How Do External Experts Facilitate Collaborative Curriculum Development? Identifying Strategies for School Improvement in Practices

• In Event: Sheraton Roundtable Session Ten
  In Roundtable Session: School-Based Initiatives: Supporting and Retaining Teachers (Table 4)

Abstract

This paper investigates external experts’ perspectives on how they facilitate collaborative curriculum development (CCD). Interview data were collected from seven external experts who facilitated 20 teacher teams to design and implement one or more school-developed, interdisciplinary curricula in recent national curriculum reform in Taiwan. In order to facilitate CCD in the different school contexts, we identify proactive, reactive, and inactive patterns in six strategies: knowledge empowerment, curriculum orientation, process intervention, team building, project management, and culture transformation, from experts’ reflections on their practices. We found that experts utilized all the strategies and adjusted patterns in each strategy based on the needs of teacher teams. Implications for expert-facilitated school improvement practices are discussed.

Author

• Yi-Chih Chiang, Michigan State University
  Presenting Author