Four math teachers have made history by getting a lesson plan that they developed themselves approved by Flanders’ education department. Normally experts within the education networks create lesson plans
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Lesson plan put together by actual teachers approved for first time in Flanders
Lisa Bradshaw
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There’s a first time for everything: Flanders’ education department has approved a maths lesson packet created by secondary school teachers. It is the first time that a curriculum developed by a group of teachers was submitted to the department for approval. Now that it has been given the green light, secondary schools can choose to use the maths lesson plan when the new school year begins in September.
“I have been teaching for 28 years and, like my colleagues, I thought that we should be giving more attention to basic arithmetic skills,” explains Els Van Lommel, one of the teachers who put together the curriculum. “We notice that pupils are increasingly unable to calculate using letters and fractions and don’t understand factorisation.”
The four teachers found that “broad basic skills” were missing in existing curricula. “So we simply provided an alternative.”
We think that teachers can sometimes have more impact than they realise
Maths teacher Els Van Lommel
Lesson plans are usually developed by experts working within or called upon by Flanders’ educational networks or organisations. Schools in Flanders belong to one of three main networks, with several organisations representing schools within those networks.
All lesson plans must be approved by the Flemish education department’s inspection service. They are assessed as to whether they fulfil requirements of the eindtermen, or standards – the skills and knowledge that pupils are expected to have on every subject by the end of the school year.
The eindtermen have been adapted recently, and the four teachers thought that the existing maths curricula were not ambitious enough to meet them. They wanted to create a plan that would expand on the minimum goals.
The four “worked extremely hard on this plan – sometimes through the night,” says Van Lommel. “We are so relieved right now – but mostly proud that we did this.” The teachers hope that this unprecedented approval will inspire more teachers to take such initiatives. “We think that teachers can sometimes have more impact than they realise.”