Perceptions of Implementability: A Policy Instrument Theory-Guided Case Study of a New Curriculum Design
| dc.contributor.author | Rudy, Colleen | |
| dc.contributor.supervisor | Sanford, Kathy | |
| dc.date.accessioned | 2023-04-06T00:10:37Z | |
| dc.date.available | 2023-04-06T00:10:37Z | |
| dc.date.copyright | 2023 | en_US |
| dc.date.issued | 2023-04-05 | |
| dc.degree.department | Department of Curriculum and Instruction | en_US |
| dc.degree.level | Doctor of Philosophy Ph.D. | en_US |
| dc.description.abstract | Public education reform programs often rely on the revision or redesign of the curriculum as a key government intervention for improving instruction and levels of student curricular achievement and attainment. This educational program change strategy is founded on the causal story of policy instrument theory. A central assumption of policy instrument theory is that changes in the design of the mandated curriculum will cause automatic, concomitant changes in teachers’ perceptions, decision making, and instructional behaviour that will result in improved instruction. However, implementation research has found that this assumed causal relationship does not always occur due to teachers’ perceptions of the implementability of the new curriculum design. Research indicates that teachers within these studies tend to have durable perceptions or beliefs with which they judge and evaluate the curriculum during implementation and upon which they will decide to accept, adapt, modify, ignore, or search for alternatives to the new curriculum design. As a result, the assumptions and causal story of policy instrument theory have been extended to include: the goodness of the curriculum design; and teachers’ perceptions of the implementability of the curriculum design. This study investigates perceptions of the implementability of a new curriculum design through interviews with seven high school teachers and a policy document analysis using a theoretical framework that includes both policy instrument theory and extended policy instrument theory. The findings from this study indicate that: 1. teachers’ perceptions of a new curriculum design mediate implementation; 2. the individual attributes of the curriculum design mediate teachers’ perceptions of its implementability; 3. mandated new curriculum documents should be supported by on-going professional learning opportunities; 4. extended policy instrument theory appears to provide the best explanation for the findings from the interview analysis while policy instrument theory appears to provide the best explanation for the findings from the document analysis and reports in the literature. The results from this inquiry may lead to a better understanding and appreciation of the value of policy instrument theory and extended policy instrument theory for explaining the relationship between curriculum design, teachers’ perceptions, and implementation within public education reform programs. | en_US |
| dc.description.scholarlevel | Graduate | en_US |
| dc.identifier.uri | http://hdl.handle.net/1828/14934 | |
| dc.language | English | eng |
| dc.language.iso | en | en_US |
| dc.rights | Available to the World Wide Web | en_US |
| dc.subject | curriculum design | en_US |
| dc.subject | policy instrument theory | en_US |
| dc.subject | perceptions | en_US |
| dc.subject | implementability | en_US |
| dc.subject | public education reform | en_US |
| dc.subject | curriculum reform | en_US |
| dc.title | Perceptions of Implementability: A Policy Instrument Theory-Guided Case Study of a New Curriculum Design | en_US |
| dc.type | Thesis | en_US |