PSYCHOLOGICAL
FOUNDATIONS OF CURRICULUM
CURRICULUM AND THEORIES OF LEARNING
Introduction
Grounded by some fundamental
assumptions about human behavior, Educational Psychology, an applied branch of
Psychology, is a strong pillar upon which curriculum is erected systematically.
The main area of psychological movement in education is understanding learning
and teaching and deepening our understanding of human potential to learn and
also individual variations – both inter and intra.
A curriculum without in-built in
psychological principle, is a void and meaningless. There are several areas in
which the psychological principles and theories come and help as the
psychological foundations of education as well as of curriculum.The concepts of
readiness and pacing, developmental tasks, intelligence stage of cognitive
development, limitation in intellectual potential, other native potential ,
motivation, problems of heterogeneity in learners, dilemma of receptive and
creative thinking, problem of underdevelopment, besides all aspects of learning
are also some the multitude determining factors and issues for the curriculum
developers and they, take account of these as the basic materials for building
curriculum superstructure.
Learning Theories and Curriculum
Knowledge about the learner and
learning is relevant to making a host of curriculum decisions. Some of the very
important decisions, according to Taba, are : selection and arrangements of
content, the choice of the learning experiences by which this content is to be
manipulated and by which the objectives not achievable through content alone
can be attained, and plans for optimum conditions for learning.
Learning is complex and there are
many different kinds : mastering motor skills, memorizing information, learning
feelings, concepts, and intellectual skills, such as generalizing, scientific
inquiry and problem solving. Theorization about all kinds of learning in a
super theory of learning is not achieved so far. Various theories of learning
are also contesting each others.
All theories of learning rest on a
concept of man and his capacities and their intricate natures as well as the
interplaying operating variables assumed by a particular theoretician.
Historically, the first concept of man produced a theory of learning often
called the theory of mental discipline or faculty psychology.
For the sake of convenience we may classify the whole family
of learning theories into three categories.
1. Behaviorist theories which deal with
various aspects of stimulus – response and reinforcement scheme.
2.
Cognitivist theories which view the
learner in relationship with the total environment, and
3. Phenomenology which emphasizes the
affective domain of learning and also personal meaning making about the environmental
inputs or happening.
4.
Increasing interest in
constructivism and curriculum.
1. Behaviorism and Curriculum
The behaviorist school is rooted in
a corresponding philosophical speculation about the nature of learning. It has
dominated particularly the first-half of the 20th
century psychology. Essentially, here learning is considered
as habit formation and teaching is regarded as arranging learning experiences
in such as way as to promote desirable behavior. It also takes notes of
retention and transfer of learning for economizing pupil learning encounter.
Broadly, behaviorists advocate that –
Ø
behaviour
is likely to be influenced by the condition under which learning takes place.
Ø
attitudes
to and abilities of learning can change or improve over time through proper
stimuli,
Ø
learning
experiences can be designed and controlled to create desires for learning.
Ø
selective
reinforcement is essential.
Ø
rote
learning and memorization of knowledge are unnecessary.
A curriculum, according
to behaviourists should
be based on
the following
concerns
:
1.
remediation, skills acquisition,
considerations of basic or advanced learning.
2.
well defined, short-term and long-term
objectives.
3. appropriate instructional materials
and media to suit the learner‟s abilities shaping behavior through prescribed
tasks, phase by phase activities, close supervision of activities and positive
reinforcement.
4. diagnosing, assessing and reassessing
the learner‟s needs, objectives, tasks and instruction with a view to improving
the curriculum.
5. curriculum planning, sequencing
contents, writing materials, illustrating materials, etc. are some aspects
which are shaped and directed by this school of thinking. We can see
manifestation of these guidelines in theories, principles or trends related to –
Ø
individualized
education, both in face-to-face and distance learning contexts.
Ø
instructional
design and systematic design models.
Ø
teacher-training
techniques such as simulation, microteaching competency performance based
teacher education.
Ø
educational
technology including programmed instruction.
2. Cognitivism and Curriculum
Cognitivism focuses on learning as
change in cognitive structure, a hypothetical construct reasoned out by a
community of psychologists, popularly known as cognitivists. Cognitive theory
of learning refers to any theory of learning that postulates intervening
variables of a cognitive nature in order to explain learning. Learning is
considered as a growth-cognitive growth, essentially through the process of
education. Educator‟s task is to facilitate pupil‟s cognitive growth.
Consequently, curriculum aims at so.
to cognitive than to behaviorism today. The curriculum specialists take not of
encouraging pupils to ask questions and solve problems. Students should be
encouraged to take up cognitive risk and seek for alternatives strategies to
come to a solution This, cognitivism regards classroom a site for
experimentation and naturally a place of greater freedom for exploration.
3. Phenomenology and Curriculum
Phenomenologists point out that the
way we look at ourselves is crucial for understanding our behaviors and that we
respond to an organization or pattern of stimuli and not to an isolated one.
That is like to understand the total, not a part of anything … It emphasizes
learning must be explained in terms of the “wholeness” of the problem. It
differs from cognitivism in this way that phenomenology
stresses the affective and the cognitivism
gives emphasis on cognitive aspect.
Because each individual has specific needs and interests related to his / her self-fulfillment and
selfrealization.
4. Increasing Interest in
Constructivist Curriculum
Constructivism is a theory abut the
nature of knowledge. While there are different interpretations of
constructivism, their common denominator seems to be a belief that knowledge is
created by people and influenced by their values and culture. Here the
teacher‟s role as facilitator is to pose problems that challenge children‟s
conception of reality. On the other hand, social constructivism posits that
knowledge is co-constructed through social and cultural contexts, rendering
reality non-objective
Thus, constructivism is a theory of
learning based on the principles that learners construct meaning from what they
experience; thus, learning is an active, meaning-making process. Curriculum
development from the constructivist point of view generally follows four
tenets.
1. Human mind has the ability to
represent through symbols; language is one of the major symbol systems having a
primary relationship to thinking and learning; meaning is also created and
expressed through other symbol systems;
2.
Individual is the active constructor
of meaning rather than passive recipient of knowledge;
3. Learning is complex process
involving the interaction of past experiences, personal intentions and new
experiences;
Although constructivism seems to
have made its strongest impact on science and mathematics curricula, leaders in
other fields are attempting to embody in curriculum units the following
principles :
Units should be problem-focused,
requiring the student to solve open-ended contexualized problems.
Units
should enable the students to have access to research and other knowledge in
Ø
solving
problems (generative knowledge).
Ø
Learning
strategies (such as the use of matrices and web diagrams) should be
Ø
taught
in the context of solving problems.
Ø
The
teacher should provide the necessary scaffolding of structure throughout units.
Ø
Because
learning is a social process, teachers should ensure that students spend at
Ø
least
part of their time in group formalism such as cooperative learning..
Ø
Units
should conclude by requiring the student to demonstrate learning in some
Ø
authentic
manner.
OTHER PSYCHOLOGICAL BEARINGS ON
CURRICULUM DEVELOPMENT
Human Development and Curriculum
Another
issues are : How
do children grow and develop ? What are the characteristics manifested during the developmental process ? Under what
conditions do children develop in a particular way ?
These are very important questions
for planning the content and process of learning involved in curriculum.
Curriculum-decisions are to be made
not on discrete measurements and standards but on the relevant factors
determining an individual‟s readiness to learn. The concept of development
suggests that the child and the adolescent are in the process of becoming and
so curriculum should aid this
process
of becoming instead of enforcing static norms of achievement and progress.
Cognitive Development
Development has several dimension to
it – physical, social, emotional, intellectual and so on. Of these,
intellectual or mental development is of critical concern to the school, as
development of knowledge and understanding constitutes the most important
objective of school-curriculum.
Piaget distinguishes three stages in
the intellectual development of the child. Piaget has highlighted the fact that
at each stage of its development, the child has a characteristic way of viewing
the world and explaining it to himself.The task of teaching a subject according
to him is one of representing the structure of that subject in terms of the
child‟s way of viewing things. It is a task of translation of the idea in the
thought forms of children. The implication of these findings are bests seen in
some of the moderncurriculum projects which have attempted to present the basic
ideas of the different disciplines in the thought-forms of children and
gradually deepen their understanding of them by enabling them to use them in
progressively more complex forms.
Transfer of Learning
Formal education is based on the premise that whatever is
taught and learnt in
the
school gets transferred over to life-situations and proves to be of functional
value to the
student.
All theories of learning make assumptions about transfer but different views
are
held as to how transfer takes place.
Ø
One view
holds that the study of certain subjects assures a general and automatic
transfer.
Ø
It
was believed. According to the second view, transfer is not automatic but is
possible only if there are identical elements in the content involved or in the
process of training.
Ø
A
third view of transfer holds that transfer occurs not by means of specific
identical elements but through generalization of the content or of the methods
employed in the learning of that content.
Ø
The
last mentioned view of transfer is backed by the cognitive field theories of
learning and constitutes a major influence on modern curriculum-practices
(1) Maturation × Nurture =
Development
Although the equation is an
oversimplification we may think of it as being a general one and applicable to
all the types of development that occur in the human being. Maturation is used
in the equation to represent innate sequences and patterns in which the design
for change is assured by internal factors.
Development is the end product of a
complex interaction between maturation and nurture to be considered for
psychological foundations in curriculum.
(2)
Maturation × Experience = Achievement
Actually in this case we would wish to consider only that
part of the experience which becomes incorporated in the learner so as to
produce achievement. For this purpose we might wish to substitute „responses‟
for experiences. This would be a more definite term since we learn our
responses, not necessarily the gross experiences to which we are exposed. .
As an example, let us consider
achievement in ability to read. If under deprived conditions, the experience is
not supplied, we would write zero in the equation for large numbers of
children. It then becomes :
(3) Maturation × Zero Reading
Experience = Zero Achievement in Reading
The goal in curriculum planning is somehow to take into
account the needs of
the
individual and of society so as to
provide the experiences
appropriate to the maturing
individual
so as to secure achievement.
The curriculum is commonly concerned
with those experiences which all children should have in common plus a consideration
of those experiences which are designed to produce differences. The process of
teaching involves the understanding and management of the factors in the
equations.
(4)
Deprivation and the curriculum
Deprivation is now commonly
recognized as the greatest hazard to the developmental process of curriculum
whether it is to be experience, or of transaction. The easiest things to
discover and to appraise in the study of the curriculum are the areas of
experience where presence or absence can be guaranteed.
Thus one can easily establish the
broad contrasts between the people who have or have not taking the positive
output about curriculum and one can discern at least the immediate effects of a
unit of study or of a particular course with and without involving curriculum.
(5) The
objectives of curriculum experiences
The objectives of curriculum
experiences are commonly found by a study of the learner and society in actual
practice these must commonly be translated by the specialists who are
acquainted with the various fields of organized knowledge
In very specific terms, however, one
might have such an objective as : „To recognize and name the common animals and
plants‟. Frequently the statement in general terms is so broad and inclusive as
to seem almost axiomatic and hardly to require a statement, while the attempt
to enumerate specific objectives results in such a bewildering number and
variety as to confront the teacher with burdensome details.
(6) The
organization of curriculum experiences
Even after objectives have been
agreed upon and the pertinent content decided upon there remains an interesting
problem of how experiences are to be organized. Many innovations have been
tried in an attempt to add meaning and transfer to school learnings.
Organization of subjects determined
by content is one of the simpler answers. Some type of fusion as in the
combination of reading, spelling, and writing in a broad field such as language
arts or communication arts has been another. Fusion and integration have been
widely accepted at different levels both on a basis of broad fields and with
unification about a particular unit or activity, e.g. transportation.
(7) Growth and the curriculum
Growth and education are closely
related. The chief measure of growth for purposes of the organization of
schools is chronological age. Thus schools, from the nursery to the college,
use the individual‟s age as a basic concept for classificationwhen schools are
built, classes organized, teachers employed, and curricula planned.
Frequently such educational
programmes are not outlined in detail, age by age, but are organized rather in
terms of broad periods of development. Such planning recognizes the limitations
of a strict age division, the approximate character of such classifications,
and the need for consideration of characteristics of children over a broader
band of time.
(8) Basic
Human Needs and Curriculum
A curriculum is supposed to be
need-centric or life – centric. In this context two aspects need special
attention of the curriculum specialists. These are – selfactualization and
development tasks. Self-actualization refers to individual student‟s need for
self-fulfillment in life by actualizing / achieving his / her own potential.
A curriculum, therefore, should
provide learning activities that allow students to identify themselves with
those things they can do well. Learners are thus helped to find personal
meaning in the learning experiences.
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