Three Approaches to Curriculum

• Curriculum developer (publisher, state, institution) sets goals and chooses learning experiences, evaluates, plans and proposes curriculum

• Students articulate learning goals that spring from their real-world roles 
• Students help plan curriculum

• Teacher leads the class while following the lead of learners 
• Students, rather than "outsiders," become experts

• Appears neutral and equitable in its availability
• Exists "out there," can be organized and transmitted 
• Is observable and measurable 

• Created through the interaction 
  of student and text 
• Builds on what learners already know
• Relevant to students' real-life context 
  

• Not fixed - dependent upon interaction among students, text, and teacher 
• Autobiographic - depends on the politics of identity brought to learning
• Complex interaction between text, the teacher, and what is taught 
• Knowledge is created, rather than taken in

• Pre-determined goals 
• Learning happens in a linear, step-by-step fashion
• Expert knowledge is important 

• Learning happens in social contexts
• Instruction is transparent and based on purposes students determine
• Learners actively build on knowledge and experience

• Education is political 
• Language and power are connected 

• A classroom with lesson plans, homework, grades possibly
• Skills-based/sequenced textbooks or workbook with pre- determined learning goals 

• Apolitical on the surface
• Drawn from adults' lives in their everyday contexts 
  

• Abandons technician mentality
• Addresses social and community issues of importance
• Curriculum not set in advance; emerges from "action and interaction of the participants" (Doll, 1993)

• Objective, observable "scientific" means
• Can provide comparative scores

• Performance of the student's contextualized goal
• Continuing, involving metacognitive strategies 

• Portfolios, self-assessment instruments
• Measures of social and personal change
• Levels of critical consciousness reached 
• External performance levels do not apply