Developing Competences Based on Textbook: The Curriculum Potential of Social Studies Teachers in Elementary School

Abstract

The 12-year Basic Education Curriculum Guideline advocates competence-based teaching, but there are still many teachers who rely heavily on textbooks and are used to the pages-covering teaching model. However, in some of excellent teaching plans, teachers design innovative teaching activities beyond the textbooks, and demonstrate their curriculum potential. This article focuses on the elementary school social studies, which is often regarded by students as the subject studied mainly by reciting. The researchers take the award-winning teaching plans and the corresponding textbook content as objects, conduct the text analysis, and discuss how teachers can expand the content of textbooks to design competence-based teaching activities. The researchers found that compared with textbooks, the learning goals set by teachers have more emphasis on conceptual knowledge and procedure skills. Secondly, their teaching plans has three characteristics: 1. To replace textbook materials with students' life situations to help build practical experience. 2. To design the inquiry process and guide to construct the concepts in textbooks. 3. To arrange learning tasks for students to apply their knowledge and skills. Based on the findings, the researchers offer three recommendations for social studies teachers to realize their curriculum potential.