EDU 513 : Curriculum: Status, Issues, and Trends

EDU 513 examines the issues and trends surrounding what schools teach and why. Central to the course is the student viewpoint that examines how young people at various levels of schooling experience the curriculum. By examining historical and current debates on what an educated citizen should look like, what a general education is for, and what kind of education is most worth having, students form and articulate their own views on these considerations. The course introduces the basics of curriculum mapping and planning, while also exploring the dynamics of the curriculum-making process at institutional levels – who or what decides which courses will be taught, selects the material to be taught, and sets proficiency standards for achievement. Over the course of the class, students engage with common themes from curriculum research such as the professionalization of teaching and the teacher-proofing of the curriculum; cultural conflicts and the impacts on curriculum making and choice; the hidden versus the explicit curriculum; how access to the curriculum is impacted by class, race, and gender; the specialization and fragmentation of knowledge; standardized learning for standardized testing; and textbooks and the consumption model of education.