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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
March 13, 2002
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CONTACTS:
Susan Moore Johnson, 617-495-4677
David Kauffman, 617-496-4812
Margaret R. Haas, 617-496-1884
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Research Shows New Teachers
Lack Curriculum for State Standards
Harvard Graduate School of Education
March 13, 2002
A new study of Massachusetts teachers
from researchers at the Harvard Graduate School of Education (HGSE) showed that
even in a state with a highly developed system of standards and accountability,
new teachers were not provided with the curricula they needed to teach to
standards. In their article, “Lost at Sea: New Teachers’ Experiences with
Curriculum and Assessment,” which appears in the current issue of Teachers
College Record, researchers from HGSE’s Project
on the Next Generation of Teachers reported that few of the 50 first- and
second-year teachers who participated in the study began teaching with a clear,
detailed curriculum in hand and even fewer received curricula that aligned with
state standards.
“Many of the teachers—who worked at
all grade levels in both public and charter schools, in urban and suburban
settings—did their best to cobble together lessons on their own, while also
managing the intense demands of the first years of teaching,” says Pforzheimer
Professor Susan
Moore Johnson, director of the Project on the Next Generation of Teachers.
“The absence of a coherent curriculum has implications for student achievement
and teacher retention. Students may learn less than they otherwise might while
many new teachers who could have succeeded with more support may leave teaching
prematurely because of the overwhelming nature of the work and the pain of
failing in the classroom.”
Nineteen of the 50 new teachers—or 38
percent—had the added pressure of teaching subjects and grade levels where the
Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS), the state’s high-stakes
test, was administered. Over two-thirds of the teachers said that the state
assessment affected their instruction, even when students in their grades were
not tested. “The frameworks and high-stakes test introduced pressure without
support and a mandate without materials,” says David Kauffman, first author on
the study.
Findings
 | One-fifth (10) of the new teachers
in the sample described receiving no operational curriculum at all. This
most commonly occurred with secondary teachers and with elementary teachers
in social studies and science.
| Over half (27) of the respondents
encountered a curriculum that specified topics or skills to be taught, but
provided no materials or guidance about how to address them.
| Only 13 teachers in the sample
described having a highly specified curriculum for one or more subjects or
classes. Only two said that they had this level of specification for most
subjects or classes they taught.
| At many schools, the curriculum
frameworks, local standards, or MCAS testing objectives served as a
surrogate for curriculum. The curriculum frameworks described academic
standards students should achieve, but unlike a curriculum, did not include
details about specific content, sequence, instructional materials, or
pedagogical methods.
| When new teachers did have materials
such as textbooks to accompany the curriculum frameworks, they often said
that the two were not aligned; the books and other materials did not cover
the same content as the state’s frameworks.
| Nearly all of the teachers in the
sample appreciated what curricular guidance they had or wished for more.
Even those who were teaching subjects in which they had strong content
knowledge, academic majors, or professional experience reported a need for
guidance about how to convey concepts to students.
| New teachers in schools where
novices and veterans collaborated to develop curriculum reported greater
comfort and clarity. |
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Recommendations
According to researchers at the Project on the Next Generation of Teachers, the
curriculum void needs to be addressed on the state policy level as well as in
terms of curriculum research and development and collaboration around curriculum
at the school site. The researchers make the following suggestions:
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If
state policy establishes standards, it must also address the unique
curriculum needs of new teachers.
If state legislators and officials
accept the premise of standards-based reform, they must take seriously their
responsibility to support its implementation in districts and schools, where
the development of curriculum and instructional materials, both with and for
teachers, and ongoing high-quality professional development are essential.
The point is not to script the classes of new teachers, but rather to
provide them with a basic set of instructional structures, strategies, and
materials so that they can refine their own teaching style and respond
effectively to the varied needs of their students.
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Research
and development is needed to identify effective curriculum that supports new
teachers.
Curriculum materials with detailed
information that supports teachers in making instructional decisions may
help teachers themselves learn about content, pedagogy, and student
learning. Additional research is necessary to evaluate the effectiveness of
existing materials, to better understand the conditions that make the
materials effective, and to develop additional materials in various academic
subject areas.
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School
leaders should support and encourage collaboration around curriculum.
School-based collaboration
between experienced and new teachers around curriculum development would
orient new teachers to their curriculum and help them figure out what to
teach and how to teach it. |
Background
The Project on the Next Generation of
Teachers at the Harvard Graduate School of Education is a multi-year
research project addressing critical questions about the future of our
nation’s teaching force by studying how best to attract, support, and retain
quality teachers in U.S. public schools.
Earlier this year, the Project’s
principal investigator Pforzheimer Professor Susan Moore Johnson, and
researchers Sarah Birkeland, Susan M. Kardos, David Kauffman, Edward Liu, and
Heather G. Peske released a study showing that 43 percent of new teachers do not
anticipate staying in the classroom as full-time teachers for their entire
careers. The findings, part of a study
of first- and second-year teachers in New Jersey, also show that 46 percent
of the state’s new teachers are mid-career entrants to the field, suggesting
that mid-career entrants are becoming teachers in roughly the same numbers as
first-career entrants.
The Project on the Next Generation of
Teachers is funded by the Spencer Foundation.
For More Information
For more information, contact Susan Moore Johnson at 617-495-4677, David
Kauffman at 617-496-4812, or Margaret R. Haas at 617-496-1884 or margaret_haas@harvard.edu.
More information about the ongoing research of the Project on the Next
Generation of Teachers is available at the NGT
web site.
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