Curriculum Terms and Concepts:

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Curriculum Terms and Concepts
Digging Deeper into Curriculum Ddevelopment and
Curriculum Designs
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• "Development" describes the process of
  curriculum-making.
• "Design" describes the end result, or the product
  of curriculum development.

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• The Four Steps of Curriculum Development"The
  Tyler Rationale"
•         1.   What educational purposes should the
  school seek to attain?          2.   What
  educational experiences can be provided that are
  likely to attain these purposes?          3.  
  How can they be organized?          4.   How can
  we determine whether these purposes are being
  attained? 

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• 1  What educational purposes should the school
  seek to attain?
• What Aims, Goals, and Objectives should be
  sought? 
• Educational objectives become the criteria for
  selecting materials, content outlined,
  instructional methods developed, and tests
  prepared. 

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• How to write objectives
• Objectives often incorrectly stated as activities
  the instructor must do, rather than statements of
  change for students. 
• Objectives are also listed as topics, concepts,
  or generalizations however, this approach does
  not specify what the students are expected to do
  with these elements such as apply them to
  illustrations in his/her life or unify them in a
  coherent theory explaining scientific
  deliberation. 

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• Objectives can be indicated as generalized
  patterns (To Develop Appreciation,   To develop
  broad  interests.)  These are more goals than
  objectives.  It is necessary to specify the
  content to which this  behavior applies. 
• Should specify the Kind of Behavior and the
  Content or Area in which the behavior is to
  operate. 

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• Examples 
• To create a simple web page using a text editor. 
  To apply Dewey's theory of the child and the
  curriculum to the process of developing a
  curriculum  module. 
•                 Or 
• Upon completion of this module, students will be
  able to  ...compute the selling price of an
  automobile given information about list price,
  taxes, options, and  destination charges 
  ...construct a timeline showing the relationship
  among at least 20 major events in the Roman
  empire  ...describe the steps necessary for
  creating complete Web-based curriculum modules 
• Example nonpreordinate objective  "Students will
  attend a Shakespeare play." 

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• 2.   What educational experiences can be provided
  that are likely to attain these purposes?
• Criteria for selecting experiences are they 
• valid in light of the ways in which knowledge and
  skills will be applied in out-of-school
  experiences?
• feasible in terms of time, staff expertise,
  facilities available within and outside of the
  school, community expectations?
• optimal in terms of students' learning the
  content?
• capable of allowing students to develop their
  thinking skills and rational powers?
• capable of stimulating in students greater
  understanding of their own existence as
  individuals and as members of groups?
• capable of fostering in students an openness to
  new experiences and a tolerance for diversity?
• such that they will facilitate learning and
  motivate students to continue learning?
• capable of allowing students to address their
  needs?
• such that students can broaden their interests?
• such that they will foster the total development
  of students in cognitive, affective, psychomotor,
  social, and spiritual domains?

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• Curriculum Content
• Criteria for selecting content 
• what will lead to student self-sufficiency?
• what is significant?
• Two definitions of "significance"
• having or conveying a meaning expressive,
  suggesting or implying deeper or unstated
  meaning 
• important, notable consequential 
• what is valid (authentic, "true")?
• what is interesting?
• note  student may not even KNOW his own
  interests
• what is useful?
• what is learnable?
• what is feasible?

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• 3.   How can the educational experiences be
  organized?
• Education experiences must be organized to
  reinforce each other. 
• Vertical vs. horizontal organization 
• Continuity - refers to the vertical reiteration
  of major curricular elements.  Reading social
  studies materials continued up through higher
  grades 
• Sequence -  refers to experiences built upon
  preceding curricular elements but in more breadth
  and detail. Sequence emphasizes higher levels of
  treatment. 
• Integration - unified view of things.  Solving
  problems in arithmetic as well as in other
  disciplines. 

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• We aim for educational effectiveness and
  EFFICIENCY. 
• Most institutionalized education is MASS
  education we want to be able to teach GROUPS
  instead of  individuals. 
• Most education is DEPARTMENTALIZED, because we
  expect someone trained in a specific topic to be
  more likely to be able to teach that topic. 
  (This is based upon the notion that WORKERS will
  have higher productivity if they do the same
  thing over and over again, related to the "social
  efficiency" theories of Frederick Taylor.) 
• Generally, we arrange educational experiences
  from easiest to hardest, and from most general to
  more specific.  (There is some evidence that this
  is not the best way to teach--that students are
  more likely to learn if specific skills or topics
  are introduced first.) 

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4. How can we determine whether these purposes
are being attained?

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Different Perspectives on Curriculum Development

• Curriculum development produces curriculum
  designs.
• Development can be articulated as a series of
  steps, such as 
• define educational purposes
• construct activities/experiences that can meet
  these purposes
• organize activities/experiences
• evaluate whether purposes have been met

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• (These are the "steps" in the Tyler Rationale) 
• Designs can be articulated or described as an
  arrangement of curricular "elements" or
  "components," such as 
• "aim"
• "rationale"
• "audience"
• "objectives"
• etc.
• In discussing "development," it is possible to
  describe several competing "approaches" to
  development. 

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• Technical-scientific approach
• curriculum as plan or blueprint
• definable process
• activity, or task, analysis
• means/end analysis
• usually "preordinate" (or preordained) objectives
  
• emphasis on efficiency
• the "Chicago School"
• extremely influential approach
• criticized as too linear, dehumanizing
•  

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• Tyler approach modified by others, especially
  Taba, who listed 7 steps
• diagnosis of needs
• formulation of objectives
• specification of content
• organization of content
• selection of learning experiences
• organization of learning activities
• evaluation and means of evaluation

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• Taba also wanted TEACHERS to be primary
  curriculum developers
• Hunkins adds initial step of "conceptualization
  and legitimization, involving deliberation of the
  nature of curriculum and its value
• Hunkins also adds "feedback loops" among various
  steps, showing that curriculum development is an
  iterative process
• This approach has found new life since mid-1980s
  as "Outcome-based Education."

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• Nontechnical-nonscientific approach
• questions some assumptions of technical-scientific
  approach
• questions universality, objectivity, logic
• t-s approach abstracts knowledge from context
• t-s approach overemphasizes articulation of aims
• t-s approach too linear
• t-s approach takes modernism too seriously
• stress personal, subjective, aesthetic,
  heuristic, and transactional nature of curriculum
  
• stress focus on LEARNER, not on "products" of
  education
• view learning as holistic
• student as participant in curriculum development
• denies logical positivism
• may stress "nonpreordinate" objectives
  (open-ended outcomes  "Students will be
  transformed through their participation in the
  high ropes course.")

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• Examples
• Glatthorn's Naturalistic Model
• Assess the alternatives
• Stake out the territory
• Develop a constituency
• Build the knowledge base
• Block in the unit
• Plan quality learning experiences
• Develop the course examination (or other
  assessment tools)
• Develop the learning scenarios
• The Deliberation Model
• "deliberation is the essential process engaged in
  curriculum development. Through deliberation,
  individuals engage in curriculum decision
  making."
• celebrate social dimension of curriculum work
• acknowledges circularity of development process
• involves acknowledgment of eternal
  "incompleteness" of curriculum
• Proceeds generally from PROBLEM to PROPOSALS to
  SOLUTION (with CONTEXT)

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• Participants in Curriculum Development Process
• Possible participants 
• teachers
• students
• principals
• curriculum specialists
• associate superintendent
• superintendent
• boards of education
• lay citizens
• federal government
• state agencies
• regional organizations
• educational publishers
• testing organizations
• professional organizations
• other groups

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• Curriculum Design
• What are the "parts" of a curriculum, and how do
  they interrelate?  Most curricula include 
• aim, goals, objectives
• subject-matter
• learning experiences
• evaluation approaches

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• Types of Curriculum Designs
• In developing specific learning activities for a
  given set of objectives, curriculum designers
  need to decide whether they want to place the
  subject-matter, the learners, or problems at the
  center.  The following sections discuss each
  category of activity

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• Subject-centered
• Many learning activities in schools emphasize
  subject-matter or academic disciplines. Either a
  particular subject-area, the broader themes of a
  discipline, interdisciplinary concepts or themes,
  the coronations among two or more subject areas,
  or particular processes can serve as this
  organizing center.  In each case, the
  characteristics of the subject-matter, and the
  procedures, conceptual structures or
  relationships which are found within or among the
  subject-matter, dictate the kinds of activities
  that will be selected. 

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• Learner-centered
• Deweys emphasis on native impulses of the child
  (socialize, construct, inquire, create) 
  Negotiated curriculum  Interest-centered
  curriculum  Freierian dialogic education 
  Hunkins disrupt the status quo of students
  understanding 

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• Humanistic
• Can emphasize development of fully-functioning
  students, through focus on subjective, feeling,
  perceiving, becoming, valuing, growing (Maslow)
  curriculum encourages the tapping of personal
  resources of self-understanding, self-concept,
  personal responsibility (Carl Rogers)  Confluent
  education strive to blend subjective and
  intuitive with the objective  Curriculum should
  provide students with alternatives from which
  they can choose what to feel  Participation,
  nonauthoritarian  Development of self as most
  important objective 

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• Transcendent education
• Concept of wholeness of experience  Give
  students opportunity to take a journey, to
  reflect on that journey, and to relate that
  journey to others, past, present, future,
  emphasizes dispositions of humans for hope,
  creativity, awareness, doubt and faith, wonder,
  awe, and reverence (OH p. 257) 

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• Problem-centered
• Planned prior to arrival of students, but willing
  to adjust to fit needs of students  Problem can
  be interdisciplinary  Life situations  core
  designs  social problem/reconstructionist
  designs  Social problems, social
  reconstructionism educators potentially affect
  social change through curriculum development 
  Engages learner in analyzing severe problems
  facing mankind  Furthering the good of society 

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• Example problems (Clift and Shane, quoted in OH
  p 262).
• What policies shall govern our future use of
  technology?  At a global level, what shall be
  our goals, and how can we reach them?  What
  shall we identify as the good life?  How shall
  we deploy our limited resources in meeting the
  needs of various groups of people?  How shall we
  equalize opportunity, and how shall we reduce the
  gap between the haves and have-nots?  How
  can we maximize the value of mass media,
  especially television?  What shall be made of
  psychological, chemical, and electronic
  approaches to behavioral modification?  What
  steps can we take to ensure the integrity of our
  political, economic, and military systems? 
  What, if anything, are we willing to relinquish,
  and in what order?  And, what honorable
  compromises and solutions shall we make as we
  contemplate the above questions?