Dr Sultan Muhammad Khan
Keywords; Psychological foundations of Curriculum, The Role of the History of curriculum in the development of curriculum, the history of the curriculum guides the future plans of curriculum, Curriculum of Imam Ghazali, Methods of Teaching and Techniques of the Curriculum
Foundations
of Curriculum
Historical Foundations of Curriculum
Foundations are the forces that
influence the minds of curriculum developers.
In this way they affect the content
and structure of the curriculum. The five most important foundations of the curriculum
are;
1. Philosophical foundation of
Curriculum
2. , Psychological foundations of
Curriculum
3. Socio Cultural Foundation of Curriculum
4. Historical Foundations of Curriculum
5. Economical Foundations of Curriculum
Historical Foundations
It includes
- Role of curriculum in achievements of nations.
- Guides future plans
- Factors that influence development of nation e.g. unity
- Eliminates the useless traditions.
Role of the History of curriculum in
the development of curriculum
History of the curriculum plays a
very important role in the development of the nation. It takes long and tedious
time to formulate a good curriculum which represents the need of the society
and the experiences of the past. The history of the curriculum tell the
curriculum planner how to develop and modify the curriculum, what to teach and
what should be the core material of the subjects, what objectives they want to
achieve through the curriculum. History also tell them how the teacher should
teach, what are the best practices they need to incorporate in curriculum
teaching and what kind of teaching need to be avoid.
The history of the curriculum also
explains the teacher psychology at different time and how to improve their
teaching styles. The history also provides a detail about the learner behavior
at different times. It also provides information about the psychology of the
students, how they learn and what they want to learn. In times curriculum
changed its shapes and patterns from teacher center curriculum to learner
center curriculum due to the long history of the curriculum development process
from Plato to modern curriculum. the history of the curriculum also changed the
teaching methods, now every researcher are finding new ways to teach and it is
also becoming the part of curriculum an
history.
Today majority of the develop
countries are those countries who have a long history of freedom and proper
education system. They achieved their successes through education and
implementation of time needed curriculum. They modified their curriculum
according to the need of time. Some of newly born countries also achieved that
status because they adopted successful model of other developed countries and
modified according to their own needs and culture.
The
history of the curriculum guides the future plans
The history of the curriculum guides
the future plans because curriculum is always based on the future demands of
the country and the lesson learned through history, tell the curriculum
developer not to repeat the mistake of the past and develop a curriculum which
is based on the future need of the society and international demands. History
is the profile of past successes and failures.
History helps in the eliminations of useless traditions
The history of education tells the
curriculum developer what not to include in the curriculum. What of lessons can
bring no good to the curriculum and what type of contents material are good for
the teaching learning process, so history of the curriculum eliminate all those
useless traditions from the modern curriculum and help the developer to
incorporate what is needed for the curriculum.
A short history of the curriculum
and curriculum development process
Plato was
the earliest most important Greek Philosopher and educational thinker. Plato
thinks education as a key for a society and he stress on education, for this
purpose he want to go to the extreme level even removing children from their
mothers and rise them by the state, he want to identify the skills of the
children and give them proper education for that particular skill which they
have so they could be become a suitable member of the society and fulfil their
duty in society.
Plato describes different stages of education
in his republic. According to Plato the education of child should be start at
the age of seven year and before this stage the child should stay with their
mother or elders and learn moral education from them.
After the
age of six years both girls and boys should be separated and boys should play
with boys and girls with girls and they should be taught the use of different
arms to both sexes. This stage goes up to the age of seventeen years. During
these years they should teach them music and early education. After the age of
seventeen years the youth should be brought to battle field to learn real life
experiences.
The fourth
stage start at the age of twenty five to thirty years and in this age they get
the training of Mathematical calculation and last for another ten years, after
the completion the selected one’s are admitted in the study of dialect.
During fifth
stage they study dialect for another five years and after that, at the sixth
stage one is ready to become a ruler and philosopher and the one enter in
practical life.
The 11th century was a
dark era for education. Few people in Western Europe were receiving any kind of
schooling and across the globe; contributions were being made to the future of
education. In China, printing by movable
type was invented in 1045, and proved to be one of the most powerful inventions
of this era which affect the curriculum development process and bring huge
change in the improvement of curriculum and contents of the curriculum around
the world. With future educational systems focusing on the written word, the
invention of type printing set the path for future publications. The first
paper mill was built in France in 1338. Paper was a Chinese invention (c. 600
AD), brought to Europe by the Arabs in the 11th century.
Imam
Ghazali Curriculum
The great educator of Islam, Imam
Ghazali was born in 1059 AD near Tus in Khurasan, a part of the then Persia.
His educational philosophy based on
his personal experience. The philosophy, which he formulated over a period of
10 years, resembles to the Philosophy of Plato. He used his personal experience
and concluded the reasons
According to Ghazali, there are four
categories of Knowledge;
1.
Prophetic
2.
Rulers
3.
Philosophers/scholars 4.
Preachers
Curriculum:
Ghazali strongly criticizes
the curriculum of his time. He raises the basic question of criteria for
selection of subject matter for curriculum. He studied the various curriculums
in his times and reached the following conclusions:
. More time is spent on religious
education and worldly education is completely ignores
.
Worldly education is equally important
.
While teaching religious education, a great number of differences arise
among the teachers, which result in mudslinging on each other
.
There is no Prioritization and it is
only left to the interest and opinions of the teachers to concentrate on
certain subjects, while ignore others.
.
No place for character building in curriculum
Ghazali included industrial
education, textile, agriculture, tailoring and hair cutting in the curriculum
Methods of Teaching and Techniques:
Ghazali has recommended the
following teaching methods and techniques, which are based on psychological
principles. These methods and techniques are widely used and educators all over
the world agree with their usefulness and today they are the foundation of
curriculum development process.
• Teaching of lessons to be based on previous
knowledge and experience of the students.
• Teachers should simplify the difficult
concepts by stories, tales etc. otherwise his teaching will not be effective
Move from simple to complex.
This is a very important
principle of today curriculum which was presented by Ghazali at those times.
History of curriculum laid down the basic foundation of curriculum development
Proper planning
Ghazali stresses the
importance of planning and advises that teachers should do his preparation
before teaching to make it effective
Abilities of students:
Ghazali stresses that while
teaching the abilities of students should be kept in mind. Concepts, which are
above the mental level of the students, will not make the teaching effective.
Today in modern curriculum teachers are asked to keep in mind the individual
differences.
In the era of colonist, the
colonist came to indo-pack and they set up schools exactly like the ones they
knew in Europe. The curriculum was centered on the learning of letters,
numbers, and prayers. Their strict learning environment did not allow for
crafts nor recess breaks, and only one out of ten children attended school.
There were common characteristics
shared by these colonies:
1. Religious Education; its major aim
was personal salvation
2
Education was centered on social
class, dual system or class system. The
children of workers should have minimal primary education, they learned the 4
R's (reading, writing, arithmetic, and religion
3
With the exception of few Schools, education
was only for boys
4
Most children in colonial times received their
education through informal means such as the family, the farm, and the shop.
Changes in educational philosophy
and curriculum came about in this era as well.
In 1901, John Dewey wrote The Child and the Curriculum, and later
Democracy and Education, in which he shows concern for the relationship between
society and education. Dewey was a philosopher, psychologist, and educator.
His philosophy of education focused
on learning by doing rather than rote memorization. He criticized the old
education system which keeps students busy.
From Dewey’s educational philosophy came the emphasis on experience,
activity, and problem-solving that helped to reshape our thinking about
education and schooling.
Maria Montessori opened her first
school in 1907. Maria Montessori was
credited with developing a classroom without walls, manipulative learning
materials, teaching toys, and programmed instruction. Many considered her to be the 20th century's
leading advocate for early childhood education.
Anna Freud, Jean Piaget, Alfred
Adler, and Erik Erikson studied under Montessori and made their own
contributions to education and child psychology
The civil rights movement and
technology change the face of the 20th century classroom.
In the 1990s, the computers invade
the classroom around the world and now it the most important part of the
curriculum.
In short history is the foundation
of the modern curriculum
Read more articles about Foundations
of Curriculum
Psychological
foundations of Curriculum
Philosophical foundation of
Curriculum
Socio Cultural Foundation of
Curriculum
Historical Foundations of Curriculum
Economical Foundations of Curriculum
