An Evaluation of Changes in the Curriculum in Elementary School Level in Turkey

Introduction Knowledge, which has influenced the 21st century, has shown twofold increase per four years. Developed societies who have carried out the necessary conditions of the century have been named as society / postmodern society. An especially in computer as well as communication and in the parallel of these developments, people's having easy access to knowledge have caused it to be an important power. Nowadays, knowledge is the fundamental capital of economy namely the basic source of it (Drucker, 1996, p. 87). Just like other institutions, objectives, structure and contents of institutions, which are the important parts of socio-cultural as well as economic innovation and development, become different. It has been an absolute necessity to be different in terms of schools in order to adapt the conditions of the time (Balo, 2001, p. 495; Taymaz, 1997, p. 28; Cafoglu, 1996, p. 39). Especially after 1980s in Turkey, it is observed that there are activities done for changing the system under the names of restructure, educational reform, redesign or development in order to reach proper living conditions necessitated by the contemporary life and increase the quality of education. In order to increase quality and improve equity in education in Turkey, utilize research findings in various scientific areas to improve programs; and integrate improvements in teaching and instruction in the curriculum, new programs for the grades 1-5 have been being used since 2005-2006 academic year. The aim of these new programs is to save students from memorizing knowledge, and help them improve their creativity, decision-making and problem solving abilities and inquiry skills. Increase of change and diversity in education field today with respect to past, reform which is introduced together with, attempts for reconstructing or school give much of the responsibility to those who make decisions. Expectations from the schools and the role of the school principals together with are changing. It has been evaluated as a common viewpoint that role and responsibilities of the school principals will be changing continuously and they will never be a constant principal (Edwards, 2000; Taymaz, 1997, p.29; Acikahn, 1995; Cetin and Yalcin, 2002; Titiz, 1999; Cafoglu, 1996, p. 39). Change management is an important and passionate topic for schools as much as institutions which have given service and produced work. The objective of education is to educate and give instruction. Education and instruction mean to change and be different. Therefore, the most important role of the schools is to manage the change. As the aim of the management is to change and educate, this situation has given a private importance to the schools. The term in contemporary management has been using for this characteristics. The idea of learning organizations states inseparable part of organizational process of education change, consequently change (James and Connoly, 2000, p. 16). New roles of the principals in the 21st. century are to manage the change, set up flexible constructions, have dynamic systems, manage systematic and unsystematic conditions for today and tomorrow, constitute learner organization and enable learner organization to live infinite (Tetenbaum, 1998; quoted in (Celik, 2000, p. 162). In other perspective, it is emphasized that leaders need to have leadership actions and thinking structures such as acting in proactively, having a vision, being a transformational leader, managing change, risks and crisis in order to exist in a knowledge or a postmodern society (Aytac, 2002, p. 59). School principals, who desire to carry out changes and innovation, need to know change processes very well, school organizations in terms of organizational perspective, powers which direct schools to change and which elements of organizations are affected so that they require a change. …