The Crisis of Curriculum Change

The similarity between 1904 and 1988 questions the rhetoric of ‘a major new initiative’ employed by the government and points to some historical continuity in social and political purpose and priorities. The 1904 Regulations embodied that curriculum, historically offered to the grammar school clientele, as opposed to the curriculum being developed in the board schools, and aimed primarily at the working classes: one segment or vision of the nation was being favoured at the expense of another. In the intervening period, more egalitarian impulses brought about the creation of comprehensive schools where children of all classes came together under one roof. This in turn led to a range of curriculum reforms which sought to redefine and challenge the hegemony of the grammar school curriculum.

Seeking in turn to challenge and redirect these reforms and intentions, the political right has argued for the rehabilitation of the ‘traditional’ (i.e. grammar school) subjects. The National Curriculum can be seen as a political statement of the victory of the forces and intentions representing these political groups. A particular vision, a preferred segment of the nation has, therefore, been reinstated and prioritised and legislated as ‘national’.

The historical continuities evident in the National Curriculum have been commented on in a number of places. For instance, The Times Educational Supplement stated that: ‘the first thing to say about this whole exercise is that it unwinds eight years of English (and Welsh) educational history. It is a case of go back to Go’ (DES, 1989). In writing of the National Curriculum project, Moon and Mortimore (1989) commented:

The legislation, and the much-criticised consultative document that preceded it, presents the curriculum in needlessly rather restricted terms. Thus the primary curriculum was put forward as if it were no more than a pre-secondary preparation (like the worst sort of ‘prep school’). All the positive aspects of British primary schooling so valued by HMI and the Select Committee of the House of Commons and so praised by many foreign commentators were ignored.

The secondary curriculum, in turn, appears to be based on the curriculum of a typical 1960s grammar school. We would not take issue with the subjects included, but we believe that such a curriculum misses out a great deal. Information technology, electronics, statistics, personal, social and careers education have all been omitted. Yet, surely, these are just the areas that are likely to be of importance for the future lives of many pupils (p. 9)?

Alongside the definition of a more regressive national curriculum - namely, one returning to links with past social hierarchies, rather than forward to more progressive coalitions - other initiatives have sought to reverse change in similar ways. The changing pattern of power, which is associated with the definition of national curriculum guidelines, has gone hand in hand with the move to restructure the teachers’ work. It should be noted that in England, traditionally a very decentralised system, more central power is evident, but likewise in more centralised systems, decentralised initiatives are underway. It could be that systems are tending to converge. In the new coalition, the teacher is seen as a technical deliverer of curriculum defined by other people, in this case the national state. This marks a substantial reversal from the role of the teacher in the 1960s and 1970s when schooling was being democratised. At that time, the teacher was seen as the moral interpreter and partial definer of the curriculum (see Goodson, 1998).