K-12 Curriculum Development

The term curriculum has many different meanings.  Before defining the word curriculum, one would have to ask specific questions about the common curriculum, local curriculum, written curriculum and/or taught curriculum.  The definition varies depending on the person you ask and depending on the word or phrase which precedes the term curriculum. 

In most schools, there is a written curriculum, but each teacher creates lesson plans which place emphasis on different parts of the curriculum.  Several teachers believe in student-led curriculum.  Student-led curriculum would allow the teacher to go into depth or alter the curriculum to meet individual or group learning needs and interests.  Marzano defined a 'guaranteed and viable' curriculum, but this is difficult to accomplish (yet, worth the effort). 

One of my favorite quotes on the topic of curriculum is from Allan Glatthorn:

One of the tasks of curriculum leadership is to use the right methods to bring the written, the taught, the supported, and the tested curriculums into closer alignment, so that the learned curriculum is maximized.
- Curriculum Renewal (1987), p. 4.

The word cloud above was created using Wordle.  You can create word clouds for your teacher team or with your students.  Caution should be used when using this tool with students, because there is no way to filter inappropriate language and content on the Wordle search engine and through the Wordle archive.