Abstract:
Curriculum packages have been developed that attempt to build in a view of teaching and learning
to promote ‘good practice’ in teaching. Improving the quality of teaching is influenced by the
ability of curriculum developers to package their product to promote faithful implementation of
appropriate pedagogy. This paper outlines research that assessed the effectiveness of a curriculum
package to promote ‘good practice’ in science teaching, characterised by constructivist teaching
approaches with cooperative learning. Teachers from three schools attended professional learning
sessions at which the learning/teaching theory supporting the curriculum package was explained
along with the main ideas that teachers were likely to find new and different. The teachers then
implemented the curriculum package. The findings suggest that teachers themselves are the
most important factor in determining the teaching that takes place and that the success of a
curriculum package combined with a professional learning program may be determined by how
well they connect with teachers’ views and experience. In some cases the curriculum package
connect with teacher views and improved the quality of teaching and learning while in others
they did not and so teaching was inhibited and learning was restricted.
