Curriculum Ergonomics#
See also: teaching, exploring-australian-curriculum
Choppin et al (2018) "conceptualize curriculum ergonomics as a field that studies the interactions between users and curriculum materials"
Origins#
Builds upon cognitive ergonomics - studying interactions between humans, systems, machines (including digital) and the environment and from that how work gets done. Different from classical ergonmics which focused on physical aspects - posture etc. Cognitive ergonomics focuses on psychological aspects "how work affects the mind and how the mind affects the work". With interests in situation awareness and cognitive load.
Four themes from cognitive ergonomics are identified
- Decision making in complex environments - it's hard.
- Impact of cognitive load - too much detracts from performance.
- Difficulty managing information flows in dynamic environments - people struggle.
- Tools can extend what people can achieve by themselves.
| Theme | Description | Example from cognitive ergonomics | Example from use of curriculum resources |
|---|---|---|---|
| Decision making in complex environments | In complex environments, there is the potential for unanticipated events or effects, making it difficult to meet goals | Determining procedures to follow in emergency situations | Determining instructional response/ adaptations when a student presents an unanticipated solution |
| Effect of cognitive load on decision making | Cognitive load can negatively impact controlled performance; moreover, performance suffers when people engage in two simultaneous activities that rely on cognitive control | Driving distracted due to engagement in activities not critical for safe driving | Enacting curriculum that requires attention to student thinking while simultaneously performing administrative tasks and managing the classroom |
| Environments that involve both human and machine interactions | When people operate in complex and dynamic environments in which they simultaneously interact with computer based information systems and other people, the cognitive load can lead to people diverging from goals or misperceiving ongoing phenomena | Trading in financial instruments, which requires virtual and real interactions while taking in multiple streams of data and following complex procedures to make decisions | Acting productively on information in realtime assessment displays while engaging in ongoing face-to-face interactions with students |
| Creativity support tools or environments | Creativity support tools extend people’s capabilities in the creation of artifacts, while creativity support environments provide accessible information and scaffolds | Using Adobe Illustrator to create Artwork or Adobe Photoshop to edit, compose, and layer a photograph with other graphical imagery | Using lesson planning templates or using new digital resources such as links to external resources, including multimedia, interactive content demonstrations, and other materials |
5 themes#
Choppin et al (2018) identify five themes that a curriculum ergonomics brings into focus (including references in the original)
| Theme | Description |
|---|---|
| Teachers’ relationship with and capacity to use curriculum resources | Design processes in which teachers engage as they draw from and transform curriculum resources |
| Alignment between design intentions and patterns of curriculum use | How users’ intentions and patterns of use align with the intended pattern of use envisioned by the designers |
| Ways in which curriculum resources influence instruction | How messages and structure in materials influence instructional outcomes from the use of the materials |
| Ways in which curriculum features are purposefully designed to achieve a certain purpose (e.g., an educative purpose) | How features of design in curriculum resources can push users to engage with content or the materials in new ways |
| Dissolution of boundaries between design and use | In the context of digital resources, teachers are engaging in new design practices as they participate collectively in the design of materials and select materials for lessons |
They use these themes to summarise/connect existing research.
Teachers' relationship with and capacity to use curriuclum resources#
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The documentation approach
Explores teacher-tool relationship. Helps in study of teachers' processes. What they generate. How they orchestrate and their role in the design process.
-
The participatory perspective
related/shares much with documentation approach. But focuses more on the reflexive relationship with teacher and curriculum resources. Mentions pedagogical design capacity from Brown (2009)
Alignment between design and use#
Are teachers aware of the curriculum's original intent? How do they transform it? Why?
- Nature of transformations.
- How learning from repeated use impacts notions of alignment.
Influence of curriculum materials on instructional practices#
The fit with teachers purposes/context/practices can exert pressure on adoption and adaptation. Curriculum resources that are more associated with delivery were strongly associated with direct instruction.
Curriculum resources that purposefully push teachers to new forms of instruction#
Dissolving boundaries between design and use#
Emergence of digital curriculum resources have enabled teachers to engage in design work. Creation (collective development) and transformation.
Proposed contributions#
Choppin et al (2018) suggest three contributions
- Allowing a focus on the fit between the intentions of curriculum designers and teachers and how that influences the adoption and adaptation of curriculum resources.
- How curriculum materials impact the cognitive load of teacher's work and how to improve that.
- How the design of digital resources affords/constraints teachers' work in terms of: selecting and designing tasks; sequencing tasks; enacting tasks to meeting planned intentions
Thus, an important potential outcome of studying the ergonomics of curriculum use is the development of empirically developed principles for supporting teachers’ capacity to understand and utilize curriculum resources to design and enact productive lessons. (p. 76)
References#
Choppin, J., Roth McDuffie, A., Drake, C., & Davis, J. (2018). Curriculum ergonomics: Conceptualizing the interactions between curriculum design and use. International Journal of Educational Research, 92, 75--85. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijer.2018.09.015