Interdisciplinary Approaches To Curriculum

This book explores interdisciplinary approaches to animal-focused curriculum and pedagogy in environmental education, with an emphasis on integrating methods from the arts, humanities, and natural and social sciences. Each chapter, whether addressing curriculum, pedagogy, or both, engages with the extant literature in environmental education and other relevant fields to consider how interdisciplinary curricular and pedagogical practices shed new light on our understandings of and ethical/moral obligations to animals. Embracing theories like intersectionality, posthumanism, Indigenous cosmologies, and significant life experiences, and considering topics such as equine training, meat consumption and production, urban human-animal relationships, and zoos and aquariums, the chapters collectively contribute to the field by foregrounding the lives of animals. The volume purposefully steps forward from the historical marginalization of animals in educational research and practice.

For undergraduate/graduate-level courses in Interdisciplinary Methods in Elementary and/or Middle School or Thematic Instruction, or a supplement to a Math, Science, or Social Studies Methods course. Building on current teaching philosophies and strategies, this text covers the what and how of developing techniques for exploring interdisciplinary connections across the curriculum using thematic units. User friendly in approach, it provides a principles-based perspective, step-by-step "how-to" guidelines from planning, to implementation, to evaluation and 10 detailed example application units with classroom-tested materials that can be used immediately with students.

Originally published as a special issue of the Middle School Journal, this book presents integrative curriculum as a foundational element of the middle school. By addressing the current gap in literature on curriculum integration in the middle grades, this text explores how learning can be organized around authentic concepts or questions which cut across disciplines and speak to young adolescents. Providing a current, nuanced, and comprehensive review of what it means to embrace and implement an interdisciplinary and integrative curriculum, the volume considers how educators can create and deliver a high-quality integrative curriculum which is enjoyable, challenging, and inclusive. Examples of implementation in teacher preparation programs and middle grade classrooms showcase integrative approaches and illustrate how curricula have been key in tackling social inequities, increasing engagement with STEM, and supporting collaboration. This text will be of great interest to graduate and postgraduate students, researchers, academics and libraries in the field of Middle School Education, Curriculum Studies, Teacher Education, Theories of Learning, and STEM Education.

Explore the two important criteria to which every interdisciplinary program must adhere and read about six design options for an interdisciplinary curriculum.

If you've ever thought that standards-based teaching and required content prevent you from integrating subject areas, then here's a book that will change the way you think and alert you to exciting new possibilities in your approach to teaching. Learn how to identify the connections in your standards that provide the basis for interdisciplinary units. Explore all types of integrated curriculum and how they bridge content standards to authentic, relevant learning experiences. And understand how to create interdisciplinary units that provide data-based evidence of student learning. A planning template and detailed examples of successful integrated curriculums are included to help you implement integrated curriculum in practice. Discover how you can make learning more exciting for students--and rewarding for you.

Interdisciplinary education has been considered a key element of middle level education since the 1960s. Interdisciplinary teaching teams and multi-disciplinary and interdisciplinary units of study have been frequently found in middle level schools since then. Although changes have been incorporated to support it, actual implementation of interdisciplinary education continues to fall short of its full potential. While recognizing the need for schools to reflect the reality of life in an interdisciplinary world, it remains difficult to restructure content-separated curriculum into a more interdisciplinary, or integrated, one. This collection of articles offers guidance to both new and established teaching teams implementing integrated instruction programs. Articles in the first section focus on the positive aspects of team organization for teachers, the effects of teaming on students, and student evaluation of interdisciplinary units. The second section offers suggestions for organizing the teaching team and techniques for developing an integrated curriculum. The third section presents several examples of interdisciplinary instruction units that were implemented successfully in schools across the United States. The final section examines the evolutionary development of the interdisciplinary team, methods of evaluating the teaching team, and some of the limitations of, and problems associated with, interdisciplinary instruction. (TJQ)

This book brings integrated curriculum into sharp focus and helps you find a curriculum model that can work for your school.