Facilitating curriculum changes in school

Facilitating curriculum changes in school Whole school development & the role of school principal

Group discussion • In your school, what are the major difficulties you have encountered in curriculum improvement? • How does the school authority tackle them? • Time: 20 minutes

Values and beliefs • People uphold different values and beliefs: • aims and goals of education • means of education • willingness to involve • etc. • This variation: not only the societal level • also in school (see for example, Finnan & Levin, 2000)

Reflection • Many researches indicate the existence of school culture (Hargreaves, Sarason etc.) • At the school level, it is not difficult to identify some distinctive cultural traits, particularly in well-established schools • But do teachers all agree with the values and beliefs of the “dominant school culture”? • What is your observation?

Such differences among sub-groups in school can also be found in societal level. • Chinese culture: • do all the chinese uphold the same values and beliefs in all areas?

The concept of culture, whether used to describe schools or larger societies is not easy to define. It is something that surrounds us, gives meaning to our world and is constantly being constructed both through our interactions with others and through our reflections on life and our world. Culture is so implicit in what we do that it dulls our knowledge that it is there. (Finnan &Levin, 2000, p.88)

The seemingly contradictory fact that culture is both conservative and ever changing. On the one hand, culture is essentially conservative, protecting people from that unknown, providing answers to what would otherwise be unanswerable. On the other hand, culture is also ever changing. It adapts to influences from other cultures and from changes in the physical, social and political environment. (Finnan &Levin, 2000, p.88)

At the societal, school culture is more appropriately termed the culture of schooling. It is at this level that culture appears to be most conservative and resistant to change, because it exists primarily at an abstract, generalized level. The culture of schooling creates and perpetuates the image members of our society call forth when they think of education, schools and schooling. (Finnan &Levin, 2000, p.89)

The shared culture of schooling is responsible for the stability is the size and design of classrooms, in the persistence of school activities and practices that have characterized schooling since the beginning of the twentieth century and in the egg crate structure vividly described by Lortie. The culture of schooling perpetuates a view of schooling in which teachers are responsible for the transmission of knowledge and culture and for shaping the minds of children. For this reason, the public is most comfortable when the teaching’learning process is dominated by a teacher and textbooks. Many people assume that learning can occur only when the teacher orchestrates it from the front of the class. (Finnan &Levin, 2000, p.89)

We use the term “school culture” to describe the unique culture of each school; this is culture at the local level. A school’s culture accounts for why it feels, looks, sounds and smells different from any otherschool. (Finnan &Levin, 2000, p.89-90)

Unlike the culture of schooling, school culture is constantly changing. It accommodates a continuous influx of new people (administrators, faculty, students, parents), new directives from the district and from state and federal agencies, and new directions recommended by professional organizations, institutions of higher education and unions. School cultures may not change in the ways external change agents want, but they dochange. (Finnan &Levin, 2000, p.90)

Teachers and administrators working in schools serving at-risk children often feel inferior to their colleagues in more affluent school. (Finnan &Levin, 2000, p.91)

In many schools, the culture allows for considerable variation among teachers on how and what to teach. This does not usually arise from a respect for diverse teaching strategies but from limited discourse among teachers and a lack of communication with parents on effective teaching. (Finnan &Levin, 2000, p.92)

Teachers and administrators often actively and passively resist externally imposed change because the proposed changes do not fit their school culture, are not well designed or are not presented in an understandable way. There are schools, however, that encourage and foster change and continuous improvement, especially if the change build on the strengths of the existing school culture. (Finnan &Levin, 2000, p.92)

But individuals who join the school as staff, parents and students also have personal histories which reinforce school culture through self-selection. The involvement of participants in a school is hardly a random event. Students from fairly homogeneous and neighborhoods attend schools that reflect community values, aspirations and expectation. Even when choosing public schools outside their neighborhoods and private schools, families select school environments that reinforce their beliefs about what schools should do. School staff to choose environment and practices that they feel most attracted to and comfortable with. (Finnan &Levin, 2000, p.92)

It is important to acknowledge school culture explicitly because it has consequences for both stability and change. We have emphasized the stability and conserving nature of school culture, in that it is like a vast web of intricate and interlocking ideas, values, beliefs and practices that protect the school from change. Both societally and locally it protects participants from external pressures for change because of its comprehensive and ubiquitous nature. Pressures for change tend to be piecemeal can only pierce a small part of this protective web, while the vast remainder remains intact. In this respect school culture serves as a barrier to change and effectively fends off attempts to transform the school. (Finnan &Levin, 2000, p.93)

Micropolitics in schools • So far we have only discussed the problem of cultural differences. • In reality, politics in school may further aggravate the problem. • For details, we can look at the work by Ball (1987), Henderson & Hawthorne (2000) also

Conflicts: • originated from • ideological differences • "refer to matters of value and philosophical commitment." • vested interest • "refer to the material concerns of teachers as related to working conditions: rewards from work, career and promotion; access to and control of resources in the school

Conflicts: • self interest: • "refer to the sense of self or identity claimed or aspired to by the teacher, the sort of teacher a person believes themselves to be or want to be (e.g. subject specialist, educator, pastoralist, administrator." (Ball, 1987, p.17)

Key concepts of the micro-political perspective • power • goal diversity • ideological disputation • conflict • interests • political activity • control (Ball, 1987)

Conflict perspective Baldridge (1971): main tenets: 1. conflict theorists emphasizes the fragmentation of social systems into interest gps. each with its own particular goals 2. conflict theorists study the interaction of these dif. interest gps. and esp. the conflict processes by which one gp. tries to gain adv, over another

Conflict perspective 3. interest gps. cluster around divergent values and the study of conflicting interests is a key part of the analysis 4. the study of change is a central feature of the conflict approach, for change is to be expected if the social sys. is fragmented by divergent values and conflicting interest gps. (Ball, 1987, p.18)

School: An arena of struggle • actual or potential conflict between members • conflicts: because of ideological differences, vested interests, self-interest • maintaining control and resolve the conflicts: no fixed pattern • partly because school: peculiar char. (Collins) • & structure: loose, poorly coordinated

Action and decision-making in school • not an abstract rational process • involve • compromise • negotiations • trade-offs • threats • pressure • underhand dealing (Ball, 1987, p.26)

How could schools survive? • If we agree that there are significant differences among school members, particularly teachers, & • If teachers’ beliefs contradict, the whole school may fall apart. • However, most schools have not reached that level. • Why?

Goals of education: abstract, varied and diversified • So many educational decisions are value-laden and ideological • Differences between depts and among teachers ~ ideological foundation • "In the normal course of events such differences are obscured or submerged in the welter of routine activities and interaction.“ • & also the loose-coupling structure

Structure of school • "Anarchic organization" • "It is anarchic in the sense that the relationship between goals, members and technology is not as clearly functional as conventional organization theory indicates that it will be." (Bell, 1980, p.187) (Ball, 1987, p.12)

However, at times of crisis or change, or in moments of reflection (occasional days, staff or dept. meetings). straightforward points of contention over practice can quickly lay bare deep divisions in teaching ideology.” (Ball, 1987, p.14) • "The ideological diversity of schools is frequently contained by a deliberate policy of loose-coupling. Depts. or other sub-units... are left to their own devices.” (p.15)

School principal:Important role

The importance of principal in school success • Hall et al. (1987): principal : crucial to success • Mortimore et al. (1988): longitudinal study of 50 schools in England: • single out 'purposeful leadership of the staff by the headteacher" : key in schools found to be effective on a variety of academic and non-academic criteria. • "In short, the school principal more than anyone else can bring successful school improvement into sharp focus.” Fullan, 1992, p.96

The importance of principal in school success "We have begun to make the transition fr. the principal's role in influencing the impl. of specific innovations to the principal's role in leading changes in 'the school as an organization'. The implication is that we have to look deeper and more holistically at the principal and the school as an organization." (Fullan ,1992, p.84-5)

Role of managers • Plan: deciding what to do & how to do it • Organise: arranging resources the best way • Direct: Motivating people to work well • Control: Measuring performance & cost • Which of the above roles are most important?

Principals: Many roles • change agent • pressure regulator • morale booster • resource supplier • climate generator

Principal: manager of operation: • major concern: smooth functioning of the building • spend more time in their office than in corridors and classrooms, attend numerous meetings outside of the building, remove themselves from the daily concerns of movt. of students and life in classrooms and establish social distance from the faculty Lieberman & Miller, 1984, p.55

Principal: • leader of instruction: • encourage instructional excellence, visit classroom, talk with teachers about heir teaching concerns, initiate program review and revitalization • active participant in the life of the school

Principal's commitment to curr. work • "... few educational roles are less clearly defined than that of the principal. He is continually barraged by a series of uncoordinated and often contradictory sets of expectations fr. dif. groups from within and outside his own school community.” (Ross, 1980, p.219) • "Research consistently found that a large percentage of principals (at least one-half) were preoccupied with adm. work and organizational maintenance activities.” (Fullan, 1984, p.100)

Management styles Four types: • *interpersonal • *managerial • adversarial • authoritarian (Ball, 1987, p.87)

Interpersonal head: "rely primarily on personal relationships and face-to- face contact to fulfill their role" Managerial head: "have major recourse to committees, memoranda and formal procedures" Adversarial head: "tends to relish argument and confrontation to maintain control"

Authoritarian head: • "avoids and stifles argument in favour of dictat" (Ball, 1987, p.87) • "An understanding of the way that schools change (or stay the same) and therefore of the practical limits and possibilities of educational devt., must take account of intra-organization process." (Ball, 1987, p.3)

Interpersonal • mobile and visible head • personal interaction, face to face contact • individual negotiation and compromises • informality • communication does not flow through a formal hierarchy • staff members are encouraged to think of themselves as autonomous professionals • set up a sense of mutual obligation, loyalty, consideration

Interpersonal weaknesses: • the decision-making mechanism comes to be seen as an elusive and mysterious process as inaccessible and behind doors • absence of structure, procedures and methods • the divine right of heads • to make it successful, headteacher needs to have excellent social skills • "charisma" (Ball, 1987)

Managerial • industrial manager • the head, normally surrounded by a senior management team • formal structure of meetings and committees • supported and outlined by written communication • educational concerns also formally defined bureaucratic • information and inf. flow thr. the formal channels and structures

Adversarial • rests primarily upon the vehicle of talk • crucial areas of talk are public rather than private • emphasis on dialogue and not infrequently on confrontation • competing interests and ideologies in the school: recognized

Adversarial • emphasis is upon persuasion and commitment • success depends on the ability of the head to cope with the uncertainties of the relatively unorganized public debate i.e. to deal with attacks, to persuade waverers, to provide reasoned argument etc. • allies must be encouraged, at times rewarded; opponents: neutralized or satisfied, as the occasion demands

Authoritarian • assert • statement • opposition is avoided, disabled or simply ignored • to reduce talk to a one-way flow

Char. of principal's work 1. A low no. of self-initiated tasks 2. Many activities of short duration 3. Discontinuity caused by interruptions 4. The superseding of prior plans by the needs of others in the organization 5. Face-to-face verbal contacts with one other person 6. Variability of tasks

Char. of principal's work 7. An extensive network of individuals and groups 8. A hectic and unpredictable flow of work 9. Numerous unimpt. decisions and trivial agendas 10.Few attempts at written communication 11.Interactions predominately with subordinates 12.A preference for problems an information that are specific (rather than general), concrete, solvable and currently pressing (Pitner, 1982; Mannasse, 1985, 442)

Basic dilemma of headteacher • maintenance of pol. stability within the organization • achieve control (domination) & commitment (integration) • The 4 leadership styles are all means to this end. • The stability may be dynamic and radical (adversorial mode) or static and conservative (authoritarian mode) • Stability may be emphasized in terms of community and relationship (interpersonal mode) or in terms of structures, roles, and procedures ( Ball, 1987, p.120)

Teacher's autonomy • a major compromise between freedom and control • it may be an illusion of freedom • as teacher's autonomy is interpreted as limited to classroom business • this limits the range of concerns over which the teacher can exercise influence

Advice from curriculum change theorists • Hargreaves, 1995 • Hargreaves, 1998 • Glatthorn, 1997 • Henderson & Hawthorne, 2000 • Blasé & Blasé, 1998 • Sarason, 1996 • Nias et al. 1992

Facilitating curriculum changes in school