The document discusses the definitions and importance of curriculum and evaluation in education, emphasizing the need for assessing the effectiveness of curricula to ensure student learning and growth. It outlines both formative and summative evaluation methods, detailing their purposes and approaches, as well as techniques such as observations, questionnaires, and interviews for gathering data. Lastly, it highlights the role of evaluation in improving educational practices, the quality of curricula, and informing policymakers.

1. PURPOSE AND
PLANNING FOR
EVALUATION
Puja Shrivastav

2. What is Curriculum?
• According to Wheeler (1967) curriculum means the
planned experiences offered to the learners under the
guidance of the school.
• Tanner & Tanner (1975) defined it as the planned guided
learning experience and intended learning out-comes
formulated through a systematic reconstruction of
knowledge and experiences under the auspices of the
school for the learner’s continuous and willful growth in
academic, personal & social competence.

3. What is Evaluation?
• Evaluation is fundamentally concerned with deciding on
the value or worth wholeness of a learning process as
well as the effectiveness with which it is being carried out.
• Curriculum evaluation refers to the process of studying
the merit or worth of some aspect, or the whole of a
curriculum.

4. Need of Evaluation
• Evaluation is a tool which can be used to help teachers
judge whether a curriculum or instructional approach is
being implemented as planned, and to assess the extent
to which stated goals and objectives are being achieved.
It allows teachers to answer the questions:
Are we doing for our students what we said
we would? Are students learning what we set
out to teach? How can we make
improvements to the curriculum and/or
teaching methods?

5. Curriculum Evaluation
• Gay (1985) argues that the aim of curriculum evaluation is
to identify its weaknesses and strengths as well as
problems encountered in implementation; to improve the
curriculum development process; to determine the
effectiveness of the curriculum and the returns on finance
allocated.
• There are two levels of Curriculum Evaluation—Formative
evaluation and Summative evaluation.

6. Formative and Summative Evaluation
Formative evaluation:
• The term formative indicates that
data is gathered during the formation
or development of the curriculum.
• Formative evaluation may include
determining who needs the
programme (eg. secondary school
students), how great is the need (eg.
students need to be taught ICT skills
to keep pace with expansion of
technology) and how to meet the
need (eg. introduce a subject on ICT
compulsory for all secondary schools
students).
• In education, the aim of formative
evaluation is usually to obtain
information to improve a programme.
Summative evaluation:
• The term summative indicates that data is
collected at the end of the implementation
of the curriculum programme.
• Summative evaluation can occur just after
new course materials have been
implemented in full (i.e. evaluate the
effectiveness of the programme), or
several months to years after the
materials have been implemented in full
or taught completely. It is important to
specify what questions you want
answered by the evaluation and what
decisions will be made as a result of the
evaluation
• You may want to know whether the
programme produced the desired
outcomes.

7. Purpose of Evaluation
Of course, we know that sometimes
we can have good instructors and
good students, but without a valid
curriculum, necessary skills to be
successful in the workplace may not
be learned.
(Contd.)

8. Purpose of Curriculum Evaluation
• Education prepares future generations to take their due
place in the society. It becomes essential that substandard
educational goals, materials and methods of instruction are
not retained but up-dated in consonance with the
advances in social cultural and scientific field.
• It is also important to ascertain how different educational
institutions and situations interpret a given or prescribed
curriculum.
• Hence, the need for curriculum evaluation arises.
• Curriculum evaluation monitors and reports on the quality
of education.
(Contd.)

9. Purpose of Curriculum Evaluation
• Cronbach (1963) distinguishes three types of decisions
for which evaluation is used.
1. Course Improvement
2. Decisions about individuals
3. Administrative regulations
(Contd.)

10. 1. Course Improvement : deciding what
instructional material and methods are satisfactory
and where changes are needed.
2. Decisions about individuals : Identifying the
needs of the pupil for the sale of planning of
instruction and grouping, acquainting the pupil with
his own deficiencies.
3. Administrative regulations : Judging how good
the school system is, how good individual teachers
are.
(Contd.)
Purpose of Curriculum Evaluation

11. Purpose of Curriculum Evaluation
• The goal of evaluation must be to answer questions of
selection, adoption, support and worth of educational
materials and activities.
• It helps in identifying the necessary improvements to be
made in content, teaching methods, learning experiences,
educational facilities, staff-selection and development of
educational objectives.
• It also serves the need of the policy makers,
administrators and other members of the society for the
information about the educational system.

12. Approaches to Evaluation
• Two basic approaches to evaluation have been identified
viz. scientistic and the humanistic (Cronbach, 1982).
• In the scientistic approach, decision about the educational
programme are made on the basis of efforts of learners.
The data gathered is in the form of test scores of
students, which are employed to compare student’s
achievements. The decision about the programme is
made on the basis of this comparison.
• In the humanistic approach, the evaluator uses data
obtained from thick descriptions of actual events. Data is
also obtained from interviews with the participants in the
curriculum programme and is utilized for the purposes of
evaluation.

13. The evaluation process should include
factors associated with…
• The learner
• The curriculum
• The instructor(s)
• The availability of necessary facilities
• Other aspects of the program that affect the delivery of
the curriculum in the system

14. Curriculum evaluation should include…
• The overall program (list of courses, prerequisites, etc.)
• Scope and sequence of content within each course
• Curricular materials

15. Elements of curriculum evaluation…
• Context-whether or not to offer the curriculum—focus,
goals, and objectives.
• Input-what resources and strategies are used.
• Process-what effect does the curriculum have on the
students.
• Product-what effect has the curriculum had on former
students.

16. Phases of Curriculum Evaluation
1. Aspects of the curriculum to be evaluated
The total school system, a particular district, a particular grade level or a
particular subject. The objectives of the evaluation activity are clearly stated.
2. Data Collection
Identify the information to be collected and the tools for collecting the data
which may involve interviews, giving of questionnaires, tests, collection of
documents and so forth. The evaluator also identifies the people from whom
data is to be collected.
3. Analysis of Information
The data collected is analysed and presented in the form of tables and
graphs. Statistical tools are often used to compare significant differences and
to establish correlation or relationship between variables.
4. Reporting of Information
Reports are written describing the findings and interpretation of the data.
Based on the findings, conclusion are made on the effectiveness of
curriculum implementation efforts. Recommendations are made to reconsider
certain aspects of the curriculum.

17. Techniques of Evaluation
A variety of techniques are employed. Observations, questionnaires,
checklists, interviews, group discussions evaluation workshops and
Delphi techniques are the major one.
a) Observation : It is related to curriculum transaction. Observation
schedule helps the evaluator to focus his attention on the aspects
of the process that are most relevant to his investigation. This
method gains credibility when it contains both subjective and
objective methods. Interviews and feed-back and other
documentary evidences may supplement observations.
b) Questionnaire : It is used to obtain reaction of curriculum users
namely pupils, teachers, administrators, parents and other
educational workers concerning various aspects of prescribed
curriculum are to be ascertained. (Contd.)

18. Techniques of Evaluation
c) Check-list : It can be used as a part of questionnaire
and interview. It provides numbers of responses out of
which most appropriate responses are to be checked by
the respondent.
d) Interview : It is a basic technique of evaluation and for
gathering information. It may be formal or informal in
nature. The information required should be suitably
defined and the presentation of questions should in no
case betray and sort of bias the part of the interviewer.
(Contd.)

19. Techniques of Evaluation
e) Workshops & Group discussion : In this technique,
experts are invited at one place to deliberate upon syllabi,
materials etc; and to arrive at a consensus regarding the
quality of the same. The materials may be evaluated
against a set of criteria that might have been prepared by
the evaluator.
f) Delphi Technique : A “Remote Conferencing” is
employed instead of work-shop technique. It can be used
at various stages of curriculum development. This
technique is cost effective and provides an equal
opportunity to all members of the group to express their
individual views. Thank
You