At two or three points in chapter 4 of Curriculum 21 by Heidi Hayes Jacobs she used the phrase "The whole is the sum of the parts" in reference to school structure and form. It may be the fact that I am an optimist, but I believe that she should have rephrased this to "The whole is greater than the sum of the parts." In any organization the individual pieces may function well separately, but is only when they work well together that you can achieve something greater.
This is why interdisciplinary studies is important in school. When the English, Social Studies, Science, and Math departments (and possibly other departments, too) team up for the students to work on a single project the students really win because they are experiencing what research in the working world is really like. For example, Scientists doing research (Science) gather data and analyze it (Math), they use historical information to help them make new discoveries (Social Studies), and write reports and publications to share their discoveries (English).
As an ELA teacher at the middle level I try very hard to integrate ELA and SS together. Last year I only taught ELA, not SS, but still tried to integrate. It is interesting that I get questions from my students such as, "Why are we studying about the Civil Rights Movement, this is ELA class?" Every year I find myself explaining how they are connected. Reading Jacobs has made me stop and think how I can now work math and science into what I do in my ELA classes. I want to do more, I just must figure out the details.
ReplyDeleteThat is a push we are trying to make at our school, more cross curricular planning, the learning becomes more meaningful if the student can see how all the classes relate to each other instead of teaching in isolation.
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