Approaches to Curriculum and Instruction pg.1

In the following discussion we focus on the ways technology can help teachers as they plan curriculum activities and assess the nature of children's progress in gaining new concepts and skills. We offer a description of ways educators use technology to facilitate the teaching/learning process. Special emphasis is given to discussing how several curriculum approaches --Themes, Project Work, and Emergent Curriculum can all be enriched through the appropriate use of technology by teachers and children.

As the wise woman once said, "There are many paths up the mountain." So are there many paths when planning and implementing curriculum. Each approach offers a unique perspective that identifies an organizational framework and strategies designed to achieve educational goals. Knowledgeable experts write entire books about just one particular curriculum or method of instruction. We offer you a brief summary of several "paths" to refresh your knowledge as you begin your trek. These include Thematic Frameworks, the Project Approach, and Curriculum Webs or Emergent Curriculum

Thematic Frameworks

Using themes to organize instruction for young children has been popular since Dewey first proposed that curriculum relate to real-life experiences. In developing a theme, teachers select topics they believe to be relevant and of interest to children, then build an array of lessons around that central idea. Such activities usually cut across the curriculum and take place either simultaneously or within a specified period of time. Relating activities through a common theme facilitates children's generalization of knowledge and skills from one experience to another (Eliason and Jenkins, 1986; Machado and Meyer, 1984; Kostelnik et al. 1991).

Early childhood educators who use theme planning well, incorporate into their teaching the principles of developmentally appropriate practice as defined by NAEYC. Such principles of practice form the foundation upon which themes can be developed and implemented. Among these principles are:

Added to these optimal instructional strategies, theme teaching helps children develop an overall sense of direction and consolidation in their learning (Hendrick, 1986). Through theme-based teaching children build relationshops among fragments of information in order to form increasingly abstract and complex concepts (Osborn and Osborn, 1983; Bredekamp, 1992).

Concepts are the fundamental building blocks of ideas children form about objects and events in the world. They are the cognitive categories that allow people to group together perceptually distinct information, events, or items (Wellman, 1988). As such concepts form the bases of knowing, thinking and reasoning. Children form concepts deductively through firsthand experiences. When they act upon objects or interact with others, children extract relevant pieces of meaning from each encounter. Through this cumulative process of experiencing, storing information, and testing knowledge children build and modify their understandings of the world around them.