Kansas Curriculum Document Analysis

How is the curriculum Documented? The Science pacing guide for Kansas City Kansas school districts science curriculum is developed around the Next Generation Science Standards. These standards are based upon three main ideas, Science and engineering practices, Disciplinary core ideas, and the cross-cutting concepts. These standards are made up of what the next generation science standards website (2013) states as, “Performance expectations are the assessable statements of what students should know and be able to do,” (p.1). There are four topics discussed throughout the curriculum document these include Engineering, Earth Science, Space Science, Physical Science, and Life science. Each topic is portioned out into a topic arrangement. In this

Two of these concepts I find very evident in my chosen curriculum document. These two concepts are Scope and sequence, and standards. Posner (2003) defines scope and sequence as, “a document listing the intended learning outcomes in each grade level, thereby giving the sequence of the curriculum; the outcomes are grouped according to topic, theme or dimension, thereby giving the scope of the curriculum” (p.6). The Kindergarten science pacing guide for the Kansas City Kansas School district is mapped out to look like the elements of scope and sequence. It gives teachers an outline of what order topics should be taught in and when they should be taught by. It also gives the big ideas and crosscutting concepts, unit plan, science performance task, online resources, and learning goals aligned with each projected topic. As for the standards part of this document, each standard is included throughout the document that are taken from the next generation science standards. Along with the science specific standards are common core standards that are crosscutting concepts incorporated into the curriculum as

The science pacing guide is made up of the Next Generation Science Standards, as stated before, so I needed to find out who developed these standards first. As stated on the Next Generation Science standards website, “he development of the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) was a state-led effort. In addition to states, the National Research Council (NRC), the National Science Teachers Association (NSTA), the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), and other critical partners were active in the development and review of the NGSS and will continue to provide significant support to states as they consider adoption and implementation of the standards. Writing and review teams consisted of K–12 teachers, state science and policy staff, higher education faculty, scientists, engineers, cognitive scientists, and business leaders. Achieve managed the development process on behalf of the lead states” (FAQs page). As you can see I did not find specific people but I was able to find the major contributing body’s of people who contributed to the development of these standards. It seems to be a range of people from outside the educational field to actual teachers in the classroom. I found this to be very interesting make up a development