Introduction To Curriculum And Pedagogy Education Essay

It is obvious to see several interpretations devised on curriculum and curriculum development by many curriculum expertises. However, they all differ from one another as they interpret their own views based on some concern they have in that field. After going through their views, I could understand that, the term “curriculum” refers to an array of strategy, specification of objectives, content and teaching materials and methods used while implementing instructional activities to achieve educational goals. So, proper understanding of curriculum development is important for all curriculum planners and teachers.

Sukmadinata (2000), presents that curriculum development could mean the preparation of an entirely new curriculum, or enhancement of the existing curriculum. Since curriculum posses major impact on all educational activities, every educational institution has a curriculum that is in accord and appropriate to the position, function and rational of these institutions. Therefore, I have discussed my understanding of four models: Tyler model, Taba model, Oliva model, and the Saylor and Alexander model of curriculum development with their respective diagrams in following pages.

1. The Tyler Model

One of the models which is still known to be applicable in present century is the one published by Ralph Tyler in 1949. He stated his curriculum rational in terms of four questions based on educational purpose, essentiality of educational purposes, organization of educational experiences, and effective attainment of those purposes; these should be considered while developing any curriculum.Sources of objectives

Students

Society

Subject matter

Tentative objectives

Screen

Philosophy

Psychology

Final Objectives

Learning Experiences

Evaluation

So, he used these questions to develop four-step process as levelled in figure 1.

Figure1: Tyler’s deductive curriculum module

We could find, in the first stage, the curriculum developers need to select and identify educational objectives based on three sources: students, society, and subject matter. The needs of students and community or national society are examined from various points of views such as: occupational, psychological, recreational, health, family, religion and civic roles. Subject matter, being another source, curriculum developers looks at the subjects that are in question to be taught.

These speculative objectives from the three sources are then filtered through two screens: the schools philosophy and knowledge of the psychology of learning, in order to finalize a set of educational objectives.

After the completion of stating and refining objectives, the rational proceeds through the steps of selection and organization of learning experiences as the means of achieving outcomes.

The final step in Tyler’s rational; evaluation is the process of examining vitality placed by the curriculum to those finalised educational objectives. Because the statement of objectives not only serves as the basis for selecting and organizing the learning experiences, but also serves as a standard against which the programme of curriculum instruction is appraised.

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2. The Taba Model

Hilda Taba’s model starts with the curriculum and the teacher’s outlook of what should be taught how, and then tests it on the students before declaring it effective. Therefore, she believed that teachers who teach or implement the curriculum should participate more than the authority in designing and developing curriculum.

She used “grass root approach in her model. So she believed that the teachers should first create specific teaching- learning units, and a hospitable environment that lets everyone feels like a positive team member to render best approach to child’s education. Thus she advocated an inductive approach to curriculum development.

I could find that Taba model is basic, yet inclusive. It offers five steps to developing curriculum as illustrated in figure number 2.

Since she used an inductive method, her first step includes creating learning units for work to be studied. This is done in eight sub stages by diagnosing student’s needs in order to formulate the objectives. Then, select and organize the content, choosing proper learning experience to attain the objectives, determination of what to evaluate and checking for balance and sequence.

Secondly, testing of experimental units are done in order to establish their authenticity and to set their demand for each grade level. This is followed by third stage where they revise and adapt units as necessary in meeting all students’ needs.

In later stage, they develop a framework to test to ensure that all material is covered in a clear and complete manner. Finally, teachers put the unit of study into practice, while always creating new units to use in the class room.

Five Step Sequence

Testing experimental units for their validity

Revising and Consolidating

Producing Pilot Units

Installing and disseminating new units

Developing a framework

1 2 3 4 5

Diagnosis of needs

Formulation of objectives

a.

Content selection

b.

Content organization

c.

Selection of learning experiences

d. Sub steps for creating pilot unit.

Organization of learning activities

e.

f.

Determination of what to evaluate & the ways and means of doing it

g.

Checking for the balance and sequence

h

Figure 2: The Taba Model showing inductive approach in curriculum developing

3. The Oliva Model

The Oliva Curriculum Development model is comprehensive and systematic, composed of twelve components each described as follows:

Component I: Curriculum developers specify and formulate philosophical and psychological principles, target, mission and vision of the institution based on the needs of students and society in general.

Component II: Here they analyse and specify the needs of the particular community, school and subject matter that will be taught in the given school.

Component III and IV: Specification of curriculum goals and objectives based on the principles, mission and vision formulated in previous component takes place.

Component V: Organize the curriculum design and starts implementing.

Component VI, VII and VIII: In these phases, they describe the curriculum in the form of the formulation of general objectives and specific learning by defining and specifying instructional goals, objectives and learning strategies.

Component IXA and X: Preliminary studies on possible strategies or assessment techniques to be used are carried in this stage and in the later stage starts implementing those learning strategies.

Components IXB, XI and XII: Finally curriculum developers do final selection of assessment techniques, evaluation and modification of instruction, instructional components and curricular components.

4. The Saylor, Alexander and Lewis Model

Saylor, Alexander and Lewis classified sets of broad goals into four domains: personal development, social fitness, sustained learning skills, and specialization. Because they believed that every curriculum development must begin by setting educational goals, domains and specific objectives that they wish to achieve, and then move into the process of planning the curriculum.

Firstly, here, the curriculum developers decide on the appropriate learning opportunities for each domain and when these opportunities will be made available.

After the designs have been created, curriculum implementation begins. Teachers select the methods through which the curriculum will be related to the learners. Teachers identify the specific instructional objectives before selecting the strategies to implement.

Finally Teachers and curriculum planners evaluate the curriculum. They evaluate the total educational programme. This process allows educators to determine whether or not the goals and learning objectives have been met.

External forces

Legal requirement

Research data

Professional associations

State guidelines

Figure 4: The Saylor, Alexander and Lewis Model

Curriculum Evaluation

Curriculum design

Goals and objectives

Bases of curriculum

Society

Learners

Knowledge (Administrative approach)

Curriculum implementation

Feed back

Comparisons among models

I could find that four models discussed above share both similarities as well as differences. Tyler and Oliva used deductive approach to explain about curriculum development where as Taba’s model is inductive; that is, Tyler and Oliva’s model shows that they finally adopt specific and precise instructional objectives after examining general needs of the society. But in Taba’s model generalization of curriculum design takes later, after examining the grass root development curriculum materials.

On the other hand, The Saylor, Alexander, and Lewis model adopt an administrative approach to curriculum development where it is a means-end model. “It assumes a desired end (goals and objectives), as means of attaining this end (learning experiences), and a process (evaluation) for determining whether the means in fact resulted in the desired end.” (Livenburg, 2011)

Though, four models differ in some aspects, all models presents their respective series of development through the range of stages. Thus, they are all linear. Never the less, the models are said to be prescriptive as they clearly suggest what is needed to be done during development of curriculum. In addition it is found that Tyler’s and Taba’s individual concepts are still relevant in quality curriculum development today because they both consider the learners and their goals, main ideas to precise teaching learning objectives crossways whole curriculum.

Conclusion

Four models were presented in this essay: The Tyler’s deductive model, Taba’s inductive model, Oliva’s deductive approach model, and The Saylor’s, Alexander’s and Lewis administrative model. I understand that these models can help us educators, curriculum developers and administrators to conceptualize the development process by pointing certain principles and procedures.

I think that none of the model is inherently superior. All four models are important in their own ways. Every model is having its own goal and objectives based from the needs of individuals, community and the society as a whole. After all, all the models assist in guiding teachers, administrators and educational planners to verify whether the institution is implementing the needs of the clientele they are serving. The only thing that we need to take in consideration while developing or planning curriculum is certain criteria that are directly or indirectly through the models explained above.