Nation,Curriculum and Identity in Conservative Cultural Analysis: a critical commentary

The article begins with a brief discussion of the recent invitation by the Chief Executive of the School Curriculum and Assessment Authority to engage in debate about the role of the National Curriculum in promoting national identity. It argues the need for a more systematic analysis than has so far been provided, of the inter‐relationships within Conservative curriculum discourse between five elements: nation, culture, identity, social cohesion and curriculum. The second main section examines writing within this tradition on the themes of nation and nationalism and social integration, drawing particularly on the work of Ernest Gellner. The final section focusses on questions of culture, ‘high’ culture and cultural diversity, illustrating the long‐standing character of the critique of economic individualism within Conservative writing (broadly conceived), before critically reviewing certain aspects of contemporary neo‐conservative discourse on British culture and the curriculum.     

Classification and Framing of the Curriculum in Evangelical Christian and Muslim Schools in England and The Netherlands

This article examines some of the ways that Muslim and evangelical Christian schools in England and The Netherlands deal with religious education. Various schools take different views about how aspects of religious belief should be taught and how Christian or Muslim belief should be related to the wider curriculum of the school. While some of the schools have attempted to integrate, for example, evangelical Christianity throughout the whole of the curriculum, others have been content to have the religious teaching as a separate component of the curriculum. This paper uses the work of Basil Bernstein to describe and understand the nature of the religious curriculum in these schools. Through a series of case studies of schools and curricula it examines the nature of the curricula and their possible effects on children.     

Curriculum Profiling in Australia and United Kingdom: Some Implications for Performance-Based Assessment in the United States

An important development in the context of recent moves toward alternative, performance-based assessment has been the emergence of curriculum profiles. These profiles are assessment tools that allow teachers to make judgments about student achievement with reference to key curriculum outcomes in different subject areas. In this article, six dimensions of curriculum profiles are identified: function-purpose, curriculum coverage, criterion referencing, validity-reliability. manageability, and interpretability. The extent to which each dimension is present in three recently developed curriculum profiling systems—the Australian National Profiles, the Victoria (Australia) Profiles, and the National Curriculum Assessment in England and Wales—is examined. This article highlights the fact that tensions exist among many of these dimensions and examines how the tensions have been addressed within each of the systems. The article concludes with a consideration of the implications of international research on curriculum profiles for the development and implementation of performance-based assessments in the United States.     

Professional Workers With Boys

The current study examines how Israeli teachers’ beliefs and ideologies are expressed in their teaching of Biblical miracles. The article explores how Israeli teachers broach the topic of Biblical miracles, and how their beliefs and ideologies help them navigate a path from the national curriculum to the classroom. The article focuses on three key areas: Initially, I discuss the educational challenges that teachers in Israeli schools confront in teaching miracles. This is followed by a mapping of educational approaches to presenting miracles. The final section analyzes conversations with three teachers about how they present miracles in their classrooms.     

The development of large-scale portfolio placement assessment at the University of Michigan: 1992–1998

The first section of this article examines in detail the mechanics of a large-scale writing portfolio assessment at the University of Michigan, including its impact on matriculation and placement; students' reactions to the requirement; and instructors' evaluation of the efficacy of placements under the new system. The second section of the article examines the scoring process used by readers to assess portfolios, describes its evolution over a 4-year period, and examines the results produced by various changes made to this process over time. The evolution of this portfolio placement assessment has not been traditional, in that it has enacted an understanding that people learn to read and write within specific social contexts, at the same time that it has enacted a commitment to connecting the intellectual and practical work of university teaching with the work of teaching that comes before it in the high schools. The assessment process also has enacted the authors' belief that issues of assessment are intimately linked to issues of curriculum and pedagogy; thus, the assessment has become an occasion for sustained talk about the purposes of our required writing courses, about the fit between our lower division and upper division writing requirements, and about the degree to which teachers share criteria for assessing students' writing within courses.     

Centrifugal schooling: third sector policy networks and the reassembling of curriculum policy in England

This article examines changes in curriculum policy in secondary education in England. It is concerned with recent curriculum policy and reform, and the proliferation of non-government actors in curriculum policy creation. It examines the emergence of a loose alliance of third sector organisations and their involvement in a series of alternative ‘curriculum experiments’. The third sector curriculum policy network revolves around a policy vision of decentralisation constituted by public–private partnership, media-friendliness, social enterprise and an ‘open source’ or network-based organisational logic. It assembles a policy ideal of ‘centrifugal schooling’ which links together ideas about ‘networked governance’ with ‘flexible’ learning and ‘entrepreneurial’ curricula. The article traces and discusses some of the inter-organisational relations, materials and discourses of the third sector network of alternative curriculum policy developments, and provides a case study of a prototypical third sector curriculum programme. It examines the organisational relations and practices by which the project was produced and the conditions leading to its failure.     

Citizenship Education in a Divided China, 1949‐1995

This article examines the reflection of national goals and ideologies in the civic education curricula of Mainland China and Taiwan. Acomparison of junior secondary school textbooks from the 1950s and the 1990s shows how the curriculum embodies the states’ changing national priorities and justificatory ideologies. Specifically, in the early period, the focus of the curriculum was on goals and values which distinguished each state from the other. By the 1990s, despite continuing ideological differences, there was a common focus on the importance of economic and social development.     

社区背景下的校本课程开发——肃南二中和勐罕镇中学的个案研究

肃南二中和勐罕镇中学两所学校,以人类学的经济文化类型为理论依托开发出来的校本课程,在加强学校教育与社会发展、学校与社区间的联结,解决教师职业倦怠,促进校园文化建设等方面取得了显著成效。但信息、技术、文化资源匮乏等给校本课程的深入开发带来困难。民族地区学校的校本课程开发要依赖于政府和社会各界对学校给予资金、技术支持,在教师培训中使用教育人类学的理论方法,积极整合社区文化资源。     

Curriculum,pedagogies and assessment in Scotland: the quest for social justice. ‘Ah kent yir faither’

This paper explores the ways in which assessment has developed and is developing in Scotland. The article begins by providing background information on Scotland's educational system. The second section tracks the relationship between curriculum and assessment in Scotland for children aged 3–14, 14–16 and 16+. The third section explores Scotland's current attempt to develop a coherent assessment system. The fourth section focuses on the major curriculum review presently underway in Scotland and reflects on the emerging future for Scottish Education. Connections between ideas of Learning, Assessment and Excellence are explored and issues being faced by one small country trying to develop a coherent assessment system that is both just and dependable are identified.     

要慎用目标模式的课程开发——兼论“泰勒原理”的局限性

现代课程理论之父泰勒提出了课程开发的四个步骤,即课程开发的目标模式,亦称＂泰勒原理＂。此原理尽管对课程开发具有重要的指导意义,但也存在不少的缺陷。研究试图探讨＂泰勒原理＂的局限性,强调在借鉴泰勒原理进行课程开发时需要注意它的适用范围,在课程开发中一定要慎用目标模式。     

Bridging further education and higher education in the formation of spiritual directors

This article examines those aspects of curriculum relating to programmes that have developed across the further and higher education divide. It analyses one particular spiritual direction formation programme that has transitioned from a vocational training programme in the further education mode to a post-graduate academic programme in a higher education context. In identifying the core elements of this formation programme, it suggests several complementary educational approaches that resonate with the formation approach within academic contexts and examines whether these approaches adequately address the breadth of learning styles and relational aspects of learning that contribute to effective pedagogical approaches. The article recommends further research to assess the relevance of curriculum design to guidelines and standards demanded of both the further and higher education sectors.     

Civics Education in Taiwan: Values Promoted in the Civics Curriculum

The purpose of this article is to analyze the values intentionally promoted in civics education in junior high schools in Taiwan. The article first examines the antecedents of civics education in Taiwan, then applies content analysis in exploring the values promoted through the curriculum for civics education at junior high school level. The article uses eight categories of values clusters as the framework for analysis, namely: self cultivation, family values, democratic values, civic life and community, economic life, fair government, national identity and social cohesion/diversity. The following findings emerged from this study:

• ? Social cohesion, democratic values, and national identity are emphasized the most in the civics curriculum.

• ? The democratic values promoted in the traditional period are used as a means to distinguish democratic Taiwan from totalitarian Communist China.

• ? Self cultivation is less emphasized than in the traditional period.

• ? National identity is promoted less as a fundamental value than in traditional civics education.

• ? Because of social and environmental change, the new civics education integrates several Western values into the curriculum.

This research was supported by a grant from the Pacific Basin Research Center of Soka University of America.     

Whose curriculum is it anyway? Stakeholder salience in the context of Degree Apprenticeships

A Degree Apprenticeship model has recently been introduced into the United Kingdom (UK) Higher Education system as part of wider changes to vocational training. The system has experienced numerous rapid changes in regulation and funding, and it is now little understood by many stakeholders. Distinguishing different phases in UK Higher Education, and using a salience model as a lens for analysis, this article identifies and examines stakeholders with regards to their influence on the Higher Education curriculum. The new Degree Apprenticeship model is funded by an employer payroll levy and it requires Higher Education institutions to deliver training to specific standards. This research explores the implications of the model for the Higher Education curriculum, concluding that the direct involvement of employers in the design and delivery of vocational Higher Education introduces untried elements into UK Higher Education on the assumption that the funding requirement will lead to a change in employer behaviour. This, coupled with the opening of Higher Education provision to private providers, transfers power over the curriculum to those with potentially no commitment to wider public values, and may offer a threat to the international standing of UK Higher Education. This article contributes to research in understanding how Higher Education systems respond to, and actors cope with, imposed change.     

A tale of two countries: comparing civic education in the Philippines and Singapore

This article provides a comparative analysis of citizenship education in the Philippines and Singapore. Through an analysis of historical contexts, citizenship education policy and curriculum, it examines Makabayan in the Philippines and National Education in Singapore. It identifies particular policy and curriculum trajectories as responses to national and global imperatives to demonstrate how countries are redefining the kinds of knowledge, skills and values deemed necessary for national citizenship in global contexts. This comparative case study illustrates some of the tensions and contradictions facing citizenship education in new global contexts and highlights the different ways countries try to manage these tensions through citizenship education policies and curricula. Findings point to different factors that shape and constrain the implementation of citizenship education programmes in both countries.     

A Course in Social and Ethical Issues in Computing

In recent years many computer science educators have struggled with the problem of how to include instruction on social and ethical issues in the computing curriculum. This article describes one approach to solving this problem. It outlines a course called Perspectives in Computing that the author has taught for junior and senior computer science majors. One unifying theme of the course is that computers alter human relationships‐‐they create relationships that would not have existed otherwise and they change existing relationships. The course both examines the nature of those relationships and studies the ethical dimensions of the computer's impact. A second unifying theme is that computing as a discipline affirms a set of professional values. The course attempts to help students discern those values and to develop a thoughtful critique of them.     

Possible influences of Arabic-Islamic culture on the reflective practices proposed for an education degree at the Higher Colleges of Technology in the United Arab Emirates

This article critically examines the compatibility of United Arab Emirates culture and values with the assumptions of reflective practice currently being written into a new teacher education degree programme. The curriculum that is being developed relies heavily on the notions of reflective practice as a method of professional development. The local culture, political and public institutions are thoroughly inculcated with Arab-Islamic values that may not accord with the assumptions underlying such practices. The author’s concerns are discussed about the trainee teachers’ lifestyle and experiences that may hinder engagement in their own learning processes, as well as the Arab-Islamic codes of behaviour that may pose serious obstacles to the implementation of reflective strategies, especially interactions between men and women and between superior and subordinate within educational settings. The author concludes that reflection, as conceived and implemented in the West, may not be in the best interests of the student teachers if they wish to teach in local schools.     

Teaching Justice and Living Peace: Body,Sexuality, and Religious Education in Asian-American Communities 1

This article examines sexuality, a null curriculum in Asian-American faith communities, and explores pedagogical strategies to move the sexuality discourse to the explicit curriculum. The article first describes the current discussion of sexuality in Asian-American communities, then it critically analyzes the Confucian notion of the body, which has far-reaching influence on Asian-American views about sexuality, including those of Christians. The article then focuses on demystification of the body, arguing that demystification is fundamental to Asian-American discussions about sexuality. Finally, it suggests pedagogical strategies for the teaching of sexuality in Asian-American contexts.     

Social interaction and language use in Irish infant classrooms in the context of the revised Irish Primary School Curriculum (1999)

This article concerns the gap between government intention and classroom outcome. The author examines the treatment of spoken language in the Revised Irish Curriculum, which came into effect in 1999. He finds much to be commended in the recognition of its central role in learning. He then examines the implementation of this curriculum with children of 5 to 6 years, in fifteen Senior Infant classrooms. Extensive observations and interviews lead him to the view that pupil talk is still seen by most of the teachers observed as a distraction from the essential business of education, namely listening, reading and writing. The interviews revealed that these teachers did not seem to understand the important role of dialogue and discussion in developing learning or recognize the need to promote sustematically opportunities for oral interactions. He concludes that educational change cannot be achieved simply by producing new curriculum statements.     

Changing curriculum policy into practice: the case of physical education in Hong Kong

This article examines the differences between the formally stated aims of education and the implementation of the school curriculum in order to show the divergence between what is initiated and what emerges as school practice. This implementation problem is examined from the policy-makers' and teachers' perspectives, with specific reference to physical education as a school subject in Hong Kong. First, it examines the existence and intention of educational policy towards curriculum as established by policy-makers. Second, the implementation process is evaluated from the teachers' perspective by employing a framework adopted by Cuban (1998) that utilized effectiveness, popularity, fidelity, adaptability and longevity. The data are derived from a case-study of a physical education programme that included document analysis, and interviews with teachers, parents and students. The case-study provided a subjective perspective of teachers and their work, while the framework assisted in demonstrating the absence of cohesion between the various government agencies. The resulting fragmentation of ideas leading to confusion and frustration for teachers also indicates that longevity and adaptability are likely to be the most constructive criteria for the assessment of curriculum change.