Spring 2007

Curriculum for the 21st century

Will this century be any better?

If there is to be a productive resolution around the idea of a curriculum for the 21st century, it will have to take account of a range of issues. Bruce Wilson discusses what those issues are.

If the 21st century resembles the second half of the 20th century, Australian educational authorities will develop or substantially redevelop about 130 curriculum frameworks during this century: about one every six years for each of the eight jurisdictions. This is assuming we don’t speed up the process, or think of some other way of making the lives of teachers more complex and difficult.

It is difficult to believe that there is a need for this much curriculum development in a small nation at this point in history. If we maintain our record of quality, a small but significant proportion of those 130 frameworks will meet with vigorous opposition from the profession, the media, commentators of one view or another and the general public. In recent years, curriculum disasters of this kind have been associated with a particular genre of curriculum writing: a genre characterised by elaborately theoretical and arcane structures, a language which is incomprehensible to normal human beings, and an extraordinary weasel character which prevents the specification of anything in particular.

The fact that the process of public commentary has identified this genre and offered a robust critique suggests that the political debate about education is not as far off the mark as we sometimes think. On the other hand, it is arguable that there are some other examples of curriculum structures that are similar, but have somehow escaped the same fate.

The curriculum examples that have run into trouble have been those that have attempted something new. They have sought to establish a new kind of model for curriculum, and this is one reason for the ferocity of the response: it is always safer to repeat the mistakes of the past than to make new ones.

This is an odd time in history for curriculum developers. There is now a greater degree of common ground nationally than ever before. In recent years we have had, for example, agreed national goals for schooling, ministerially endorsed statements of learning for English, mathematics, science, civics and citizenship and ICT, and agreed statements on studies of Asia, values, and languages education. At the same time, and despite the broadening areas of apparent agreement, there seems to be an increasing divergence in State and Territory curriculum documents, as attempts at articulating a new kind of curriculum wrestle with efforts to restate the old curriculum ever more starkly.

It is also an odd time because there is an increasing gap in understanding between the curriculum leaders of the profession and almost everyone else. Many professional and industrial organisations and bodies have made claims about the nature of curriculum for the 21st century that go well beyond the relatively safe consensus reflected in Ministerial papers. Professional discussion about curriculum often seeks a future orientation, a challenge to current practice and a more transformative view of the world.

One organisation, for example, seeks a curriculum that goes beyond basic skills ‘to develop capabilities needed for individuals and communities to thrive in the twenty-first century’ and ‘meet the demands of a globalising world’. Another proposes to base the future curriculum on a set of ethical questions, and canvasses the reconceptualisation of curriculum ‘in terms of the future needs of students’, which may be reflected in the trend to redefine outcomes as ‘capabilities’ rather than ‘the knowledge obtained through studying particular subjects’. Some State and Territory education departments have argued for a more significant shift in curriculum to recognise the changed world. The Tasmanian Essential Learnings Framework is structured around five domains: Thinking, Communicating, Personal Futures, Social Responsibility, and World Futures. The South Australian Curriculum, Standards and Accountability Framework notes that ‘The SACSA Framework does not represent a prescribed body of knowledge’, suggesting a significant shift from some former conceptions of curriculum.

For virtually all commentators and participants in the debate, if there is to be a productive resolution around the idea of a curriculum for the 21st century, it will have to take account of a range of issues which are taken to be powerful influences on the curriculum of the future. These issues include increasing complexity, accelerating rates of change, globalisation, the knowledge economy, environmental pressures, increasing population diversity, and so on. Anyone who has read the introduction to any recent report on education could fill out the list.

Differing views

There are differing views about how school education should respond to this set of issues. One kind of response argues that what is required is a substantially new kind of education that goes beyond old solutions and deals in a thoroughly reformed way with a very different world. The other, at the opposite end of the spectrum, argues that the curriculum now in place is a weakened and diluted form of an education that seemed to work in the past. This strain seeks a reinforced commitment to standards, values, and particular curriculum content, as a means of ensuring a sound foundation for young people in a changing world.

One of the difficulties faced by those seeking a way forward is that, to put it bluntly and to dramatically over-simplify, the curriculum community largely supports a radically reformed curriculum, while politicians, much of the media and many members of the public seek a return to the kind of education they remember from their own schooling. There is a sharp divide between the profession and many of its employers and clients.

A new forum: a national curriculum

Proposals for a national curriculum provide a new kind of forum for the debate. It is being conducted at the highest levels, with everyone from the Prime Minister and Leader of the Federal Opposition vigorously involved. It is occurring in public, so the profession has to some extent lost control of the debate. And it is subject to dramatic shifts in Australian Government–State relations, which mean that some of the old ways of doing business are no longer available. The stakes are now much higher.

It is difficult to imagine that a resolution will consist of a victory for one side or the other. The public and its representatives are unlikely to accept a new curriculum that bears little resemblance to traditional forms. The profession is unlikely to accept that reform means undoing what is seen as the progress of recent decades.

But it is the profession that must resolve this debate, because no one else can. A resolution has to include a proper recognition of the rights and views of the customers. It must also incorporate the kinds of insights about methods and approaches that the profession has gained in the past half- century. So a new curriculum for the 21st century must be explicit about the kinds of knowledge and skills which are essential to all young Australians, but also about the sophistication and depth of understanding that is required if our children are to be effective citizens and contributors in the 21st century. It must outline a view within each domain that recognises the power of specific knowledge and skills, but also articulates what students should be able to do with their knowledge and skills in complex, uncertain environments and working on real-world problems.

If educators are to shape the debate and make a major contribution to the new circumstances, they must demonstrate two things:

• that they take seriously the views of their employers, politicians, the media, the public and many teachers; and
• that they can articulate a view about curriculum that extends those views in ways which are persuasive, comprehensible, and educationally challenging and engaging.

We risk being locked out of the debate unless we find a position which is both politically realistic and educationally powerful.

Note

This article draws in part on a paper prepared earlier this year for the Australian Curriculum Studies Association entitled School Curriculum

Bruce Wilson is a former CEO of Curriculum Corporation, he manages his own independent consulting company, The Education Business.

The author owns the copyright in this article. For information related to the reuse of this work in any form please contact the publisher denise.quinn@curriculum.edu.au