In my current review of the various approaches to curriculum,[1] with the
last approach, the academic, you might have sensed a shift from the previous
three approaches. That is, the academic,
with its philosophic bent, is quite a bit less technical than the three
approaches that preceded it: the
behavioral, managerial, and the systems approaches. With this posting, I will describe an
approach that is the most artistic of them all, the humanistic. As such, this approach can be considered the
least rigid and technocratic. Here, the
attempt is one in which there is a much higher level of concern with what is
personal and with how the person interacts socially. The approach is more of a reaction to what
its proponents see as curriculum workers neglecting the artistic and cultural
elements that a sound curriculum should not only encompass, but upon which it
should focus. By so doing, those
involved, from curriculum worker to student, can address the need to be
self-reflective and to progress toward self-actualization. In order to do this, this approach takes into
account, to a much more heightened level, the socio-psychological environment
of the classroom and of the school in which the curriculum is to function.
As with many of the approaches considered, this one has its
origins in the work of John Dewey and his days at the University of
Chicago. There, the works of Charles
Judd and Francis Parker are of note. It
gained impetus when Dewey moved to the Teachers College at Columbia
University. Other names associated with
this approach at Columbia include Frederick Bosner, Hollis Caswell, L. Thomas
Hopkins, William Kilpatrick, and Harold Rugg.
The stretch of time between the development in Chicago to New York
stretched from the 1920s to the 1950s.
The later years were influenced by advancements in child psychology and
humanistic psychology. Insights into
ego, valuing, mental health, and personal growth and fulfillment were
incorporated into the work of these educators.
Probably the area of pedagogy most affected by the
developments of these curricular workers was in elementary education. Such instructional techniques as group games,
artistic endeavors, and field trips were devised with the overall aim of having
students engage in life simulating activities and activities that reflected
socially dynamic aspects of learning such as creative problem solving and
active participation within, when possible, school-wide or even community settings. All of this had a strong dose of progressive
thinking behind it.
There was a strong input from developmental psychologists
Robert J. Havighurst, Erik Erikson, and Abraham Maslow. Child-centered instructional innovations by
German educator Frederick Foebel, Swiss educator Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi,
and Scottish educator A. S. Neill were incorporated. In addition, what I believe to be a very
important development was the attention these educators brought to what was
labeled the informal and hidden curriculum – those aspects of schooling that
are not identified or necessarily addressed by the other approaches. To cite a simple example, this approach looks
at the effect of having those bells ringing every hour or so to indicate the “learning”
period either beginning or ending. How
do such practices define what we consider education to be and, in turn, how
artificial is that definition? As part
of this new viewpoint, educators were encouraged to take into account the whole
child – emotions as well as cognitive and behavioral factors – in how and why a
child is educated. This added such areas
of concern as music, health education, literature, and the other humanities to
the content and were considered just as important as the STEM subjects – science,
technology, engineering, and math.
From all of this work, various instructional practices were
added to the repertoire of teachers.
These included cooperative learning, small-group learning and other
practices that emphasized more of the cooperative rather than the competitive
nature of learning. It also strongly
suggested that curriculum planning and implementation take on a more social
character where parents and other community representatives could be
included. There should be, according to
the proponents, more collegiality and mentoring going on at the schoolhouse
and, in turn, participation should be considered a duty by other members of the
community. The addition of curriculum
committees would promote a more bottom up view as opposed to the managerial
perspective of a top down approach to curriculum development and implementation. This whole perspective probably hit its
apogee during the 1970s. But it is my
impression that while a lot of this is given lip service, with mandatory
committees being instituted, the whole approach never took much of a hold as its
proponents hoped. While a faculty of any
size would probably have one or two teachers – the creative ones – the bulk of
instruction in that school does not follow the humanistic approach. The missing element is the necessary
transformational change such a dynamic and all-encompassing shift demands. That is, to fully implement these ideas, teachers,
administrators, parents, students, and other community members have to have an
emotional commitment that is simply not there, at least not to the degree that one
would need in order to secure the displacement of what I believe is prominent
in our schools – the managerial approach. Perhaps such a change is unrealistic and
utopian, but I do believe our schools can more meaningfully apply what this
approach strives to implement. What
seems to be missing is a more realistic view of what change encompasses –
hence, the need for more well-informed and skilled change agents.
[1]
Again, I
will base most of the factual accounts of these approaches on the work of Allan
C. Ornstein and Francis P. Hunkins. See
Ornstein, A. C. and Hunkins, F. P.
(2004). Curriculum: Foundations,
principles, and issues. Boston,
MA: Allyn and Bacon.
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