What is commonly called “curriculum work” today is not curriculum work in the proper sense. It is simply the listing of topics to be studied, or the selection and arrangement of study materials. Textbooks, videos, and worksheets are gathered into grade level and subject containers, and this is called a “curriculum.” However, it lacks the essential elements of a true curriculum and is the source of instability and poor outcomes in both schools and homeschools.
A curriculum is a complete course of study designed to allowstudents to fulfill the goals of their education. In education, the curriculun includes goals, objectives, courses, lessons, activities, assessments, reports, and records. It also requires full knowledge of the external requirements that govern education, including state learning standards, college admission expectations, and accreditation criteria. These must be known in advance and used to guide the development of the curriculum at every level so that all of the “real world” obstacles are overcome and the journey is successful.
When this work is done properly, the curriculum is not a collection of topics or resources but a structured system of learning with a clear beginning, middle, and end. It begins with goals. In classical Catholic education, these goals include both modern academic requirements and classical Catholic studies. The program must ensure that students meet all necessary standards while also advancing in philosophy, theology, and the liberal arts. This requires experience, knowledge and skill that very few possess. Thankfully, like a lawgiver ordering a city, only one person needs to be able to do it to lead many to success.
After the goals are established, objectives or intermediate steps are set to lead from one to the next until the end is reached. The goal may be “to gain wisdom”, but all of the steps required for the achievement of that goal must be known and set down in order.
After objectives have been established, tasks must be provided that actually allow the student to move from one objective to the next. An inexperienced teacher cannot provide these tasks because he does not know the way from one objective to the next. These tasks include:
- the lesson content to be studied,
- expositions of that content to ensure it is understood rightly
- assessments to measure a student’s mastery of the lesson content
- records to track the students progress from one objective to the next
All of this work belongs to curriculum development and is the responsibility of the school administration, not teachers or parents.
This task-level work is necessary because study objectives must be completed as efficiently as possible without any unnecessary work wasting time, money or energy. Efficient studies all for the study of a full study program, which includes not only modern requirements but also philosophy, theology, and the liberal arts. When a “curriculum” is poorly arranged, students struggle to complete the minimum requirements. This is common in most schools today.
When this work is done rightly, not only are students given the opportunity to make the greatest possible progress, but curriculum becomes stable. The school administration does all the work and owns the curriculum from the goals down to the individual tasks completed by students: lessons, expositions, quizzes, exams, assignments, grading rubrics, records, etc.. A proper curriculum stabilizes the entire school.
In most schools, what is called “curriculum” is little more than a vague scope and sequence or listing of study materials. Schools leave the most important work to teachers, who are expected to determine what lesson sources are to be used, how lessons will be explained, how students will be assessed, and whether class activities satisfy learning standards. The first problem with this ia that this produces variation in instruction, inconsistency in standards, and uncertainty in outcomes. The second problem is that, with teacher turnover near 30%, this process starts over for a third of the curriculum every year. The third problem, is that unlike finding a single excellent curriculum developer, schools will never find the number of teachers they need to do the work they are expected to do. The teacher-dependent school model is not practicable.
In homeschools, the same responsibility is placed on parents, which is even worse. Parents must select materials, organize them into a course of study, teach the lessons, assess their children’s learning, keep records, and ensure that all requirements are satisfied. This is only possible when the curriculum degenerates into minimum legal standards — especially when multiple children need to be educated. The same flaw is present in schools and homeschools.
The Classical Liberal Arts Academy was developed to eliminate these problems.
Our curriculum is not a collection of interesting topics or resources we think should be learned. It is a complete system of goals, objectives and academic tasks designed to lead a student to the satisfaction of the goals of both classical Catholic and modern studies. The general layout of this curriculum can be read of on our Curriculum page. The task-level details of our curriculum can be seen on the course pages on the Study Center.For example:
Because this curriculum work has been done in advance, students are not dependent on teachers or parents to organize, teach, or assess it. The alignment between content, ability, and objectives is built into the curriculum. Students can focus on completing one task at a time, and parents and teachers can simply focus on helping them do so. If teachers come and go, students remain focused; if parents are distracted, students remain focused.
In the Classical Liberal Arts Academy, the responsibility of curriculum design down to the task level is provided. The curriculum is developed as a complete system, guided by clear goals and known requirements. This produces consistency, efficiency, and stability from the highest level of program design down to the individual lesson. Students are able to work independently within a defined course of study. Requirements are satisfied as work is completed. Progress is measured and recorded. Time is made available for higher studies. The program is not dependent on teachers, or parents. The curriculum is stable and can improve constantly. Best of all, unnecessary expenses are eliminated and education is made affordable for all students.
All of this is possible only when curriculum work is done in the proper sense.
Mr. William C. Michael, O.P.
Headmaster
Classical Liberal Arts Academy
