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The seventh edition of Curriculum Planning is a collection of readings that presents the knowledge, skills, and alternative strategies needed by curriculum planners and teachers at all levels of education, from early childhood through adulthood. The book offers a variety of learning experiences for students with wide-ranging interests, learning styles and backgrounds. Made up of ten chapters, the first six emphasize the development of knowledge and skills in the four bases of the curriculum - social forces, human development, learning, and knowledge and cognition. The last four chapters emphasize the application of curriculum planning skills for educational programs for children, early, middle, and late adolescents, and adult and senior learners. At all levels, current issues, innovations, and trends are examined from both theoretical and practical viewpoints. For anyone interested in curriculum development and planning.

Source:

amazon.com

The eighth edition of Curriculum Planning is a selection of readings that presents the knowledge, skills, and alternative strategies needed by curriculum planners and teachers at all levels of education, from early childhood through adulthood. The book offers a variety of learning experiences for students with wide-ranging interests, learning styles, and backgrounds.

Source:

pearsoned.co.uk

In addition to the Curriculum Planning Council, many districts find it helpful to organize a Citizens’ Advisory Council. The Citizens’ Advisory Council is made up of parent and community representatives who reflect the community’s diversity and who report to the board. The central office administrator in charge of curriculum is usually an ex-officio member of this group. In some smaller districts, this council is made up of a committee of the board representing community viewpoints. However, if the members are not board members, they are usually appointed by the school board and serve in an advisory capacity to the board.

Source:

smasd.k12.pa.us

To support Curriculum Planning, this section of Guiding Learning Communities includes the following four processes. The timeframes are intended as a guide only and may be adapted to suit particular needs of the participants.

Source:

ltag.education.tas.gov.au

In organizing for curriculum planning, a Curriculum Planning Council will be needed. The Curriculum Planning Council, chaired by the central office administrator, is responsible for the planning and development phase of the curriculum process and for overseeing all other phases dealing with curriculum. The members of the council can be selected from teacher and administrative groups representing the various instructional levels and subject areas in the district and a representative of the Board of Education. It is important that these representatives be key communicators who can exchange information with the district council. The council’s role is to assist the central office chair of the council in coordinating the curriculum activities.

Source:

smasd.k12.pa.us

Curriculum Planning is central to delivering effective learning and teaching. The Essential Learnings concept-based curricular approach promotes, for all students, inquiry that leads to deep understanding about significant real-world issues. It focuses on problem-solving and the need for students to apply their learning to new situations.

Source:

ltag.education.tas.gov.au

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Good Practice
Curriculum Development
Curriculum Planning

1.
Developing a curriculum proposal:
*
What is the current situation?
o What are you doing right, what could be improved in terms of
+ cohesiveness of program?
+ recruitment and retention of students?
+ efficiency of teaching / learning process?
+ communication, collaboration among course instructors?
+ student learning outcomes?
+ the learning environment?
+ assessment procedures?
+ responding to diversity among students?
+ use of resources?
+ etc......
o Look at data, collect some data.
o Reflect on experiences

*
What are the alternatives?
o Open yourself to new ideas, explore possibilities for innovations
+ self-directed learning
+ cooperative learning / teamwork
+ problem-based learning
+ education for critical thinking
+ resource-based learning
+ interdisciplinary study
+ outcomes-based education
+ experiential learning
o Attend workshops, read widely, talk to others doing different things (why?)
o Might choose to have departmental workshop on a topic that seems particularly relevant to departmental concerns -- how do people respond?

(Note: We don't believe in focusing narrowly on what is already being done in your discipline. Real innovations are basic principles used appropriately in a specific situation. Many really good ideas haven't yet been used in your discipline--it's up to you to figure out how to do it. At this stage, become familiar with alternatives, and consider whether might suit needs identified above.)
*
What is meant by a systematic approach to curriculum development?
Become familiar with key steps in instructional design/planning.
o borrow a book, attend a workshop, read flyer

GOAL: To identify a clear rationale for change, some notion of what you want to change to, an idea of the procedure you will use to implement the change, and achieve some "buy-in" in the department.

Keep it focused, purposeful. Any educational change will automatically affect many other aspects of the educational system. Small is manageable, more likely to lead to real, sustained change, change that can be built upon. Later, you can start the process over again: what are we doing well, what can we do better...etc.
2.
Implementing a curricular change

Must go through the curriculum development and implementation process
1. Systematically (instructional design)
2. Specifically (teaching methods and materials, assessment procedures)
3. Collectively (communication among all parties as you go)

CTL can help by facilitating this process.
* Can keep you on track (devise simple, straightforward exercises to go through to ensure that you address all the key things), as outside person not in the middle of departmental politics.
* Can provide details about specific teaching methods (eg. how to teach diverse student body).
* Can share case studies (in library, or put you in touch with persons) of others who have done similar things: help you avoid or prepare for likely obstacles.

CTL Role: to get you through it step-by-step (keeping track of design procedures), and get you the information you need when you ask for it, if possible. You make all the decisions, of course.
3.
Monitoring the change/assessing the impact
* Assess ripple effect of change: is re-training of faculty or TAs necessary? must other parts of curriculum be changed?
* Assess student response to change
* Assess faculty and TA response to change
* (Write it up so others can learn from your experience??)

CTL can help devise assessment procedures for evaluating the impact of the change, and can do some of the assessment ourselves e.g. speak with students, faculty (Example: attending departmental TA orientations), and can help plan training sessions for instructors.

We are happy to help you keep records so can write it up: tell us beforehand.

Curriculum Overview

Page Contents

Curriculum


Curriculum & Instruction


Bases for Curriculum Planning


Curricula Criteria


How Values Influence Planning


Curriculum Foundation


Other Pages of Interest


Sources

Curriculum

The term curriculum is used in a number of different ways by parents, educators, and businesses. Some see curriculum as the "academic stuff that is done to children in school." Others view it as teacher directions and student activities that can be purchased from any number of curriculum publishers. Teachers themselves use the term in different ways depending on their views and needs. In any school staff room one may hear statements about curriculum such as the following:

"There's not enough time in the day to get through the curriculum!"
"The ____ reading curriculum's great but I hate that ____ math curriculum."
"I found this great curriculum website the other day that has all kinds of ideas for science lessons!"
"The kids are really making progress since I began modifying the curriculum to better meet their needs."

Webster's concisely defines curriculum as, "A course of study offered by a school" (Webster's II New Riverside Dictionary, 1984 p176). Curriculum is also often referred to as learning content, activities, and structures as experienced by students. Ronald C. Doll, in his book, Curriculum Improvement: Decision Making and Process, goes further, stating that:

The curriculum of a school is the formal and informal content and process by which learners gain knowledge and understanding, develop skills, and alter attitudes, appreciations, and values under he auspices of that school (Doll, 1996 p15).

It is this last definition that is perhaps the most useful to educators who wish to affect and improve student learning. Partially this is because it lacks the vagueness that many definitions have, and partially it is because curriculum, as Doll has defined it, can have outcomes that may be measured, allowing for the curriculum to be acted upon and improved.

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The Relationship Between Curriculum and Instruction

Instruction is the creation and implementation of purposefully developed plans for the teaching of curriculum content. It is what teachers often concisely refer to as "planning" and "teaching." The relationship between curriculum and instruction is so intimate that "curriculumandinstruction" is frequently spoken as if it were one word (perhaps we should refer to it as "curstruction" or "instriculum"). With curriculum being the content of what is taught along with an overall process of how that content is to be taught, and instruction being the more detailed plans and the way those plans are implemented in order to teach the curriculum content, it becomes easy to understand that the two must be compatible in order to maximize student learning.

The case of multiage classrooms illustrates this close tie that exists between curriculum and instruction. Currently the most common classroom structure in American elementary schools is the single-grade classroom. This structure is meant to make instruction more efficient, allowing students of the same age to move through curriculum content at the same pace. In these classrooms the most prevalent teaching method is whole-class direct instruction. Because of the dominance of this structure nation-wide, commercially available curriculum and state learning standards are designed to be implemented in this type of learning environment. Some educators in their efforts to improve education have switched from a single-grade classroom structure to a multiage one. The multiage structure purposefully places students of different ages together in the same classroom while supporting an individualized continuous progress instructional model. While changing the structure of the classroom, multiage educators also change the instructional methods they use in order to better match the needs of their diverse group of students. They have found that "(c)urriculum designed for use in single-grade classrooms is not always adaptable to environments in which whole-class direct instruction is not the norm. Allowing for flexible groupings, academic diversity, and individual pacing are needs that are central to multiage practices" (Yates, Curriculum in Multiage Learning Environments, 2000). The instructional methods used by these teachers necessitate that curriculum be organized in a compatible manner.

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The Bases for Curriculum Planning

When planning for curriculum improvement, two categories of bases should be understood, those that are institutional in nature and those that affect people directly. The institutional bases for curriculum planning include planning domains, the context or characteristics of the school situation, the impact of current trends and issues, and the use of strategic planning. Those bases of curriculum planning that affect people directly include student and teacher needs, local curriculum problems to be addressed, competencies of the planners, and pressures from inside and outside the school (Doll, 1996 p362-378). All of these bases affect the curriculum planning process in various ways and to differing degrees. They can also vary with each situation over time.

As of this writing, a current educational issue in the United States is that of student performance and preparation for the workplace. The trend is for state governments to create standards of competence that are tested at various points in students' educational careers and to make schools and students accountable for their performance on these tests. Test scores are frequently reported in the local media and this may lead to pressure from the local population being brought to bear on the school to improve its curricula. The context of the school may be that it is within a district that hasn't passed a school levy for a number of years and thus has not been able to budget money to work on improving the curricula during that time. This not-uncommon scenario shows how a combination of factors can become the bases for, and can influence the curriculum planning process.

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Criteria to Plan, Develop, and Implement Curricula

Ronald Doll lists eleven principles of decision making and process as it relates to the evaluation of curricula and projects. These principles form the criteria of a quality curriculum development process that includes the stages of planning, development, and implementation.

Curriculum decisions should be made:

1. for valid educational reasons.
2. on the basis of the best available evidence.
3. in a context of broadly conceived aims of education
4. within a context of previously made decisions and of needs for additional decision making so that balance and other important curriculum considerations may be safeguarded.
5. by achieving a resolution of forces originating in the nature and development of learners, the nature of learning processes, demands of the society at large, requirements of the local community, and the nature and structure of subject matter to be learned.
6. cooperatively by persons who are legitimately involved in the effects of the decisions.
7. taking into account new facts of human life such as the proliferation of knowledge and a need for a new sense of unity within our diversity.
8. taking into account the many differences among learners.
9. with a realistic view of certain organizational or engineering matters that can affect the quality of the decisions themselves.
10. with some forethought about ways in which they may be communicated and shared.
11. only with reference to subject matter and pupil experiences that cannot be offered as satisfactorily outside the school (Doll, 1996 p293-296).

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How Values Can Influence Curriculum Planning

Social forces that can influence curriculum planning come from far and wide. The ideas and values of various groups of people may include their social goals, ideas about cultural uniformity and diversity, social pressures, ideas about social change, their plans for the future, and their concepts of culture (Coutts, 1999). An example of this can be seen when contrasting the CYFERNet and the Catalyst: Voices of Chicago School Reform websites. The Children, Youth, and Families Education and Research Network website, CYFERNet is designed to provide "...program, evaluation and technology assistance for children, youth and family community-based programs". The website is a collaborative project that "...is funded (by) the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Cooperative State Research, Education, and Extension Service and the Cooperative Extension System" (Cooperative Extension System, 2000). Because of this, many of the curriculum links are to agricultural and 4-H educational activities. In contrast, the CATALYST: Voices of Chicago School Reform website sponsored by the Community Renewal Society, works "...to create racially and economically just communities" (Community Renewal Society, 2000). Its focus is on Chicago area urban educational issues, especially in regards to race and the economically disadvantaged. It provides information to help influence educational decision making as it relates to the organization's mission. On the one hand is a group that wishes to influence educational policy (and thus curriculum) to better meet the needs of children in an urban environment, and on the other a group trying to do the same for rural children. Although there may be a few communities where the two groups compete with one another, they do illustrate how the values and issues of various social groups can try to influence curriculum planning.

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Curriculum Foundation

At the foundation to every curriculum, including the planning, design, and implementation stages, is the educational philosophy of those directly involved in the process. Often this can influence to a great extent the direction a school or school district takes with its curriculum and instruction. At the school district this writer has been employed with, the philosophy has allowed for a diversity of instructional styles as a way of meeting a diversity of children's learning styles. This has led in the elementary school to several educational options available for students and parents: single-grade, single-grade clusters, multiage, looping, and home-school hybrid educational environments. Because some of these educational structures have different instructional designs than others, there are available different curricular materials. Other nearby schools offer only a single choice and a single curriculum. The basis for these decisions can be found in the above mentioned factors as well as in the educational philosophies of the decision makers.

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Other Pages of Interest

* To read about the educational philosophy of the writer, please follow this link to My Teaching Philosophy.
* To read a paper written by this author that discusses in more detail how the philosophical views of curriculum committee members can influence a curriculum decision, follow this link to Position Paper on Curriculum Priorities.

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Sources:

All sources used in creating this website are cited on the Bibliography and Sources webpage. Also note that in-text citations used above are linked directly to the appropriate portion of the Bibliography and Sources webpage.

1. Give at least five (5) definition of research from different authors.

Research

- detailed study of a subject, especially in order to discover (new) information or reach a (new)

understanding.

- used to describe a number of similar and often overlapping activities involving a search for

information.

- an active, diligent and systematic process of inquiry in order to discover, interpret or revise facts, events, behaviors, or theories, or to make practical applications with the help of such facts, laws or theories. The term "research" is also used to describe the collection of information about a particular subject.

- systematic investigation, including research development, testing, and evaluation, designed to develop or contribute to

generalizable knowledge

- careful, systematic, patient study and investigation in some field of knowledge, undertaken to

Discover or establish facts or principles.

2.Give at least three (3) chars characteristics of good research

1. search for individual facts or data. May be part of the search for a solution to a larger problem or simply the answer to a friendly, or not so friendly, bar bet! Concerned with facts rather than knowledge or analysis and answers can normally be found in a single source.

Example

Find the population of each country in Africa or the total (in dollars) of Japanese investment in the U.S. in 2002.

2. A report or review, not designed to create new information or insight but to collate and synthesize existing information. A summary of the past. Answers can typically be found in a selection of books, articles, and Web sites.
[Note: gathering this information may often include activities like #1 above.]

Example

Find out what is known generally about a fairly specific topic. "What is the history f the Internet?"

3. Gathering and analyzing a body of information or data and extracting new meaning from it or developing unique solutions to problems or cases. This is "real" research and requires an open-ended question for which there is no ready answer.
[Note: this will always include #2 above and usually #1. It may also involve gathering new data through experiments, surveys, or other techniques.]

Example

Gather evidence to determine whether gang violence is directly related to playing violent video games.

3. Differentiate and illustrate by example;

a. Basic Research vs. Applied Research

Basic (aka fundamental or pure ) research is driven by a scientist's curiosity or interest in a scientific question. The main motivation is to expand man's knowledge , not to create or invent something. There is no obvious commercial value to the discoveries that result from basic research.

For example, basic science investigations probe for answers to questions such as:

· How did the universe begin?

· What are protons, neutrons, and electrons composed of?

Applied research is designed to solve practical problems of the modern world, rather than to aqcquire knowledge for knowledge's sake. One might say that the goal of the applied scientist is to improve the human condition .

For example, applied researchers may investigate ways to:

· improve agricultural crop production

· treat or cure a specific disease

· improve the energy efficiency of homes, offices, or modes of transportation

b. Hypothesis vs. Theory

A theory is a well-established principle that has been developed to explain some aspect of the natural world. A theory arises from repeated observation and testing and incorporates facts, laws, predictions, and tested hypotheses that are widely accepted.

A hypothesis is a specific, testable prediction about what you expect to happen in your study.

c. Related Literature vs. Related Studies

Related literature- this are written information that could have relation or relevance to a specific topic that you are interested in to discussed in your thesis or dissertation. elated literature should give a brief summary of the written literature and the relationship with the present study.

Related studies are investigations that are usually unpublished materials like
manuscript, thesis and dissertation’s, which were conducted previously, to which the present study has similarity and relatedness.

Related literature and studies help the researcher understand his topic better because it may clarify vague points about his problem. It also guides the researcher in making comparisons between his findings with the findings of other similar studies. So it is necessary that the related materials should have true value. I listed some characteristics of related literature and studies for your guidelines.

Give at least three (3) difficulties of research. Explain and illustrate by example.

1. Lack of facilities. This problem is often faced by the individual researcher. Adequate facilities may not bear the performance of the research project.
2. Limited Time Duration. Researcher often have to resort to cross-sectional studies, even if the longitudinal approach is most appropriate because of time limitation.
3. Financial Difficulties. The money aspect is important in launching a research project because of the cost of materials and personnel involved.

Explain and illustrate the following sources of research

1. Specialization. The scholarship that should result from intensive specialization in one or more subdivisions of the chosen fields of training will reveal both the accomplishments of completed research and the problem get unsolved.
2. Instructional Program Pursued. Adequate courses include numerous suggestions concerning needed research, through the medium of lectures, discussions, reports and reading. Stimulating contracts between professors and students outside the classroom are unusually profitable in the selection and development of problems for investigations.
3. Program of Reading. Both extensive reading over a range of topics for breath of background and intensive reading on selected themes for analysis and evaluation purposes.

Explain & illustrate by example the criteria for selection of a problem

1. Interest, intellectual, curiosity and drive.

One of the personal motives for research most frequently mentioned by scientists themselves is pure curiosity, accompanied by genuine interest and a derived satisfaction or enjoyment.

2. Costs and Returns.

Graduate instruction and research are expensive. In the final selection of the thesis problem, the candidate must consider carefully his own financial resources and that provided by the institution.

3. Hazards, Penalties and Handicaps.

In the selection of certain types of problem, the worker may well consider other special hazards, penalties or handicaps of a personal, social or professional character, not necessarily with the thought or avoiding or giving up a particular study but making the choice within open.

Definition of Research

re·search: NOUN: 1. a detailed study of a subject, especially in order to discover (new) information or reach a (new) understanding.

Cambridge Dictionaries Online,
© Cambridge University Press 2003.

The word "research" is used to describe a number of similar and often overlapping activities involving a search for information. For example, each of the following activities involves such a search; but the differences are significant and worth examining.

Florida Death Penalty System Criticised
Mark Weisenmiller

TAMPA, Florida, Sep 26 (IPS) - An influential lawyer's group in the United States has strongly criticised Florida's death penalty system, calling it ambiguous and secretive.

The American Bar Association (ABA) Death Penalty Moratorium Project also stated in a detailed, 450-page report that Florida has the highest number - 22 -- of innocent death row prisoners who have been exonerated since 1973.

That alarming number prompted the ABA to study Florida's justice system first. It eventually plans a review of 16 states in all. The report, funded by the influential law association and the European Union, identified 11 problem areas in total. Among its findings:

·The state of Florida did not provide adequate legal counsel to its poor prisoners after they have been convicted.

·Florida is the only U.S. state which does not require juries to vote unanimously on capital punishment cases.

·The southern state shows a racial disparity, making a non-white far more likely to be sentenced to death for killing a white victim than a white prisoner to be convicted for killing a person of colour.

·Florida has a high number of inmates - an estimated 50 percent -- with severe mental disabilities on death row. Some of them, the report stated, were disabled at the time of the offence; others became ill after conviction and sentencing.

·Florida's clemency process is full of "ambiguity and secrecy."

The ABA issued its report four days before Florida executed Clarence Hill, 48, the inmate who sought to block his death in an appeal to the US Supreme Court in January. Hill's death was the first execution in Florida in 2006. Moreover, the state this week has set Oct. 25 as an execution date for Denny Rolling, who was found guilty of murdering five college students 16 years ago.

"The people in charge of the death penalty have made mistakes. No one likes to admit that they made a mistake and the ABA report shows that. There's no accountability in the (state's death penalty) system," Mark Elliott, spokesman for the anti-capital punishment organisation Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty told IPS.

The ABA panel reviewed previous death penalty studies, including one by the state's own Supreme Court, and concluded that defendants convicted of killing whites are more likely to receive death sentences that those found guilty of murdering a non-white.

None of the 60 prisoners executed by the state of Florida since 1979, when the state re-instated capital punishment, have been white defendants found guilty of killing a black victim. A 2003 Amnesty International report found that even though blacks and whites are murder victims in nearly equal numbers in the U.S., some 80 percent of inmates executed since 1973 have been killed for murders involving white victims.

In 2000, Gov. John Ellis "Jeb" Bush appointed a commission to investigate racial bias among the state's death row inmates. Then-Florida Attorney General Charlie Crist, who currently is running for Governor in the November elections, "did nothing with the commission's report. He kept things at status quo," Mark Schlakman, director of the Centre for the Advancement of Human Rights at Florida State University and a member of the panel told IPS.

The first of four key recommendations by the ABA, then, is the creation of two commissions independent of each other. One committee would specialise in studying the underlying causes of wrongful convictions in death penalty cases. The other would be comprised of a panel of judges that would review claims of factual innocence in existing cases.

The 22 Florida death row inmates exonerated so far have served a total of 150 years in prison for crimes they did not commit, Christopher Slobogin, a University of Florida law professor who led the eight-member team told IPS.

The ABA panel also recommended that Florida eliminate its statutory lawyer fee of $3,500 which must be paid by the defendant.. Instead, the state should allow for greater options in obtaining payments for services rendered. Moreover it wants state-appointed attorneys to meet minimum nationally-recognised requirements for lawyers defending death row prisoners.

Moreover, the state must immediately require a jury's capital punishment verdict to be unanimous and must drop a law that allows judges to overrule a jury decision, the panel recommended. In 2005, a state Supreme Court Justice urged the Florida legislature to amend its law requiring unanimity, saying Florida's death penalty rules could be open to attack. That bill did not pass.

One recommendation that Slobogin said could be implemented quickly is that the jury instructions by judges presiding over capital punishment cases should be uniform throughout Florida.

"It's important to know that our report does not come out for or against the death penalty," Slobogin told IPS. "Our point was to bring out the concerns and needs and some problems with the death penalty in Florida with some recommendations to address these issues."

The ABA panel was comprised of death penalty opponents as well as supporters and included a circuit judge, a state attorney, a former Florida Supreme Court justice and a former public defender.

"The composition of the team was important," Schlakman said, because the panel wanted to include all perspectives. It is believed to be the first comprehensive and impartial study of the death penalty as it is operated in Florida.

State officials said they would study the report, but have not yet promised to implement the changes.

"We're looking at the report...but I believe that the death penalty process here (in Florida) is protected by an appeals process that is extensive. It can go on for ten years," Gov. Bush told reporters.

It is doubtful that Gov. Bush will implement the recommendations in the report, as he will be leaving office, due to term limits, after this November's election. That job will fall to either Jim Davis of Tampa, the Democratic candidate for Governor, or Crist, the Republican candidate for Governor.

In the past, Crist has urged the legislature not to make any changes in the law because it might weaken it. He has called the state's current regulations necessary in order to "deter potential future murderers."

Still, Elliott, the death penalty opponent, added that the report "should be a wake-up call for both Governor Bush and whoever the new Governor will be to start to listen to people who have various viewpoints about the death penalty."

"It's a non-partisan problem, no matter if a Democrat or Republican is Governor, for not investigating problems that have long been in the system," he added. (END/2006)

Module 20 Problem Solving and Creativity

Torrance framework for Creative Thinking

A common framework for creative thinking processes is described by Torrance (1979)

Fluency – refers to the production of a great number of ideas or alternate solutions to a problem.

Implies understanding, not just remembering information that is learned.

Flexibility - refers to the production of ideas that show a variety of possibilities or realms of thoughts. It involves the ability to see things from different points of view, to use many different approaches or strategies.

Elaboration – is the process of enhancing ideas by providing more details. Additional detail clarity improves interest in, and understanding of, the topic.

Originality – involves the production of ideas that are unique or unusual. It involves synthesis or putting information about a topic back together in a new way.

Creative Problem Solving

Van Gundy’s ‘6x2 stages’ form or Brandsford’s IDEAL model.

Stage 1: Mess Findings: Sensitive yourself (scan, search) for issues (concerns, challenges, opportunities, etc.) that need to be tackled.

· Divergent Technique –brainstorming to identify desirable outcomes

· Convergent Technique- includes the identification of hot spots

Stage 2: Data findings: Gather information about the problem

· Divergent Technique- includes five Ws and H and listing of wants, sources, and data.

· Convergent Technique- Mind mapping to sort and classify the information gathered.

Stage 3: Problem findings: convert a fuzzy statement of the problem into a broad statement more suitable for idea finding.

· Divergent Technique- techniques include asking ‘why’?

· Convergent Technique – reformulation of problem-statement to meet the criteria that they contain only one problem and no criteria, and selection of the most promising statement

Stage 4: Idea finding: generate as many ideas as possible

· Divergence using any of a very wide range of idea gathering technique. The general rules of Classic Brainstorming (such as deferring judgment) are likely to-pin all of these.

· Convergence can again involve hotspots or mind-mapping, the combining of different ideas, and short-listing of the most promising handful, perhaps with some thought for the more obvious evaluation criteria, but not over-restrictively.

Stage 5: Solution findings: Generate and select obvious evaluation criteria (using an expansion/contraction cycle) and develop (which may include combining) the short listed ideas from Idea Finding as much as you can in the light of these criteria.

Stage 6: Acceptance findings: How can the suggestion you have just selected be made up to standard and put into practice? Shun negatively, and continue to apply deferred judgment- problems are exposed to be solved, not to dishearten progress. Action plans are better develop in small groups of 2-3 rather than a large group. Particularly for people problems it is often worth developing several alternative action plans.

Submitted by: JACIN GENLAN NARAGA

BSED2 SOCIAL STUDIES