The British Council have produced an education pack for primary schools which supports study of Chinese New Year and the start of the Chinese spring festival on 31st January. 2014 will be the Year of the Horse, and the pack has many useful ideas, lesson plans, links and support materials for discrete and interdisciplinary learning linked to this theme. It includes learning experiences across the curriculum and addresses elements of international education and global citizenship. Click here to download the pack.
Author: Y. McBlain
What is “Interdisciplinarity”?
Anne Pearson, Acting Head of Service for Falkirk Council Education Services found this interesting video clip (click below to view). Myra Strober of Stanford University shares her interpretation of interdisciplinarity, its current influence and application within education, and how it is best fostered.
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What is good interdisciplinary teaching and learning?
The latest national guidance we have on the features of good interdisciplinary learning offers the following list:
- Starts with the experiences and outcomes, carefully selected within a few curriculum areas.
- Clear success criteria focus the intended learning, within & across the experiences & outcomes.
- Connections between disciplines within the IDL are clear & meaningful.
- Learning does not become “lost” within the context.
- Purpose, benefits & types of IDL are carefully considered & understood by all.
- Planning clearly shows where children are applying existing knowledge & understanding.
- Children can discuss connections, compare & contrast contributions of different curriculum areas, use & develop higher-order thinking skills
- Progression is clear across the different curriculum areas.
- A whole-school framework/overview of IDL is developed to ensure progression & coherence.
- Assessment is planned as an integral part of learning & teaching, based around the success criteria.
- Principles of curriculum design are used to inform teacher’s decisions about organising learning & their evaluations.
These were defined in a presentation by Graeme Logan and Joanne MacLauchlan in December 2012.
St Bernadette’s RC PS Track Coverage of the Experiences and Outcomes
Marianne Savage, principal teacher at St Bernadette’s RC PS has created Microsoft Publisher poster versions of the experiences and outcomes at first and second levels of Curriculum for Excellence. She developed these from the South Ayrshire Early Years Annual overview document below. Marianne has very kindly agreed to share these (now converted into PDF format to ease access – you will need to assemble the pages and enlarge the documents if printing):
Early Level South Ayrshire Annual Overview First Level
Second Level sheet 1 Second Level sheet 2
Marianne’s head teacher, Cathy Quinn, had these printed A2 size by Printworks so that staff throughout the school could highlight the E & Os being addressed by learning and teaching. Staff use colour coding to monitor coverage via this simple tracking system and record the levels of breadth and depth achieved. Click here to visit St Bernadette’s school blog, and contact Marianne or Cathy on 01324 503400 for more information.
