A Study Guide for Curriculum 21: Essential Education for a Changing World

Most of the questions contained in this study guide are ones you can think about on your own, but you might consider pairing with a colleague or forming a study group with others who have read (or are reading) Curriculum 21: Essential Education for a Changing World.

Chapter 1: A New Essential Curriculum for a New Time

Heidi Hayes Jacobs

1. How might we determine the year that we are preparing our learners for? What years should we be preparing them for?
2. What evidence do we see in our classrooms of preparation for ongoing and thoughtful curriculum and instruction?
3. What do we need to know as a faculty to prepare our students for the future?
4. Are there myths at play affecting our faculty and administration that hold us back from more bold and needed action? Our parents? Our students?

Chapter 2: Upgrading the Curriculum: 21^st Century Assessment Types and Skills

Heidi Hayes Jacobs

1. What assessments and skills do we value on our local level?
2. Might we consider the 21st Century Pledge (see pp. 22-23) as a way to begin to upgrade a unit at a time?
3. What resources do we have in our schools and community that are underutilized?
4. What Web 2.0 or technology tools might we add to our school's instructional arsenal?

Chapter 3: Upgrading Content: Provocation, Invigoration, and Replacement

Heidi Hayes Jacobs

1. What makes content such a challenging area to upgrade?
2. What specific subjects are begging for attention and seem dated to our staff and our learners?
3. Is the possibility of purposeful provocation useful as a means to get out of our subject matter ruts?
4. Could our study group choose one subject and go through the process of reviewing it to upgrade and to replace content?

Chapter 4: New School Versions: Reinventing and Reuniting School Program Structures

Heidi Hayes Jacobs

1. How does our school setting show growth from past models of what school used to look like? Do we need to update where we are? How?
2. How does our school or setting reflect the axiom of form should follow function?
3. What is the interplay and connection among form, program structures, schedules, grouping of students, grouping of professionals, and space? Is it evident in our setting? Should and could that be changed? How?
4. How might we expand each of the structures (schedules, grouping of learners, grouping of professionals, and virtual and physical space) and connect them to one another to begin to create a better version of our school setting?

Chapter 5: Five Socio-Economic Trends That Change Everything in Learning and Teaching

Stephen Wilmarth

1. In what ways has technology has changed the socialization of our students since our student days? Since our student-teaching days?
2. How do we see technology affect how our students access and generation of knowledge? How does technology affect how we access knowledge?
3. How do we see technology changing our professional networks and knowledge?
4. How might we as a faculty or leadership team embrace these trends productively?

Chapter 6: A Classroom as Wide as the World

Vivien Stewart

1. How can each teacher personalize the global experience for his or her learners?
2. How can our school and our teachers bring global perspectives directly into each subject and classroom?
3. How can we share the necessity for globalizing curriculum and instruction to our larger community, school board, and parents?
4. What is the importance of world language instruction in our specific location?

Chapter 7: Making Learning Irresistible: Extending the Journey of Mabry Middle School Tim Tyson

1. What are the underlying motivations and actions that helped Mabry Middle School make learning irresistible? Are these ideas applicable to your school? How? Are there motivators that work better for your students and staff?
2. Does the author draw lessons from the band and orchestra classes at his school that are pertinent to your school setting? Specify.
3. What leadership qualities are used on both the programmatic and personal level to enable the faculty to thrive? Would those work for you and your staff? What would work better for your leadership and community?
4. How has the film festival and movie making work helped students take more ownership of learning? Is it possible to inject this work into your setting?

Chapter 8: Media Literacy: 21st Century Literacy Skills

Frank W. Baker

1. How can we help our learners realize that that "all media messages are constructed"?
2. What are the implications for the K–12 curriculum when media literacy includes both analysis of media messages and production of media messages?
3. What are the specific implications for media literacy in each discipline? In interdisciplinary projects?
4. How can we help students wrestle with media issues such as plagiarism, censorship, and cyber bullying?

Chapter 9: Digital Portfolios and Curriculum Maps: Linking Teacher and Student Work

David Niguidula

1. Are there restrictions inherent to the forms of student assessment that we use in our school? What are those restrictions? How can we move beyond those restrictions?
2. How might digital portfolios allow our learners and teachers improve the long-term motivation and self-knowledge of our learners?
3. How does the work with digital portfolios affect curriculum decision-making?
4. The author states, "Portfolios can be used to create an ongoing dialogue between students and teachers." How could such a conversation improve performance at your school?

Chapter 10: Educating for a Sustainable Future

Jaimie P. Cloud

1. How can our school setting address what the author calls the "upstream problem"?
2. How can we create a foundation with our specific constituents (students, professionals, parents, community) to educate for sustainability?
3. What might sustainable curriculum and assessment look like for our specific community at each level, K–12?
4. How might we inject and upgrade curriculum content across disciplines with an emphasis on sustainability?

Chapter 11: Power Down or Power Up?

Alan November

1. How is the "disruptive" force of technologies and digital tools transforming teaching and learning?
2. How do the professionals in our school perceive this force? Explore the different attitudes by professional level and experience.
3. How can we develop new roles for professionals in our school setting so that we all become more comfortable and empowered?
4. How can our students make rigorous and meaningful contributions to the school and to their own education?

Chapter 12: Creating Learning Connections with Today's Tech-Savvy Student

Bill Sheskey

1. As a classroom teacher, how does the author's changing perceptions about the savvy student match your faculty's perceptions?
2. How might we help our faculty have "the light go on" through the use of a salient use of a piece of hardware (video podcasting camera) to a Web 2.0 site?
3. How can our professional staff revise its instructional style and approach to match the digital child arriving each day?
4. How might we use social networks for our own professional growth? How might we use social networks to stimulate the growth and knowledge of our learners?

Chapter 13: It Takes Some Getting Used To: Rethinking Curriculum for the 21st Century

Arthur L. Costa and Bena Kallick

1. Which specific 21st century curriculum and instruction transitions will take "some getting used to" for faculty, administrators, and students?
2. Are there specific Habits of Minds (from the list of 16 habits, pp. 212–213) that need cultivation in your school community to make the transition into the 21st century?
3. How can you support these habits of mind? What will use and support look like in practice?
4. What do the authors mean by changing our "mental model" in terms of planning and communicating in schools? What mental model is dominant now?

General Suggestions

1. Make a commitment that at the start of each meeting (whether faculty, department, grade level, or team), at least one member of the group will share a "new" 21^st century strategy or tip. Whether it is a Web 2.0 application or a new software program, this habit of sharing will prove contagious with the faculty.
2. Create a Curriculum 21 task force to begin the "one" upgrade a semester challenge. Ask each teacher and administrator to replace a dated content, skill, and/or assessment in his or her work with a modern approach.
3. Create a social network (NING) for your school faculty and Curriculum 21 team to share resources, ideas, and discoveries. Consider posting responses to this study guide as well.
4. Continue your professional development and responses to this book with additional readings and share your thoughts in a series of graphic organizers using software tools or open applications. Your responses can be focused on practical next steps such as establishing a mission statement for learning or professional development.
5. Create a Curriculum 21 strategic planning team to begin long-range plans for developing a new type of school. Include research on each of the four program structures that discussed in Chapter 4. Develop a set of several possible adjustments that could serve as a viable new direction for the school over the next three to eight years.

Curriculum 21: Essential Education for a Changing World was edited by Heidi Hayes Jacobs. This 250-page, 6" x 9" book (Stock #109008; ISBN-13: 978-1-4166-0940-7) is available from ASCD for $20.95 (ASCD member) or $26.95 (nonmember). Copyright © 2010 by ASCD. To order a copy, call ASCD at 1-800-933-2723 (in Virginia 1-703-578-9600) and press 2 for the Service Center. Or buy the book from ASCD's Online Store.