You are entering the doors of the School of Inquiring Minds.

Definition: Engaged, meaningful learning occurs through questioning, reflection, risk taking, searching and evaluating, and synthesizing.

Key Theorists: Vygotsky, Serafini, Keene, Dewey, Kulthau

Epistemology: Knowledge is achieved through high level thinking. Construction of knowledge is active and driven by questions.

Role of Teacher: guide and docent, co-learner

Role of Student: question, reflect, collaborate, engage, pursue

Situatedness of Curriculum: This philosophy exists in the context of the learner.

Metaphor: Doorways open the way to possibilities. We don't always know what's behind the door; sometimes we find the expected, other times the unexpected. What door would will we pick?

Facilitating

Reflect on your sub-area of education (e.g. administration, teaching, consulting, supervision) and how you facilitate the process of curriculum development and implementation.
I think my role as a curriculum consultant facilitates develpment and implementation in two ways, depending on the definition of curriculum.
One of my jobs is to work with teachers to know and understand the provincial curriculum documents. This is a bit of challenge, because of the perception by teachers that they are unrealistic and out of touch with the students. I know that I have had the same thought many times, especially when I was in the classroom. I now look at curricula through a different lens and with more time to think about them and I do believe that the province is creating better documents than in the past. That said, I try to help teachers know the curriculum well enough to sythesize it and simplify it so that it does become a helpful document rather than a cumbersome burden.
Another way of facilitating the curriculum is to challenge teachers to think about what and why they are teaching. Sometimes we get so focused on the what of teaching that we forget about the why.

What is the purpose of education?

I really think this is an important question. As I move about and talk to teachers and educational leaders, I hear a lot of stress. We are asked to take on more and more every year. This year our province is bringing in the first wave of new curricula that ask a shift of us. I believe that if we don't think long and hard about our purpose, we will continue to try and do it all and fail at doing much of it. Not for lack of trying or caring, but for lack of time to come to an understanding of what we are doing.
There are all kinds of statements being made that our students will not be equipped to deal with the world they will live in as adults. We can transfer that to our present world as educators. We are not equipped to move our students into that world. Over my career as a teacher, life has changed. Students are different, parents are different, knowledge is much more abundant and specific. We are asked to teach more and more while being told our student's learning is lagging behind. Yet we still teach the way we were taught, with a few minor adaptations. What are we to do?
Far be it from me to have a answer, but perhaps if we clarified our purpose it would help. If we are told that we need to be clear about outcomes and objectives for the lessons and units we prepare, why would we not also be clear as a profession about our ultimate aim of educating.

Okay, enough of a rant. I'm taking a risk and trying to define what I believe should be the goal of education.

The purpose of education is to teach students to think.

If students know how to think deeply they will become contributing members of society; to care about learning, to care about themselves and others, and to care about the global world.

What is Curriculum?

It's a big question. My first answer is that it's that big binder the people in Regina created for us to follow as we teach a variety of subjects.

As I reflect on my journey of trying to come to a deeper understanding of what is curriculum, I have narrowed it down to one simple statement: Curriculum is the definition of what is taught. So that can mean many things, including the prov. documents previously mentioned. As well it can include the overt, hidden and nulled curriculum introduced to us in class.
The 'simple' statement brings to mind 2 major questions, to which I have few answers.
Does curriculum have anything to do with what is learned?
Who truly makes the decisions of what is taught, not what should be taught, but what actually is taught?