Research On The Path Of Improving The Practical Ability Of Curriculum Of High School Chemistry Teachers Based On Key Competences

Education in China is going through a significant period of change.A move to competence-based curricula that focus on skills development as well as knowledge-building will require teachers to understand the learning outcomes and develop innovative teaching and learning strategies.This will be a significant challenge for teachers.How to deal with this challenge? How well do teachers understand and agree with the curriculum standards? How is their curriculum being implemented? What are their confusions? What kind of professional support is needed? How to improve the understanding and practice of the curriculum through effective professional development programs? These are the basic questions of this study.The study makes an investigation of the high school chemistry teachers' point of view about curriculum development and its implementation,identify challenges or difficulties encountered in embedding key competencies.Whilst policy can set the conditions for effective practice,it can not control how teachers will act in the classroom.Practitioners bring their own knowledge and experience to teaching,but their way is not always consistent with policy and administrative decisions.Then the study employed a qualitative research design among four high–school chemistry teachers,which involves semi-structured interviews,observations,and a stimulated recall task and interview,to gain an understanding of chemistry teachers' perceptions of reform and their role in implementing reform and key competencies practices in the chemistry classroom.Utilizing such a design allowed researcher to understand more fully a period of time and uncover the teachers' unique experiences and hear their unique voices,as well as gain an understanding of high school chemistry teachers' knowledge of disciplinary literacy as the implied framework of reform.Although the specifications present a detailed set of disciplinary key competences,a finer grained representation of the underlying skills is lacking in the standards document.Therefore,teachers are facing challenges understanding and effectively implementing the standards,especially with regards to the disciplinary key competences and learning outcomes.In order to improve teachers' understanding and implementing ability of curriculum,in a two-week summer professional development program,an organising framework which is built on key competences is developed to help teachers to interpret the learning outcomes of the new curriculum standards,the chemistry questions and the classroom instruction,and recognise the embedded competences as they plan for teaching,learning and assessment.And a study in which teachers were asked to use the framework to analyse their understanding of learning outcomes shows that,the way of learning to offer teachers is critical to the professional development of teachers and to the success of revised curricula.Careful consideration must be given of the best way to provide guidance so that the new curriculum is interpreted in the way that the developers intended.The study developed two design-based research projects in which teachers and students actively contributed to the process of curriculum development and implementation.In the first project the teachers worked at the interface between policy and research,and brought their experience and knowledge to the Unit Learning Approach design process.It also demonstrates how key competences can be embedded in learning outcomes.The second project describes the relevance of chemistry for sustainability and presents examples from the chemistry classroom.In the project the teaching and learning materials were designed by the experts and teachers.One of the benefits of including teachers in curriculum development at any level is the potential to increase capacity,and to facilitate the discussion about,for example,what disciplinary key competences mean,and what performance they demand of learners.The main research findings are as follows: During transition periods of the new curriculum standards,teachers must undergo a period of learning as they adapt to change.This learning is contingent on their understanding the nature of the reform and the rationale.Rather than relying on listening to experts' lectures in the short-term intensive training,learning to adapt to change is best done in the teacher's own classroom.Placing teachers at the centre of curriculum development and implementation allows for innovations that require changes in teaching,learning and assessment methods to be trialled in real classrooms,and reflected on in practical settings.When teachers are able to use their professional judgement in making decisions about curriculum,teachers and learners are more likely to engage in meaningful conversation with one another about what works in teaching and learning and why.It is easier to take risks if teachers can check that what they are doing is falling within the broad ideals and parameters of the national curriculum.Listening to teachers' voices and providing professional support are the key factors for teachers to play their roles in curriculum reform.The study gathers evidence from practice to help inform policy and practice and advise curriculum developer on the professional development needs of teachers,provides some experiences and lessons for further developmental and implemental work of chemistry curriculum of high school.