Several years ago a fellow teacher mentioned a book titled The Saber-Tooth Curriculum as a book that every educator should read. At that time there were many discussions about helicopter parents, lawnmower parents, tiger parenting, and so forth so I believed a saber-tooth curriculum was something along those lines. However I recently had the opportunity to read the book myself and found my original perception of what it really covered was far off the mark.
What is The Saber-Tooth Curriculum?
The Saber-Tooth Curriculum is a work of satire originally written in 1939 by Harrold R. W. Benjamin under the pseudonym of J. Abner Peddiwell. It consists of a series of fictional lectures given by a university professor, Dr. Peddiwell, to one of his former students in the most unlikely of academic locations: a bar in Tijuana, Mexico. The topic of these lectures is a history of paleolithic education. However, this fictional discussion of schooling for cavemen offers not only a commentary of the education system of the time period in which it was written as well as that of today, but it also offers nuggets of wisdom on practices that can improve student learning and understanding.
What Can You Learn from The Saber-Tooth Curriculum?
One of the first topics covered in the fictional lectures was the creation of the Saber-tooth curriculum by a caveman known as New-Fist-Hammer-Maker. He first identified the needs of people to provide food, clothing, and security. With these three goals in mind, he then worked backwards to develop curriculums that would provide the means for students to master these needs. His first course, fish-grabbing-with-the-hands taught pupils how to wade into the water and catch fish with their bare hands. Once the need for food was met, he next developed wooly-horse-clubbing so that students could learn to acquire skins of small horses to use for clothing. Finally, in order to keep the people safe from saber-tooth tigers, a class was developed to teach students how to wave fiery torches to keep the predators away: saber-tooth-tiger-scaring-with-fire (Peddiwell, Benjamin, & Goodlad, 2004). Pediwell’s examples of the creation of these courses reflect the three stages of backward design of curriculum. First, the desired results were identified; namely providing food, clothing, and security. Next, the desired evidence was determined. In the case of the paleolithic education, students would be able to catch fish, kill small horses, and scare away tigers. Finally, the instruction and learning experiences were planned (Wiggens & McTighe, 2005).
Another educational principle continued within these lectures is the importance of students learning by experience. The prehistoric pupils were not taught to catch fish with their hands within a classroom cave with diagrams chalked upon the walls. Instead they learned by wading into streams and actually catching fish with their hands. This was summed up by New-Fist that “these pupils are learning what they live and living what they learn” (Peddiwell, Benjamin, & Goodlad, 2004, p. 66.) This follows the theory of John Dewey that “all learning occurs within a social environment…[and] is socially constructed based on our experiences” (Cloke, 2023). Students gain greater understanding when they actually use what they learn since this can involve multiple modalities of learning.
Wiggins and McTighe (2005) argue that performance tasks are a necessity in assessing students’ understanding of what they are learning. These tasks should replicate what students might face in the real world and test their ability to use and apply what they have been taught. The ability to transfer knowledge and skills to a different context should be an important outcome of education. This is reflected in the saber-tooth curriculum of the lectures in that original subjects taught directly affected the ability of the people to survive. It is when the prehistoric academia loses sight of this purpose and insist as times change, that students still learn the concepts of the old skills and knowledge that no longer apply to their present situation, they not only lose the purpose of education, but also their society all together.
Why You Should Read The Saber-Tooth Curriculum
As mentioned earlier, the book is a satire critical of the state of education at the time of its original publication as well as of our current times. Yet as it illustrates problems in education, at the same time it also demonstrates important topics which educators can implement in their curriculums today. In fact, these examples of progressive education of which some are over 100 years old, are still being used and encouraged today. I found myself engaged in personal reflection as I read, considering my teaching and curriculum design as compared to paleolithic educators and recognized some of the pitfalls presented in my own practices. This quick and fun read is tough to put down since the concept of caveman academics and universities is so absurd that it captures the attention while also stimulating the mind as it reflects modern education and its shortcomings. While the intended audience was educators, it can be appreciated by anyone with an interest or investment in education including school board members, parents, and community partners. I highly recommend The Saber-Tooth Curriculum to anyone interested in education and educational improvement.
The Saber-Tooth Curriculum is available from many online book sellers including Amazon which also offers a Kindle edition.
References
Cloke, H. (2023, September 28). John Dewey’s learning theory: How we learn through experience. Growth Engineering. https://www.growthengineering.co.uk/john-dewey/
Peddiwell, J. A., Benjamin, H. R. W., & Goodlad, J. I. (2004). The saber-tooth curriculum [Classic edition]. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Wiggens, G. & McTighe, J. (2005). Understanding by design. Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.
