Curriculum Models

Ross Woods

Models of curriculum parallel those of program evaluation and of quality. Some of the recurring themes are product/goals, negotiation with input from all parties, statements of values, academic content, and quantitative criteria. It is almost possible to lay out a bidimensional matrix with many of the themes on one axis and curriculum, conceptions of quality, and program evaluation models on the other. Although not all models correspond perfectly, they match closely enough to make the following chapters appear slightly repititious.

Studies of curriculum also help the accreditor to be able to identify the extreme forms and the characteristic weaknesses and strengths of each model. Curriculum models are not a way for accreditors to classify types of degrees because programs often use models eclectically. There is no point in doing so anyway as long as programs are responsibly structured. Besides, the choice of curriculum model is the prerogative of the school.

Definitions of curriculum are so numerous that none is definitive. It not only includes what teachers teach but can also include what they try to teach or unintentionally teach. Alternatively, others suggest that it is what students learn, either exclusively from what teachers do or from their total school learning experience. (Cf. Print, 1985:8)

Different Models

Curricula take many forms. Below is a very brief, almost simplistic, description of six main models based on Print. The various ways of arranging content is a separate topic, even though they roughly parallel curriculum models. (Print, 1985:75ff; Deal and Nolan give a similar outline.) Each of the first five models in some way or another presents a unique concept of what sort of knowledge students should have, and how one should evaluate it. The core values of each of these models contribute something important to an understanding of education:

Means-end models. Tyler (1949) developed the first major version of this model, which is flexible, much-modified, and apparently more scientific. It starts by forming objectives, then formulates ways to achieve them. During and after instruction, teachers use these objectives to evaluate student progress. Others, such as Taba (1962), Wheeler (1974), and Nicholls and Nicholls (1972), added parts, reordered others, and emphasized its cyclical structure. (Although Tyler's model was actually cyclical is often mistakenly represented as linear. [Tyler, 1949:123; cf. Brady, 1983:175]) In the last step of the cycle, curriculum developers review their results and modify their objectives, so the cycle can start again. Brady goes one step further, describing a model in which the same elements are handled in almost any order at all, which is what often happens anyway. (1983:64ff)

Some curriculum developers use a stricter form which is less compatible with other curriculum models. They start by surveying the felt needs of the population they intend to teach, and use survey results to formulate behavioral objectives.

All variations depend on means-ends thinking, and most modern curricula fall into this category. They assume the same central values as the means-ends conception of quality and that the steps in the cycle should be consistent with each other, that is, that instruction and evaluation should fit program objectives. They emphasize functionality over content.

Academic model. Perhaps the oldest of all approaches, it teaches the accumulated wisdom of the past, those movements presently in vogue, and the thoughts of great thinkers. It groups information according to academic disciplines, and stresses independent critical thought and rigorous examinations. One of its main values is the worth of disciplinary knowledge; it focuses on content.

Cognitive model. The cognitive curriculum does not emphasize learning information so much as thinking skills. Basically the student must learn how to learn; he must be able to find information, use it to make inferences, analyze it, create new variations of it, and evaluate it. It uses disciplinary knowledge and thorough evaluation. It values thinking skills most highly and is a content-based view of curriculum.

Humanistic model. The teacher provides situations and resources so that each student can discover meanings that assist in his unique personal development; it is analogous to spiritual development. Teachers do not predetermine outcomes, which they assume will take many different forms; they evaluate students by monitoring individual growth. Its core values are the student's personhood and personal experience, and in many ways, it parallels the environment or experience model of quality. It is a person-oriented approach to curriculum, conceiving content to be primarily personal.

Problem-solving model. This model appears mostly in technological training and in-house professional staff development in industry. It assumes that the corporation faces problems or deficiencies, and that solving problems will increase productivity and profits. This type of curriculum is intensely practical, blends readily with other approaches, and tends to favor the adult (androgenous) learner. Knowledge of theory is a means to a problem-solving end. It produces a great deal of situation-specific, practical research. Teachers and managers evaluate learning pragmatically, asking themselves whether proposed solutions and innovations would really work. (Boud, 1986, esp. pp. 240-242; cf. Margetson, 1987) The model leans heavily towards functionality rather than content.

Negotiation model. This conception describes how people with various conflicting opinions negotiate with each other to agree on a particular curriculum design. It does not really prescribe what schools should teach or how to structure a curriculum development project, so in some ways it is not particularly helpful. However, it describes what usually happens anyway in spite of other models. Its key element is the truth that curricula are negotiated, not just formulated; this aspect is very relevant to accreditation, despite the relative insignificance of this curriculum model. (Cf. Print, 1985:33)

Eclectic approaches. It is easy and practical to combine two or more of the first five models, and almost all combine with the sixth in practice. The means-end model does not necessarily imply a view of content other than that it must be teleological. Consequently, it has for accreditation the very important property of being able to facilitate other models. It does not normally mesh with a humanistic view, although Clute produces behavioral objectives that have open-ended responses. Some of his objectives have the characteristics of affective objectives but he uses them for cognitive content. (See Clute, 1978:11; cf. also Print, 1987:25, 71)

This list excludes one model because it is not really a method of curriculum. The social reconstructionist model is a belief that education should change society, and is often at least as much a leftist ideology as a curriculum model. One of its key values is social relevance. Some social reconstructionists believe that schools are too separate from society, or that education should be a democratizing process, or that education is a manipulative strategy in which students are merely tools.

Comments on Models

A simple way to create great amounts of literature is to play these models off against each other. For example, a large amount of remote, disciplinary knowledge can contrast sharply with personal growth or areas of immediate interest. (Pring, 1976:48ff, 64ff) That is, the academic model appears to be inconsistent with the humanistic model. Similarly, Boud contrasts the academic model with the problem-solving model. (1986:238f) There is more to gain in becoming a little eclectic. To return to Pring's example, he seems justified in saying that memorizing information for an examination is hardly education if it leaves students untransformed (pp. 52f).

While not all imply a conception of quality, some curriculum models at least imply ideal kinds of learning. Of those not mentioned in the chapter on quality, the academic model idealizes disciplinary knowledge, the cognitive model thinking skills, the humanistic model personal development, and the problem-solving model idealizes problem-solving ability. (As kinds of learning, all models are cognitive in the sense that cognitivism refers to that which is learnt.)

Perhaps of more direct relevance to quality is the matter of impression. A school using the academic model appears to have high standards because it supposedly emphasizes academic content, even though its program might actually be quite weak. Similarly, an excellent school with remarkably high standards which uses a problem-solving curriculum can appear to be no more than a simple training program. A school can falsely give the appearances of raising standards by doing no more than changing to an academic curriculum model.

The normal definition of nontraditional education was to use only means-ends terms, that is, the use of non-campus means to reach ends equivalent to those of on-campus education. Other models can create new directions for nontraditional education, and some nontraditional schools already use them without articulating them. For example, Bynner (1986:23-25), Laverty (1988), and Kinsler (1985:9) describe nontraditional Master's degrees that are more academic than means-ends based. (See Keegan and Rumble, 1982a for a brief but wider view.)

Different Forms

While it is easy to manipulate the models of curriculum to devise supposedly revolutionary innovations, it is also easy to make them appear quite similar and easy to integrate with each other. For example, a graduate reading-writing program could take the following different forms:

Means-Ends. The teacher specifies the learning objectives of the program and suggests some helpful books. Evaluation depends on the objectives.

Academic. The student writes a formal essay on an agreed topic. He reviews current publications, describes the current state of knowledge on the subject, and provides analysis and evaluation where necessary.

Cognitive. The student writes an essay analyzing a complex problem, relating relevant theory and generating various possible solutions.

Humanistic. The student suggests a topic which he feels will be to his benefit. If the supervisor approves, the student negotiates a reading list with him. On the basis of his reading, the student makes journal notes of what he learns, how he responds to the reading material, how he integrates different opinions, and how he would personally apply what he learns. Evaluation is based on the journal.

Problem-solving. The student finds a significant problem and finds both literature and non-literature information for a research bibliography. He then formulates a solution to the problem and presents it in a formal report. Evaluators mainly ask, "How satisfactorily is the problem solved?"

Extreme Forms

Most of the curriculum models have extreme forms, which are by nature unhealthy. These extremes warn accreditors that normally compatible models can be made to become incompatible with each other; they are summarized as follows:

Means-ends extreme: Needs are the only basis of curriculum, and educators can and should predetermine all specific learning outcomes. (Tyler himself disagreed with both these ideas saying that no single source is adequate to provide objectives, and preferring some measure of generality. 1949:5, 57; also 58ff) Unless the teacher controls and evaluates every detail of what happens in class, students will not learn effectively. (Contr. Ferrarra, 1987:16f)

Academic extreme: Disciplinary knowledge is the only valid type and is in essence always relevant.

Cognitivist extreme: All present knowledge is worthless because it is inflexible and will soon be obsolete. A program of study cannot teach everything which the student will need to know, so schools should only teach students how to learn.

Humanist extreme: These beliefs are pseudo-religious, such as self-actualization. Students are basically good and do not need control or discipline. Educators should never try to predetermine specific learning outcomes. When humanism extends to content rather than curriculum, it can imply a philosophical basis in mysticism and secular humanism, and the model takes some extreme non-school and anti-traditional forms. Teaching can become group counselling where learning is affective, unconscious, and almost unspecifiable. (Raven, 1991:71f)

Problem-solving extreme: Academic theory is always useless and only applied knowledge has value.