CUST 562: Introduction to Curriculum Issues and Theories

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CUST 562 Introduction to Curriculum Issues and
Theories
Dr. Stephen Petrina Department of Curriculum
Studies University of British Columbia
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CUST 562 Introduction to Curriculum Issues and
Theories

• What is (a) curriculum?
• Curriculum, n., pl., curriculums or curricula,
  l. a race, course, career, from currere, to
  run figurative use. a specific course of study
  or, collectively, all the courses of a study in a
  university, college, or school. From Websters
  New Universal Unabridged Dictionary (1979).
• Curriculum vitae-

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CUST 562 Introduction to Curriculum Issues and
Theories

• What is (a) curriculum?
• Visible v. hidden
• Official v. unofficial
• Taught v. null
• Written v. unwritten
• Learned v. unlearned
• Delivered v. experienced
• Expressed v. inarticulate
• High v. low curriculum
• Formal v. popular curriculum

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CUST 562 Introduction to Curriculum Issues and
Theories

• What is Curriculum Studies?
• What is Instructional Design?
• What should be taught?
• How should it be organised for learning?

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What should be learned?How should it be
organised for teaching?
CUST 562 Introduction to Curriculum Issues and
Theories

• The first question tends to be a question of
  content and theory, the second a question of
  design and form. To put it another way, the
  first question is generally one of politics, the
  second one of realpolitik.

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What is curriculum studies?
CUST 562 Introduction to Curriculum Issues and
Theories
Subjects? Discipline?
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10 School Subjects 10
Hail to the Victors!
Winning by 10 Always 10 Forever 10
Univ of Michigan Marching Band
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Field of Curriculum Studies

• Curriculum Theory
• Popular Curriculum
• Curriculum Foundations
• Politics of Curriculum
• Curriculum History
• Comparative Curriculum
• Curriculum Design
• Curriculum Evaluation

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(No Transcript)
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Reflecting on the Authority of the Subjects
(Graduating from CI High!)
From Kick Shoe Kooy (http//cathykooy.typepad.com/
kick_shoe_kooy/2005/01/the_mans_a_mani.html)
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Spencers Principle (1850s)
What is Curriculum Theory?

• What knowledge is of most worth?
• before there can be a rational curriculum, we
  must settle which things it most concerns us to
  know . . . we must determine the relative values
  of knowledges.
• Apples Qualification (1980s)
• Whose knowledge is of most worth?

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Tylers Curriculum Rationale (1949)
What is Curriculum Theory?

• What educational purposes should the school seek
  to attain?
• How can learning experiences be selected which
  are likely to be useful in attaining these
  purposes?
• How can learning experiences be organized for
  effective instruction?
• How can the effectiveness of learning experiences
  be evaluated?

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Reconceptualization (early 1970s- )
What is Curriculum Theory?

• questions of design, development, instruction,
  and evaluation the perennial foci of the
  curriculum field are no longer useful or
  interesting (Pinar, 1975, p. 397)
• Currere- a method that will allow us to
  bracket the educational aspects of our
  taken-for-granted world. That is, we must attend
  to the contents of consciousness as they appear
  (p. 406).
• the problem initially is to get under ones
  exteriorized horizontal thinking, to begin to
  sink toward the transcendental place, where the
  lower-level psychic workings, those psychic
  realms determined by conditioning and genetic
  code, are visible (p. 407).
• When sufficient data has accumulated (and the
  question of when may well be left to the
  investigator) the analysis begins (p. 408)
• This process of turning inward to examine ones
  currere will lead to a generalized
  inner-centeredness and hopefully initiate or
  further the process of individuation, leading to
  a gradual formation of the transcendental ego
  (p. 410).

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Orientations (Habermas, 1971)
What is Curriculum Theory?

• Technical interests (Positivistic)
• transmissive curriculum
• Practical interests (Interpretive)
• transactive curriculum
• Emancipatory interests (Critical)
• transformative curriculum

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What is Curriculum Theory?

• Orientations (Eisner Vallance, 1974)
• Academic rationalist primarily about
  disciplinary knowledge and cultural canons
• Cognitive process primarily about intellectual
  reasoning skills such as problem solving
• Self-actualisation, or personal relevance stress
  psychological conditions and are concerned with
  individuality and personal expression
• Social reconstruction stress sociological
  conditions, social justice and collective reform
• Utilitarian primarily concerned with functional
  competencies, performance, procedure and
  instructional efficiency

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What is Curriculum Theory?

• Genres
• Critical Theory-
• Hermeneutics-
• Narrative-
• Phenomenology-
• Postcolonialism-
• Postmodernism-
• Postsructuralism-
• Queer Theory-

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What is Curriculum Theory?

• Visible v. hidden curriculum
• Official v. unofficial curriculum
• Taught v. null curriculum
• Written v. unwritten curriculum
• Learned v. unlearned curriculum
• Delivered v. experienced
• Expressed v. inarticulate curriculum
• High v. low curriculum
• Formal v. popular curriculum

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What is Curriculum Design?

• Disciplines (e.g., mathematics, engineering,
  humanities, sciences)
• Fields (e.g., art, civics, design, home
  economics, industrial arts, social studies)
• Units (e.g., bicycling child labour feminism,
  jazz mass media queer fiction verbs water
  colours)
• Organising Centres (e.g., activities, modules,
  minicourses, problems, processes, projects, tasks
  and competencies)
• Personal Pursuits (e.g., aerobics, autobiography,
  cooking, bird watching, guitar playing)
• Core or Interdisciplinary designs designs employ
  combinations of disciplines or broad fields

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Curriculum Design Process, ca. 1960s-present
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Curriculum Design Process, (Taba, 1962)

• Diagnosis of needs.
• Formulation of objectives.
• Selection of content.
• Organization of content.
• Selection of learning experiences.
• Organization of learning experiences.
• Determination of what to evaluate and the ways
  and means of doing it.

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What is Instructional Design?

• Instructional Theory
• Instructional Foundations
• Instructional Planning
• Instructional Development
• Instructional Implementation
• Instructional Management
• Instructional Evaluation

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Instructional Design Rationale

• For whom is the program developed?
  (characteristics of learners or trainees)
• What do you want the learners or trainees to
  learn or demonstrate? (objectives)
• How is the subject or skill best learned?
  (instructional strategies)
• How do you determine the extent to which learning
  is achieved? (evaluation procedures)

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Instructional Design System
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Instructional Design Process (Gagné and Briggs,
1974)

• Analysis of Needs, Goals and Priorities
• Analysis of Resources, Constraints, and Alternate
  Delivery Systems
• Determination of Scope and Sequence of Curriculum
  and Courses Deliver
• Systems Design
• Determining Course Structure and Design
• Analysis of Course Objectives
• Definition of Performance Objectives
• Preparing Lessons Plans (or Modules)
• Developing, Selecting Materials, Mass Media
• Assessing Student Performance (Performance
  Measures)

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Critical Curriculum Rationale

• What and whose world is of most worth? Does this
  world of abundance and poverty lend itself to
  common, just representation, understanding,
  scrutiny and reform? If yes, how ought we
  publicly represent what we and our students feel
  and know about this world? If no, ought this
  world be left to private representations,
  processes and forms?
• What and whose students are of most worth? Do
  these students lend themselves to a common or
  core curriculum? If yes, how ought we organise
  their commonalities and differences? If no,
  ought these students be left to individualized,
  independent and private processes of education?
• What and whose knowledge is of most worth? Does
  this knowledge lend itself to public, pedagogical
  (or andragogical) forms? If yes, how ought we
  organise it for learning? If no, ought this
  knowledge be left to emotive and intuitive
  processes of the private self?
• What and whose practices are of most worth? Do
  these practices lend themselves to critical,
  public scrutiny and reform? If yes, what
  evidence of what students learned from these
  practices will be judged? If no, ought these
  practices be left to the private processes of
  self-justification?

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Critical Curriculum System
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Critical Curriculum Design

• Sublimation or focusing of desires and fears
• Calculation of commonalities, differences,
  interests and values
• Fabrication of needs, goals or modes of
  justification
• Appropriation and organisation of knowledge into
  curriculum forms
• Appropriation and re/production of technologies
  or practices of mediation and re/presentation
• Communication of intentions
• Stipulation of conditions for learning,
  delegations of practices
• Negotiation of contents and forms of scrutiny

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Critical Curriculum Design