Maybelle B. Animas, R.N

Latin: “Currere” - Running course

Scotland 1603: Carriage way, road

the set of courses, and their content,

offered at a school or university

The Word: Curriculum

Curriculum Organization?

Process of selecting curriculum

elements form the subject, the current

social life and the students experience

then designing the selected curriculum

elements appropriately so thy they can

form the curriculum structure and type.

Criteria for Effective Curriculum

Organization

Continuity

Sequence

Integration

Curriculum Designs

A curriculum design is a framework or plan of

action for preparing a course of study or a set of

students’ experiences .It is a deliberate process of

devising, planning and selecting the elements,

techniques and procedures of curriculum.

Curriculum design is a method of thinking.

Importance of Curriculum

Designs Curriculum design involves the creation of the set of

operating principles or criteria, based on theory, that guide the selection and organization of content and the methodology used to teach that content .With the accelerated rate of social change, schools are preparing youth for adulthood in a society not yet envisioned by its members .Hawley’s words still ring true: “it’s not a question of whether or not to change , but whether or not we can control the way we are changing. We are living in an Alice in an Wonderland world where you have to run just to stay where you are .To get anywhere you have to run even faster than that. The pieces on the chess board keep changing and the rules are never the same.”

Models of Curriculum Designs

An effective curriculum must be built on a solid philosophical foundation that answer the question of what educational purposes the school should seek to achieve. The classical model for curriculum design, proposed by Tyler in 1949,asked four questions of curriculum planners:

What educational purposes should the school seek to attain?

What educational experiences can be provided that are likely to help attain these purposes?

How can these educational experiences be effectively organized?

Models of Curriculum Designs

How can we determine whether these purposes

are being attained?

Tyler’s steps for curriculum design included stating

objectives, selecting learning experiences,

organizing the experiences, and evaluating

results. Tyler’s model is most closely aligned with

the educational purposes of preserving the social

order and teaching skills and competencies

needed to function effectively in society.

Principles of Curriculum Designs

The problems of curriculum change become the criteria for determining the desirability of a curriculum. A list of the problems of curriculum development, recapped and stated as criteria, following:

Be consistent with the conceptual framework and implement the conceptual framework commitments.

Derive and test its concepts and theories in teaching process.

Respond to the educational needs of society and the immediate concerns of students.

Cope with the knowledge explosion and the short “half-life” of scientific knowledge

Principles of Curriculum Designs

Use the logical, precise, effective, and efficient educational technology that is currently available.

Use teaching personnel in the most economical and efficient way (time, energy and money).

Enable utilization of cognitive teaching input.

Provide for student testing of learned behaviour in real situation.

Produce a graduate capable of delivering creative teaching care for the next fifteen to twenty years.

Spend a reasonable length of the time accomplishing the goals of the curriculum.

Steps in Curriculum Design

Fiorno and Nowak suggest the following steps in curriculum design:

(1) Identification of the problem.

(2) Diagnosis of the problem.

(3) Search for alternative solutions.

(4) Selection for the best solutions.

(5) Ratification of the solution by the organization.

(6) Authorization of the solution.

(7) Preparation for adopting of the solution.

(8) Adoption of the solution.

(9) Direction and guidance of the staff.

(10)Evaluation of the effectiveness of the solution.

Establish a Curriculum

Committee

Persons responsible for curriculum decisions include administrators ,teachers ,students ,parents ,and community leaders. Most major innovations in the public school are introduced by teachers , state boards or departments of education, and textbook publishers and instructional materials producers indirectly provide educational leardership.

Categories of Curriculum Designs

Subject-Centered Curriculum

Activity/Experience based curriculum

Core curriculum

Subject Centered Design

Subject centered curriculum is a rigid curriculum , based on specific courses, which mandates specific amounts of material to be covered over special periods of time regardless of student abilities or interests. Subject centered curriculum assign the greatest importance to subject matter rather than to the students .It consists of having students in classes for one subjects at a time such as mathematics for 45 minutes, science for 45 minutes. And history for 45 minutes. Three related designs have emerged from subject centered designs:

Subject design

Academic Disciplines design

Broad Fields design

Subject Design

This is probably the oldest and most widely used form of curriculum organization found in schools and educational systems .This is based on the classification and organization of subjects matter into discrete groups, which we have called subjects .These groupings, which have become known as school subjects, were initially based on evolving divisions of labour in research that produced physics , history, literature and mathematics and so forth. In more recent times practical areas such as typing , home economics and industrial arts have become accepted as subjects.

Academic Disciplines Design

This approach to organizing curriculum is essentially a post second world war phenomenon ,gaining greatest support in the inherent organization of content, as is the subject design, the academic discipline design emphasizes the role played by those distinct entities called academic disciplines .In a school setting, the content of this design would focus on what an academician does, that is ,how a biologist , historian , or a mathematician research is done , how that research is carried out , how data are analysed, how research is reported , and so forth. The result , it is hoped ,is that the school would produce mini versions of academic disciplinarians.

Broad Fields Design

This third design was developed to

overcome a perceived weakness in the

subject design that was evident in the

nineteenth and the early twentieth

centuries .Broad field design was

deemed more suited to younger

learners. The broad fields design is

commonly found in primary and lower

secondary schools.

Common Feature In Three Subject

Centered Designs

Classification and organization of all contents into subjects or subjects-like groupings.

Subjects are clearly defined and distinguished.

A hierarchy of subjects is commonly found according to their perceived value.

Methodology applied and practised is largely teacher-centered and expository in nature

Advantages of Subject Centered Design

The advantages of subject-centered

curriculum are:

Students like it , they are used to it and

it fits their idea of what school should be.

What students learn , they learn well.

This approach is efficient in a field in

which resources for staff development

are scant.

Disadvantages of Subject Centered Design

The disadvantages of subject-centered curriculum

are:

Teachers wouldn’t be able to innovate their

teaching style to help students learn in a creative

way.

Students simply memorize what they need to

know in order to pas a test , instead of actually

learning it.

Teachers are teaching the students to think inside

the box in order to pass the exams.

Activity/Experience Based Curriculum

This approach is based on determine the genuine needs and interests of learner , which in turn form the basis of the curriculum. An important claim of this approach is that “people only learn what they experience”. According to M.K Gandhi ,education is the development of all the aspects i.e. body mind and spirit . So mind without activities can not develop the personality perfectly .so education must give importance to activities. Education ,which has no link with life is meaningless.

Activities Under Activity Based Curriculum

Physical Activities:

These activities aim at physical development of the child .it includes physical training ,games and sports.

Environmental Activity:

These activities includes nature study ,excursion ,survey , social visit. These activities develop civic sense and love for nature in children.

Constructive Activity:

With these activities love for

work dignity of labor , production efficiency may be

developed. Handwork craft repairing of tools belong

to this category of activities.

Aesthetic activity:

Music ,arts creative crafts are

included in this type of activities. These provide

opportunities for self-expression and development

of inborn creative faculties.

Community Activity:

These Activities aim at community development and include community projects ,first aid ,social service , etc these activities also help in the socialization of the child. The teacher can provide information regarding history, geography ,and economics with the help of these activities.

Advantages of Activity Based Curriculum

Advantages of Activity based curriculum are:

The most important feature of Activity based curriculum is learning by doing .so this method can fulfill the natural urge of a growing child on one hand also can help them learn their lesson.

The method also promote better understanding of a lesson among students as they learn the lesson by practicing the task themselves.

It inspires the students to apply their creative ideas ,knowledge and mind in solving problems.

It also helps learner psychologically as the can express their emotions through active participation in something useful.

Disadvantages of Activity Based

Curriculum

Activity curriculum method require long term

planning with details of the whole process before

engaging the learners, the teacher has to make

sure that all students have sufficient knowledge

and skills regarding the task they are going to

perform .so this method can not be used on a

regular and daily basis as it involves a lengthy

procedure.

The objective of this method can be only be

fulfilled if the planning of the lesson is flawless.

Limitations of Activity Based Curriculum

Activity curriculum attaches too much

importance on activities. It neglects

other activities needed for intellectual

development of the child.

Personal supervision is needed for

every activity which is not possible in

school.

Activity curriculum is not applicable to all

stages of education.

Core Curriculum

The notion behind a core design, usually called a core curriculum, is that there exists a set of common learnings (knowledge, skills and values) that should be provided to all learners in order to function effectively in a society .The core concept, however, does vary considerably in interpretation and one writer has suggested that it is possible to distinguish no less than six forms of the core design. For our purposes, it is sufficient to understand that a curriculum may be organized around the idea of a core as a set of learnings essential foe all students. The emphasis of this approach to core curriculum was that all students would experience a set of common and essential learnings that were necessary for learners to function effectively in society.

Benefits of Curriculum Design

It Focuses Attention On Goal.

It Improves the Probability of Success.

It Improves economy of Time and

efforts.

It Facilitates Communication And

Coordination of Projects.

It Reduces Stress.