Summer 1, 2002 May
20 – June 26 , M/W 4:30 – 8:00
Peter Appelbaum
|
The
notion of curriculum as enveloping patterns of norms, endeavors, and values seems
particularly lacking in these times, both within public discourse and in
schools. Interest in curriculum too often involves narrow discussions about
specific programs, outcomes, and effectiveness, as procedural perspectives of
educational outcomes dominate curriculum development. Public debates about
curriculum appear as politically motivated diatribes calling forth simplistic
notions of what is wrong with schools or what sure-fire curriculum will save
them. Few educators participate in public deliberation with vigorous
discourse about purposes and practices of education. We seldom hear teachers,
curriculum specialists, and administrators reflect on, question, and
challenge curricular aims and actions by examining patterns of curricular
beliefs and their immediate or unforeseeable influences upon schooling.
–Pamela Bolotin Joseph 2000 |
The
first antimony is this: on the one hand, it is unquestionably the function of
education to enable people, individual human beings, to operate at their fullest
potential, to equip them with the tools and the sense of opportunity to use
their wits, skills, and passions to the fullest. The antinomic counterpart to
this is that the function of education is to reproduce the culture that
supports it – not only reproduce it, but further its economic, political, and
cultural ends. – Jerome Bruner, 1996 |
If we cannot make these new connections for ourselves, we do
not really grasp what we have been told … If a child is told that water runs
downhill, he is much more likely to be able to repeat those same words than
he is to be able to rephrase them with all the meaning that they represent.
He is very unlikely … to be able to draw significant connections – as, for
instance, that the outlet from the Great Lakes must be uphill from Quebec
City. Piaget’s emphasis is that we have to do the work ourselves making the
connections, even if others take pains to point out the connections they have
been able to make. –Eleanor Duckworth, 1996 |
|
The
school is not an agency of social reform. Its responsibility is to help the
growing individual continuously and consistently to hold to the type of
living which is the best practical one … --Franklin Bobbitt, 1926 |
[We]
do endorse, by common consent, the obvious hypothesis that the child rather
than what he studies should be the center of all educational effort. – Burton
Fowler, 1930 |
A
democracy is more than a form of government; it is primarily a mode of
associated living, of conjoint communicated experience … Since a democratic
society repudiates the principle of external authority, it must find a
substitute in voluntary disposition and interest; these can be created only
by education. John Dewey, 1916 |
|
Education
as a force for social regeneration must march hand in hand with the living
and creative forces of the social order. In their own lives teachers must
bridge the gap between school and society and play some part in the
fashioning of those great common purposes which should bind the two together.
–George Counts, 1932 |
Many educational programs do not have clearly defined purposes.
–Ralph Tyler, 1949 |
|
|
School is Hell. --Matt Groening,
1982 |
To
teach in the American school today is to undertake a profoundly human as well
as a professional responsibility. –Maxine Greene, 1967 |
The
field of curriculum is moribund. It is unable, by its present methods and
principles, to conduct its work and contribute significantly to the
advancement of education. It requires new principles which will generate a
new view of the character and variety of its problems. It requires new
methods appropriate to the budget of its problems. --Joseph Schwab, 1969 |
|
I
have argued … that curriculum theory as it pertains to educational objectives
has had four significant limitations. First, it has not sufficiently
emphasized the extent to which the prediction of educational outcomes cannot
be made with accuracy. Second, it has not discussed the ways in which the
subject matter affects precision in stating educational objective. Third, it
has confused the use of educational objectives as a standard for measurement
when in some areas it can be used only as a criterion for judgment. Fourth,
it has not distinguished between the logical requirements of relating means
to ends in the curriculum as a product and the psychological conditions for
constructing curriculums. –Elliot Eisner, 1967. |
I
believe that education is, or at least ought to be, not a discipline, not a matter
of being found or finding self along a set path, nor of moving progressively
along a path defined by others and by which we can define ourselves by our
place along it; education might be understood as the opportunity of getting
lost. –Alan Block, 1998 |
Within this new civics curriculum, civics can be
interpreted as follows: C courage, I inclusion, V value, I integrity, C
cooperation, S safety. What would each of these principles look like if it
were used as an organizing principle for our teaching and classroom
communities? –Mara Sapon-Shevin, 1999 The primary challenge in open systems is not to bring process
to closure (to produce a “perfect” product) but to direct the transformation
in such a manner that the becomingness of process is maintained. – William
Doll, 1993 |
Catalog Description:
Examination of current curriculum literature and major educational philosophies with implications for curriculum development. Includes the development of curriculum in a simulated setting. Designed for teachers, supervisors, and administrators.
We will, of course, begin the
semester by identifying what you believe are the most pressing
curriculum questions and issues to be considered. And we will apply all that we
read, talk about, and imagine to these important questions. Along the way, I am
hoping that this course will also enable you to:
(My) Guiding Questions/Issues:
Available at our bookstore, and on-line.
Tyler, Ralph (reprint 1969) Basic Principles of Curriculum and Instruction. University of Chicago Press; ISBN: 0226820319.
Grant, Carl and Sleeter, Christine (1998) Turning On Learning: Five Approaches for Multicultural Teaching Plans for Race, Class, Gender, and Disability. Merrill/Prentice Hall. ISBN: 0136511341.
Pinar, William (ed) (1999) Contemporary Curriculum Discourses: Twenty Years of JCT. Peter Lang. ISBN 0820438820.
Appelbaum, Peter (1995) Popular Culture, Educational Discourse, and Mathematics. State University of New York Press. ISBN 0791422704.
Scott, Melissa
(2001) The Jazz. TOR
Books. ISBN 0312875428.
Photocopies of other readings will be
available in class; most of these will be read together in class:
Apple, Michael (1971). The hidden curriculum and the nature of conflict. Interchange, 2 (4), 27-40.
Dewey, John (1929). My pedagogic creed. Journal
of the National Education Association, 18 (9), 291-295.
Eisner, Elliot (1967). Educational objectives
– Help or hindrance? School Review, 75 (3), 250-260.
Greene, Maxine (1973). Doing philosophy and building
a world. In M. Greene, Teacher as stranger: Educational philosophy for the
modern age (3-25). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.
Grumet, Madeleine (1988). Pedagogy for
patriarchy: The feminization of teaching. In M. Grumet, Bitter milk: Women
and teaching (31-58). Amherst, MA: The University of Massachusetts Press.
Heubner, Dwayne (1975). Poetry and power: The
politics of curricular development.” In W. Pinar (Ed.), Curriculum
theorizing: The reconceptualists (Chapter 16, 271-280). Berkeley, CA:
McCutcheon. Reprinted 2000 as Curriculum studies: The reconceptualization.
Troy, NY: Educator’s International Press.
Kliebard, Herbert (1970). The Tyler rationale.
School Review, 78 (2), 259-272.
Macdonald, James (1995). A transcendental
developmental ideology of education. In B. Macdonald (Ed.), Theory as a
prayerful act: The collected essays of James Macdonald (69-97).
Pinar, William (1978). The reconceptualization
of curriculum studies. Journal of Curriculum Studies, 10 (3), 205-214.
Schwab, Joseph (1969). The practical: A
language for curriculum. School Review, 78 (1), 1-23.
Wink, Joan (2000). Critical pedagogy: What in
the world is it? In J. Wink, Critical pedagogy: Notes from the real world
(27-74). NY: Addison-Wesley Longman.
Your grade will be based on
three parts:
Project:
Individual. Initially
set up professional questions and goals. Project: apply readings and
discussions to the initial questions and goals. Reframe if necessary in light
of Dewey’s cycle of reflective thought. Checkpoints 2 & 3 and progress
report will each be graded assignments. Your assignment is to find connections
between every reading and class meeting and your initial questions and goals,
to describe these connections, to interpret each connection, and to examine the
implications of your interpretation for your professional practice. You are
required to report on these connections, your analysis of the interpretations,
and the implications you identify. You should make an effort to compare the
various approaches to curriculum theorizing that we examine throughout the
course, and to challenge yourself to explore those approaches with which you
are least familiar and that are least accessible to you. The final goal of this
project is to identify two projects that you will undertake next year because
of this course, and to begin planning how you will make sure that you can do
these proposed projects.
Choose one:
Popular culture report: due June 10. Interpret a popular culture experience or artifact as curriculum in light of what we have read and discussed so far. Present in class (15-20 minutes).
Youth guide report: due June 17. After being taught by a young person about what you should know about a kids-culture experience, and sharing it with your guide, you interpret your experiences as curriculum in light of what we have read and discussed so far. Present in class (15-20 minutes).
Class
participation and contributions:
Merely showing up to
class is not enough. We have a lot to do in a short period of time, so we
really have to rely on each other: to talk about the ideas we are
working with; to ask questions when we do not understand (and this
should be happening often); to help others to further develop their
thoughts by asking them to elaborate on something they have said, or to give an
example of what they mean; to be patient when someone else is still not
sure what they mean or believe; and thus to wait for others and not to
insist on controlling the conversation. If we are to establish a community of
learners, then we cannot miss any classes; everyone else is counting on your
comments and questions to contribute to their own understanding. We also cannot
afford for any one person to feel uncomfortable about the expectations or the
atmosphere in the community, so you must share concerns, and speak your mind,
both when things are going well (let us know!) and when things are going not so
well (so that we can work on it for the rest of the course!).
|
Date |
Topic(s) |
Read before this day: |
In-class assignment |
Assignment Due today: |
|
May 20 |
Welcome! |
Course catalog |
Survey |
Registration for course |
|
May 22 |
The rational model. Outcomes, concepts. From Bobbit to Standards |
Ralph Tyler *Need computer |
Dewey; Framing project |
Initial project ideas |
|
May 27 NO CLASS- Memorial Day |
Historical Moments |
Eisner, Kliebard |
|
NO CLASS |
|
May 29 |
Historical Moments |
Schwab, Pinar, Greene; |
Apple, Grumet, MacDonald |
What could/should school be/do? How could/should/would we structure institutions? Who could/should/would decide these things? |
|
June 3 |
Multicultural & Diversity Education |
Grant & Sleeter, pt. 1 |
Case study tour |
Project checkpoint 1 |
|
June 5 |
Disability studies, diversity studies; trans/global |
Grant & Sleeter, pt. 2 |
Checkpoint development |
Project checkpoint 2 |
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June 10 |
Cultural Studies Power, ideology, |
Appelbaum, pt. 1 |
presentations |
Popular culture report |
|
June 12 |
Power/knowledge; practices; technologies of power and morality; commodification & cultural resources; |
Appelbaum, pt. 2 |
Film presentations |
|
|
June 17 |
Technoculture & Cyberculture |
Scott |
presentations |
Youth guide report |
|
June 19 |
Youth cultural studies; x-games and videoculture; multitasking; virtual worlds |
Review readings for project |
Remaining presentations |
Checkpoint 3 |
|
June 24 |
Post-modern, Post-colonial, post-feminist, post-post |
Pinar, pt. 1 |
Decisions about final progress report |
Project progress report materials |
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June 26 |
Contemporary Politics of Curriculum |
Pinar, pt. 2 |
|
Project progress report |
Pennsylvania Department of Education http://www.pde.state.pa.us/
See especially Curriculum and Instruction, including the State Standards.
UNESCO Task Force on Education for the 21rst Century http://www.unesco.org/delors/
At Arcadia, we encourage an global/international approach.
JCT The Journal of Curriculum Theorizing. http://www.jctbergamo.com
State-of-the-art , cutting edge work in curriculum theory and classroom practice.
Journal of Curriculum Studies. Free trial copy: http://lucia.catchword.com/vl=35714107/cl=23/nw=1/rpsv/catchword/tandf/00220272/contp1-1.htm
Canadian website: http://www.edu.uwo.ca/jcs/
International journal of curriculum theory, with a broad range of topics and types of articles.
Pedagogy, Culture & Society http://www.triangle.co.uk/cus/
New journal in educational theory
Curriculum Inquiry http://fcis.oise.utoronto.ca/~ci/
Classic journal of curriculum theory.
LSU Curriculum Theory Project http://asterix.ednet.lsu.edu/~lsuctp/
Often has resources, and information of help to graduate students specializing in curriculum theory.
Nailing Jello to the Wall: Pinpointing Aspects of State-of-the-Art Curriculum Theorizing, by Handel Kashope Wright http://www.aera.net/pubs/er/arts/29-05/wright01.htm Recent article in Educational Researcher, which prompted some interesting responses.
History of Education, entry on Ralph Tyler http://fcis.oise.utoronto.ca/~daniel_schugurensky/assignment1/1949tyler.html
The man to whom we all owe our commonsense notion of curriculum development.
Jim Sears’s Syllabus, Turning Points in Contemporary Curriculum Theory http://www.jtsears.com/sylT111.htm
You can compare our course to this one.
TIP: Theory into Practice, database on learning theories http://tip.psychology.org/
For those of us who need a psychological theory to back up our opinions.
A Brief History of Theater of the Oppressed http://www.inmotionmagazine.com/theater.html
For those of use who want a transformative social action perspective to inform our work.
Issues in Freirian Pedagogy. http://nlu.nl.edu/ace/Resources/Documents/FreireIssues.html
One of many website devoted to Freire and critical pedagogy. A brief intro by Tome Heaney.
Center for the Study of Technology and Society -- Education page http://www.tecsoc.org/edu/edu.htm
Do we know where we are going? Where we have been?
The Three Little Pigs in a Post-modern World, http://www.mtsu.edu/~itconf/proceed98/drader.html
By Dennis and Jan Rader. One approach to understanding postmodern curriculum theory
Postmodern Curriculum Research and Alternative Forms of Data Presentation http://www.quasar.ualberta.ca/cpin/cpinfolder/papers/slattery.htm
By Patrick Slattery. A friendly introduction to Patrick’s ideas.
Rap (in) the Academy: Academic work, education, and cultural studies http://www3.uakron.edu/edfound/people/weaver/weaver_rap.pdf
By John Weaver and Toby Daspit. Why are educator’s afraid of popular and postmodern culture?
A Dictionary of Postmodern Terms http://www.california.com/~rathbone/lexicon.htm
On-line dictionary to help you turn jargon into theory
Cultural Studies Central http://www.culturalstudies.net/index.html
Name says it all
Popcultures.com http://www.popcultures.com/
Another useful site that can direct you to other places.
John Dewey’s Democracy and Education http://www.worldwideschool.org/library/books/socl/education/DemocracyandEducation/toc.html
The Classic work in its entirety
APA Cheatsheet http://wtfaculty.wtamu.edu/~rbrammer.ess/edpd5529/admin/APA_sheet.htm
Good guide when you are not sure how to cite/reference things in your papers.