Introduction

Why Is Concept-Based Curriculum

Critical for the 21st Century?

E ducators today seem to be faced with a choice: Continue teaching centuries­

old ways of organizing the world through traditional disciplines such as math­
ematics and music or throw them out in favor of innovation and creativity in order
to move into a 21st-century paradigm for teaching and learning.

This is a false choice. Here's the important truth: Innovation requires the creative
transfer of the fundamental and powerful concepts of the traditional disciplines. We
should put real-world challenges in front of students that require them to improvise
based on what humanity has already discovered. Innovators stand on the shoulders
of past scientists and mathematicians in order to innovate. They don't invent without
a deep understanding of how the world works.

Innovation occurs when people creatively trans­

fer what they learn to complex situations. It relies
Innovation requires the creative
on abstracting to a conceptual level in order to
transfer of the fundamental
do it. Although innovation is a current buzz
and powerful concepts of the
word, the imperative to design education in this
traditional disciplines.
way stands on a long history of research.

Decades ago, cognitive psychologist Jerome Bruner (1977) wrote, "Grasping the
structure of a subject is understanding it in a way that permits many other things to
be related to it meaningfully" (p. 7). He wrote this at a gathering of leading scientists
who were tasked with figuring out how to improve schooling in the United States
after the Soviets launched Sputnik. These experts wanted schools to produce innova­
tors and concluded that conceptual understanding was the way to achieve that goal.

Nearly 20 years ago, corporate analyst Teresa Amabile (1998) explained in Harvard
Business Review, "W ithin every individual, creativity is a function of three compo­
nents: expertise, creative-thinking skills, and motivation" (p. 81). Students still need
a depth of knowledge and understanding in order to innovate. Amabile's research
echoes what Bruner posited decades earlier: It would be unwise to throw out the
academic disciplines and replace them with the goal of innovation without the sup­
port of a deep knowledge base.