This document discusses new concepts of curriculum that focus on developing thinking skills. It argues that today's world requires life-long learning and problem solving abilities rather than just content knowledge. It presents five key aspects of a "thought-full" curriculum: 1) directly teaching thinking skills, 2) using content to engage and activate the mind, 3) stimulating dialogue to build shared understanding, 4) reflecting on one's own thought processes, and 5) cultivating a more thoughtful world through education. The overall message is that education needs to go beyond just teaching content to developing strong thinking abilities in students.

1. New Concepts of
Curriculum
By
DR. Magdy M. Aly
Professor of Curriculun and EFL
Instruction
FoE ,Ain Shams University
maly2007@yahoo.com

2. Our world has shifted away from an 
industrial model of society to a
learning society. These changes
require education to develop
individuals with the knowledge,
problem solving-skills, cognitive
processes, intellectual dispositions
and habits of mind necessary to
.engage in life-long learning

3. Students entering the new millennium 
must come fully equipped with the skills
that enable them to think for themselves,
to be self-initiating, self-modifying and
self-directing. They must acquire the
capacity to learn and change
consciously, continuously and quickly.
They will require skills beyond that of
content knowledge. They must possess
process skills beyond just fixing
problems, rather, they must anticipate
what might happen and search
. continuously for more creative solutions

4. Five thoughts about a
thought-full curriculum
Learning to think . 1 
All of us think. Indeed, we come to 
this earth with the capacity, ability
and inclination to think. Nobody has
to “teach us how to think” just like
no one teaches us how to move or
walk. We do it innately when we are
ready. Thinking, therefore, may be
.taken for granted

5. Learning to think is enhanced when 
teachers teach them directly by
make thinking skills explicit,
labeling cognitive processes and
habits of mind and habits of mind
when they occur, employing
thinking maps and diagrams, and
modeling the steps of problem
.solving and decision making

6. Thinking to learn . 2 
Learning is an engagement of the 
. mind that changes the mind
. Learning is an engagement of the mind that changes the mind
Martin Heiddeger Heiddeger
Martin 

7. Meaning making is not a spectator 
sport. Knowledge is a constructive
process rather than a finding. The
brain's capacity and desire to make
or elicit patterns of meaning is one
. of the keys of brain-based learning

8. Meaning making is not a spectator 
sport. Knowledge is a constructive
process rather than a finding. The
brain's capacity and desire to make
or elicit patterns of meaning is one
. of the keys of brain-based learning

9. Content, therefore, should not be 
viewed as an end of instruction, but
rather as a vehicle for activating
and engaging the mind. Content is
selected to serve as a vehicle for
experiencing the joy ride of
.learning

10. Furthermore, meaning making is not just 
an individual operation. The individual
interacts with others to construct shared
knowledge. There is a cycle of
internalization of what is socially
constructed as shared meaning, which is
then externalized to affect the learner's
social participation. Constructivist
learning, therefore, is viewed as a
reciprocal process in that the individual
influences the group and the group
(.Vygotsky, 1978 )influences the individual

11. Instructional strategies and techniques 
that encourage successful participation
in group activities assists students in
constructing their own and shared
meanings. Teachers engage students’
thinking by posing challenging questions
and relevant problems, inviting student
assessment of their own learnings, and
maintaining a safe, non-judgmental
.classroom atmosphere

12. Thinking together . 3
Friendship is one mind in two “ 
.” bodies
Mencius 
A great problem facing education is 
caused by the fragmentation of
thinking and acting—a way of
thinking that divides and fails to
see the interconnections and
coherence of divergent views

13. Therefore, another purpose of a 
thought-full curriculum is to
stimulate dialogue as a means of
” ) building an “ecology of thought
(— Isaacs, 1999

14. Humans, as social beings, mature 
intellectually in reciprocal
relationships. Collaboratively,
individuals generate and discuss
ideas eliciting thinking that
. surpasses individual effort

15. identify Baker, Costa, and Shalit )1997( 
norms which may serve as standards that
are understood, agreed upon, adopted,
monitored and assessed by each
participant when working as contributing
. member of a group
Pausing : Taking turns is the ultimate ( 1 
in impulse control )Kotulak, 1997(. In a
discourse, space is given for each
. person to talk

16. Paraphrasing : Covey )1989( ( 2 
suggests we seek to understand
before being understood.
Paraphrasing lets others know that
you are listening, that you
understand or are trying to
.understand and that you care

17. The use of probing and clarifying is 
intended to help the listener better
understand the speaker. In groups,
probing and clarifying increases the
clarity and precision of the group's
thinking by clarifying
understandings, terminology and
.interpretations

18. Paying attention to learning styles, 
modalities and beliefs when
planning for, facilitating of and
participating in group meetings
enhances group members’
understanding of each other as they
converse, discuss, deliberate,
.dialogue, and make decisions

19. Thinking together demands a shift 
away from the confines of our own
traditional obsolescent thinking
conception of “me” to a sense of
”. “us

20. Thinking about our own . 4
thoughtfulness
I thank the Lord for the brain He put in “ 
. my head
Occasionally, I love to just stand to one 
.” side and watch how it works
Richard Bolles 
Human beings, to the best of our 
knowledge, are the only form of life with
the capacity for metacognition—the
ability to stand off and examine their own
. thoughts while they engage in them

21. Thinking involves the whole of us— 
our emotions, our ways of feeling in
the body, our ideas, our beliefs,
and our qualities of character and
our visions of being. Learning to
think begins with recognizing how
we are thinking now. Generally we
are not all that conscious of how we
are thinking. ) See Metacognitive
:questions on p

22. Teachers can cause students to 
reflect on their own thoughtfulness
by posing challenging problems and
then having students describe their
plans and strategies for solving the
problem, sharing their thinking as
they are implementing their plan
and then reflectively evaluating the
effectiveness of the strategy that
.they employed

23. Thinking big . 5
I learned to make my mind large, “ 
as the universe is
large, so that there is room for
paradoxes.”
Maxine Hong Kingston

24. A thought-full curriculum serves a 
. larger, more spiritual agenda
A thought-full curriculum, therefore, 
builds a more thoughtful world as
an interdependent learning
community; where all people are
continually searching for ways to
trust each other, to learn together,
and to grow towards greater
. intelligence

25. The best way to predict the future is to invent “ 
.” it
If we want a future that is much more 
thoughtful, vastly more cooperative, greatly
more compassionate and a lot more loving, then
we have to invent it. The future is in our
. schools and classrooms today
Destiny is not a matter of chance–it is a matter “ 
. of choice
It is not a thing to be waited for–it a thing to be 
.” achieved
William Jennings Bryan 