Historical Foundations of Teaching and Learning

 In the article, “Foreign Influences on Curriculum and Curriculum Policy Making in Canada” by Tomkins (1981), he explored the influence other countries and curriculum have had on Canadian curriculum development throughout history. Overall, the author mentions the positive and negative influences on the Canadian curriculum, meaning there are both good reasons for this, and reasons that it makes defining Canadian education difficult (Tomkins, 1981). The article explores what it means to teach, as it highlights the conflicts from when Canada was first declared independent and the mixture of French and English viewpoints (Tomkins, 1981). For teaching, the article explores this as a collection of learning that is influenced by external forces, especially American. Thus, there is an exploration that Canadian teaching has a rich history of multiple cultures blending together. For learning, it states that Canada is close to the mainstream global learning curve (Tomkins, 1981). Thus, it looks at learning as something that is global and has external forces on what is expected of students to learn. Learning is then understanding the world, and meeting the global standard of learning. As Tomkins explores the influence various cultures have had on Canadian education, the exploration for innovation and creativity is limited. For innovation, it could be argued that the Canadian curriculum is innovative as it blends multiple cultural influences. It is a unique way to address the needs of Canadian education, thus innovation is defined as a way to address the needs of people and finding a unique solution that appeals most. Furthermore, for creativity, Tomkins argues that there was a need to address these various external factors, and still remain the mainstream standards (1981). For this problem to be solved, there needed to be a creative process to occur. Creativity could then be defined as a process and idea sharing, as Tomkins shares the history it took to produce this education system and curriculum. 

My questions for Tomkin’s article would be if he feels there are other countries in our modern society that would be good for the Canadian curriculum to adopt, or should we not adopt other practices? Furthermore, does he still think that the Canadian curriculum is still near mainstream learning around the world? Why or why not? 

In the article “The History of Education,” by Herbst, the article highlights the importance of understanding history and the need to instil critical thinking in history (1999). For teaching, Herbst emphasises the need for students to explore various countries and have an opportunity to be critical thinkers (1999). The article also instructs that teachers need to allow students to explore the connections rather than telling students what is important. Thus teaching could be defined as an experience to learn about various cultures in a critical and self exploratory manner. For learning, Herbst highlights the critical skills of learning for future historians (1999). This explores critical thinking, understanding significance, and making connections. Learning could then be defined as an active, critical, and significant experience that a person takes with a mentor or a teacher. Moreover, creativity is explored as there is a need for learners to make connections to understand the significance of historical events. For creativity then, it could be defined as finding ways to connect your past learning to current events and finding unique ways to make these connections with academic support. Finally, for innovation, this article highlights the need for an innovative approach to change the current model of teaching to embed these learning skills (Herbst, 1999). Thus, a definition of innovation could be identifying a problem and finding a creative and new way to implement the solution to the problem. Overall, Herbst argues the need for critical thinking and having students explore these connections regardless of the subject, and is important to be included in these definitions. 

My questions for the Herbst article would be how to develop the skills needed for students to flourish for critical thinking? Could the school curriculum and system change to develop these, or have there already had these changes started to occur?

References 

Herbst, J. (1999). The history of education: State and the art at the turn of the century in

Europe and North America. Paedegogia Historica: International Journal of the History of Education, 35(3), 737–-47. doi: 10.1080/0030923990350308

Tomkins, G. (1981). Foreign influences on curriculum and curriculum policy making in 

Canada: Some impressions in historical and contemporary perspective. Curriculum Inquiry, 11(2), 157-166.