I've worked at a few schools and have dealt with a couple different
types of curriculum styles. It seems as if schools today go towards
two extremes with curricula. Either the curricula is matched to the
child's developmental and cognitive abilities or the children are
matched with peers who are at the same mental ability levels. When the
curricula is matched to the child's ability, (s)he is able to learn
broad concepts through exploration and direct experience. The goal of
this process is to
produce critical thinking individuals who seek answers to their own
questions. When children are grouped together through ability tracking,
they learn through carefully structured and sequenced curricula that
develops measurable proficiencies in each subject. The goal of this
process is to produce a mastery of skills, including memorization and
the ability to respond to questions with the right answer, rather than
the wrong one. I was wondering which styles seem to work more
efficiently for teachers and students in practice, or what
cir***stances does it depend on?
