Abstract:
Currently, the educational system of Kazakhstan is undergoing the significant
reforms related to the secondary school curriculum as the previous one inherited from the
Soviet times was criticized for being ineffective in allowing students to develop the
twenty-first-century skills. This issue was revealed during the research on secondary
education conducted by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development
(OECD) in 2014. To address the problem, the OECD team recommended reviewing the
content of the school curriculum. The given recommendation has been realized in the form
of the upgraded curriculum, the implementation of which started in the 2016-2017
academic year.
The study aimed to explore teachers' perceptions of implementing the upgraded
curriculum in one of the mainstream schools of Aktau, to identify their attitudes towards
new reform. It was also focused on the factors supporting and impeding the
implementation of new curriculum. Mixed methods design was used to provide an in-depth
exploration of teachers' attitudes. This approach first identified to what extent were
teachers satisfied with new practices, and then explained their answers in more detail
through the qualitative data from selected participants. Participants with different
backgrounds regard the issue from different perspectives.
The findings of the quantitative part show that most teachers have positive beliefs
about new reform; only a few statements demonstrated negative attitudes of teachers
towards assessment. These answers were examined more deeply in the qualitative part of
the study, which found that more experienced teachers are less satisfied with the changes
in the content and pedagogy while less experienced teachers see only opportunities in the
upgraded program. However, the obstacles caused by inadequate educational resources,
diversity and the big number of students, poor parental involvement, memories and
pressure from the top constrain their enthusiasm to implement the new changes.