Language Teaching Pedagogy

Curriculum Design refers to the sets of strategies and practices that educators implement in planning the curriculum of a given course. These strategies and practices typically address what subject areas will be covered, what learning objectives will be targeted, what activities will be implemented in order to realize these learning objectives, what types of evaluations will measure student performance, pedagogical approaches to teaching, and so on. In other words, curriculum design outlines both a vision for a given course and a detailed plan for realizing that vision. Thoughtfully engaging in curriculum design allows for the creation of coherent courses of which all the parts work towards bringing about the articulated student outcomes. For example, do student activities and assessments correspond with the skills and knowledge that have been practiced /discussed in class? By considering a course in its entirety, curriculum design aims to ensure a productive marriage of form, function, and content so that that all aspects of a course form a consistent and logical whole.

As the resources referenced in this page make plain, curriculum design is a multidimensional and iterative process. This means that one must consider multiple aspects of a curriculum in relation to one another (for example, content, learning experiences, student outcomes, evaluations, etc.), and that one must continually review and refine these aspects of the curriculum in light of new information / inputs. For example, changing one’s learning outcomes will require a redesign of learning experiences, evaluations, and so on.

Below, one will find resources on curriculum design linked, along with some summaries and illustrations of some of its key concepts and considerations. The summaries and illustrations are based on the Pressbooks' page created by Linda J. Button, Ed.D, “Curriculum Essentials: A Journey.”  

A Sample Model and Rationale for Curriculum Design*

Tyler’s Model (1949) is based on the following four (4) fundamental questions he posed for guiding the curriculum design process. They are as follows:

1. What educational purposes is the school seeking to attain?
2. What educational experiences are potentially provided that are likely to attain these purposes?
3. How can these educational experiences be effectively organized?
4. How can we determine whether these purposes are being attained?

Schematically, Tyler’s model is presented as follows:

Application of Ralph Tyler’s Model in Curriculum Design

In applying Tyler’s model to curriculum design, the process begins with framing objectives for the curriculum. Because of its emphasis on the importance of objectives, it is considered an objective-based model. This process starts with analyzing information from various data sources. Data sources for curriculum according to Tyler include:

• Contemporary society/life
  • For this source, the designer analyzes the issues affecting society that could be solved through education.
  • Examples are cultural issues, socio-economic issues, and health issues such as HIV/AIDS among.
• Learner’s needs and interests
• Subject specialists/subject matter

From these sources, the designer develops general objectives. These are subjected to a screening process, using the philosophy of education and psychology of learning as the major screens. Social values are also used as a screen, but sometimes these are subsumed in the philosophy of education. This yields a feasible number of objectives that are focused on in education.

Specific objectives are then derived from the general objectives. For each of the specific objectives, learning experiences are identified. In this context, the learning experiences include the subject matter/content and learning activities.

The next step is the organization of learning experiences. This is done to ensure effective learning takes place. The various principles of the organization include scope, sequence, integration, and continuity, among others. The final step involves evaluation, to determine the extent to which the objectives have been met.

Feedback from the evaluation is then used to modify the learning experiences and the entire curriculum as found necessary.

Learning Experiences

Learning experiences refer to the interaction between the learner and the external conditions in the environment which they encounter. Learning takes place through the active participation of the students; it is what the students are involved in that they learn, not what the teacher does.

The problem of selecting learning experiences is the problem of determining the kind of experiences likely to produce given educational objectives and also the problem of how to set up opportunity situations that evoke or provide within the student the kinds of learning experiences desired.

General Principles in Selecting Learning Experiences

• Provide experiences that give students opportunities to practice the behavior and deal with the content implied.
• Provide experiences that give satisfaction from carrying on the kind of behavior implied in the objectives.
• Provide experiences that are appropriate to the student’s present attainments, his/her predispositions.
• Keep in mind that many experiences can be used to attain the same educational objectives.
• Remember that the same learning experience will usually bring about several outcomes.

Selection of Subject Matter/Content

The term subject matter/content refers to the data, concepts, generalizations, and principles of school subjects such as mathematics, biology, or chemistry that are organized into bodies of knowledge sometimes called disciplines. For instance, Ryman (1973) specifically defines content as:

Knowledge such as facts, explanations, principles, definitions, skills, and processes such as reading, writing, calculating, dancing, and values such as the beliefs about matters concerned with good and bad, right and wrong, beautiful and ugly.

The selection of content and learning experiences is one crucial part of curriculum making. This is mainly because of the explosion of knowledge that made the simplicity of school subjects impossible. As specialized knowledge increases, it is necessary either to add more subjects or to assign new priorities in the current offerings to make room for new knowledge and new concepts.

New requirements for what constitute literacy have also emerged. In secondary schools, the usual method of accommodating new demands is to introduce new subjects or to put new units into existing subjects.

Improved educational technology such as the use of television, radio, computers, and multi-media resources support an expansion of what can be learned in a given period. New technological aids for self- teaching, for communicating information, and for learning a variety of skills are shifting the balance of time and effort needed for acquiring a substantial portion of the curriculum. What then are the criteria for the selection of content?

Criteria for the Selection of Content

Several criteria need to be considered in selecting content. These include the validity, significance, needs, and interests of learners.

Validity

The term validity implies a close connection between content and the goals which it is intended to serve. In this sense, content is valid if it promotes the outcomes that it is intended to promote. In other words, does the curriculum include concepts and learning that it states it does?

Significance

The significance of curriculum content refers to the sustainability of the material chosen to meet certain needs and ability levels of the learners.

Needs and Interests of the Learner

The needs and interests of the learners are considered in the selection of content to ensure a relevant curriculum to the student’s world. This also ensures that the students will be more motivated to engage with the curriculum.

Utility

In this context, the subject matter of a curriculum is selected in the light of its usefulness to the learner in solving his/her problems now and in the future.

Learnability

Curriculum content is learnable and adaptable to the students’ experiences. One factor in learnability is the adjustment of the curriculum content and the focus of learning experiences on the abilities of the learners. For effective learning, the abilities of students must be taken into account at every point of the selection and organization.

Consistency with Social Realities

If the curriculum is to be a useful prescription for learning, its content, and the outcomes it pursues need to be in tune with the social and cultural realities of the culture and the times.

*This illustration and the subsequent explanation comes from Linda J. Button's Pressbooks page "Curriculum Essentials: A Journey," which is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.