boards of education and institutes always make a summary of various educational problems in the prefecture and promote reform of cur- riculum and method in schools. Local agencies, unlike national one, maintain closer re- lationship with personnel in regions and render more actual services to solve problems. The local boards of education are responsible for personnel management and budget of each school and here have a certain danger of reinforcing the reform to schools (i.e. reform from above). Therefore teachers always study and practice of their own accord, namely, reform from below is expected. The Mombusho itself points out the necessity of teachers' origi- nality in study of their classroom teaching.
4. School stage
Schools are the most concret and practical fields for curriculum and method develop- ment. Any theory of education must be applicable to classroom teaching and be evaluated there. Thus schools need to be worthy of study system and teachers have to demonstrate their originality. Also prefectural and municipal boards ofeducation should suport schools for their fmance and equipment. Especially the policy of municipal government that can control schools' actual fmance, exert a great influence on schools. In general the most acti- vely the municipal government has interest in school education, the more sufficiently schools are equipped. 'IThese are not always the cases ofbig citiesbut ofsmal1 local towns.
More important is that the study by a school affects others and its results are refiected in the administration, involving feedback to the school itself. Every year every school has publish- ed so many research results, but it is a question whether such an feedback circuit is fu11y organized. First ofall, schools reflect on their classroom teaching and then report the results to municipal and prefectual boards of education. Just by such a close corresponding circuit between guidance by administration and practice evaluation by schools, curriculum and method could be promoted. In fact supervisors ofprefectural boards ofeducation are visit- ing schools to guide and assisit their problem-solving. On account oflack of supervisors there are anyway nothingbut to expect spontaneous activities ofteachers. After al1 the pro- blem is whether teachers colleges could educate such teachers with positive attitude and ability to study. Thus the problems of teacher training are considered as the common theme of each stage.
5. Teacher training
The central actors to study development of curriculum and method are teachers. The study could be promoted by active and creative teachers and their groups. Therefore it is necessary to train teachers as experts of curriculum and method. Generally in our country, however, teachers' speciality means the one ofa subject regulated by the law and the special- ity of curriculum and method is not admitted. Also in teachers colleges, it is not sufficient to mstruct most students for this kind of specialist in spite of much emphasis on it (Nagao, 1982). Generally the course of student teaching consists of training to analyze and inter-
pret teaching materials in each subject and oftraining to acquire teaching skills. According- ly, it is natural that when newly recruited teachers take charge of classroom, they will face the actual problems of curriculum and method for the fust time and be troubled with them.
Then it is too late for teachers to solve them, which shows a serious theme ofteachers col- leges hereafter.
6. Broadcast education
As a concrete example in relation with the problems of each stage mentioned above, broadcast edueation is considered in the following.
In our broadcasting system. NHK is the only educationa1 broadcasting station and monopolizes channels of educationa1 radio and TV programs in the position of public broad- casting. NHK broadcasts over the nation-wide network but in several prefectures the boards of education participate in commercial broadcast and produce their own educational pro- grams which are closely adapted to meet the needs of schools and regions in the prefecture.
Besides there are a few CATV that are established by municipalties. They were essentially the ones to dissolve trouble reception areas on TV, but now they have become much more significant media for people and schools to produce their own programs. It means that CATV is an effective medium in current information society for people to appeal the reform of their life and region.
As stil1 smaller broadcast, almost all schools have studios and pupils are working for collecting learning data and producing programs on their daily school life. These pupils' ac- tivities are spontaneous learning which makes the most of broadcasting media. Thus teach- ers must study the curriculum and•method to develop such pupils' ability and further pro- mote the reform ofschool education (Turner, 1970. Gillespie, 1980).
From the above stated, the studies and practices of broadcast education are devided into four stages as foliowing: (1) national stage (NHK), (2) prefectural stage (UHF-TV in prefecture), (3) regional stage (CATV), (4) school stage (CCTV).
Unlike stages in educational agencies, there is no relation ofleadership from above to below between these stages on broadcast. From each stage broadcast, various programs are offered to schools. Educational information received by schools are surely abundant.
Therefore how to use broadcasting media is very important for teachers and pupils to build up as new ability in information society.
In the process of broadcast education, evaluation data on programs is sent back to broadcasting station by two kinds of feed back systems:
(1) Study meetings at each stage are held annually and their data is reported from local to central broadcasting station.
(2) Local or ntional program councils arrange the opinions of teachers who are using programs as teaching aids and the information is exchanged widely in regions and nation. It should be careful that a easy use of broadcasting aids tends to make school curriculum uni- form 1ike the case of using textbooks in classroom teaching. In home life, TV hasbecome excellent medium of collecting information and also of learning at the same time. So in schools too, the study for the development of multiple use of TV is expected.
V. Phasesofevaluation
Corresponding to development of curriculurn and method, administrative and educa- tional agencies at each stage above-mentioned, have to evaluate themselves respectively and their results are reflected on next practives and on other agencies. It seems that this process has been treated somewhat lightly so far, that is, circuit of feedback has not been fully or-
ganized, which would be examined in the following. Derek Rowntree (1976) explains micro
and macro evaluation in the teaching precess, but in this paper phases ofevaluation are taken up in three types: administration, study and practice phases.
1. Administrationphase
As evaluation in national stage, the Mornbusho requires information suitable for the purpose to reform the Coursesof Study. It grasps the total state and the trend ofproblems in various conditions. Prefectural boards of educaiton collect the data practiced by schools and grasp the situation ofutilizing curriculum and method. The boards of education denote anually main guidance objectives of education in the prefecture and require formative and summative evaluation, not to tend in an empty talk, and then reflect them on the adminis- tration next year. The Mombusho can indicates the national standard but can not guide directly school practices, while prefectural board of education have advatage ofbeing able to guide and assist schools concretely.
2. Study phase
New curricula have been enforced for schools throughout the country with the reform of the Courses of Study since 1981 and schools are working hard for taking the necessary measures at present. The education center of prefecture is charged directly with study and guidance for schools. For example, it holds training meetings for teachers ofkindergartens, elementary and secondary schools about a hundred times anually (Nara Prefecture, 1982).
Also the center itself has sutdy project, and further makes a summary ofvarious studies of schools, results of which are reflected on its curriculum of in-service education. Then really concrete feedback circuit ofpractice and evaluation is materialized.
3. Practicephase
Teachers have three functions, namely, to practice, study and evaluate their own classroom teaching, which make the shortest feedback circuit. That the Courses of Study could be practiced and evaluated in school stage for the first time, shows strong expect for teachers to assume the responsibility. The evaluation in school must be reflected through feedback circuit on prefectural and national agencies and be generalized gradually. Evalu- ation is not so simple as it ends at once, for the purpose could not always be achieved so easily. It needs to be repeated and revised adjusting the problems in the process. How to make the most of evaluation in feedback circuiti is important for next activity. Neverthless teachers are surprisingly unconcerned and negligent of it so far, that demands reconsidera- tion for them. Yasuo Saito (1979) points out that in USA, teachers themselves have begun self-government for the study and evaluation on in-service education.
VI. Summary
The present state of education and the problems of curriculum and method are con- siderd. The reforms from and below are adoptted contrastively and personnel organizations and facilities are regarded as important conditions. Four stages about practice and evalua- tion, namely, national, college, prefectural and school stages, are considered from the point of view of educational technology. As a concrete example, broadcast education is taken up.
Just teachers are in the chief point of intergrating curriculum and method. How to train such teachers in colleges is discussed. Regarding to evaluation, it is stated that large or smal1 feedback circuit between agriecies of administration, education and research must be system- atized and the question how to reinforce the circuit is indicated as the reform from above exerts strong influence on lower agencies and feedb ack from below is week.
References
Educational Center ofNara Prefecture, (1982) A Report of Educational Center, Mar. 1982 Gillespie, J. (1980) Media Resources in Curriculum Develpment, Scottish Council forEdu- cational Technology, pp 15-16
Ministry of Education, Science and Culture. (1981) Mombusho, p 21
Nagao, M. (1982) `Reformation of Teacher Education -,An Interim Report of Research Committee for Teacher Education' - Japanese Journal of Educational Research, vol.
49-2, p56, p57
Ota, S. (1981) `Aii Analysis ofMicroteaching in Classroom', Bulleting ofNara University of Education, Vol. 30-1, pp 161-176
Rowntree, D. (1976) Educational Technology in Curriculum Development, pp 130-133, Harper & Row, London
Saito, U. (1979) `In-Service Teacher Education in the United States', Japanese Journal of Educational Research, Vol. 46-1, p 35, pp 37-38
Turner, P. & Atkinson, CRM (1970) An Expriment in Closed-Circuit Television at Mill- field school, National Committee for Audio-Visual Aids in Education, p13
