A r c h i v e d  I n f o r m a t i o n

Using TIMSS to Inform Changes in Curriculum

The findings suggest directions for changes in U.S. curriculum policies. As a starting point, we need more focus, coherence, and rigor in our curriculum. Higher performance expectations for students and by students, especially during the middle school and high school years, are needed to alter course-taking patterns.

We cannot solve our curriculum problems by simply moving upper-grade courses or advanced topics to lower grades or merely insisting that students take more of what is currently available. Rather, curriculum reform means redefining content, grade by grade, to ensure coherent transitions from simple to more complex content and skills. It may also mean organizing topics in a different way.

Every national context is different, and similar curricula play out in different ways in various nations, states, and classrooms. Merely emulating the curriculum practices of other countries is not an effective strategy for the United States. Rather, we should apply the new knowledge about curriculum from TIMSS to develop new alternatives that fit our own context. The process of reforming curriculum should include strategies for monitoring how students and parents respond to innovations. In the past, some educators have pushed curriculum innovations like whole language to an extreme before we really knew which aspects worked and which did not. And they lost public support in the process (Richard Elmore, Harvard University, TIMSS Policy Forum).

Implementing these changes will require policymakers to make some difficult choices, such as deciding which topics are most important, which can be eliminated, and what should be done for students who do not learn the content at the time it is offered. Making these changes will necessitate discussions across grades and across levels of government. Right now the United States does not have professional or policy structures that encourage these kinds of conversations--suggesting we may have to create them.

While focus, coherence, and rigor in curriculum appear to be necessary conditions for raising math and science achievement, these characteristics alone cannot guarantee high achievement. The curriculum sets the stage for good instruction (Schmidt and Valverde, 1997).

[What TIMSS Says About Curriculum]

[What TIMSS Says about Instruction and Professional Development]