Anatomy of a Curriculum

Educational Purposes
Context of Curriculum
Development

Johnasse Sebastian C. Naval, RN

CURRICULUM
Planned learning experiences that the educational
institution intends to provide for its learners.
Educational institutions, as institutions charged with all
important societal concerns, have the sole claim to curriculum.

Choices and decisions about curriculum are not random

choices, but are based on thorough understanding of the
educational ideologies on which they are based.

EDUCATIONAL PHILOSOPHIES
THAT UNDERPIN CURRICULA
CHOICES AND DECISIONS

THE CONSERVATIVE VIEW

There are certain enduring worthwhile
truths that should be taught and learned;
social change should be slow; there is a
need to conserve and therefore to oppose
reform; methodology should be teacherdirected; emphasis should be placed on
content-centered curriculum.

PERENIALISM
Views education as having limited
relevance to professional education
because of its focus on the basics such
as reading, writing, arithmetic.

ESSENTIALISM
Rooted in idealism, it contends that both
body and mind are important in education and as
such, core knowledge and skills are essential to a
successful society because those requisite abilities
allow the individual to be economically productive
members of society (Gaudelli, 2002: 198).

The preservation, through transmission to

generations of learner, of that which is essential
to learn.
Is not based on learners needs and
wants, but rather on what those in authority
know is essential for the learners to know.

Seen as a passive recipient of

information transmitted by disciplinary
experts. The learners role is not to reason
why, but to do as told.
The teacher knows best, an expert with a
wealth of information.
Acquisition is best achieved through a
teaching/learning process that places emphasis
on lectures, drill, recitation, and demonstration,
provided and led by an expert in the discipline.

THE PROGRESSSIVE VIEW

Associated with the rise in dissatisfaction with

traditional education practices which placed
emphasis on content and totally disregarded the
place of the learners needs and interest in
education.

PROGRESSIVE ROMANTIC NATURALISM

(European Stream)

Child-centered education; society

interferes too much in the education of
children;
Children, if left alone, have a
potential to grow up and become distinct
and individual beings, untainted by societal
influences and thinking.
(have not had any significant influence in
Nursing education)

PRAGMATISM OR EXPERIMENTALISM

Education must focus on the learners

experiences and interest rather than on
predetermined bodies of knowledge. This
does not mean that content has no place
in education, but rather that the learners
experiences must be used to mediate
knowledge; truth is only that which can be
verified through experimental testing.

To help learners make connections between

their life experiences and the world of schooling;
it should help learners to become responsible and
critical citizens in democratic societies.
Life experience should form the basis of
what is learned, because experience
consists of the active interrelationship
between the thing and its sensation,
perception, image, and idea ( Novack,
1975:161)

The learner is viewed as an intertwined

psychological and social being; learner is
directed by interest evoked by images in his
world; student inquires, and is always curious.
The teacher assists the learner in
properly responding to experiences (Dewey,
1998: 231).
Teacher is not only a transmitter of
knowledge and ideas, but mainly as a
mediator of knowledge.

Learning happens by doing (experimentation)

rather than passively listening to lectures; ideas
result from action (Dewey, 1998)

THE RADICAL VIEW

Education should do more than prepare them

for participatory democratic citizenship; it
should also prepare them for deliberative
citizenship

RECONSTRUCTIONISM

A branch of progressive education; central

to it is the conviction that societal change can
be achieved through education (Kilgour,
1995).
Progressive education is too slow or
too soft ever to lead a change in the
existing social order.

Schools should be used as instruments of

social change.
The social studies curriculum is preferred over
other disciplines, such as natural sciences.

Tanner and Tanner describe an ideal learner as

a rebel committed to and involved in
constructive social redirection and renewal; role
therefore is to understand and rebel against
those forces that operate to create and maintain
social, economic, and political inequities.

They have to be courageous and bold in

performing their roles in reconstruction.
The learners would accept that what was
taught was true and that they themselves had a
responsibility to reconstruct the society, through
revolutionary actions and/or legislations

CRITICAL CURRICULUM THEORY

(CRITICAL PEDAGOGY)

Schools contribute to cultural

reproduction of class relations and economic
order that allows very little social mobility
(Slattery, 1995: 193).
Enabling the students to become transformers
of societyenabling the students to be critical
thinkers and critics of society who are able to
make decisions and take actions which will better
the society in which we live.

Critical curriculum content is chosen, not on

the basis of what is intrinsically worthwhile
knowledge, but rather on the basis of social
worth (Dewey, 1916, 1961)
Conceived as a critical and questioning
individual; constantly questions the world in
which he/she lives with a view to transformative
action

Helps the learners learn how to think, and

provide them with the tools they need in order to
transform society; role requires that he make
accessible to the learners the culture, worldview,
social arrangement, and everyday practices of
their society in all their subtleties and nuances so
that the learners can begin to question that
which they had always taken for granted (Mason,
2000).

Problem-posing and problem-solving

educational experiences form the hallmark of a
liberating education (Freire, 1972).
Questions are based on contemporary
problems of inequity, oppression, dominant
cultures, and politics of race, and class;

Teachers help learners reflect on the

mentioned issues so that they can begin to
understand the situation in which they live, so as
to be able to effect changes;
Textbooks only serve as tools for
interpretation and analysis rather than a
authoritative sources of information.

Objectives
Content
Curriculum

experiences
Evaluation approaches

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Aims, goals and objectives

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 Vision
A clear concept of what the institution

would like to become in the future.

The unifying element
Mission
Spells out how it intends to carry out its

Vision
Targets to produce the kind of persons the
students will become after having been
educated over a certain period of time
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Goals
Are broad statements or intents to be accomplished
May include learners, society and fund of
knowledge
Educational Objectives
Goals that are made simple and specific
Explicit formulation of the ways in which students
are expected to be changed by the educative
process
Intent communicated by statement describing a
proposed change in learners
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 By

Benjamin Bloom and his

associates
Each composed of specific skills,
attitudes and values
In hierarchy or levels

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 Domain of thought process

involves knowledge and the

development of intellectual skills

Six Categories:

Knowledge
Comprehension
Application
Analysis
Synthesis
Evaluation

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 Domain

of valuing, attitude and

appreciation
Receiving
Responding
Valuing
Organization
Characterization by a value

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 Domain

of the use of psychomotor

attributes
includes physical movement,
coordination and use of motor skills

Perception
Set
Guided response
Mechanism
Complex overt response
Adaptation
Origination
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The Philippine educational system is divided in

three educational levels and shall aim to:

Inculcate patriotism and nationalism

Foster love of humanity
Promote respect for human rights
Appreciate the role of national heroes in the
historical development of the country
Teach the rights and duties of citizenship
Strengthen ethical and spiritual values
Develop moral character and personal discipline
Encourage critical and creative thinking
Broaden scientific and technological knowledge and
promote vocational efficiency
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 Provide

knowledge and develop skills,

attitudes, values essential to personal
development and necessary for living
in and contributing to a developing
and changing society

Provide

learning experiences which

increases the childs awareness of
and responsiveness to the changes in
the society
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 Promote

and intensify knowledge,

identification with and love for the
nation and the people to which he
belongs, and

Promote

work experiences which

develop orientation to the world of
work and prepare the learner to
engage in honest and gainful work
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 Continue

to promote the objectives

of elementary education; and

Discover

and enhance the different

aptitudes and interests of students in
order to equip them with skills for
productive endeavor and or to
prepare them for tertiary schooling
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 Provide

general education programs

which will promote national identity,
cultural consciousness, moral integrity
and spiritual vigor
Train the nations manpower in the
skills required for national development
Develop the professions that will
provide leadership for the nation; and
Advance knowledge through research
and apply new knowledge for
improving the quality of human life and
respond effectively to changing society
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Curriculum content or Subject matter

44

 Another

term for knowledge

A compendium of facts, concepts,
generalization, principles and
theories
Content selection is a very crucial
stage in curriculum development

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Self-efficiency less learners effort but more

results and effective learning outcomes
Significance if it will develop the domains of
learning
Validity authenticity
Interest learner will value content if it is
meaningful to him or her.
Utility - use of the content to the learner in
present or future
Learnability within the range of experiences
of the learners
Feasibility time, resources expertise of
instructor, nature of the learner
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 Frequently and commonly used

Suited to maturity levels and abilities

of learners
Valuable in meeting the needs and
competencies of a future career
Related with other subject area
Important in the transfer of learning

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 Balance

- level of area not

overcrowded or less crowded
Articulation smooth connections of
each level of subject matter
Sequence logical arrangement
Integration interrelationship of
subject areas
Continuity - constant repetition,
review, and reinforcement of learning
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Curriculum Experiences

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 Core

of the curriculum
Put into action the goals and use the
contents in order to produce an
outcome

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 Teaching methods are means to achieve the end

There is no single best teaching method
Teaching methods should stimulate learners

desire to develop domains of learning

Learning styles should be considered

Should lead to development of learning outcomes
Flexibility should be considered
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 Block

system

Programme time is divided into blocks

which are dedicated to either classroom

teaching or clinical placement

Integrated

system

Exposed to both classroom teaching and

clinical learning every week

Internship

system

Consist of a service-learning period

following the formal academic programme

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 Closeness
The

in time

same teacher

Advanced

directives

Using

clinical material in the

classroom
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Curriculum Evaluation

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 Formal

determinant of the quality,

effectiveness or value of the
program, product and process of the
curriculum
Stufflebeams CIPP Model
Context - environment
Input ingredients
Process means; operation
Product if goals are accomplished
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Focus
Collect
Organize
Analyze
Report
Recycle

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