Abstract:
Chapter eight introduces Rata’s Curriculum Design Coherence Model (CDC Model) and shows how TransAcquisition Pedagogy and the CDC Model are aligned. Both methods take an academic concept approach to the pre-teaching design of concepts and content, the focus of the CDC Model, and then the actual teaching of those academic concepts as the focus of the TransAcquisition method. Identifying the alignment is crucial to the purpose of this book. That purpose is to show that effective curriculum design alongside effective bilingual teaching methods contributes to increased student achievement. Isolating and describing the features of the alignment reveals the connection between knowledge and learning (that is, ‘thought’ and ‘thinking’) to demonstrate the role of language as the connecting mechanism. The added value of the alignment provides an innovative approach to education, particularly to bilingual and immersion education. The CDC Model focuses on the ‘thought products’ which comprise the epistemic structure, while TAP provides teaching methods for the ‘thinking process’ in the cognitive structure. The conceptual coherence of the thought object’s epistemic structure is directly linked to the conceptual progression of the thinking process. The alignment is demonstrated in an account of the Knowledge-Rich School Project with examples from science.