Theme 1, Module 1:
1.Some conceptions of curriculum continue to be mainstream approaches -lasting over time – while others are not. Explain.
2 Explain your interpretation of conceptions of curriculum and how you can use them as tools or frameworks to analyze planning, instruction, and assessment within your specific context of practice.
I can answer question 1 using an example from the Visual Art Curriculum and how this has changed in the last 30 plus years; interspersed will be comments on the 2nd question.
There will always be a steady rollout of curriculum expectations along the lines of the Scholar Academic Ideology, Michael Stephen Schiro,( 2013) or the Academic Rationalism, Eisner and Vallance,(1974) – to teach the chronology and peaks (or dynamic changes) in human achievement in the visual arts and image making since the Paleolithic period. From the Venus of Willendorf through Iconography, Gothic Cathedrals, the Renaissance, the fine art Movements of the 19 and 20 Centuries, practical art skills in drawing, painting or printmaking – and visual appreciation and critique – a selection of the artistic human disciplines will be taught in almost every art curriculum, according to the ancient canons of, predominantly western art.
As for other conceptions – another curriculum “mainstay” would be Development of cognitive processes, Eisner and Vallance, (1974), to add value and interrogation to art critique. What makes great art? Why is this so? Why does this – or that- artwork speak to the time in which it was made? How can we deconstruct the visual elements in the artwork? How could we connect it to our own experience or enter into the experience of the artist? How does it connect us with society?
Social reconstruction ideology, Schiro, (2013), as a concept, has always been expressed through the arts (see Delacroix – Liberty Leading the People( date ), Social Realist art in Mexico, Diego Riviera or protest art in South Africa, Dumile Feni (1960) among others, but social reconstruction conceptions have been expressed more overtly since the inception of the distinct field of curriculum study, in the 1920’s and have a wide appeal. The interesting thing about art is that it teaches transformation even without people realizing it. In a paper by Kerry Freedman and Patricia Stuhr the writers note this transformation:
” At one time, sociologists thought popular forms of visual culture merely reflected social life. Contemporary images and artifacts. however, are a major part of social life. Visual culture teaches people (even when we are not conscious of being educated) and, in the process, we recreate ourselves through our encounters with it. As we learn, we change, constructing and reconstructing ourselves. Global culture functions through visual culture (television, radio, newspapers, telephones, faxes, World Wide Web, etc.) to produce hegemonic, virtual realities, including our social consciousness and identities. “Curriculum Change for the 21st Century, Visual Culture in Art Education, Kerry Freedman and Patricia Stuhr- (2001?) Ch. Social lssues and Cultural ldentities.
So I would concur that Social reconstruction as a conception will endure, especially in the arts curriculum.
And, on Technological Curriculum, Friedman and Stuhr have this to say:
“Contemporary visual technologies have promoted the collapse between the boundaries of education and entertainment. It is the wide distribution of the interaction of seduction, information and representation that makes newer information technologies so powerful.” Curriculum Change for the 21st Century, Freedman and Stuhr- (2001?)
Wow! This is exciting – it really resonates with everything I find both useful and annoying in arts curriculum technology use. Trying to achieve a balance here in classroom use through selective programs, gallery websites, Kahnacademy.org, Art21 and others which make for fabulous input and which make managing a changing curriculum somewhat a breeze. But assessment goals for learning can fall out of the window in the race for more information and more visual entertainment. It can remain superficial if it isn’t well managed. Managing this would be to ensure itemized “breaks” for individual and class feedback or discussion, using technology for topic quizzes, Kahoot games, or spending time drawing or painting the “Three Graces” or another artwork after it is introduced.
Even a quick squiggle drawing with annotations works really well to reinforce content learning, but slower drawing allows for deeper connections to the artwork studied.
These are all mainstream conceptions of curriculum and they will be lasting ones. I am inclined to believe that the only reason a conception would not be long- lasting over time is under certain social conditions: The more conservative the political situation, the less important Learner-centered curriculum ideologies become, the more important state agenda’s and ideologies become, and the more curriculum management and design would be filtered through the Social Efficiency Ideology. And, changes to curriculum reflect social and political trends.
Political changes happen when a country is made to feel afraid; gripped by fear mongering through political rhetoric, or real events, a threat of actual war – these political climates tend to make people more conservative, wanting strong, defined leadership, someone who will take control. Discernment in the quality of leadership can be ill defined. From the readings I concluded that curriculum changes were most evident at times of political upheaval. They seemed to mirror the effects of political and social events in the 1920’s, 1960’s, 1980’s- and 2008. This is not wholly surprising but it does mean that at times like this curriculums will tend to glance back to more conservative structural changes. What are the possible effects of this?
Elizabeth Vallance, A second Look at Conflicting Conceptions of Curriculum, (2001) ” A swing from Social Activism to social conservatism today writes ” The rise of the new right and the growing strength of the fundamentalists social agenda has shifted the popular meaning of social reconstructionism- [leading to] a reconstruction of society along lines concerned with a religious based morality.”
These changes will be reflected in policy changes which will affect curriculum. So if we are not aware, as educators, what this means for curriculum, then we will find ourselves being led by the nose along a narrow religiosity which has nothing to do with education, or religion in its truest sense.
References:
Schiro, Michael Stephen. SAGE Publications Ltd, Calif.2013
Al Mousa, Nadya. An examination of CAD use in Two Interior Design Programs from the Perspectives of Curriculums and Instructors, Thesis. (2013)
Vallance, Elizabeth. A Second Look at Conflicting Opinions of Curriculum (2001)
Songololo Times 