Season 3 | Episode 2 - Principles for Responsive Curriculum Use - Guest: Dr. Corey Drake

Dr. Corey Drake, Principles for Responsive Curriculum Use

ROUNDING UP: SEASON 3 | EPISODE 2

When it comes to curriculum, educators are often told to implement with fidelity. But what does fidelity mean, and where does that leave educators who want to be responsive to the students in their classrooms? Today we’re talking with Dr. Corey Drake about principles for responsive curriculum use that invite educators to respond to the students in their classrooms while still implementing curriculum with integrity.

BIOGRAPHY

Corey Drake is the senior director for professional learning at The Math Learning Center. She began her career in education as a middle school special education teacher in the Chicago Public Schools. Corey is committed to supporting teachers in using curriculum materials to teach diverse groups of students in equitable ways.

RESOURCES

Responding to Student Thinking Via Curriculum Materials (Handout)

TRANSCRIPT

Mike Wallus: When it comes to curriculum, educators are often told to implement with fidelity. But what does fidelity mean? And where does that leave educators who want to be responsive to students in their classrooms? Today we're talking with Dr. Corey Drake about principles for responsive curriculum use that invite educators to respond to the students in their classrooms while still implementing curriculum with integrity.

One of the age-old questions that educators grapple with is how to implement a curriculum in ways that are responsive to the students in their classroom. It's a question I thought a lot about during my years as a classroom teacher, and it's one that I continue to discuss with my colleague at MLC, Dr. Corey Drake. As a former classroom teacher and a former teacher educator who only recently began working for an organization that publishes curriculum, Corey and I have been trying to carve out a set of recommendations that we hope will help teachers navigate this question. Today on the podcast, we'll talk about this question of responsive curriculum use and offer some recommendations to support teachers in the field. 

Welcome back to the podcast, Corey. I'm excited to have you with us again.

Corey Drake: It's great to be with you again.

Mike: So, I've been excited about this conversation for a while because this question of, “What does it mean to be responsive to students and use a curriculum?” is something that teachers have been grappling with for so long. And you and I often hear phrases like “implementation with fidelity” used when folks are trying to describe their expectations when a curriculum's adopted.

Corey: Yeah, I mean, I think this is a question teachers grapple with. It's a question I've been grappling with for my whole career, from different points of view from when I was a classroom teacher and a teacher educator and now working at The Math Learning Center. 

But I think this is the fundamental tension: “How do you use a set of published curriculum materials while also being responsive to your students?” And I think ideas like implementation with fidelity didn't really account for the responsive-to-your-students piece. Fidelity has often been taken up as meaning “following curriculum materials page by page, word for word, task for task.” 

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