Session Information
27 SES 12 A, Didactics and/or Curriculum
Symposium
Contribution
Some 20 years ago an intercontinental comparative discussion was started on the role of didactics as opposed to that of curriculum - mainly between representatives of “Didaktik” and science education in Germany and Scandinavia on the one hand and outspoken colleagues in the United States like Shulman on the other hand. The latter were interested in teaching methodologies, in materials development, but also for a closer analysis of what teachers really know or should possess as pedagogical (professional) knowledge, designing teacher education accordingly.
From a European perspective, such a focus on curriculum development and research was seen as too narrowly oriented towards planning the syllabus, producing teaching material, formulating teaching-learning sequences and designing whole textbooks as the central task of pedagogy, whereas the “scientific/empirical” analysis of what was going on in the classroom was left to pedagogical psychology. Later, this distinction was also virulent in Europe: namely between a socio-political approach of defining content and learning goals from a societal, future needs perspective as opposed to an approach of transposing “scientifically-based” knowledge structures and studying the interactive processes of teaching/learning them, observing (un)intended effects. Nowadays, we see both approaches as complementary: they belong together like many other aspects of institutionalized education, e.g. identity building or personality development of learners and teachers etc.
The European understanding of didactics has expanded to include all of these strands into a larger theoretical framework of general and subject-based education. It comprises goal setting, selection and definition of appropriate content, organizing materials as “problem-solving” opportunities as well as methodical considerations and principles like multimodal exposure, conscious learning, adequate exercising, self-evaluation and last, but not least “measurement” of outcomes. All of these aspects involve levels of planning, action and evaluation that have to be integrated into a theory of personal as well as functional “Bildung” (= domain-specific or subject-based education which contributes to the development of personalities as much as to the construction of relevant knowledge which can be used in private, social and professional contexts).
The notion “curriculum” also has evolved over time. It can be understood in a general sense, covering a range of issues, approaches and perspectives. The term may refer to planning units of different scope: from a whole-year educational program to a specific part of such a program or to ways of designing a course of studies and implementing a syllabus respectively. Seen like that, curriculum is only a certain part of didactics, limited in scope and value, yet indispensable as such. It helps 1) to define the proposed goals that teachers should strive for (knowledge and competences of different types, attitudes, insights and understandings), 2) to suggest and justify certain types of (plausible) sequencing in the teaching/learning process and 3) to link the goals to possible forms of evaluation of the actual outcomes. These evaluation procedures, however, are not part of the curriculum any more: they cannot be derived either from goals or from content, they follow a modelling logic of their own.
It is to be assumed that in different European countries different traditions of pedagogy, didactics and evaluation have evolved, shaping the space of school/subject teaching and learning differently, assigning a specific place to curriculum. Our symposium will topicalize such comparison, clarifying the central terms and theories of didactics as well as curriculum in context. By looking at examples, we will identify forms of pedagogical planning and research which help to bridge the gap between what is expected or hoped for (curricular perspective) and what actually happens in the learners’ and teachers’ mind, what move and motivates them (didactic perspective).
References
Akker, Jan van den et al (eds.) (2006). Educational Design Research. Milton Park: Routledge. Beacco, J.-C., Fleming, M., Goullier, F., Thuermann, E. & Vollmer, H. J. (2015). The Language Dimension in all Subjects. Handbook for Curriculum Development and Teacher Training. Strasbourg: Council of Europe (http://www.coe.int/t/dg4/linguistic/Source/Handbook-Scol_final_EN.pdf ) (especially Ch. 10: Curriculum Development). Hopmann, S. & Riquarts, K. (eds.) (1995). Didaktik und/oder Curriculum. Zeitschrift fuer Paedagogik, Beiheft 33. Weinheim/Basel: Beltz. Plomp, T. & Nieveen, N. (eds.) (2013). Introduction to Educational Design Research. Enschede: Netherlands Institute for Curriculum Development (SLO). (http://www.slo.nl/downloads/2009/Introduction_20to_20education_20design_20research.pdf/).
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