A Parallel Model

Each subject area teaches a related topic concurrently. Subject matter content is not changed, but realigned to coincide in a timely manner. The same or reinforcing topics are taught in each area, but not necessarily with the same concepts. The transfer of learning occurs primarily in the student's head rather than as a direct result of instruction.

Example: The English teacher instructs The Diary of Anne Frank, the world history teacher, the Holocaust, and the visual arts teacher, Picasso's mural, Guernica.

An Integrated Model

The subject area content is organized around a big idea, theme, concept, problem, or project. Subject area content and thematic content co-exist. Interdisciplinary connections are realized through commonly instructed concepts and ideas. The transfer of learning occurs as a direct result of instruction. There can be varying degrees of integration of the subject areas. In a fully integrated approach, "you're not quite sure what class you're in." says Patricia Waslet, a senior researcher with the Coalition of Essential Schools.

Example: Improvisation is studied from the perspectives of drama, music, visual arts and dance. Students are challenged to find similarities and differences.

Pros & Cons

Pros

"The real world isn't divided into separate disciplines."
Suzanne Krogh, Professor of Education, Western Washington University

"The disciplines are contrived ways to give people information."
Susan Kovalik, Education Consultant

"When learning jumps from one discipline to another every 45 minutes learning is unnecessarily fragmented."
Suzanne Krogh

"When students are taught solely through the disciplines, they believe math is math and social studies is social studies-and never the twain shall meet. The idea of applying mathematics to a social studies question, such as changing the demographics of cities, may never occur to them."
Suzanne Krogh

"We have known for a long time that students learn more, remember more, and apply knowledge more when they are taught in an interdisciplinary mode."
Joan Palmer, Associate Superintendent, Howard County, MD

"Student learning is richer when they are taught in an interdisciplinary mode because drawing connections between subjects requires students to do more higher level thinking."
Ben Ebersole, Professor for Education, University of Maryland-Baltimore County

CONS

"The contention that the disciplines don't reflect real life sets up a phony contrast because there are disciplines that operate in the world outside school."
Grant Wiggins, Director of Programs and Research at the Center of Learning Assessment and School Structure.

Wiggins cites the case study method used at Harvard Law School which is closely tied to the real world, yet subject specific. Better attention to content and context can make subject area instruction as relevant and motivating as integrated instruction is touted to be.

Wiggins worries that interdisciplinary instruction may require teachers to wade into topics beyond their expertise.

The idea of interdisciplinary instruction is popular, Wiggins believes, because it's a seemingly plausible response to a real, perceivable problem: dreary teaching of subjects.
 

Sponsored by The Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center, The Center for Renaissance and Baroque Studies, and the Maryland State Department of Education.