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Curriculum Overview
Maryland has developed curricular documents that define what students should know and be able to do at each grade, pre-kindergarten through grade 8 and for selected high school courses. The curriculum documents are formatted so that each begins with content standards or broad, measurable statements about what students should know and be able to do. Indicator statements provide the next level of specificity and begin to narrow the focus for teachers. Finally, the objectives provide teachers with very clear information about what specific learning should occur.
History of Development
Each of the documents was developed by hundreds of educators from across Maryland. These educators came from Maryland’s public school classrooms as well as universities and colleges. Content specialists, supervisors and administrators helped in the development and review of the documents. Working with research and existing national standard documents, teams of educators created clear statements of grade level expectations in each content area. The final review of the document involved outside content experts, hired through the State procurement process, to review the document and benchmark Maryland’s curricular documents against exemplary documents from other states and countries.
The Reading English/Language Arts State Curriculum was developed based on the work of the National Reading Panel, existing Maryland Content Standards and Core Learning Goals as well as the National Council for Teachers of English/International Reading Association’s Standards for the English Language Arts. Expert reviews were conducted in 2003 and 2007. In 2003 expert review Maryland’s Reading English/Language Arts State Curriculum was compared to California and Massachusetts’s standards and for early literacy, Maryland‘s State Curriculum was compared to New Standards, North Carolina and Texas. In 2007, experts compared the high school English/Language Arts State Curriculum to the American Diploma Project Benchmarks.
The Mathematics State Curriculum was developed using the standards developed by National Council of the Teachers of Mathematics and the existing Maryland Content Standards and Core Learning Goals. Expert reviews have been conducted in 2003, 2007 and 2009. During the 2003 expert review, the Mathematics State Curriculum was compared to state standards from Indiana and Massachusetts, and the Singapore National Math Standards. During the 2007 review the Maryland High School Mathematics Curricula were compared with the mathematics standards of the American Diploma Project. In 2009 Achieve’s American Diploma Project (ADP) K-6 and Two-Year Middle School Backmapped Benchmarks for Mathematics, the National Mathematic Advisory Panel Foundations for Success (NMAP), the National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP) Mathematics Framework 2009—Grades 4 and 8—and the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) Curriculum Focal Points for Prekindergarten through Grade 8 Mathematics are the standards that were used as the basis of comparison for the review of Maryland’s PreK- 8 Voluntary State Curriculum (VSC) in Mathematics.
The Science State Curriculum used the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)—Benchmarks for Science Literacy and the National Science Education Standards, as well as existing Maryland Science Content Standards and Core Learning Goals. In the Achieve 2005 expert review the Science State Curriculum was compared to the State documents from Delaware, Indiana and Massachusetts.
The Social Studies State Curriculum was developed using the existing Social Studies Content Standards and Core Learning Goals as well as the National Standards for United States History (K-4), the National Standards for United States History (5-12), the National Standards for Civics and Government, the National Geography Standards for Life, the National Voluntary Standards in Economics and the National Council for Social Studies Standards. During the Westat 2005 expert review the state documents from Indiana and Kansas were used as benchmarks for comparison.
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In Focus
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School Improvement in Maryland
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To learn more about the Voluntary State Curriculum, such as what it looks like and how it was developed, visit School Improvement in Maryland—the state’s award-winning Web site for educators.
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Division of Instruction
Maryland State Department of Education |
| 200 West Baltimore Street |
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