Applying principles and practice in curriculum development

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This interactive series of five workshops will guide you through the principles of curriculum design and how these can be practically applied to the development of a curriculum. 

You will learn how to choose relevant content, design progression, and integrate cross-cutting themes. You will be given the opportunity to evaluate examples from a range of different types of curriculum from national frameworks to school curricula to textbooks. 

The workshops have been designed for curriculum professionals and others working in education who are responsible for curriculum design, development, and review at national, regional or school level. 

Workshop dates

Course outline

Through this series of workshops, you will learn about the importance of coherence as a key quality criterion for curriculum design. We will guide you through the development of a curriculum from establishing aims to writing clear curriculum content, blending theory with practice.

The workshops will cover how to integrate progression and cross-curriculum themes into the curriculum as well as how to use design principles to achieve curriculum aims. 

Taken over five weeks, each session will build on the learning from the previous, with an expectation that you will reflect on the content in between:

• Session 1: Challenge: What is a curriculum? - Understand the fundamental challenges that curricula are designed to overcome. By exploring the many different definitions of curriculum you'll learn how, together, they describe the key features of a quality curriculum.
• Session 2: Cycles: Why and when does a curriculum change? - Appreciate the drivers for curriculum change. You'll also learn the steps to consider when making decisions about how to align your curriculum to these drivers.
• Session 3: Content: How do you choose curriculum content? - Learn how to select content relevant to your context and consistent with your aims. You'll also learn how to place content within an appropriate structure and progression.
• Session 4: Coherence: How do you write high quality curriculum content? - Discover the importance of the curriculum by exploring the ways curriculum interacts with other elements of education. Recognise how design principles can be used to ensure curriculum expectations are realised.
• Session 5: Consensus: Who is the curriculum for? - Explore the role that different stakeholder and different forms of knowledge play in content selection. You will also learn how to write curriculum standards that are equitable and inclusive of all learners.

Throughout the series, you will be given the opportunity to discuss real examples of curriculum design, including your own, with your peers and with curriculum experts from Cambridge. As well as the live workshops you will have access to further resources and an interactive discussion forum via the virtual learning environment (VLE).

Key learning outcomes

By the end of the five sessions you will have:

• Discovered what makes a curriculum
• Learned how to identify quality in a curriculum
  
• Recognised how to select and place curriculum content
• Learned how to link the intended and enacted curriculum
• Developed strategies to check the quality of your curriculum and plan for the future