Can the National Curriculum Help Reduce Working‐class Under‐ achievement?

This paper reviews some of the evidence which demonstrates under‐achievement in working‐class children together with important analyses and interpretations, and contemporary practical attempts to redress the problem. It is argued that practical innovations have not greatly influenced or improved the relationship between class and achievement. An attempt is made to discover to what extent the introduction of a National Curriculum as part of the Education Reform Act can be seen as a potential solution to the problem of working‐class under‐achievement. It is argued that the means of redressing working‐class under‐achievement in the National Curriculum must lie ultimately with individual teachers and their ability to present the National Curriculum in relevant forms to all children. In any mass education process there will be those for whom the given curriculum is removed from everyday experience. This does not invalidate the idea of “worthwhile’ knowledge but it means that we must be constantly questioning how we can transmit the curriculum while, as far as is possible, reducing the gap between everyday experience and classroom experience.     

Beyond Economic and Industrial Understanding: An economic perspective in the primary curriculum

Abstract

In the fashioning of the National Curriculum on a subject basis, Economic and Industrial Understanding (EIU) emerged as one of the ‘cross‐curricular themes’ intended to impart some coherence and social purpose to the whole curriculum. In this way, attention was focused on Economics, which is not one of the National Curriculum foundation subjects. However, Economics is not only linked in the primary curriculum with Industry, but should also constitute one of a series of necessary perspectives on the children's world, all of which, together with moral and social understanding, they should learn to apply as they learn to live in that world. Before institutional education developed, this economic perspective was central to life, and is still indispensable and should be progressively fostered within a flexible curriculum as children grow. It necessarily involves problems and controversies, but the recognition of, and engagement with, such matters is itself an important part of social education. Due, but not unthinking or excessive, attention should be paid to ah economic perspective in its own right, in any simplification and revision of the National Curriculum in the primary phase.     

高职教育课程重建的正途——构建以就业为导向的现代课程体系

中国高职教育正从初创期向成熟期过渡,亦即进入"内涵式发展"阶段。课程重建乃是时势所需。高职教育课程重建的正途,是以现代课程理论为支撑,构建以就业为导向的现代课程体系。课程的高职范式由此而诞生。     

Planning for Their Future

Robert Ashdown (Headteacher of St. Luke's School, a special school for pupils with severe learning difficulties in Scunthorpe, Humberside) argues that although the years since the Education Reform Act have been marked by intensive curriculum development in special schools for pupils with severe learning difficulties, external pressures may have forced schools to focus on the National Curriculum at the expense of the whole curriculum. This risk remains with the new, slimmer National Curriculum. This article reports on what has been achieved and what remains to be done, particularly as regards the personal and social development of pupils.     

课程内容选择的反思——新课程改革背景下的一个案例分析

教育的中介是课程,课程内容的选择是课程论中一个中心问题,直接关系到教育是否能够良性发展。通过引入委托一代理理论对上海二期课改中语文教材删除《狼牙山五壮士》进行了分析,清楚地说明了课程内容选择主体之间的关系,为课程论提供了新的视角,并希望能对新的课程改革有所启发。     

新课程背景下对高中英语教师的培训初探——对宜宾市高中英语教师的调查分析

目前,我国基础教育课程已经经历了八次改革。在推行新课程改革的过程中,教师的地位和作用不能忽视。本文根据基础教育课程改革和高中英语新课程标准的要求,对宜宾市高中英语教师关注的热点以及其所在中学改革的现状和难点进行了抽样调查,分析得出目前教师们急需培训的几个方面,以帮助师范院校对高中教师进行更有针对性的师资培训,推进基础教育课程改革更顺利地进行。     

Education for Democracy? A Philosophical Analysis of the National Curriculum

ABSTRACT This paper shows that the stated principles and content of the National Curriculum are those presupposed in any justification of education in a democracy. What it also shows is that the National Curriculum can only genuinely exercise its democratic role in the kind of society which provides the social and cultural conditions necessary for its practical application. But since the National Curriculum is being implemented in a society which lacks these conditions, any failure to provide an 'education for democracy' will not be a failure of the curriculum it prescribes, but of the kind of democratic society in which it is being enacted.     

试论国家课程的作用与特点－－以英格兰国家课程为例

英格兰正在实施的新国家课程力求对国家课程自开始之日起就纠缠不清的几个问题进行梳理和明确，以使教育适应21世纪对自身提出的挑战。它给予我国正在进行的新一轮基础教育课程改革的启示在于：1.国家课程要想取得成功，必须使学校既能从长计议，形成和提升学生恒久性的价值观念，又能对现实中出现的经济和社会变迁积极应对；2.新的国家课程在形成过程中应有教师的高度参与，教师须持有清晰的课程理念；3.跨学科学习主题应在国家课程中有所体现。     

What’s in a name? That which we call a crisis? A commentary on Michael Young’s article ‘Overcoming the crisis in curriculum theory’

Michael Young’s article ‘Overcoming the crisis in curriculum theory: a knowledge-based approach’ (JCS, 45, 2) is discussed from the starting point that the claimed crisis is constructed from a decisive solution, that is the solution determines what is a crisis. But curriculum research and curriculum theory are in need of change. Curriculum research is discussed from an international and historical perspective. The focus is on how economic changes and changes in modes of production have created demands that have been met by an increasing trust in competition between schools and nations. Curriculum construction has been globalized. Curriculum research and curriculum theory ought to problematize and analyse these changes in the conditions for curriculum construction and the politics of education. It is insight into these changes that are needed as well as a serious discussion on the meaning and direction of formation (Bildung) as a framework for research on the knowledge that has to be selected and organized for teaching.     

课程的文本化转向与教师的策略

课程研究是教育研究的核心领域。课程由蓝本向文本的转向，即意味着一个从知识中心到人本主义、从精英教育到大众教育、从封闭的知识体系到开放的意义结构的转变过程。同时，面对这种转向，教师的教育观念及教学行为方式也面临着一系列的调整。     

Middle years and middle schools now

This article presents an analysis of the current situation with regard to the primary curriculum, in particular the latest review documents, and proposes possible forms of integration as a solution to the problems of content overload. It comprises: a critical commentary on the review of the National Curriculum in England; a retrospective consideration of and additional perspectives on curriculum integration; and suggests a process of ‘curriculum mapping’ to examine and analyse what is to be learned in each subject, as a way forward.     

芬兰《幼儿教育和保育国家课程指导》的内容与启示

《幼儿教育和保育国家课程指导》是芬兰政府颁布的指导芬兰幼教工作的纲领性文件。芬兰的幼儿教育和保育强调尊重儿童的内在价值,为儿童发展提供支持。在课程实施中体现公平性、整体性、集体性、环境舒适性、快乐性、语言中心等原则:课程内容主要包括数学、自然科学、社会-历史、艺术、道德和宗教一哲学等六个方面。芬兰《幼儿教育和保育国家课程指导》重视保障体系的建构,关注地方差异,强调政策的弹性,对我国具有借鉴意义。     

On the Un-becoming of Measurement in Education

Abstract

Education in democratic South Africa has been saddled with the extraordinary task of sanitising a once dehumanising and splintered education system into a singular narrative of social justice and creative, problem-solving individuals. This extraordinary effort has witnessed a pendulum swing from the openness of outcomes-based education, to a less flexible National Curriculum Statement, and recently, to what has been criticised as a too restrictive Curriculum Assessment Policy Statement (CAPS). In its narrow focus on ‘assessment for learning’, CAPS appears to be trapped in a particular understanding of teaching and learning that can be understood only in terms of measurement, thereby discounting education as happening outside that which can be measured. In this article, I contend, firstly, that while education is not averse to measurement, it cannot be allowed to dominate the educative process. Instead, it is possible to reconcile measurement, as expressed through a ‘language of needs’ with a language of ‘coming into presence’, which recognises that learners enter the education arena with their own ideas of what is known and yet to be known. Secondly, I argue, that if a post-apartheid education system hopes to re-humanise its citizens and society, then this will only be possible through cultivating a curriculum, which is understood as a process of socially just encounters—one which is always in becoming, and therefore not necessarily measurable.     

Editorial

The National Curriculum of primary schools in England and Wales sets out the statutory and non-statutory requirements for teachers. It describes the aims and goals it aspires to achieve and the content of its subjects. In this article I suggest that the statutory and non-statutory guidelines of the National Curriculum present conceptually different goals in relation to the holistic development of a student. The first section discusses the two basic aims of the curriculum, their recommended implementation and the implications they have upon the curriculum. I specifically emphasize that ‘statutory’ guidelines represent information-based knowledge and that the ‘nonstatutory’ guidelines treat value-based issues. This division of roles creates difficulties in implementing the non-statutory part of the curriculum. In the second section I demonstrate this division by using education for sustainable development as a focal point. I conclude by highlighting important issues for education and, more particularly, for education for sustainable development.     

“课程产业”三题

课程的产业特性表现在生产性、商品性、求利性和组织性等方面。作为其核心的课程成本主要呈现为机会性、类型多样和贯穿始终等特点,且能够规范课程投入、为课程评估提供参照和促进课程管理水平的提高,有利于课程实践。《国家基础教育课程改革纲要(试行)》从课程标准、课程管理和教材等方面蕴含了产业思路。     

The impact of the National Curriculum on twelve special schools in England

Abstract

The National Curriculum represents one of the most significant UK educational reforms of this century. However, it was planned and introduced with little reference to pupils with special needs, particularly those attending special schools or units. Alongside pragmatic responses to the implementation of the National Curriculum in special education, there has been a lively and continuing debate about its appropriateness, in principle, for pupils in special schools. This paper reports data derived from interviews with headteachers of twelve special schools (encompassing three distinct special needs groups). Continuities of view, notably an acceptance of the principle of a national curriculum for all pupils, are discussed. Divergent Views reflected an adherence to equality or individuality as underlying educational principles. The findings are placed in two contexts: first, the process of curriculum change, and second, the links between integration and curricular conformity as reflected in some European special education literature.     

A Disabling Curriculum for Some?

There has been no recent research into the curriculum as a whole for pupils with physical disabilities. This small-scale survey was carried out by Tony Lonton and Asifa Farooqui, who looked at curriculum composition in relation to the National Curriculum. Tony Lonton was until recently in charge of the M.Ed. (special education) course at Manchester University, and Asifa Farooqui, a former student on the course, is now on the staff of the National Institute for Special Education, Pakistan.     

Music education in the UK: Theory and Practice

Music curriculum plays a significant role in pupils' school education. The connection between National Curriculum and practical classes becomes the most important ability for teachers. This essay will contextualizing my group's scheme of work at Cleves Junior School relative to influential theory and research surrounding mainstream music education.