Images of Curriculum

People who work with curriculum carry a picture in their heads of what it is, and the picture shapes what they do with it. There are seven of these images. Each one is a different answer to the question “what kind of thing is a curriculum,” and each one leads to a different way of planning a school. This chapter takes them one at a time, and ends with the image that pushes schools to change society.

Curriculum as Subject Matter

The oldest image, curriculum as the subjects taught, reaching back to the seven liberal arts

Curriculum as a Program of Planned Activities

The fuller image, curriculum as everything planned in advance, written or unwritten

Curriculum as Intended Learning Outcomes

Curriculum as the set of specific ends learning should reach, shifting the focus from means to ends

Curriculum as Cultural Reproduction

Curriculum as the way a society passes its culture to the next generation

Curriculum as Experience

The view that what a learner actually lives through, not what was planned, is the real curriculum, and the idea of currere

Curriculum as Discrete Tasks and Concepts

Curriculum as discrete skills and concepts to master, borrowed from job training