Why Teach Certain Material at Specific Grade Levels?

Abstract

What criteria and guidelines are used to place content at specific grade levels or to align standards with the curriculum? The authors have searched for years for the answer but keep drawing a blank. NO SOLID basis exists in the research literature for the ways we currently develop, place, and align educational standards in school curricula. If this sounds shocking, it should not. The same holds true for placing subject-matter content at specific grade levels (scope and sequence). Basic content criteria or specific subject-matter criteria, for the most part, are being used to assign content to grade levels. Nevertheless, standards and assessments have come to dominate K-12 curriculum design at national, state, and local levels. And most of these standards come with required assessments that essentially make them mandatory for local school districts. A 15-Year Search We base the statements above on 15 years of searching and researching. Since we retired in 1997 as professors of curriculum and instruction, we have devoted our efforts to researching the topic full time. Before that, dating back to the mid-1980s, we began corresponding and conversing with educators and representatives of educational organizations. Our recent intensive research has included surveys and questionnaires sent to the 50 chief state school officers, to national professional councils and subject-matter associations, to major textbook publishers, to major universities, to educational leaders, and to local school districts throughout the U.S. In all this correspondence and in all our personal interviews with innumerable educators at all levels, one indicated that he or she had studied how content should be placed at specific grade levels. That is, no one seemed to have any idea why something was placed at a specific grade and at the grade above or below. No one seemed to know who made the determination, how it was made, or what criteria were used to make it. We realize that saying not one individual is a very absolute statement, and so we repeat: one respondent indicated that he or she knew or had seriously considered how material was placed at grade levels or what criteria were used in doing so. The usual responses ranged from It's in the textbook, to It's in the curriculum guide, to We've always taught that in that grade. Retired teachers were no more enlightened in this area than those still active. Findings to Date So how has curriculum content actually been placed at various grade levels? How has it been situated in the scope and sequence? The process has been haphazard, arbitrary, and subjective; it has evolved with no organized plan. Certainly, it is that attempts have been made to develop an organized plan. Just check the 38th Yearbook of the National Society for the Study of Education to see some of the extensive work that has been done in this area.1 This yearbook reveals the size and extreme complexity of the task, which no doubt explains why we have found just one (and only one!) subsequent attempt at organizing a plan with specific criteria for placing and sequencing content in the K-12 curriculum. That plan was created by the National Council for the Social Studies.2 Through extensive planning and study, the NCSS developed six scope and sequence models and 24 criteria that a model should meet. Even though one of the models includes all 24 criteria and no clear basis for placing and aligning content in the curriculum is included, the plan certainly furnishes helpful criteria and guidelines for developing K-12 social studies curricula. It is our intent to encourage the development of such criteria and guidelines for using educational standards in school curricula of the 21st century. It is difficult to cite examples of content placed at particular grade levels for particular reasons. …