The Necessity to Design a Curriculum Consulting Training Package with Brain-Based Educational Approach

Introduction

Curriculum consultation is a new topic that has been formed based on educational engineering in the field of curriculum studies. The purpose of this research motivated to investigate the necessity of designing a curriculum consultation educational package with a brain training approach. This approach emphasizing the brain and its operation and linking it with learning processes has brought new topics into the educational fields. Consulting services have been an important place in line with the complexities of modern life and the specialization of many jobs today. Researchers have always emphasized the need for counseling services, especially for students from various psychological, academic and occupational aspects, and confirmed its effectiveness. Curriculum consulting has been associated to jobs such as educational planning specialist, educational manager and consultant, learning consultant and educational consultant. However, there are many ambiguities regarding academic counseling and curriculum counseling. It should be noted that the audience of curriculum consultation are primarily learners, trainers and teachers that these two may have similarities in terms of goals, but they have different levels of activity and scope of activity (Rudi, 2017). The ultimate goal of counseling is to achieve academic success upon knowing and solving the students' problems; by creating motivation and interest, the counselors will make them work better; and by knowing the students' talent and interest and guiding them to favorite field cause to prevent their academic failure; and in other hand, lead to increase the self-efficacy of students in doing their activities which ultimately result in the growth and prosperity of society.

The method of this qualitative research was content analysis and comparative categorization system. Qualitative research has been considered a broad, deep and meaningful and even non-instrumental approach to problems, behavior and findings. The field of research in this study included all the books and resources written about lesson planning counseling with the brain training approach that all relevant articles and books available from 2010 to 2019 were used as sample. And also the method of scanning the printed and digital books and resources available in the library, databases, magazines and electronic books were used to collect information. The method of data analysis in this research was the use of a comparative categorization system along wih subjected coding method, which used the paragraph analysis unit and was carried out in three stages: the first stage of coding was to convert data and phenomena into concepts; for this purpose, separate data were "crossed". Then phrases were categorized based on semantic units so that comments and "concepts" (codes) were attached to them. Accordingly, the important sentences related to the research question were extracted and placed in the table, and then detailed concepts were extracted and coded from the text. In next step, these codes were categorized based on the phenomena discovered in the data that were directly related to the current research. The obtained categories were re-linked to codes that were more abstract than the codes of the first stage. Codes clearly represented the content of the category and above all helped to remember the reference of the category. To find the proper title and name for the codes, the works and literature of educational sciences and counseling were used. The second stage of central coding was that categories obtained from open coding were refined and separated, and then those that seemed to be used more than other categories in the next stages were selected and the common concepts were set in one group. Basically, axial coding involves the process of relating more basic categories. This action includes a complex process of inductive and analogical thinking that was carried out in several stages. The third stage was selective codingthat means axial coding continued at a more abstract level and each category was labeled. According to the fact that this study was intended to examine the needs of designing a curriculum consulting training package with a brain training approach, firstly, the relevent population were divided into 4 sections including curriculum designers and implementers (at the macro and micro level: designers at the level of  the Ministry and General Departments of Education, educational directors and assistants, teachers), academic and psychological counselors of schools, learners and parents, while the requirements were prepared separately for these 4 departments.

After the coding process, 16 main categories were extracted regarding the necessity of designing a curriculum consultation educational package along with a brain training approach in the department of curriculum designers and implementers. Designers and implementers of curricula at the macro and micro levels included designers at the level of the ministry and the general administrations of education, educational managers and assistants, teachers. The main categories contained curriculum elements, educational system issues, brain-based education, curriculum reform, curriculum goals, school coordinators and provincial and national executives, educational outputs, financial and welfare facilities, curriculum planning process, curriculum planning courses, participation in curriculum planning, facilitating the implementation of curriculum, teaching skills, classroom management practices, school coordinator and parents. After the coding process, 10 main categories were extracted regarding the necessity of designing a curriculum consultation educational package with application of a brain training approach in the educational and psychological counselors department of schools. The main categories consisted of the core of curriculum consultants in education and training, consulting skills, the network of curriculum consultants in schools for teachers and for guidance teachers, academic guidance, brain-based education, the activation of curriculum planning committees, program consultation as a lesson for students and a lesson plan to a principal. After the coding process, 5 main categories were extracted regarding the necessity of designing a curriculum consultation educational package with a brain training approach in the learners' section. Hence, main categories were curriculum elements, brain-based education, curriculum planning process, individual counseling, and communication skills. After the coding process, 7 main categories were extracted regarding the necessity of designing the educational package of curriculum consultation with the approach of brain training in the parent department that the main categories were considered as curricula, school functions, educational processes, curriculum consultants, school goals, subject familiarity, and communication skills.

The overall conclusion of the research provided some evidences as strengthening and implementing the educational package of curriculum consultation with the brain training approach that may result in helping schools in various fields of study and learning processes.