Vol.3 No.

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JALT Journal of Applied Learning & Teaching

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What is curriculum?
Nelson Ang Director, Curriculum and Assessment, Kaplan Singapore

DOI: https://doi.org/10.37074/jalt.2020.3.1.10

Introduction over discipline-specialised knowledge (Muller & Young,

2014). This dislocation is deemed unproblematic because
The main question in the field of curriculum seems the relevance that higher education seeks is increasingly
to be “What is curriculum?” found in university graduates’ employability. If generic skills
- Johnson-Mardones, 2015, p. 124 will get the graduates employed, then surely the curriculum
ought to follow. In Singapore, employability is further
It is no coincidence that, separately, Pinar, Reynolds, defined by starting salaries and employment rates. Such
Slaterry, and Taubman (1995, as cited in Pacheco, 2012, p.2) measures of educational quality are thought to be valid and
and Johnson-Mardones (2015, p.124) declared curriculum demanded of both the autonomous universities and private
a “complicated conversation”. 20 years of deliberation and education institutes with the results publicly compared in
study did not yield greater clarity in the field (or should the national newspapers.
it be fields) of curriculum theory, studies, design, and
development; it appears that time does not clarify. However, higher education’s utility in the job market is not
entirely straightforward. It is necessary to discern knowledge
Should government/regulator or institution specify from opinions and experiences without devaluing either
curriculum, and make decisions with regard to knowledge, because specialised knowledge is significantly different
skills, and pedagogy (Priestley, 2017)? Should regulation/ from everyday knowledge. It is produced differently (not
policy govern the input (what is taught) or output (what informally through everyday experiences), structured
outcomes have been achieved) of curriculum? In what ways differently, and for different purposes (Young & Muller,
would curriculum be globally and locally influenced in terms 2013).
of vision and purpose? How are curriculum, teaching, and
learning related? Such contentions of schooling’s response (or lack of) to
prevailing trends and the ensuing curricular debate lay bare
This is a conversation that asks tough questions. Perhaps the the challenge of making decisions on the future of education.
answers have thus far been underwhelming. What are the possible futures when defining curriculum?

Traditionally, higher education and vocational education are

Sensing curriculum respectively bounded and separated. These boundaries are
taken for granted and the social construction of knowledge is
… the assumptions of … ‘future thinking’ tend to ignored. However, the distribution of specialised knowledge
be that certain wider social changes are not only heavily favours the elite few in higher education whilst the
inevitable, but of positive benefit to humanity and mass has to settle for simpler, procedural versions of the
that schooling in the future will have to follow knowledge through the vocational track. Thus, this Future
them. This ‘following’ is invariably viewed as 1 has often been accused of causing “social divisiveness,
unproblematic. inequality, unhappiness, and conflict” (Young & Muller,
- Young & Muller, 2010, p. 11 2010, p. 17).

This following along with the alluded requirement to Future 2 is the emergent anti-thesis seeking to break
stay relevant have fractured specialised knowledge from the boundaries, de-differentiate and de-specialise both
schooling (Muller & Young, 2014). Consequently, there knowledge and institutions thereby leading to the conflation
appears to be a deliberate conflation of higher education of higher education and vocational education. Young &
with vocational education, treating conceptual knowledge Muller (2010, p.18) proffered various manifestations of this
and practical knowledge as similar (if not the same), perhaps “over-socialised” knowledge:
even emphasising generic skills (such as problem-solving)

Journal of Applied Learning & Teaching Vol.3 No.1 (2020) 134

 • Integration of school subjects resulting in the
weakening of the boundaries between school
knowledge and everyday knowledge

• Stipulation of curricular content as generic

skills thereby weakening disciplines

• Promotion of formative assessment over

summative assessment leading to the
weakening of boundaries between students

• Introduction of unified qualifications

framework weakening the boundaries
between academic and vocational
qualifications

• Promotion of facilitative over directive

teaching weakening the boundaries between
experts and novice learners

Unfortunately, the apparent elevation of vocational Figure 1. Layered construct of curriculum

education has a price.

The erosion of expertise and the loss of trust in between the curriculum field and other educational fields.
specialist knowledge has been an inadvertent
consequence of the relativism of boundary- Curriculum as design is often referenced against the
less thinking. Trust in reliable knowledge and in Tylerian tradition of technical decision making about what
the judgments of specialist knowers has been is to be taught and how. This is often achieved through
hollowed out by common sense scepticism... we appropriating Bloom’s taxonomy for the necessary verbs
deride specialised knowledge and knowers even to formulate learning outcomes, ascertain suitable levels
as our lives are ever more dependent upon them. of understanding, and ensure measurability (Johnson-
- Young & Muller, 2010, p. 21 Mardones, 2015). Inevitably, a dialectical reaction against
the perceived rigidity of the Tyler Rationale would emerge.
As a result of this ostensible dichotomy, the necessary The reconceptualists, chiefly William Pinar, claimed that “the
Future 3 dialectic seeks to hold that the construction of curriculum field was in a period of stasis and that there was a
knowledge is social and historical whilst situating the need to move it into new ways of understanding” (Pacheco,
boundaries of disciplines within communities of practice. 2012, p. 5). The curriculum discourse thus departed from the
These boundaries are not a given (unlike Future 1) and are technical towards the political and personal; predominantly
subjected to reordering (not eliminating as called for in underpinned by critical theory.
Future 2) where new knowledge is socially constructed then
stabilises. Are we there yet? Curriculum as phenomenon is manifested in the written and
experienced. As a written document, curriculum “regulates
the content of schooling, shapes the school experience,
and controls teachers’ work” (Johnson-Mardones, 2015, p.
Particularising curriculum 125). This is a familiar aspect of curriculum. However, the
curriculum experienced by students “through schedules,
As alluded to in the preceding discussion, curricular routines, and school rituals” may differ from the official
considerations span a wide array of milieus and elements. prescription, giving rise to a “hidden curriculum” (Johnson-
Priestley (2017, p. 2-3) proffers that delineating curriculum Mardones, 2015, p.126). Consequently, curriculum as a
requires conceiving it as a layered construct. phenomenon is complex, layered, and multidimensional.

A parallel can be found in Johnson-Mardones’ (2015) The various dimensions and their respective constituents
treatise on the “fractured” state of the field of curriculum are:
studies (p. 124). He opted for a multi-dimensional concept of
curriculum so as to accommodate its complexity, proffering
an understanding of “curriculum as a phenomenon, as
design and as field” (p. 125).

Curriculum as an academic field enables research into

various discourses that are undergirded by disciplines
spanning phenomenology, critical theory, postmodernism, Table 1: Dimensions and consituents of curricula.
psychology, and beyond. This, in turn, allows dialogue

Journal of Applied Learning & Teaching Vol.3 No.1 (2020) 135

Lecturer agency This diagram illustrates an attempted synthesis of the many
facets of curriculum reported earlier. The realms of the
Curriculum consideration is incomplete without including written and enacted curricula have been discussed in the
the state of lecturer agency. The enactment of curriculum preceding sections. What remains glaringly missing is the
is necessarily lecturer-mediated, between policy intentions consideration of student experience in the lived curriculum.
and classroom realities, hence never lecturer-proof, and
predisposed to implementation gaps and unintended
The lived curriculum
consequences (Priestley et al., 2015). The temptation,
therefore, is to remove all decision making from the
lecturers so that fidelity of implementation is enshrined. ... a peculiarity of academic learning is to focus,
However, counter-intuitively, the problem is exacerbated not on the world itself, but on others' views of
when lecturers are constantly tasked with implementing that world. The idea that people can learn through
others’ decisions without appropriate autonomy being listening to lectures most clearly expresses the fact
accorded to them. Agency by necessity requires an “acting- that teaching is a rhetorical activity, seeking to
out” by the lecturer, which is dependent on the agent’s persuade students of an alternative way of looking
capacity to decide between myriad alternatives, resolving at the world they already know through experience.
dilemmas, then acting on that decision. Lecturer agencies This way of learning presupposes that students must
cannot be aided by efforts in dehumanising them. Instead, a be able to interpret correctly a complex discourse
bottom-up approach is needed, where improvements may of words, symbols, and diagrams, each bearing a
be achieved through lecturer-driven initiatives. specific meaning that must be interpreted correctly
if the student is to learn what is intended. How do
Unfortunately, the prevalent regulations demand students deal with this?
accountability and benchmarking – enforcement of top- - Laurillard, 2002, p. 43, emphasis not in original
down control when a bottom-up approach is desired.

Indeed, how much is going on in the classroom? How

Ethical and professional practices thus lose out to complex is learning? When learning takes place in the away
performative pressures, as survival strategies lead to from the real world, how many representations of that world
tactical and even cynical compliance. are present? How might the myriad first-order experiences
- Priestley et al., 2015, p. 4, emphasis not in original that students bring with them to class be reconciled with
the second-order descriptions by the subject matter experts
– namely the curriculum developer and lecturer? Indeed,
The achievement of lecturer agency lies within the narrow students experience not just the subject matter but the
space where the autonomy of a bottom-up initiative overlaps teaching as well, how much of this dual-experience are we
the conformity towards a top-down regulatory requirement. paying attention to? Would the representations from the
Apart from the capacity of the lecturer, the affordances written curriculum and the enacted curriculum converge
accorded, and the limitations of the ecology influence the or diverge? Would these representations accurately and
degree of agency (Priestley et al., 2015). sufficiently reflect reality? Or would these representations
be mired in ludic and narrative fallacies? How do students
then reconcile these in a representation of their own?
A working construct of curriculum: A synthesis

The impossibility of education?

Formal learning that is situated away from actual practice

predisposes a written curriculum, and the very act of
codifying the curriculum causes the loss of authenticity.
This is often criticised as the impracticality of theoretical
knowledge. However, it is the second-ordered nature of
curriculum, be it higher education or vocational, that is
driving a “crisis of confidence in professional knowledge”
(Schon, 1983, p. 3). The loss of faith in specialist knowledge,
where experts do not solve problems without creating new
ones, is not due to a ubiquitous theory-practice dichotomy.
The chasm may instead lie in the loss of randomness inherent
in real-life vis-à-vis a deliberately designed lesson plan that
is anything but random; and the tacit knowledge that drives
the expert’s intuitive responses vis-à-vis a well-defined, best
practice protocol. Such authenticity cannot be replicated in
a well-structured curriculum in the classroom, particularly
the Future 1 and 2 curricula.
Figure 2. A working construct of curriculum: A synthesis

Journal of Applied Learning & Teaching Vol.3 No.1 (2020) 136

Therefore, a causal education seems impossible since the Muller, J. & Young, M. (2014). Disciplines, skills and the
very act of writing a curriculum negates the efficacy of the university. Higher Education, 67, 127-140.
learner’s problem-solving abilities in real-life. We are unable
to conclude that the enacted curriculum has caused the Pacheco, J. A. (2012). Curriculum studies: What is the
successful development of the stipulated learning outcomes field today?. Journal of the American Association for the
and that these outcomes adequately reflect success in Advancement of Curriculum Studies, 8, 1-17.
real-life. Furthermore, would not academic success at best
reproduce current realities (more likely inferior versions Priestley, M. (2017). Approaches to specifying curriculum
given the irreproducibility of intuition) and thus ineffectual areas of learning. Stirling: The Stirling Network for Curriculum
in creating new realities that are apposite to these uncertain Studies.
times? How then might a non-written curriculum be
enacted? Would navigating through the elements in the Priestley, M., Biesta, G., Philippou, S. & Robinson, S. (2015).
above model afford mediation towards the co-construction The teacher and the curriculum: Exploring teacher agency. In
of disciplinary boundaries by lecturers and learners in the D. Wyse, L. Hayward & J. Pandya (Eds). The SAGE handbook
form of a Future 3 curriculum, thus removing the need for a of curriculum, pedagogy and assessment. London: SAGE
written curriculum? Publication.

If so, then the outcome of education is necessarily Schon, D. A. (1983). The reflective practitioner: How
teleological. This is a conversation that asks tough questions. professionals think in action. Massachusetts: Basic Books.

Young, M. & Muller, J. (2010). Three educational scenarios

for the future: Lessons from the sociology of knowledge.
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Johnson-Mardones, D. F. (2015). Understanding curriculum Young, M. & Muller, J. (2013). On the powers of powerful
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Laurillard, D. (2002). Rethinking university teaching: A

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Copyright: © 2020 Nelson Ang. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution
License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright
owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No
use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

Journal of Applied Learning & Teaching Vol.3 No.1 (2020) 137