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Different Types of Curriculum

Anwaar Ahmad Gulzar Anwaar Ahmad Gulzar

2 years ago

Kinds of Curriculum

Different Types of Curriculum

Curriculum defined

Curriculum is a broad plan that is made by school and it includes educational experiences to achieve its
aims, goals and objectives and students have these educational experiences under the guidance of the
school. Therefore, Curriculum has ten basic patterns that are discussed below:

1. Child-Centered Curriculum

It is also called learner-centered curriculum. The philosophy underlying this curriculum is that the
children is that the center of the educational process. This pattern of curriculum bases upon the abilities
and the interest of the learners and students have experiences and diverse learning activities rather
than rote learning. Learner-centered classrooms focus primarily on individual students’ learning. The
teacher’s role is to facilitate growth by utilizing the interests and unique needs of students as a guide for
meaningful instruction.

This curriculum allows the students to actively participate in discovery learning processes and a variety
of hands-on activities are administered in order to promote successful learning. And it focuses upon a
child as a learner being a center of activities in a learning center.

2. Teacher-Centered Curriculum

In this curriculum, the focus is upon teacher’s teaching skills and the way of delivery of the content. It
emphasizes the importance of transmitting of knowledge, skills and information from a teacher to
students. A teacher is a center of knowledge and instills the respect of authority and makes children
aware of their responsibilities. Teachers focus on making relationships with students that are anchored
in intellectual explorations of selected materials.
They focus more on content than on student processing and this pattern of curriculum places more of
the responsibility on delivering content rather than considering students needs and desires. The teacher
plans each and everything about what to do in the class and students follow the teacher.

3. Core Curriculum

This type of curriculum is a set of common courses and is a general education for all students and
common learning includes knowledge, skills and values and all learners are provided these learning
experiences and these common learning experiences are expected essential for the learners to adjust
effectively in the society and these learning sets the basic subjects like English, Math, History, Science
etc.

This type of curriculum emphasizes on the total growth the of the pupil such as social, emotional, moral,
intellectual, physical and spiritual and each learning experience aims at the total growth.

4.Overt, Explicit, or Written Curriculum

Written curriculum is simply that which is written as part of formal instruction of schooling experiences.
It may refer to a curriculum document, texts, films, and supportive teaching materials that are overtly
chosen to support the intentional instructional agenda of a school. Thus, the overt curriculum is usually
confined to those written understandings and directions formally designated and reviewed by
administrators, curriculum directors and teachers, often collectively.

5. Covert or Hidden Curriculum

The hidden curriculum refers to the types of curriculum which is unplanned or unintended curriculum
but plays a vital role in learning. It consists of norms, values, and procedures. The hidden curriculum
refers to the way in which cultural values and attitudes (such as obedience to authority, punctuality, and
delayed gratification) are transmitted, through the structure of teaching and the organization of schools

6. Integrated Curriculum

An integrated curriculum implies learning that is synthesized across traditional subject areas and
learning experiences that are designed to be mutually reinforcing. This approach develops the child’s
ability to transfer their learning to other settings. It is a unification of different subjects having
interrelating themes and concepts. Teacher teaches various subjects by using integration techniques.
For example, General Science curriculum integrates concepts from Physics, Chemistry, Biology, Geology
and Astronomy etc.

7. Subject-Centered Curriculum

These types of curriculum give importance to training pupils in particular subjects. Its main objectives
are all the elements of knowledge that constitute a subject for study. Thus, the curriculum goes into the
depth of the subject that gives specialized knowledge to the learner. The specialist teacher is appointed
to deal with the subject in its analytical detail.

Higher education is characterized by this subject-centered curriculum. It leads to higher study, research,
and experimentation of individuals on the subject. This type of curriculum is more appropriate for
students of academic interest and creativity talents.

8. Broad Field or Holistic Curriculum

Broad field curriculum is a modification of subject centered curriculum. A broad field curriculum is a
structure for achieving educational outcomes that combines related subjects into one broad field of
study.

The purpose of a broad field curriculum is to highlight relationships between subjects and to integrate
the learning experience. The broad field design combines two or more related subjects into a single
broad field of study, for example, Language Arts combines the separate but related subjects of Reading,
Spelling, Writing, Speaking, Listening, and Composition.

9. Activity Centered Curriculum

The type of curriculum that gives priority to active learning of a subject may be known as an activity
curriculum. The verbal system of education neither suits the mental need of the child nor the
circumstances of life. It is the philosophy of Pragmatism behind this curriculum which beliefs in learning
to be practical, useful, and work-oriented. Activity involvement in learning naturally gives better results.
Work is a natural and easier means of learning anything. It is also the native and natural tendency of
children.
Further, the experience derived from work is more durable and more meaningful for life. So, modern
educators like Froebel, Montessori, Dewey, and Gagne in their respective learning methods have
designed this activity curriculum for children.

10. Null Curriculum

Eisner (1985) defined null curriculum as information that schools do not teach. Sometimes the teacher
ignores some content or skill, deliberately or unknowingly. A teacher may consider some idea
unimportant and ignore it. Similarly, teacher may avoid detailed description of some topic for the one or
other reason. An example is the exclusion of Darwin’s theory of evolution from the official biology
curriculum.

OTHER RELATED POSTS

Elements of Curriculum

The Definition of Curriculum

Need Analysis for Curriculum

Difference between Teaching and Instruction

Categories: Curriculum Development

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