Transforming Curriculum Through Teacher-Learner Partnerships

Book excerpt: Empowering learners for life requires a fundamental shift in higher education curriculum design. New priorities, pedagogies, technologies, spaces, and assessment strategies are required to enable learners to take ownership of their learning. “Student-centeredness” concepts are still prescriptive in nature as most decisions on curriculum, assessment, teaching, and learning approaches are still teacher-centric. Teachers are developing student-centered learning environments without the involvement of the learners in the planning, decision making, and/or design process. In addition, some lecturers are still practicing the traditional approaches of content delivery and conventional assessment methods rather than experimenting with innovative practices suited for student-centered approaches. Therefore, there is an ongoing need for research focused on the importance and effectiveness of a paradigm shift in education that involves student-teacher partnerships, fueled by innovative teaching and learning designs, where students take an active role and contribute as partners in learning. Transforming Curriculum Through Teacher-Learner Partnerships captures experiences and evidence among teachers in exploring the possibility of active student participation in curriculum design, delivery, and assessment through teacher-learner partnership. The chapters address issues of teacher-learner partnerships in designing the learning environment and how student-centered methods create resilient, adaptable, and future-capable learners. While highlighting topics within this scope such as learner autonomy, learning performance, self-efficacy, and teaching pedagogy, this book is ideally intended for teachers, administrators, teacher educators, practitioners, stakeholders, researchers, academicians, and students interested in issues related to the teacher-learner partnership.