attributes of curriculum essay

1. Curriculum itself has been defined differently by different scholars and authors over past
60 years, this essay is going to focus on Lawrence Stenhouse view on curriculum, Lovet
and smith’s view as well as the different attributes of curriculum such as knowledge, reality
and truth, product or process and curriculum as intention.
According to (Stenhouse, 1975), “Curriculum is an attempt to communicate the essential
principles and features of an educational proposal in such a form that is open to critical
scrutiny and capable of effective translation into practice”, based on Stenhouse’s
definition one may view curriculum as a document of principles that are meant to govern
the educational process and also open to new ideas and suggestions on what can be
done to improve what is being taught or shared. Stenhouse also hold some views on
curriculum, he sees curriculum as an intention, plan and prescription whereby he talks
about ideas by the curriculum designers of what is expected to be done by the teachers
and learners at schools. In this view curriculum is simply planned and prescribed with
intentions to achieve certain outcomes or results or set of rules that are meant to be
practiced or put into reality. The other view is that curriculum is seen as existing state of
affairs in schools and this can be referred as what really does happen at school, in this
view there is gap between ideas and aspirations and our attempts to operationalize them
because what is being prescribed and intended does not really happen as expected
reason being that the ones who design the curriculum have different perspective with
those who are implementing or delivering it.
Lovet and smith used different definitions and aspects or attributes to elaborate further
on curriculum, attributes such as curriculum as a selection, curriculum as intention
curriculum and reality, curriculum and truth, curriculum and process as well as curriculum
and product. The other point emphasized is that curriculum is basically about knowledge,
truth and reality and the other purposes of curriculum as it is mostly used in school is to
socialize learners to accept social norms. Looking at curriculum as selection, main focus
is on what is regarded as “worthwhile knowledge” whereby what is being regarded
suitable for curriculum is selected and taught since well everything cannot be taught, in
most cases what is being chosen is not neutral but favors majority and dominant groups.
In curriculum selection they select what covers people’s interest, subject knowledge,

2. disciplinary knowledge, the other thing is that what is being selected has to be socially
relevant and cover different social contexts. Curriculum as intention also known as
normative focuses on what is intended to take place at school and instill knowledge and
discipline in learners, curriculum as intention is more of a course or syllabus that must be
followed and covered at schools. The other attribute is curriculum and reality whereby
learners are being taught what is mostly relevant to their real life situations and
experiences and also what is being taught create reality for learners, regulates and shape
their identity. Curriculum and truth basically has to do with what is right and what is wrong,
it addresses the behavior on how one should behave, it instills acceptable values,
principles and ethics. This concept teaches learners how to carry out themselves in the
community or society, it promotes good morals and values that are accepted by the
society and prepares learners on how to become responsible adults in the near future.
Curriculum and process focuses on what is being done to deliver the content, it focuses
on things like teaching strategies/methods as well as the activities that are being used to
assess learners.
In overall one can say curriculum as process focuses on how the content is being
developed in learners. Lastly there is curriculum as product which focuses on what exiting
students or learners should be capable of at the end of the course, the experience that
learners have gained, what information and knowledge are they taking with them. It is
about the achievement or the intended results or outcomes, for example, skills acquired
for certain job at the end of the whole course. Curriculum planning has been arranged in
levels whereby there is national, provincial, school and classroom. In national level is
whereby the curriculum involve the subject experts and different scholars of particular
discipline form across the country, the provincial level consists of the coordinators,
principals, teachers and scholars and it is formed at the department to suggest what
should the chosen program consist of, we have school level which is formed by the
committee, parents as well as teachers and lastly we have the classroom level which
involves the teacher, class reps as well as learners, this has to do with cooperative
learning between teachers and the learners or students. There are factors that influence
curriculum as a whole, factors such as historical, political, social and economic factors.
Politics influence what one teaches, how the person teaches as well as the how the

3. schools re being organized. According to (Whitehead, 2019), “schools are subjects to
the local ministry of education and that ministry is under the control of the government
that is likely to want to promote particulars religious, political or cultural agendas”. Certain
ideology will be instilled on learners whereby critically thinking, global mindfulness and
creativity will not be encouraged in learners as a certain desired agenda has to prevail
and the politicized curriculum will also influence learners thinking and ways of doing
things. As it is said that “those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat
it”, according to (Chau, 2018), “curriculum has strong historical roots, these pre-
occupations have influenced the development of curriculum theory from outset” so that
learners are taught about history to avoid repeating the same mistakes of the past.
Society has its own expectations about what the curriculum should cover, things that will
be beneficial to the society and that how the curriculum is being socially influenced, other
social conditions such as the family background, great diversity in cultural backgrounds
as well as the school organization.

4. BIBLIOGRAHY
Chau,J. (2018, November11).whatis the influnce of historyoncurriculum.
Stenhouse,L.(1975). An introduction to CurriculumResearch and Development. pearsonEducation
1975.
Whitehead,S.(2019, November15).How do Political Factors affectcurriculumdevelopment?