Running Head: DIVERSIFICATION OF EDUCATIONAL CONTENT 1

Diversification of Educational Content:

Problems, Solutions, and Classroom Integration

Arizona State University

Joseph Canzona, Andrew Z. Colvin, Amber Root

15 April 2018
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Abstract

American students are experiencing a standardized, uniform, and uncreative education based on

textbooks, worksheets, and cold abstractions that fail to mimic real life experiences and

applications. Educators rely heavily on third-party-created materials such as textbooks,

worksheets, and tests that are often designed with narrow state standards in mind. This model has

led to the reduction of creativity, engaging classroom experiences, lab and fieldwork, trips, and

thought-provoking lessons. Pressures from teaching for the end year exams have invariably

driven teachers and classrooms toward a static experience. A range of solutions are proposed that

focus on giving teachers a better idea on what is on the AZMerit (or similar tests), giving

educators more funds and resources for planning, and finally, showing teachers how to

effectively remodel their classroom dynamic.

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Introduction

Educators collectively share a common dilemma: lack of engagement in the classroom.

This stems from a multitude of problems: an over reliance on textbooks, a finite amount of

resources and funding, and a low salary—low enough to de-incentivize the creation of thought-

provoking lesson plans. Several solutions exist that can make this recurring problem much more

bearable; however, implementing these solutions is seemingly impossible, or at the very least,

unrealistic. For example, giving teachers access to the end of the year tests and paying teachers

more would heavily incentivize them to implement engaging lesson plans that rely very little on

a textbook. However, teachers having access to a high-stakes test that dictates how well the

United States is doing educationally can potentially result in malpractice in a number of areas,

practically nullifying the United States’ credibility in education. As a society, we place almost no

priority on the efficiency of our education, as can be seen through the United States spending

about $600 billion dollars in 2015 on its military and roughly $70 billion dollars on education in

that same year. (“Military Spending in the United States”, 2015). However, this does not mean

that this problem is permanent. The solution is paved when educators recognize that the problem

is fixed directly in the classroom. Ultimately, students experience a standardized, uniform, and

uncreative education: textbook-based, detached, and nonrepresentational lessons that fail to

model real life applications and provide genuine experiences to students—a phenomenon that

educators must counter to legitimize learning.

Background

In the United States, the state of education is one of teaching that is scarcely applicable to

real life skills or the reality faced outside of the classroom. This is a disservice to our students, as

learning becomes barely useful outside of the context of “the Test”. The practical logic of this
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set-up is hardly beneficial. A majority of classes are so focused on getting out the content that

classes become standardized using primarily textbooks and worksheets. John Wakefields in his

Brief History of Textbooks writes that: “In themselves, textbooks have not resolved these

problems, but they have been written, edited and marketed as teaching and learning aids.”

However, in the status quo, so much of the content that is being learned in classrooms comes

right out of the textbooks. This is reflective of early educational theory where the teachers acts

more of an “advanced student” (Wakefield). Unfortunately, this highlights, as textbooks changed

in order to reflect popular pedagogy, teachers dependence on them did not.

Early classrooms were the epitome of standardized; in the sixties and seventies, however,

there was a series of laws passed in order to make teaching more accessible to students of

different intelligences, and to those with disabilities—both physical and mental. This increased

the workload and expectation of teachers, without actually accommodating them for the change.

Teachers are no longer masters of their content, and that is simply because a majority of

them do not have the means to be so. Between already long hours spent at school, a daunting

pay, and increasing loopholes and expectations, there is no incentive to become a content master,

nor is there the expectation to be. It stopped being about a teachers ability to teach the students

well rounded lessons, but rather, the focus become completely on the test, something students

can attest to.

In Gene Leynons, “Why Teachers Can’t Teach” he wrote that, “The public was not ready

to forget the concept of accountability. If anything, accountability had become increasingly

important because… the legitimacy of public schools as institutions that provide equitable

educational programs for children was even more in question than it had been a decade earlier.

During that period the decline in scores on standardized tests was convincingly documented, and
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it became clear that some U.S. high school graduates were functionally illiterate” (Leynons

1980). Because of this, teachers faced increased scrutiny, and now have their jobs and paychecks

secured by nothing more than standardized tests scores. These tests, which do not test on ability

to apply knowledge to real life situations, but rather, ask for students to demonstrate knowledge

in a fashion that is cold and hard. We are asking and teaching students to memorize facts, many

of which are promptly and habitually forgotten after the test. Teachers often hear the questions

“when a I really going to use this”. Students fail to recognize the connections, because they are

not taught that it exists.

Standardization

Educators use strenuous guides to create lessons and provide materials to students for the

learning process. Lesson plans are often highly structured, incorporating a step-by-step

framework by which the teacher will teach one particular lesson. These plans often require an

abundance of coverage—from standards (from more than one source), learner outcomes,

expected skills, evidence of mastery, possible misconceptions, materials, justifications, 5E

models, and differentiations (Bybee et al. 2006). A veritable reservoir of over-structuralized

qualities for one lesson; of which the students are expected to master following its cessation. The

lessons are also expected to adhere to multiple sets of standards ranging from content, language

arts, technology, etc. Schools and teachers within attempt to utilize different methods of

teaching, with many different approaches. Over time, these methods have changed and evolved

to suit different needs and different purposes. Various factors such as results-based learning

played key roles in many of these changes; of which have given rise to classrooms becoming

increasingly textbook-oriented and hands-off. Pair this with the growing influence of
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privatization and large educational publishing companies such as Pearson, it is no surprise

engagement has gone the way of birds in Winter (Hazen et al. 2016).

Organizational Bodies and the Stakeholders

Educational organizations and government bodies largely homogenized the nation’s

learning to guarantee that students of an entire state (and even the nation) are learning the same

material, generally at the same pace. Research-based standards have been widely implemented

such as Common Core—a revolutionary reform that arose in the 21st century. These standards

have a rigor designed to advance the next generation of American students. Fortunately, the

standards are relatively positive for the sciences. For example, an experimental focus has been

adopted in an attempt at giving students a greater hands on approach. Experimental methods are

both taught and integrated into laboratory exercise, which by their very nature, illustrate how

scientists conduct research (Cox et al. 1972). This aspect is incredibly important for students to

learn, as understanding the nature of science illuminates its testable-nature, reliability,

limitations, and the logic in which scientists use to come to conclusions. It builds students critical

thinking skills and mirrors learning by inquiry (Valdez et al. 2015). When these skills and topics

are exempt from the standards, and, by proxy, the standardized test, students miss out on

valuable skills that they would have otherwise been able to take with them out of the classroom.

Unfortunately, much is missed in the CCSS and its comprehensiveness. A focus on big

picture ideas is ignored—unlike those of the United Kingdom’s Association for Science

Education's Working with Big Ideas of Science Education standards (Harlen 2015). They also

pigeonhole lessons into compartmentalized, drone-like forms that do not represent natural ways

of teaching and learning (Greene 2014). A great deal of criticism has been fired at the proponents

of standards-based reform. Thomas Ultican put it succinctly in his blog post by the San Diego
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Free Press, “There are twin lies supporting standards-based education reform and the destruction

of public education in the United States. The first lie promotes the illusion that public education

in this country is failing. It never was failing nor is it failing now. The second lie is driven by

market-based ideology. It posits that privately-run charter schools are superior to ‘government’

schools.”

Effects on educators. In an attempt to use the standards as a way to ensure all American

students could access the same content, instead it created a standardized test that homogenialized

the classroom and created an experience that focused more on an arbitrary test than real life

applications of content and skills. It was a way for the public to ensure that their students were

actually going somewhere for eight hours a day and actually getting educated. However,

because so much of a teachers job is riding on this issue—as well as district and state funding—it

has been disproportionately focused on in the educational setting. Further, due to the

deterioration for the art of education, there are fewer and fewer teachers per student, which only

makes creating unique experiences that cater to everyone’s learning needs only more difficult

and daunting. Teaching the curriculum—as it shows up in the textbook—and ensuring the

students can memorize the information using worksheets, may be boring and unengaging, but it

is a surefire way for teachers to convey the information to students and help them get the best

test scores they can (Shernoff et al. 2016). This mode has been a heavily criticized method of

assessment for decades (Hazen et al. 2016; Salganik 1985).

However, just because these methods make life easier for the teacher, especially since

compensation is low, it does not mean that it is the best way to be teaching our students. What

we need are engaging classroom experiences. Our core classes should not simply be teaching

facts, but they should teach valuable life skills. And valuable practices for any student who may
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wish to further their education in the field of a core class. In Arizona, teachers do not even need

their degree in their content in order to teach it anymore. We are at a point where anyone with a

BA can be an educator which only further devalues the work and dedication of the teaching

profession, but also de-motivates teachers who did work hard to get where they are. Not only

that, it is a complete disservice to students who are getting their schooling from someone not

properly educated in their field. Teachers need to be held to a higher standard, and must prove

mastery of their content—the primary way to best serve the students. There are many teachers

who recognize that what is happening is wrong—that teaching to the test, and teaching cold hard

facts instead of letting students experience curriculum is unfair.However, money is ultimately

what makes a school function, and what allows a teacher to live. That has ensured that teachers

and administration will care only about test scores. Despite this, teachers and administration have

made several attempts to address this cold, dry, abstract way of teaching in the field to try to

make a difference that is ultimately more beneficial for their students.

Outcomes. One positive aspect has arisen out of standardization (at least in the science

fields): inquiry-based laboratory activities. Through much of America’s public school history,

cookbook labs have been the gold-standard (Germann et al. 1996). Cookbook labs are guided,

step-by-step instructions for a lab procedure. Students are expected to learn the process of

science by experiencing it, and verify the information learned from class. These structured labs

promote very little critical thinking, conceptual understanding, or appreciation of the topic being

studied (Longo 2011). Inquiry-based science labs allow for exploration, investigation,

responsibility, and learning the real scientific process. Inquiry lab activities also promote critical

thinking and creative design of experimentation. Most importantly, they allow for student

discovery (Longo 2011).

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As education progresses into the future, students will increasingly struggle to relate the

subjects to real life if they do not interact with it in an authentic way. They will avoid college and

stray from a potentially promising and fulfilling career. To foster understanding, appreciation,

and curiosity about knowledge, secondary education classrooms must reinvent the learning

experiences. Teachers can approach this by integrating fieldwork into lessons. The research

strongly supports this mode of learning (Amgen 2016; Barker et al. 2003; Fägerstam & Blom

2013; tMichaud 1941; Resasco 2013). There is also research that has consistently found that text-

based and lecture-based teaching is ineffective when compared to inquiry-based teaching (Rosen

1989), and inquiry-based learning nearly always opens the doors to hands-on activities (Sadeh &

Zion 2011) which can almost certainly lead to field-based activities—with one caveat: as long as

teachers are motivated to conduct them.

Addressing the Problems

Educators recognize that the cold education that many students are being given is not

necessarily the most beneficial to the students. And despite an intense deficit of resources, there

have been some attempts to address this in the classroom. For instance, regarding the

phenomenon of the overuse of textbooks, Jay Matthews, of the Washington Post, admitted a love

for textbooks, but admitted that there was a necessary change that was, fortunately, underway.

He wrote, in regards to the new Common Core Standards that : “Forty-five states and the District

have adopted [them] for math and English language arts in hopes that the move will force

textbook companies to remake products that do not inspire much learning” (Mathews 2012).

While the intent was good, unfortunately, the board that created the curriculum the new

textbooks would be following consisted only of educators who were only teaching at the

university level, and no k-12 educators. While they hoped that they would be able to create
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newer textbooks that would be more engaging, and create a fun to learn environment, instead,

David Greene, of US News hilights the reality: “ Academic creativity has been drained from

degraded and overworked experienced teachers. Uniformity has sucked the life out of teaching

and learning” (Greene 2014). He attributes this drain to the fact that Common Core retains an

intense culture of teaching to the test. Districts buy resources, lesson plans, and project guides so

on and so forth for their teachers, and expect teachers to use those guides in order to ensure

growth in test scores. However, when you do that to an educator, they lose their ability to create

unique experiences in the classroom, and instead create an environment that is uniform and

unengaging.

Introducing authenticity. In regards to a lack of authenticity in the classroom, some

teachers are at fault just as much as textbook companies and Common Core. If problem solving

plays a crucial roles in our everyday lives, then it should play a prominent role in our education.

Teachers are under the impression that adding story-oriented problems is a method of

implementing a problem-centered model of educating, but in reality, these tasks are limited and

are not problematic enough to give students the engagement they need to solve them (Kelly &

Zhang 2016). Just because you are adding some context to the problem does not make it any

more authentic to the student. Tasking students to find the perimeter of Farmer Joe’s farm does

not add any substance to the problem at hand. Problems in all content areas must grasp at a

student’s intellectual need to learn and that starts with the teachers. However, if students were

able to experience a real life application of a problem, such as controlling traffic flow through

school hallways or mapping their campus to determine safety routes, they may feel more realistic

and highly relevant to their daily lives. Other examples could include simple, but active learning

such as determining flight zones and initiation distances for the birds found on a campus;
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measuring human locomotion rates; or determining how mealworm beetles find suitable mates.

Problem-based learning in history could include a historical analysis of the school, their family

history, or this history of their town. It could even be taken to a smaller and more detailed level

that could include geography, mapping, and mathematics. The fundamental conclusion from the

vast array of lesson ideas is this: as a unit, the teacher and students should come up with a

question that none of them know the answer to (this includes the teacher). If the entire class has a

goal to find the answers, more learning could be achieved in a week long investigation than in

months of packet-work or multiple choice tests.

Remodeling the Curriculum

Integrating a Problem Solving Framework

To pave the way towards an engaging and authentic curriculum, educators must

break students out of their shells. To do this, teachers must integrate a thought-provoking

curriculum that gives students the incentive to search for the answer. Bloom and Carlson

(2005) deduced that solving problems in any content area follows a very cyclic route. We

start with orienting ourselves with what is being presented, creating a plan to solve it,

executing that plan, and checking if that plan worked; if something can be revised, go back

to the planning stage. With this in mind, they have constructed a multi-dimensional

problem solving cycle that educators should integrate into their content area for their

students: Orientation → Organization → Execution → Verification.

Now, this network of problem solving cannot be simply integrated into a content area full

of mundane, repetitive problems. Take most math classes into consideration. One must

remember solving questions 1-30 that were all the same concept with just different numbers.
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Kien H. Lim (2009) stated that “For students to experience intellectual need, they must encounter

a problem that they understand and appreciate” (p. 93). Educators in all fields must design tasks

that follow three characteristics: 1) be driven in that particular content area, 2) be accessible to

students, and 3) require justification and explanations. Instead of modeling a classroom where

students are to behave as robots following a predetermined pattern, teachers should devise their

own thought-provoking tasks that fit into their students lives and can be appreciated. Most

problems should be intrinsic such that it goes just beyond what the student’s current knowledge

of that concept is and it grants them a desire to resolve this situation.

Implementing Deductive Reasoning

A method following this model of teaching is introducing games that require students to

use deductive reasoning. Deductive reasoning is a logical process in which a conclusion is based

on the concordance of multiple premises that are generally assumed to be true. Janelle McFeetors

and Ralph T. Mason (2009) designed a game that seemed to rely on purely chance to win, but as

their students continued to play, they realized that they can triumph over their competitor with

logic and strategy. They stated, “In mathematics, logic culminates in generating well-defined

statements of absolute truth proved by rigorously structured argument. However, before students

can construct proofs with mathematical rigor, they need to learn to make convincing arguments

supporting general assertions that matter to them (p. 285–286). This is where developing an

intellectual thought-provoking curriculum comes into play. Even though a lot of these examples

are using math, this model of facilitating is applicable and essential to all subject areas.

Problem-Centered Model of Teaching

To build off of this notion that teaching towards an intellectual need is an essential step

for fixing this particular problem, it is also crucial for educators to teach with problem solving in
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mind. For instance, building a problem-centered classroom environment will “provide

intellectual challenges for enhancing student’s understanding and development (Cai & Lester

2010). To summarize the findings of Cai and Lester (2010), problems should follow a criteria in

which they embed important and useful concepts that can be applied outside of the classroom,

require higher-level thinking, contribute to the conceptual development of students, create an

opportunity for the teacher to assess learning, be approachable in a multitude of ways, offer

various solutions, encourage student engagement and discourse, and finally connect to other

areas within that content area. Of course, it is unreasonable to expect that a teacher follows all of

this criteria when developing a problem. What is important is for them to choose which criteria

can successfully satisfy a particular problem.

Discussion-Based Classroom Environment

The final step to strengthening a student’s drive for learning is by implementing a

reflection and discussion based classroom dynamic. Giving students the power of discourse

motivates them to participate within the content. Students will be driven to contribute and share

their ideas which, in turn, incentivizes learning. Research by Estrella Johnson and Sean Larsen

(2012) described an “inquiry-oriented” classroom environment where students discuss while the

teacher participates by utilizing three forms of listening: hermeneutic, interpretive, and

evaluative. “When a teacher engages in hermeneutic listening, the teacher becomes ‘a participant

in the exploration’. As such, the traditional roles of teacher and student begin to shift, and the

class, rather than the teacher, becomes the authority” (Johnson & Larsen 2012). When the

students have the role of authority, they are heavily incentivized to collaborate with each other

and justify their reasoning. The best part of this shift is that the teacher is receiving a plethora of

new perspectives on the topic they are covering with their students.
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Bringing in Professionals

Off of the topic on how to teach, something to keep in mind is that teachers have

resources available to them that they may not realize. For instance, teachers have the opportunity

to bring in professionals pertaining to their content area into the classroom. The change of pace

and the break from uniformity is already enough of a breath of fresh air for both students and

teachers. Further, in a society where teachers can not afford to be—and are not expected to be—

complete professionals in their content area, this gives students an entirely new perspective and

will give them a deeper appreciation and understanding of the content, further engaging them.

Teachers can bring in architects, or even general mathematicians to explain to students how math

plays out in their careers. Instead of students wondering if they will ever use certain concepts,

they can see how these concepts present themselves in real life. For the sciences, a professional

could come in and help lead an activity in a way that is almost mirroring of the way the lab they

work in is run and the expectations that are placed on them. In this regard, students are allowed

almost a roleplaying experience. Both of these instances also allow for a slightly less intensive

workload for the teacher. Instead of creating lesson plans and unit plans by oneself, solely based

off of experiences in the classroom, teachers are able to find a valuable resource in professionals

who can help come up with content, and the teacher can help create effective teaching strategies.

For ELA and history, teachers can bring in guest speakers. Also regarding ELA, teachers can

invite local authors or publishers, or even book reviewers to the classroom, especially people

involved in writing books that are required for a class. Through this, students can learn to

appreciate the book for more than just text written on paper, but rather for everything that goes

into it.
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Further, if available, allowing students to meet with the authors of their readings, allow

for them to think more critically of the book and to try to understand the story in relation to the

life of the author in a way that is exponentially more meaningful than than of simple research of

the author. For history, they could bring in archeologists, if they are talking about ancient

civilizations, where the archeologist could show pictures of what they discovered and what they

through it might have looked like at the time it was made. Or, as history becomes more

contemporary, people who lived through the events sharing their experiences, or even local

politicians. This will allow students to grasp the reality of the history that is being taught. It is not

just a story of the world, but rather, an actual authentic experience for some people. For lessons

that bring in a professional, teachers can utilize a co-teaching method that will allow the person

working the field to share their experiences and connect them to the students lives while the

teacher is there to provide effective learning strategies such that students of all levels can access

this style of learning. Not only would this encourage a more engaged classroom, but it would

also be a lesson that is less strenuous on the educator, making it a win-win all around.

Technology and its Implications

Integration of technology is an important aspect of most classrooms, utilizing internet

website resources and smartphone or tablet applications—primarily screen-based computer

technologies. Technology has proven to be a great benefit to contemporary classrooms, allowing

students to delve deeper into concepts to gain greater understanding and wider perspective. It has

also allowed for streamlining of lesson material and learning processes. Unfortunately, the

technology advances have also contributed to these cold abstract experiences. However, the

focus on visualizing the abstract on digital screens can do a great deal for quality education.

Thankfully, many current devices are able to record video, audio, and even motion, so this can be
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used as an alternative to advanced scientific machines and as a way to engage students beyond

the desk. Of course, funding is always an issue with technology, and limitations exist as to what

students can acquire, and what teachers can expect to acquire.

Technology has enhanced the learning process; however, it has increasingly driven

education in-seat and online. For example, in biology, learning about adaptations at a desk is

meaningless in terms of its relationship to the real world. Students must be able to see organisms

in nature, behaving in ways that express those adaptations as a function of survival. Thankfully,

the internet has allowed these visualizations to be seen with videos, but one could argue that a

real life experience is worth far more than a video. Another example from biology would be the

teaching of animal coloration and camouflage. If students do not get to actually see it in real life,

is it worth teaching about it? The case can certainly be made that student need to experience

authenticity for their learning to be validated and to feel relevant (Greene 2005). Videos and

images cannot fully inspire curiosity, questions, and the potential for laboratory experiments as

much as real life can (Spell et al. 2013). A study by Julian Resasco supports this notion, finding

that field-based ecology labs greatly engaged student interest in the natural world (2013).

Technology is the perfect example of the lab–field border (Kohler 2002) while simultaneously

acting as a potential bridge for outdoor biology experiences, labs, instruction, and lessons. In

mathematics, technology also plays a bridge–border role. Teachers can simulate mathematical

properties and concepts that could never realistically be shown before technological advances

were around. However, technology can inhibit learning when it is used in place of an authentic

scenario. Giving students the opportunity to go out and personally solve a math problem that is

relevant to them and leaves an impact is much more valuable than graphing the equation of a line

on a calculator. In history, it is impossible to experience the past. However, it is possible to

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experience the relics of the past today by visiting museums and publically available

archaeological sites. This, of course, requires trips and boils down to funding. Technology is

both a solution and a contributor to the problem. It should be used as an aid to scaffold students

towards solving authentic scenarios rather than used as a placeholder to avoid these tasks

altogether.

Conclusion

It is clear that the education system in America is functionally flawed. Students are

receiving a boring, thoughtless education that is not impactful to their lives. This is not the single

fault of government policies, textbook companies, or even the teachers. It is a collective, cultural

dilemma that needs to be fixed directly in the classroom and with how teachers directly facilitate

their students. As a lack of classroom engagement continues, American education will decline.

Teachers must combat this by instituting creative, high-quality, and self-created lessons that

break from the norm. With the weight of bureaucracy, under-funded budgets, and low pay,

teachers cannot accept the present state and must break from tradition. Collaboration with peers

and outsiders is crucial to its success.

Educators must use standardization to their advantage by taking their vagueness and

openness and applying authentic lessons in (or outside of) their classrooms. They must take

advantage of their technological resources and be creative with how the students experience

content. By applying a new classroom dynamic in which students are challenged intellectually,

are given a momentary role of authority, and are free to academically discuss amongst their

peers, the classroom environment will already start to shift progressively towards a more

engaging and genuine experience for both the students and the teacher.
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