CurriculumHistory andEducationalLeadership

The curriculum field is suffenng from asenrious case of ahistorism and wasting

one of our most valuable resources.eeriene.

LAUREL N. TANNER

We do not merely have topast. We use our past expeconstruct new and better ofuture

eeACX'S COUnSCI, Tr1is disquietingly ap

u educators todaey . -lum field keeps recycling olal models and treating thefails to learn from the pasquently repeats its failures.cause the profession to(Cremin, 1973) when its grto benefit from its ownthinking and experience.

Manv of us can remembcal histors because we were tto-basics" was the mostmovement in elementary aleducation in the 19 50s. T1its advocates implied thatlessened their commitmendamentals and must empl-tism and extensive workRs.I The Council for Basicfounded in 19 56 to confine"basic subjects," recommecial studies, which freque"problems approach" to Icrosses several disciplines iione, be replaced by drill

38

repeat the work in single subjects or courses. I hisriences to was "a timc-testcd method for inculcat-nes in the ing in the young symbols ancl facts

which rm.st be part of the natural fir--John Dciwc. nishing of thei mind before it canl solve

any problerns" (Smith. 1966j. Toda,social studies is once again a scapegoatof the back-to-basics monernrent (Shan-

ade in 1920() non. 1975ipropriate for The point, however, is that the pres-Fhe curricu- cnt push toward basics is being treatedId education- bv mans who are involved in curricu-m as new It lur development as something thatt and consc- never happened before. Not onls hasCsclical fads there alreacld been a back-to-basicslose ground movement, but it has been procien acatest need is false step We know this because of thevast store of "do your own thing" couriterrcactionl in

the 1960s.er education- Why do we get a funnls feeling whenthere. "Back- we read the proposals of the National-heard-about Commission on Excellence in Educa-nd secondary tion for reforming science educationl7len. as now-. Because we have read them. ald expcri-schools had enced them before. "Science educa-

t to the fun- tion" was the educational bhzzAword iniasize patrio- the United States Congress from 1943 toin the three 1960. This led to the birth of thile Na-c Education,education to

nded that so-ently takes alearning andnstcad of justand memory

Laurel N. Tanner is Professor of Educa-tion, Department of Urban Education,Temple University, Philadelphia, Penn-sylvania,

tional Scieice ouiidation in 1950( al(ndthe creation of mrajor Science cuirricn-lunl projects of a national scope ill thelate 195)s. Concern for mreetinlg tlhcSovict colimpetitionl ill space led to tlheNational l)efeisc Es dilcatio Act of1958, pro-iding aid for scicncc aindmathcemiatics, witlh the addlition of for-cign language instruction.

I oday the competitor is Japani alndthe probleCm is cars, nit Spritiiks. TI hcNational Cominission oil F xccllicncc inEducation has called uponi ulni\crsitscientists to "upgradc" the science cur-riculInil "as thci did in the post-Spitinikera." l'he implication is that all wkcntwell withl those reforms, blt did it'What was our expericnce iof a quarter-century ago?

Scientists wlho lwcrc engageCd il cur-ricnlurnl nlaking sought to shape thestudelnt to their ownl iliagc, andl tlluscreate more scientists. But despite theexpensice refrrms anld efforts to per-suade vouth to cmbark oil scientificcareers. enrollimelnts in physics phrin-meted thlroughout the 196()s. Amongthose turning awas from plihsics wereour most gifted students. 'l'he curricu-luim. which emphasized basic science atthe expense of applied science, and didnot allow for humane reflections andinterpretations. was identified I)n scicn-tists and curriculumin specialists as a fac-tor in the problem of falling enrollments

EDi(UCAT I(NAI I.FAI)ERSHIP

in physics. Now, in 1983. the NationalCommission on Excellence in Educa-tion is unaware that the policy that theNare recommending (and recalling withnostalgia) probablv created the svenproblems thes are trying to solhe. It ledto a decline of student interest in sciencethe last time around, and there is noreason to beliese that it wnould affectthem differently nose. To ignore ourexperience and retrace our false steps isto court almost certain waste and disas-ter. But this has beco the pattern incurriculum devClopmenlt since llidCCn-tury.

Reading about the reform efforts ofthe early progressives can be equall!dismaying. One must. for example,confront the fact that contingency con-tracting, or "contracting" with pupils todo their work. is a reinsenitionl of theDalton Plan developed bs Helen Park-hurst in 1913. As might be expected.the division of the curricullnl into con-tract jobs presents the same theoreticaldifficulties nos as it did then. To men-tion just one, not all of the finctions ofthe school can be met mechanicallk.This problem and others were aired inthe educational literature a half centunago. 2 Clearly, those who reinvented theDalton Plan did not search the literaturefor previous experiences with contracts.Instead, they approached their task asthough the world did not exist beforetheir own curriculum reform efforts.

Curriculum History: What Is It?Curriculum history is the cumulativeexperience of the curriculum field. Forthe purposes of this discussion, let usconsider curriculum histon as historicalproducts and historical processes. His-torical products are the body of re-search, evaluation, and conceptualiza-tion that contemporarv workers can andshould draw upon in impros ing curricu-la. These products (facts and principles)can guide the practical work of schools.

As Dewey (1929) and Gage (1978)pointed out, the fund of knowledge inthe field is not a closed system. As thescientific method is applied to problemsof the field, portions of that fund may bediscarded in favor of findings demon-strated to be more valid. Curriculumhistory need not be out of the depth ofthe past; it's histor' if it happened onlyyesterday. The research and theory inour field is nothing more or less than theliving presence of histor--some recent,some not so recent.

The ideas of educational reformers of

the past continue to have great rele-vance in our work today. Dewes. forexample, looked upon curriculum andmethods as the chief means for therealization of equal opportuniih in ademocratic socihet, nin w hich thegrowth of individuals and a better futuresociehty depend. DI)cw- defined equalopportunity as shared kiinowsledge. inter-ests, and concerns among the melbeilsrsof a socichh. Schools that, for iwhatever

reason, prescribe one curriculum forpoor children and another for pris ilegedyoungsters violate that principle of equalopportunih'. Educators ought. rather, touse the curriculum to break doiwn thebarriers of race and class and to liberateindividuals' capacities (Dewes. 1916).This principle is a historical product.

Another example of historical prod-uct is the principle that those swho arcexpected to put news curricula into oper-ation should participate in identifyingand solving curriculum problems. Thisprinciple was formulated in the progres-sive education era. and swas stronglyreinforced by the experience of the FordFoundation's Comprehensis e SchoolImprovement Program and other simi-lar experiences with "teacher proof"curricula in the 1960s (Tanncr andTanner, 198(t).

Yet a third illustration, of a differentorder, is the finding that third-gradeteachers (and presumably others) %whowant to improve achievement in readingshould move around the classroom agreat deal, communicating their interestin pupils' progress and attending to theiracademic needs (Gagce 19-8). Gagetested the significance of the combinedresults of studies on teaching andshowed that certain teacher behaviorscorrelate positiscl swith pupil achic-c-ment. This is a marked departure fromearlier reviewss of studies of teaching thatfound news consistent relationships. Itillustrates very clearly that the facts su-penisors use in their work do indeedchange as the scientific method is ap-plied to problems of teaching.

Historical processes arc the experi-ences of educators in devcloping profes-sional knowledgc and ill changing thecurriculum. Such records do exist butarc apt to be neglected. An example isthe set of reports published in 1942 onthe Eight Year Study.' The problemwith which the study is conccnerned-thedevelopment of a curriculum and in-structional program designed to be use-ful to adolescents-is still with us. andis, in fact, one of the most persistentproblems of education. There is much

to be learned from reading the reports ofthat experiment. Another illustration isCurriculum Improvement in PublicSchool Srstems (Caswcll and others.1950) in which the activists who xereinvoh'ed describe reform in Demver andother cities. Look through a half cenlturof The Elementanr School loural or amnother pcnodical for practitioners' ac-counts of curriculum change in theirclassrooms or schools. thes arc not com-mon.

Descriptions of cumculum reform inany era Vanr cnormoushl in their useful-ness. lanil\ of the authors utrre unclearabout their educational objectives. andsomec schools. such as Caroline Pratt'sPlay School of the carld progressive era.were "cxprimental" in name onlh. Ac-cording to one author. the child must"work with entire freedom. No crticismis ever made bsy hteachers" (i'insor.1973. p. 33. Thcse ritings arc usefulonly if thes arc seen as ominous warn-ings. Child-centered education has al-reads been tried and abandoned twice inthis centun'.

This brings us to perhaps the mostimportant historical insight. The threefundamental factors in cuniculum de-velopment arc the learner. soicth. andorganized subiect matter. Amn curmcu-lum reform that attempts to pit onefactor against the others is doomed tofail. An cxamination of recent cumcu-lum movements is instuctier. Itshould also be noted that the curricularpast. particularly the progrcssive cduca-tion movcment. has become lgqendan.Indeed. for the nostalgic. it seems tobelong to a better age than ours. Butprescriptions fashioned to fit this notioncan lead onlh to repetition of the pastand its mistakes. )

There have been mans v-aluable ex-periences in curnmculum dcvelopment.which teachers have failed to writeabout. The experiences of many- teach-ers who followed the Dsure-an ideal ofencouraging children to identihf prob-lems of intcrest to them and of impor-tance to their communits died withthem. If teachers and supervisors are tomake positive contributions for others todrasw upon and build on. the- mustrecord their own experiences in curncu-lum improvement.

Granted that the abilih to build onpast cxppcnencc is one criterion of aprofession. a sense -of responsibilith isanother (Grecnwood. 1966}. To dealwith the problem of ahistoricim. edu-cators must sics it as part of the largerproblem of professionalism. which is

NOVEMBER 1983 39

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3qNOVEMBER 1983

fundamentally one of educational lead-ership.

Leadership from the UniversityIn 1969, Bellack %srote of curriculumprofessors' growing awarencss of ahistor-icism. Awareness was not enough. hos-ever; it needed to be translated intocourse offerings in curriculum histors.As the years have passed, these courseshave been implemented at a nlmbliher ofuniversities (including 'leachers Col-lege, Columbia Unisersit, kvhcre sucha course emerged directl' from Bellack'sefforts).

If the curriculum field is to deal x iththe problem of ahistoricisil. leadershipmust come from the universities. Pro-fessors of curriculum and their doctoralstudents must undertake research incurriculum histon. And curriculumhistorn must be included in programspreparing curriculum workers as well ascurriculum researchers. Such coursesshould be constrictive and functionalThe questiorl underlying the studv ofspecific reform movements cosiesstraight from Deu es (1921)): W'hat doesour "old experiericec tell us about "de-veloping a new and imrprecd expcri-ence"?

Leadership from the SchoolSchools must accept the primar! rc-sponsibiliht for countcriisg educationalcycles and fashions. Scholars can teachand srite about a "new" idea that hasbeen tried and discarded (althoughmany professors are, unfortunatels.bandwagon hoppers themselves). butschool administrators have to deal withthe board and communith pressure toadopt it. What makes the situation ofthe school especially difficult is thateducational cicles are often influencedby wider sociopolitical forces. The con-temporarn retrenchment in the curricu-lum, for example, has been influencedby political and philosophical retrench-ment in the larger society. Nevertheless,I am convinced that administrators andteachers can deal with ahistoricismwhen they see the possibilities Twomajor principles are involved.

First, any discussion of a "new" edu-cational model or program should takeadvocates beyond the "we want it" stageto a consideration of the problem it wasmeant to solve. Every innovation wasoriginally developed to solve a problem,which may not be your school's prob-lem at all. In fact, by adopting someoneelse's solution, you may create newproblems of your own. If this happens,

sou call be certain that the next era ofreform inl our district ill bhe all atteilptto undo the excesses of this one.

Perhaps the most striking examplemas be found in our inlner-cit clclicn-tars school classrooms. 11 1969, tleFord Foundation sought to transplantcertain features of reform in Britishpriniar schools inl American inner-citvschools (lanner and T'anilcr 1971.1 he main feature of the open classroomimported fronm Britain was lack of struc-ture. Children we-re free to select theirown Icarnilg actikities. and learningvwas supposed to he largely self-directedIn Britain, this model was created as ameans of providing greater frcedom forchildren from highly structured and rig-id w-orking-class homes. Not surprisilg-lv, s hcn the open classroorm was traiis-planted into Americall inluer-citschools, the results were disappointing,if not disastrous. The children theseschools sersed had a great deal of free-dom outside the school and needed asense of direction. Little wondder that theschools soon tried to refornl the "rc-form" with a new excess. Both nouc-ments. do-your-ow n-thing and hack-to-basics, ranl counter to the body ofresearch in the curriculum hieldSchools must probe the background ofan innovation in order to precvent expen-sive failures and to move ahead in desir-able directions.

Second, curriculum reform effortsshould not bce mere reactions to theexcesses of a preceding era of reform.but should begin as an attempt to solve aproblem. One starts with the problem,not the innovation or model. Inl workingon a problem, we must see what hap-pened before. (Most problems, like mostproposals, are not new. ) O)ur strengthlies in our experience. Our misfortunelies in our failure to use it.E

'See Arthur Bestor. The Restoration ofLearning (New York: Alfred A Knopf. Inc,1955). and C. Winfield Scott and Clyde MIHill. Public Education Under CriticismfNew York: Spectrum Books. 19531

'See Allison Cornish. "The Contract Planin Retrospect," School and Society 34 (Juls18. 1931r: 95-97: and Clas J Daggart anldFlorence A. Petersen. "A Sunerx of PopularPlans for Instruction." Educational Admin-istration and Supervision 18 (October 19321:499-522.

'Entitled Adventure in American Educa-tion. the series was published bs McGraw-Hill Book Company. See Wilford M.I Aikin.The Story of the Eight-Year Study: H. HGiles and others, Exploring the Curriculum,Eugene R. Smith and others. Appraisingand Recording Student Progress; Dean

Chamberlaiil ad others. I)d Thev' Succeedin College'.; ad Thirty Schrxls 'ell TheirStory (participatinlg schools proside all ac-coiint of their ilxorlcilcmlt ill tlhe expri-nilet. Ihuich asscssed pTsgrcssisc ilicthlcls Itthe scconldarx Ilxcl and ranll froil 1932 to1940).

'-An xccllent sourcebook for accoiints ofcuirricillluln reform ill the progrcssive cdlc al-ti era, hons cxcr. is I a rience A. Crcnlil 'sclassic. The 7ransformiation of the Schrold1961

References

Bellack, Arnl A "I llstorx of CuirrlcuilinThought and Practicc '' Reiieu iof I duca-tional Research 39 (iJune 19691 28;-292

Caswell. Hollis L . and others Currc u-lum Improvement in Public School SsstenlsNew York: Butrcau of Pblicationis Tscac hcrsCollege. Columbia Ilnicrsait. 19511

Crenilln. IL arclcc A T'he Transfrlrmation of the School Ncw York: Alfrcd. \Knopf. Inc . 1961

Crcnrii.n La.rcnce A "Thc irec SchoolMloemcnt: A Pcrspcctix c Notesr on Iduca-tion 2 (197 3) 1-11

Dcwecs. Johin. Democracy and EducatiorNew York: Mlacmillanl Piblishing Co . Inc .1916.

Dewes. John Reconstruction In Phloso-phs Nec York Henrs Holt and Co.. 19211

Deses, lohn The Sources of a Science otEducation New York: lixeright, 1929

Cage. N. 1. The Scientific Basis for theArt of Teaching Ncss York: T'eachers Gol-lege Press, 1978

(;renos o d, Ernest.I -The Elemenicts ifProfcssiollalizatioul " hl ProfessionalizationEdited bs 11. M Vollner aiid D I. 1, illsEnglewood Cliffs, N.J Prenticc-tiall. Ic .1966

National Commission oni Excelleice iEducationi A Nation at Risk: The Impera-tive for Educational Reform. W'ashinlgton.DC U S Covernment Prinlting ()fficc.1983

Raths. James D "Rcport of a Sur\c s1iReaders of Educational Leadership" EdIuca-tional Leadership 29 tOctober 1971) 35-4(l

Shanlson. William V. "Historrs s SocialStew." The New York Times, Augulst 29.1975, p 27.

Smith, Mortimer "The Bright--and theNot So Bright." A Decade of Comment onEducation Washington, D .C Council forBasic Education. 1966.

Tanner, Daniel. and Taliler. Laurel NCurriculum Development: Theory Into Prac-tice. New York: Macmillan Publishing Co .Inc . 1980.

Tanner, Laurel N., and Tanner, Daiel"News Notes" Educational Leadership 27(January 1970): 427

Tyler. Ralph W. Perspectives on AmericanEducation. Chicago: Science Research As-sociates, 1976.

Winsor, Charlotte. ed. ExperimentalSchools Revisited New York: Agathon Press,Inc., 1973.

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Copyright © 1983 by the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development. All rights reserved.