Block Scheduling

Block scheduling is a class schedule alternative that offers fewer classes each day for longer blocks [Page 84]of time. Following the publication of A Nation at Risk in 1983, public schools in the United States entered a period of reform and restructuring designed to improve student academic performance and to make better use of instructional time without lengthening the school day. Reformers called for a creation of smaller schools, the development of a standard core curriculum, the elimination of student tracking, and a reexamination of the use of time. Changes to pedagogical practices and the curriculum demanded more flexible scheduling. In the face of these demands, many secondary schools implemented variations of block scheduling based on Trump's Flexible Modular Scheduling Design. Robert Lynn Canady and ...