Lesson nine
Writing Competencies and Objectives
Introduction:
A curriculum framework in Career and Technical Education in North Carolina is referred to as a blueprint. This document serves as a means of communication to all those involved. It also provides detail and pulls all the content together for the instructor.
Developing a framework or blueprint for a course is the most time consuming part of curriculum development and can sometimes be the most frustrating part of the process. Framework development takes place after all of the needs are considered and an advisory group has decided on the curriculum content. Usually one person or a very small committee writes the competencies and objectives. After they are written then they can be sent back to the original content committee for final approval.
As you study the North Carolina standards for blueprint development and the North Carolina blueprints, be aware of the information in each column of the blueprint. "Time in hours" can be filled out by the instructor when they use the blueprint as a pacing guide. Also realize that agricultural education competencies and objectives do not necessarily have to be taught in the sequence of the blueprint. It is possible to teach multiple objectives in one lesson from different units. For example you might not want to teach about careers all in one day. This might be an objective that is taught over a series of days along with career related skills.
If you are a detail person you will enjoy this lesson and Phase III of the assignment. I think you will find writing competencies and objectives a difficult but fulfilling task of the curriculum developer.
Objectives:
-
Examine the importance of building a curriculum framework in the curriculum development process.
-
Compare goals, objectives, and competencies in the curriculum development process.
-
Examine national and state goals that have been developed in vocational and agricultural education by commissioned studies and initiatives.
-
Compare the domains of learning and how they determine the selection of the action verb in objective and competency statements.
-
Write an objective and competency using North Carolina Department of Public Instruction standards.
Readings:
-
Read chapter 8: Setting Curriculum Goals and Objectives, located in Moodle.
-
Examine the recent "The National Strategic Plan and Action Agenda for Agricultural Education Reinventing Agricultural Education for the Year 2020: Creating the Preferred Future for Agricultural Education The National Strategic Plan" which identifies current national goals for agricultural education.
-
Examine North Carolina agricultural blueprints to determine the format used to lay out a curriculum framework..
-
The North Carolina Department of Public Instruction has developed standards for VOCATS blueprints. How do they differentiate between competencies and objectives? Be aware that they have recently added a standard that does not allow content related CTSO's competencies or objectives to be included in the blueprints.You must follow these standards when writing your competencies and objectives in Phase III of your final project.
-
If you need an action verb to match your objective classification (cognitive, performance, or affective), check this list out.
Powerpoint Presentations:
Download this week's presentation:
Assignments:
-
This week you will complete Phase III of your project. You should use the blueprint shell to develop a mini-blueprint for the course you decided to develop in Phase I. This mini-blueprint should consist of a minimum of 10 competencies and 20 objectives. Make sure you follow the steps for writing competencies and objectives in this week's lesson (refer to the PowerPoint), and the standards and verb sheet above. Feel free to send me a sample of your efforts this week, if you want feedback before you write all of them.
Plugins to third party applications found in this lesson such as Quicktime, Powerpoint, Word, Adobe, etc can be downloaded from the AEE 529 course syllabus.