This article addresses how 'powerful' curriculum theory might be constructed from the perspective of the German "Didaktik" tradition--highly compatible with Schwab's the Practical. To start with, I scrutinize Joseph Schwab's model of curriculum planning and Wolfgang Klafki's model of lesson preparation and examine two theories of content…

In Finland, the vocational education and training (VET) qualifications lead into work. Also, active citizenship is one of its aims, and qualification enables application to tertiary study. In terms of these aims, literacies are central. In the context of competency-based VET, we analyse how a curriculum of literacy is realized during literacy…

This study draws on data collected from Chinese language textbooks to investigate the ways in which ethnic minority cultures and languages are represented in primary school textbooks in China. Drawing on the methods of thematic and comparative analysis, we specifically analyse how the representation of ethnic minorities in Chinese textbooks has…

In this paper, the author uses an AsianCrit analysis of US Department of War Educational Manual No. 42, Our Chinese Ally (EM42), a document of military curriculum from WWII. Their argues that EM42 demonstrates both a state-sanctioned [re]racialization of Chinese and Chinese Americans through simultaneous technologies of Sinophobia and…

This paper argues that Young and Muller's 'powerful knowledge' requires a more extensive conceptualization of the relation between knowledge and practice. However, rather than focus on the 'practice turn' in social theory as Carlgren has suggested, it is argued that what Rouse terms a 'normative practice' can help explicate the specialized…

This conceptual article is to problematize Western-centered comparative curriculum studies in South Korea, drawing on research related to postcolonial criticisms of comparative education and curriculum studies, and to suggest a decolonial research imagination for comparative curriculum research in South Korea and East Asia broadly, based on…

"Dialectic Materialism as a Method of Doing Education" - was written over 30 years ago by one of us -- Huebner. Following an interesting dialogue we had over the last years, Dwayne suggested co-re-writing a revised piece to be published under both names. It explores at greater length the ideas that structured the initial piece and offers…

The article aims to explore to what extent and in what ways discourse institutionalism can contribute to the understanding and analysis of curriculum change in a globalized context. By focusing specifically on curriculum change, this article proposes how discourse institutionalism can contribute to the so-called 'crisis of curriculum theory' by…

This paper looks at the experiences of school history education and explores the impact this education has had on the development of young adults and their sense of identity in England. Adopting a qualitative approach, this study used semi-structured interviews with twenty young adults, aged 18-22, some from white backgrounds, but most from…

This essay builds on the notion of 'racialized affects' in conjunction with recent educational theorizing of Sylvia Wynter's work on 'the human' to consider how these insights might extend conceptualizations on the 'coloniality of the affects' in curriculum and pedagogy. Specifically, the analysis shows how bringing into conversation Wynter's…

Discussions about the what, the when and the how of teaching and learning in schools deal in German-speaking countries with the term "Lehrplan", while English-speaking countries discuss similar topics with the term "curriculum". Yet, these two terms are not just exchangeable terms in two different languages, but imply also two…

This paper analyses the coverage of Indigenous topics in K-12 education in British Columbia (BC) using curriculum documents and course enrolment. It focuses on curriculum documents published between 1995 and 2010 and mandated in public education from 1995 to 2019, and argues that Indigenous topics were marginalized in the curriculum overall.…

This article presents a new conceptualization of 'shadow curriculum', one component of the worldwide phenomenon of shadow education, i.e. learning outside of school. Traditional conceptions of curriculum are not applicable to shadow education, and so this article begins by exploring how shadow education practices qualify as a new focus of…

In England, two concurrent but largely disconnected discourses have emerged whose representatives have promulgated initiatives relevant to students' extended historical writing: genre theorists and the history teachers' 'extended writing movement'. Despite certain goals held in common, the two discourses have tended to talk past one another…

Drawing on Bernstein's concept of recontextualization, this paper explores how mid-level actors interpret and translate curriculum policies in the context of growing concerns about the performance and accountability of education systems. Little is known about the work of recontextualization agents responsible for the professional development,…