At present, the prevailing reality in the world has aroused and brought in man the dazzling of consciousness in the face of the transformations that the social system constantly undergoes, thus, the individual immersed in that system is forced to adapt his needs to said context.
In this sense, there is no doubt that all this part of an important axis in the formation of any individual; in the construction of any society; in the restructuring of any system; education, as a basic and indispensable instrument for the world to be world.
For these reasons, the equation, being the driving force of every society, is that it has looked at the circumstances from other perspectives, and thus, it is how it has reconsidered the re-elaboration of its role within a society, from here, it is that They have originated the various educational currents that contribute and clarify the problems that it is going through and the objectives that it must retake and rethink to forge individuals for the sake of human needs.
In effect, this report presents the problem of the curricular contents and their preparation and design; Likewise, the perspectives and currents that from this area model and justify the design and orientation that should govern the curricula or the curriculum of educational institutions are also described; In the same way, the curricular conception is presented from a cultural and social angle, this being in turn the instrument of a nation and the State, for the achievement of the objectives of national planning, thus attributing to the curriculum, part of the educational responsibility integral of the individual from cultural and epistemological patterns.
Curricular Contents
From the 60s, the current called sociology of education, illuminated the complexity of the problems that underlie the contents of the curriculum; It is since then that education begins to consider content as a point of weakness, since more attention was always paid to the transmission of knowledge as such, and not to its design and orientation.
Thus, the central problems of curricular policy were given by the criticisms of the elements of the curriculum, its objectives, its methodology, its evaluation; But after discovering that the content problem was one of the most important reasons within education, the curricular policy had to face the problem of being able to determine what knowledge is and which are those that should integrate the curriculum. In this sense, the subject of content begins to be approached as a complex problem, dedicating its importance to the subject of knowledge.
However, in the debate that arises in response to this problem, various conceptions about the contents of the curriculum are beginning to be structured, thus, for example, it is said that “it is a selection of scientific knowledge, structured in the academic disciplines that were considered as the most refined forms of elaboration of human experience and with the capacity to offer us a better understanding of the world ”(Angulo and Blanco, 1994).
However, other authors point out that the content "is more than a selection of knowledge…" (Gimeno, 1988). From this perspective, the author considers this definition of content, broadening the concept of the school, as a body that has functions that go beyond the transmission of technical and scientific knowledge, thus the justification of the curriculum is based on criteria of character social and moral thereby seeking a model of man and citizen.
Indeed, there is a relationship between the content and the curriculum, since the first has to do with the way in which the function of the curriculum is understood, that is, the content will be a function of the orientation and purposes of the curriculum as such, therefore, in turn, there is also an interaction between knowledge and society, since societies wield and demand the knowledge they believe is relevant, which will be reflected in the contents of the curriculum.
On the other hand, other authors argue that “the contents should not be reduced to the formal knowledge organized in the curriculum, but should include all those elements that permeate the life and consciousness of the people… (Popkewitz, 1987). Likewise, (Coll, 1992) says that “it is a set of knowledge or cultural forms whose assimilation and appropriation by students is considered essential for their development and professionalization”.
From this body of ideas by the aforementioned authors, it follows that there are two key issues in the management of content: on the one hand, the role of society, since it has the power to define and select what it wants or needs to learn; and on the other hand, the instrumental nature that the contents have, namely, they are subject to the objectives, logically, established by the society in question.
The Curriculum, Cultural Project of a Society
Repeatedly, it is argued and affirmed that societies establish the necessary means for the transmission of the conditions, knowledge, skills, ideas, which give meaning and characterize them. Within each society there are human groups that have their particular knowledge, values, and abilities, and it is from here that those that society believes convenient and necessary to transmit are selected to guarantee continuity and dynamism within the system.
However, in heterogeneous societies (for example, our case, Latin American), there is a gap between cultural production and reproduction. That is why it is proposed here to solve the problem of the representation of the social world (material and cultural), and this is done by Selecting, Classifying and Transforming the knowledge and skills necessary to participate in social life in "texts" that represent, recreate that social world.
Thus, Ludgren (1992), calls curriculum to those texts that are created as a solution to this problem, that is, that each society builds its identity, its history, its customs, and at the same time takes charge of their reproduction and distribution to guarantee homogeneity within the system and the set of values and knowledge, all based on the ultimate goals of the State.
That is why the curriculum represents the source that contains the Principles for the selection of knowledge and skills to be transmitted; the organization; and the indication of Methods for the transmission and acquisition of the contents.
Perspectives on Knowledge and the Curriculum
Since the nature of knowledge cannot be clarified, since there is no theory that explains the dynamics of the curriculum or of knowledge itself; In this way, different currents have arisen that have postulated their conceptions regarding the problem of the contents of the curriculum, based on knowledge. Below are some of the perspectives that focus knowledge from different perspectives as the axes that should guide the curricular content. In this sense, Eggleston (1980) calls them a philosophical perspective and a sociological perspective.
Philosophical perspective
From this perspective “knowledge is considered as a received body of understanding that is not given - and even attributed - and that, in general, is not negotiable… it is non-dialectical and consensual” (Eggleston, 1980). This approach argues that knowledge is knowable and given, that there are established knowledge and that they are independent of the teachers in individuals, however, it is convenient that this knowledge is clarified, discovered and understood in such a way that the curriculum is meaningful and the successful learning experiences.
Thus, for this perspective, the search object is valid knowledge, it must in turn identify those knowledge based on epistemological characteristics, these being objectives and stable, not being influenced by values or interests of social groups, times, etc. Finally, the knowledge that must be part of the curriculum must be an intellectual and balanced “diet”… as Phenix (1973) would say “the essential components of a curriculum destined to train people of integrity”.
On the other hand, within this current the so-called Liberal Education was released, led by its exponent P. Hirts, who explains that the conception of this is of Greek origin since it allows man to free him from error, illusion, misconduct, is based on what is true, it realizes the person teaching him in turn to know how to live.
This education is founded on the nature of knowledge itself (and interested) only and directly in the achievement of knowledge, thus, education is objectively determined in its scope, structure and content, since education is not intended to develop skills or achieve moral qualities, only interested in the knowledge of reality.
The bases of liberal education are the forms of knowledge itself, understood as those different ways "in which our experience is structured around the use of accepted public symbols" (Hirst, 1977). Similarly, the forms of knowledge (disciplines) are the complex ways of understanding the experience of the human being.
Finally, from this perspective, the curricular contents must be loaded with forms of knowledge (disciplines) that are clearly epistemological, objective, since the curriculum should not lend itself to the interests or whims of political groups, to historical contexts, etc.
Sociological perspective
In contrast to the arguments of the philosophical perspective, the sociological current questions the excessive emphasis that it puts on epistemological knowledge, and therefore in turn, defends the criticisms and historical and sociological analysis of education and knowledge at that time, since from this current it is “shown that social power is culturally represented and that knowledge and culture are essential moments in the process of social domination… (Wexler, 1982). However, the existing Marxist connotation at the time is noted, and obviously from here the problems of that time were reflected.
In effect, this ideology argues that “the content of the curriculum is considered as a social product and that, therefore, it must be carried out as a socio-historical construction and treated as negotiable, legitimately criticized and debatable… subject to political influences and where differences in the possession of knowledge and the ability to assert their positions as socio-cultural groups is relevant ”(Angulo and Blanco, 1994).
In this sense, the Sociology of Education seeks to problematize the processes and mechanisms of selection, distribution, classification, evaluation and transmission of knowledge… thus considering the curriculum as a means and instrument for the distribution of power. Thus, some of the characteristics of this trend is to consider it as "social merchandise"; understand the school and knowledge as a reflection of the social structure, balances and imbalances of power in it; pose knowledge as the means, instrument, by which society guarantees its control over individuals.
Finally, the content of the teaching should be considered less as a reflection, an expression or an image of the surrounding culture than as the product of a selection made. (Forquin, 1987).
Young considers knowledge as a group of available meanings, collectively constructed; to this extent it is not absolute, but neither is it arbitrary. What is called “truth or good reasoning or logic, are models based on shared meanings. These shared meanings are often taken for granted, and their constructed and "consensual" character is forgotten, preventing them from being treated as problematic and questionable.
The essential point is that for the exponents of this perspective, the school not only processes knowledge but also people, and that between them there are power relations, which underlie through the Selection and Organization of Knowledge. Thus, the positions of power (the groups that are in it)… will define what is to be considered as valid knowledge, who will have access to it and through what channels.
The two faces of the same coin
Finally, both perspectives assume the problem of curricular content, and approach it from different conceptions, on the one hand the philosophical one defends the epistemological contents, and on the other the sociological one defends the cultural contents. However, both perspectives suffer from each one, that is, on the one hand the philosophical perspective is socially weak, but the sociological perspective is epistemologically weak.
In conclusion, the contents of the curriculum must be impregnated with both currents, since human needs and current systems are designed from the perspective of epistemological knowledge structured by man, which in turn implies the social and cultural component. It is absurd to conceive a teaching based on objective knowledge without allowing the student the creative process of criticism and analysis, contextualizing said knowledge to his own system.
Today, however, the curriculum must promote the art of weighing circumstances, deliberating on issues and values, and making prudent judgments.
Given that the world is configured from pragmatic aspects, where the market is the one who regulates all the activities of social systems, and its dominance prevents natural and human social development; the curriculum becomes a consumer product since curricula are opened according to the needs and interests of the market and not to human needs. In this sense, the curriculum and its contents must advocate not to abandon Human Contents, put them into practice and promote the development of the individual and of society.
Where does the school content come from?
Within the design of the curriculum, as well as the currents that point to knowledge as its source, there are two orientations, well differentiated;
1.-One from an epistemological analysis; find in the Disciplines the source of the school contents, 2.-And the other understand that this source will be given in the culture.
a) Disciplines as Sources of Content
Thus, for example, Phenix (1973), understands disciplines as those fields of knowledge with a peculiar structure that is manifested through the results of research, grouping a specialized community.
On the other hand, Chervel (1991), indicates the term "Disciplines" to refer to school subjects is associated with its function of order as intellectual gymnastics as an exercise of the mind subject to certain canons of order, rigor and demand.
Why is a Discipline Justified?
Authors such as Taba (1987) affirm that… (the disciplines) make unique contributions to learning, not only in terms of information about facts, but also in the specific way of thinking they use, in the use of a special logical language, at the level of abstraction and its consequent mental impact.
However, it differs not only in facts, but in the way in which facts and ideas are treated, in the balance between induction and deduction, and the extent to which generalizations are trustworthy and universal. The logical process of thinking does not have exactly the same meaning in all contexts. Due to all this, it can happen that each discipline contributes from a different angle to the orientation in the world.
Indeed, not all education researchers agree with these statements. At this time there is a consensus that the school must respond to the challenges of the 21st century, it must vary its training strategy and establish the coordinates of a synthesis between the formative and the instructive, the expressive and the cognitive.
Finally, the school is committed to taking the student to the progressive position of the various scientific codes of the most powerful disciplines to systematize, according to the possibilities of each evolutionary moment, with what? With their own experience. Each subject is a specialized way of _penetrating_ significantly in oneself as reality and in the reality of one's own context.
In another vein, Phenix, identifies six "spheres" of meaning as forms that knowledge takes:
Simnoetics: Set of knowledge that must be transmitted to students, the subject to be taught.
Ethics: We analyze the essence of the moral act, its structure, freedom, the realization of morality, moral virtues, professional morality, which add value to the human being.
Symbolic: Static movement that encourages writers to express their ideas. Symbolic thought and symbolic behavior are between two more characteristic features of human life and that all the progress of culture is based on these conditions.
Empirical: It is the doctrine that states that all knowledge is based on experience, while denying the possibility of spontaneous ideas (or a priori thought).
Aesthetics: It is said that it is a branch of philosophy related to the essence and perception of beauty.
Synoptics: It is shorter, it sets out the fundamental and specific ideas of the text in question and expressed in an abstract way, without excluding details or critical judgments.
In this sense, all of them together group all the disciplines from which education will have to extract its content. They refer to those of language, mathematics, science, art, personal relationships, morals, history, philosophy and religion. Likewise, all of them include the basic competencies that are required for the adequate and complete development of human beings.
However, the content of the curriculum must come exclusively from the various fields of "Disciplined Research" created and sustained by the specialists who contribute the "Public Academic Community". That is to say; It is going to be elaborated from a set of information that emerges from the context and is reflected in a document: Such as the Academic Curriculum Plan, with the decision or intention of a clear socio-political-cultural vision, where a group of experts or specialists in function to the needs of teachers, students and society, they select, systematize, organize the lines of action to be fulfilled, facilitating the transit or trajectory of a student towards the process of social construction.
Disciplines Characteristics
Each discipline is characterized by having four distinctive features that identify it and make them different from each other:
- A series of central concepts: That they belong to a certain way of thinking A distinctive logic: Fruit of the way in which the capital concepts are articulated forming a specific logical structure Validation criteria of their statements: containing a notion of truth that It can be tested empirically and is a fundamental requirement to establish judgments. Specific methods: To develop and validate its proportions.
Thus, the introduction of forms of knowledge, given their complexity and richness as opposed to the simplicity of knowledge that we can achieve in everyday situations, requires that it must be done through careful and rigorous instruction and planning: " New interests and new ways of knowing are opened to students through the development of disciplined attention, accuracy, patience, and other qualities. Without teaching planned and directed by those who already possess this knowledge, it is hardly conceivable that students can achieve such goals ”(Hist, 1974).
However, the arguments for considering the disciplines as the source of school knowledge could be summarized as follows (Lawton, 1975):
- The Justification of the disciplines in terms of the nature of reality, for example, Phenix; there is an objective reality that we can know and the knowledge of such reality is what the disciplines contain; Likewise Lawton: he says that although there are limits between the disciplines that are mandatory, there are others that are not, but respond to the nature of reality. Different Disciplines pose different questions (to approach) and offer different answers about reality (Understand the world). This would be Hirst's position The Disciplines and Nature of Learning. From these perspectives, it is proposed that subjects learn according to the logic of the disciplines. Lawton,Here, he frames Piaget's work indicating that the way in which individuals structure their experiences and their knowledge are not cultures but that “There is something in the mental structure of human beings that facilitates certain forms of conceptualization. In this case not only in the fields of mathematics and science, but also in moral development. (Lawton, 1975). Disciplines and meaningful learning. Where this position is defended that learning across disciplines is easier and more efficient: this is what Phenix argues, also Schervel (1975) and Bruner (1972) share her opinion.(Lawton, 1975). Disciplines and meaningful learning. Where this position is defended that learning across disciplines is easier and more efficient: this is what Phenix argues, also Schervel (1975) and Bruner (1972) share her opinion.(Lawton, 1975). Disciplines and meaningful learning. Where this position is defended that learning across disciplines is easier and more efficient: this is what Phenix argues, also Schervel (1975) and Bruner (1972) share her opinion.
b) Culture as a Source of Content
There are authors who, admitting the importance of the disciplines, the content of the curriculum finds to attend to other considerations, for example:
Stenhouse says that the important thing is that the contents that are extracted from the cultural fields allow students to be introduced to the knowledge of their culture as a system of thought. That is, the virtuality and the central characteristic of knowledge is that it can be thought with it, that it constitutes "a structure that supports creative thinking and that provides structures for judgment."
In the same way, Skibeck refers that in current multicultural societies it is not possible to continue offering a curriculum based solely and exclusively on the disciplines. The curriculum must be a reflection of society.
However, culture in general does not exist except through cultures. Education must show the individual, social and global destiny of all and our roots as citizens. That will be the essential core of the training of the future.
That is why Stenhouse (1984) considers that there are four cultural spheres from which the school extracts content:
- The Academic Disciplines: Considered not only in their epistemological characteristics but also as communities with a localized social existence and that generate and guard knowledge, under the format of disciplines it constitutes the core of the study subjects. The Field of Arts: It offers two traditions different, and do not present a social existence. First, Creative Traditions are those that make art and Second, the critical tradition is those that study and teach art. Skills: These reflect the basic ones, related to vocational and vacation training. Languages: Whether dead and alive.
The important thing about this author is that the contents that are extracted from these areas allow students to be introduced to the knowledge of their culture as a system of thought. That is why the curriculum must be a reflection of the society that raises it and, therefore, should build a representative map of it that allows the reconstruction (before reproduction) of the existing cultural order. In this sense, nine nuclei of problems are suggested as a proposal for the construction of the basic curricular nucleus:
- Communication: Through verbal and non-verbal codes in the different existing languages and understanding of meaning for life.Modes of Scientific and Technological Knowledge: With their social applications to the productive life of individuals and society. Skills and Mathematical reasoning and its applications.Social, Civic and Cultural Studies: The purpose of which would be to understand and participate in social life and which would include the political, ideological and belief systems and values in society.Education for Health: Attending to the various physical and emotional aspects … Arts and Crafts: Including literature, music, plastic arts, normal jobs, etc. Study on the environment: Including aspects of understanding and awareness of how they are maintained and deteriorate. Moral Reasoning,Values and belief system. World of work, leisure and lifestyles.
Indeed, Lawton (1989) proposes an analysis of cultural invariants as a way of making a representative selection of culture; an analysis that must include the historical dimension of society as well as a system of values and beliefs, all of them different but interconnected:
- Socio-political System: All societies have an identifiable structure that is what allows defining and organizing relationships within them, related to economic and technological factors where the concepts of power and authority are central.Economic System: Every society has some procedure to generate, distribute and exchange financial resources: Marketing Channels. Communication System: Language is an essential characteristic of human beings. Both verbal and written language acquires different values that must be transmitted to new generations. Rationality System: This system that allows them to differentiate what is reasonable from what is not as valid explanations for all kinds of physical and social situations. Technological:You are going to consider all the tools that allow us to manufacture and produce things that individuals need to live, from food to scientific artifacts.Moral System: In this case, this system allows us to differentiate the right from the wrong, the good from the bad, it works as rules of conduct. Ethical codes. Belief System: About the world, the human being, nature, etc. Religious (in some societies). Aesthetic System: It is a necessity and a characteristic of human beings that gives rise to artistic forms that constitute an important part of the cultural heritage. Maturation system or incorporation of subjects into social life. (Norms, customs) from child to adolescent, from adolescent, from adolescent to adult.from food to scientific artifacts. Moral System: In this case, this system allows us to differentiate what is right from what is wrong, what is good from what is bad, it works as rules of conduct. Ethical codes. Belief System: About the world, the human being, nature, etc. Religious (in some societies). Aesthetic System: It is a necessity and a characteristic of human beings that gives rise to artistic forms that constitute an important part of the cultural heritage. Maturation system or incorporation of subjects into social life. (Norms, customs) from child to adolescent, from adolescent, from adolescent to adult.from food to scientific artifacts. Moral System: In this case, this system allows us to differentiate what is right from what is wrong, what is good from what is bad, it works as rules of conduct. Ethical codes. Belief System: About the world, the human being, nature, etc. Religious (in some societies). Aesthetic System: It is a necessity and a characteristic of human beings that gives rise to artistic forms that constitute an important part of the cultural heritage. Maturation system or incorporation of subjects into social life. (Norms, customs) from child to adolescent, from adolescent, from adolescent to adult.About the world, the human being, nature, etc. Religious (in some societies). Aesthetic System: It is a necessity and a characteristic of human beings that gives rise to artistic forms that constitute an important part of the cultural heritage. Maturation system or incorporation of subjects into social life. (Norms, customs) from child to adolescent, from adolescent, from adolescent to adult.About the world, the human being, nature, etc. Religious (in some societies). Aesthetic System: It is a necessity and a characteristic of human beings that gives rise to artistic forms that constitute an important part of the cultural heritage. Maturation system or incorporation of subjects into social life. (Norms, customs) from child to adolescent, from adolescent, from adolescent to adult.
It is necessary that if all societies have these new subsystems, a cultural selection that starts from them will offer, in principle, some guarantee of collecting all the central nuclei of social life that know how to be transmitted.
School Contents: A Specific Cultural Product
Although it is true that school content arises from the need that society demands to generate professionals and technicians who solve problems and provide solutions to situations that arise in them, in schools where said human resource is trained, techniques, tools and techniques are used. methods that facilitate meaningful learning and develop skills and abilities, but that are different from the circumstances that arise in the context of social reality.
On this approach, there are two currents that seek to explain that school content is a specific cultural product: one is that derived from the historical analysis of the construction of school subjects and the other is the analysis of the structure of cultural transmission.
Thus, the first of the currents considers that internal and external factors influence for the establishment of the subjects in the curriculum, and that they contemplate a series of sequential steps that go from the invention, legitimation, institutionalization, reaching their legal license or patent.
For its part, the invention refers to the initiative, which can come from teachers or public outside the schools; legitimation, which refers to the identification of the persons linked to the subjects; institutionalization; which is the formal inclusion of the matter through legislation; and the patent or license, which is obtained once the matter is institutionalized, limiting itself only to the topics and content contemplated in the legislation.
That is why this trend, when it analyzes the birth, development, modification and even disappearance of the subjects, tries to justify its results as a product of strong political, social and professional interests. On the other hand, they end up stating that school subjects are different from the disciplines from which they come.
Likewise, the second of the tendencies that try to show that school contents differ from the disciplines that originate them, is the one that analyzes the structure of cultural transmission. One of its great defenders, Bernstein, tries to study the connections between school and society and the phenomena that occur, such as the processes of production, transformation and social and cultural reproduction as a product of the division of labor.
For this reason, Bernstein tries to explain his theory through a structure that makes the transmission, reproduction and cultural transformation possible, which he called a pedagogical device.
The pedagogical device is presented in three contexts:
- The context of generation, where the external limits of transmission are established, which are strongly influenced by the distribution of power and control of society by those who lead it; The context of transmission or recontextualization, which is where creates the pedagogical discourse, where the rules that allow cultural transmission are created and in what way the transmission is to be made, in this context the transmission, acquisition and evaluation of knowledge is controlled through the instructive discourse, and behaviors and attitudes of subjects according to social norms through regulatory discourse; yThe acquisition context, regulated by a set of rules that determine the fundamental way in which culture is to be transmitted between students and teachers,among other elements such as progression, transmission, progression and sequence of time.
Finally, it can be argued that the contents that are included in the subjects or subjects taught in school, despite having their origin in the disciplines that surround it, many of the functions and rules that derive from the school, they do not have felt out of it.
