ABSTRACT

We studied how the distal policy mechanisms of curricular aims and objectives articulated in official curriculum documents influenced classroom instruction, and the factors that were associated with the enactment of those curricular aims and objectives. The study was set in the U.S. context, where there is an ambitious effort to transform curriculum and instruction via the Common Core State Standards for Mathematics (CCSSM). The CCSSM represented the curricular aims and objectives in most of the U.S. at the time of the study. We analyzed enactments of this official curriculum in terms of the rigor of mathematical activity in 47 middle school mathematics lessons from multiple state and curriculum contexts. The enactment of the CCSSM was not uniform across contexts, and the lack of uniformity was associated in part with the type of instructional materials used by teachers. The use of instructional materials classified as delivery mechanism was associated with activity we characterized as routine procedural rigor. In lessons involving instructional materials classified as thinking device, we found greater variation and more occurrences of non-routine forms of rigor. These differences between types of instructional materials occurred despite the finding that teachers across the sample held similar views of the CCSSM. We conclude that the teachers responded more to features in the instructional materials than to the curriculum aims and objectives articulated in the CCSSM while planning and enacting lessons, which has implications for policy makers who aim to influence instruction through national standards and for school districts as they select materials.

摘要

我们研究了官方课程文件中阐述的课程目标和目标的远端政策机制如何影响课堂教学，以及与制定这些课程目标和目标相关的因素。该研究是在美国背景下进行的，美国正在努力通过共同核心国家数学标准 (CCSSM) 来改变课程和教学。CCSSM 代表了研究期间美国大部分地区的课程目标和目标。我们从多个州和课程背景的 47 节中学数学课中，根据数学活动的严谨性分析了这个官方课程的制定。CCSSM 的制定在不同背景下并不统一，缺乏统一性部分与教师使用的教学材料类型有关。教学材料的使用分类为交付机制与我们描述为常规程序严谨性的活动相关。在涉及归类为思维装置的教学材料的课程中，我们发现变化更大，并且出现更多非常规形式的严谨。尽管发现样本中的教师对 CCSSM 持有相似的观点，但教学材料类型之间的这些差异仍然存在。我们得出的结论是，在规划和实施课程时，教师对教学材料中的特征的反应比对 CCSSM 中阐明的课程目标和目标的反应更多，这对旨在通过国家标准影响教学的政策制定者和学区产生影响，因为他们选择材料。