POSITION PAPER

NATIONAL FOCUS GROUP

ON

CURRICULUM, SYLLABUS

AND TEXTBOOKS

2.3

POSITION PAPER

NATIONAL FOCUS GROUP

ON

CURRICULUM, SYLLABUS

AND TEXTBOOKS

2.3

First EditionFebruary 2006 Phalguna 1927

PD 170T BB

© National Council of EducationalResearch and Training, 2006

Rs. 100.00

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ISBN 81-7450-494-X

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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Introduction: Exploring PossibilitiesAt the very outset, a critical analysis of the Indian School Education System reveals that it is largelya monolithic system perpetuating a kind of education which has resulted in a set of practicesadopted for development of curriculum, syllabus and textbooks that is guided by the patternsand requirements of the examination system, rather than by the needs determined by a mix ofcriteria based on the child’s learning requirement, aims of education and the socio-economic andcultural contexts of learners. A marked feature of educational practices in school are a dullroutine, bored teachers and students and rote system of learning.

The position paper makes an effort to explore possibilities to provide for an enablingand flexible framework for promoting increased choices made by the schools and teacherspossible, and a greater role for children and community in making those choices on alarge scale. In certain cases the States themselves have attempted to redefine curriculum anddevelop textbooks and other teaching learning materials. In view of the above, it is important toanalyse whether the existing policy and curricular framework facilitate development of diverseand appropriate curricular approaches for achieving desired aims and objectives of education.

Curriculum for EqualityThe analysis of various policy documents clearly indicate that achieving equality through educationhas been consistently and unequivocally voiced, over the years. However, the challenge of translatingthe vision of equality into a curriculum framework has remained unanswered. The basic problemthat emerges has been conceptualising flexibility or diversity which is closely linked to the systemsinherent limitation and inability to define the role of the ‘curriculum’ and its transaction. Related tothis are the associated problems in defining ‘syllabus’, ‘standards’ and going beyond the ‘core’ curriculum.This reluctance of the system to allow for true plurality and flexibility in the curriculum, as well asthe restricted meaning of the term curriculum itself is most clearly evident in the report LearningWithout Burden (GOI 1993).

The past ambiguity in decentralising and diversifying curricula and textbooks reflects a perceivedneed for appropriate mechanisms to ensure that quality conforms with common standards ofattainment as well as to a broad national democratic vision. With a view to promotingdecentralised curriculum development it is suggested that appropriate regulatorymechanisms be created by establishing an independent body at the State level with afederal national structure, to approve different curricular packages, which includetextbooks, teacher training and recruitment processes, assessment and examinations, etc.The national structure may be answerable to the CABE, and should produce professionally

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developed criteria and guidelines, conduct documentation and review, and ensureappropriate consultation and sharing among the State bodies. It is also recommendedthat the regulatory mechanism must be professionally worked out to carefully avoid theattendant distortions and problems that may arise out of bureaucratic and politicalpressures, vested interests or even corrupt practices, within bodies established to approvethe curricular packages1.

Mapping, Conceptual, Field Notion of Curriculum Syllabus and TextbooksThe existing ground realities and curricular documents reveal that all the NCFs emphasise theconcerns and issues but do not make a very clear connection between the concerns, aims andcurricular contents. The pedagogy and the view on knowledge also remain some what hazilydefined. The rational for almost all prescriptions is left un-stated. To address this, in this sectionthe notions of curriculum, syllabus and textbooks have been examined and deliberated upon onthe basis that the curriculum is a plan of facilitating learning for the child. This plan starts fromwhere the child is, enumerates all the aspects and dimensions of learning that the considerednecessary, gives reasons why such and such learning is considered necessary, and what educationalaims it would serve. This plan also defines stage specific objectives, what content to teach andhow to organise it. It also recommends general principles of teaching methods and evaluation,and criteria for good teaching learning material.

Justifications of the basis for making curriculum choices are very important. The keyto understand the question of curriculum choice is to understand the relationship betweenthe curriculum and the aims of education. Therefore, the curriculum is viewed more as aconceptual structure for decision making rather then details of what is to be done in theclassroom.

The structure demands workable principles and criteria in most of the areas such asselection and organisation of content ways of interacting with children and classroomorganisation, type of teaching-learning material etc. What is perceived to be important is whatforms the basis for the choices made in syllabus, pedagogical decisions, textbooks etc. It is alsosuggested that a set of foundational assumptions a curriculum framework uses needs to beinternally consistent, as clearly articulated as possible, and acceptable to all stakeholders.

Finally, operational definitions are also been placed for consideration to facilitate the processof curriculum development

Curriculum Framework: A plan that interprets educational aims vis-a-vis both individual andsociety, to arrive at an understanding of the kinds of learning experiences school must provide tochildren.

Curriculum: Curriculum is, perhaps, best thought of as that set of planned activities which aredesigned to implement a particular educational aim- set of such aims - in terms of the content of

1 One member of the Focus Group has a dissenting view of this issue. She did not think that such a body should be created.

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what is to be taught and the knowledge, skills and attitudes which are to be deliberately fostered,together with statements of criteria for selection of content, and choices in methods, materialsand evaluation”. In reference to the framework above it would mean the ‘curriculum core’ and‘syllabus’ put together.

Syllabus: refers to the content of what is to be taught and the knowledge, skills and attitudeswhich are to be deliberately fostered; together with stage specific objectives.

Groups Essential PositionThe overall approach advocated should be to provide a curriculum framework that :• facilitates schools and teachers make decisions about choice of content, pedagogy, teaching

learning material, evaluation, etc. at school level; in other words, a national curriculum frameworkfor increased autonomy of the school

• provides help to the teacher in becoming reflective practitioner who learns from her ownexperiences

• emphasises learning with understanding and learning to learn, and helps children developtheir own understanding based on their lived experiences; and;

General aims of educationIt is proposed that within this framework, the articulation of aims needs to serve twomajor purposes. Firstly, reflect collective socio-political aspirations of the whole societyand second, serves a significant pedagogical purpose of provide direction to the teacherin choice of content and methods of education.. Aims are stated in two parts only as principlesand no elaborate justifications and/or explanations are provided.

A. Values and Ideals: education should promote in society, as well as help the learner developa rational commitment to:• Equality – of status and opportunity,• Freedom – of thought, expression, beliefs, faith and worship; as a value in life• Autonomy of mind – as independence of thinking, based on reason,• Autonomy of action – freedom to chose, ability and freedom to decide and ability and

freedom to act,• Care and respect for others – going beyond respecting their freedom and autonomy, concern

about well being and sensitivity to all members of society,• Justice: social, economic and political.

B. Capabilities of individual human beings• Knowledge base – sufficiently broad knowledge base encompassing all crucial areas of

socio-political life, and all basic ways of investigation and validation of knowledge

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• Sensitivity to others – Sensitivity to others well beings and feelings coupled with knowledgeshould form basis of rational commitment to values. ‘Others’ should include all life forms.

• Rational/critical attitude: Critical rationality is the only way to autonomy of thought andaction.

• Learning to learn – the future needs of development of knowledge, reason, sensitivity andskills can not be determined in advance. Therefore, ability to learn as new needs arise in newsituations is necessary to function autonomously in a democratic society.

• Work and ability to participate in economic processes – choices in life and ability to participatein the democratic processes depends on ability to contribute to the society in its variousfunctions.

• Aesthetic appreciation/creation – appreciation of beauty and art forms is an integral part ofhuman life.

Stage wise objectivesThe stage wise objectives need to be arrived at by keeping in mind the general aims of education,the developmental stages of children, nature of the knowledge in general and curricular subjectareas in particular, and the child’s socio-political contexts. Further the objectives also have to bespecific enough to be used as guidelines for content selection and organisation. It is proposedthat articulation of curricular objectives should also take cue from the statement of aims.Formulation of curricular objectives for all but the last stage; can be done at the state and districtlevel and each school can reorganise them as per the need of their children and teachers.

Principles of content selection and organisationOften demand for introducing new subjects in curriculum is voiced to emphasise certain concerns. Itis thus suggested that selection and organisation of curricular knowledge should be consideredfrom at least four different perspectives, those of: aims of education, epistemological perspective,child’s learning and mental developmental, and the child’s context.

Teaching – Learning Methods and Classroom PracticesA number of basic principles have been outlined in order to guide the choice of classroompractices:• Understanding that children construct their own knowledge• Importance of Experiences in Learning• Active Engagement of learners is important for construction of knowledge• Variety of situations and multiplicity of methods important for creating diverse

experiences• The socio-economic context and identity of the learner

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• An enabling Teacher Child relationship• The role of and space for parents and community

Teaching Learning Material and TextbooksThe present day classroom practices are, in almost all schools of the country, totally dominated bythe textbooks. As a result it has acquired an aura and a standard format. What is needed is nota single textbook but a package of teaching learning material that could be used to engagethe child in active learning. The textbook thus becomes a part of this package and notthe only teaching learning material. Therefore, a large number of packages should bedeveloped at state and district levels with adequate provision for cluster and school levelmodifications and supplementary materials. The availability of a number of alternativeTLM packages of all approved quality to the certainly increased choice of the teachers.

EvaluationEvaluation in education is always associated with objectives and implementation. By itself it is aprocess that determines the course of action and recommends changes for the betterment of theindividual, society, nation and mankind. If we view education as preparation for meaningful life,then the process of evaluation presently been followed is limited in that it measures and assessesa very limited range of faculties of mind, is highly inadequate and lacks in giving a true picture ofan individual’s abilities or progress towards the aims of education.

Revamping the examination system is an important step of any meaningfuleducational change. In addition, making the model of continuous comprehensiveevaluation effective necessarily calls for collective understanding among all concerned -child, teacher, parent, institutions of higher education and employer about what is beingevaluated.

To improve the present system, the following is suggested

• Strive for excellence in all aspects of the learning, especially in the writing of materials,correction of work, monitoring student progress, and responding to enquiries by thelearners.

• Opportunity for revision and improvement of performance should consistently beavailable without exams and evaluation being used as a threat to study. Deductionof marks cannot be an alternative to motivating learners.

• The learning experience itself must be evaluated, and not only its outcomes. Learnersare happy to comment on the totality of their experience, and this information can beused to modify the earning system as a whole. The learner must be able to assess herlearning experiences, individually and as a part of a group.

MEMBERS OF NATIONAL FOCUS GROUP ON

CURRICULUM, SYLLABUS AND TEXTBOOKS

Shri Rohit Dhankar (Chairperson)DirectorDigantar, Todi RamzanipuraKhonagorian RoadP.O. JagatpuraJaipur – 302 025Rajasthan

Dr. Kamala MenonPrincipalMirambika Free Progress SchoolSri Aurobindo MargNew Delhi – 110 016

Prof. Anita RampalMaulana Azad Centre for Elementaryand Social EducationCentral Institute of EducationDelhi UniversityDelhi – 110 007

Prof. Rajendra BhatiaHeadStatistics and Mathematics UnitIndian Statistical Institute7- Shaheed Jeet Singh MargNew Delhi – 110 016

Dr. Gayatri Devi DuttDirectorRegional Institute of English South IndiaJnanabharthi CampusBangalore – 560 056Karnataka

Prof. Sandeep PonnalaDean, Faculty of EducationOsmania University12-13-677-12, Kimtee ColonyStreet No.1, Lane No.1Tarnaka, Secunderabad – 500 017Andhra Pradesh

Dr. Vipralhou KesiezieDirectorState Council of Educational Researchand TrainingKohima – 797 001Nagaland

Dr. Janaki RajanDirectorSCERT, Varuna MargDefence ColonyNew Delhi – 110 024

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Mrs. Jaishree AcharyaD4-1, MS Flats, Sector 13R.K. PuramNew Delhi – 110 022

Dr. Jyotsna Jha74- Vijaya Laxmi Apartments98, Indira Prastha ExtensionDelhi -110 092

Mrs. Priyadarshini KachhwahaVice PrincipalBharatiya Vidyabhawan’s Vidyashram SchoolOpposite OTS, K.M. Munshi MargBajaj Nagar, JaipurRajasthan

Shri Prakash BurtePlot No. 5, “Maitra”Dr. Antrolikar Nagar No. 3Behind “Kinara” HotelHotgi Road,Solapur – 413 003Maharashtra

Dr. Sandhya Pranjpe (Member Secretary )Department of Elementary EducationNCERT, Sri Aurobindo MargNew Delhi – 110 016

CONTENTS

Executive Summary ...vMembers of National Focus Group on Curriculum, Syllabus and Textbooks ...x

1. INTRODUCTION: EXPLORING POSSIBILITIES ...1

2. A POLICY PERSPECTIVE ...32.1 A Curriculum for Equality? ...32.2 Contested Conceptions of Uniformity and Flexibility ...52.3 Limited Notions of the ‘Curriculum’ and ‘Beyond the Core Curriculum’ ...52.4 The Role of the Textbook and ‘National Standards’ ...72.5 Supporting Decentralised Curriculum Development ...8

3. MAPPING THE CONCEPTUAL FIELD: NOTIONS OF CURRICULUM, SYLLABUS ANDTEXTBOOK ...93.1 The Existing Scenario ...93.2 A Conceptual Framework and Operational Definitions ...103.3 Detailing for Implementation ...12

4. GROUP’S ESSENTIAL POSITION ...194.1 The Approach ...194.2 Position on Elements of Curriculum ...20

4.2.1 The General Aims of Education ...204.2.2 Stage-wise General Objectives of Education ...234.2.3 Principles of Content Selection and Organisation ...244.2.4 Teaching-learning Methods and Classroom Practices ...324.2.5 Teaching-learning Material and Textbooks...374.2.6 Evaluation ...39

Bibliography ...43

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1. INTRODUCTION: EXPLORING POSSIBILITIES

“I have decided to end my life because the pressure of exams isgetting to me. I can’t take it any more”, wrote Sudhanshu inhis suicide note on March 4, 2005. The education thatshould give hope, teach the worth of life, developcapabilities to shape it, is often taking life and enablingvery few. The majority of even those who pass examswith flying colours are capable only of seeing life as adeadly competitive race in which they have to win tosurvive. The principal, to whose school the unfortunatechild belonged, seems to be utterly bewildered. “Wehave conducted several workshops involving students on the needto combat stress. One just doesn’t know what goes on in theminds of students these days”, she says. She does not realisethat both the cause of the malaise as well as the remedywill have to be sought at a different plane. One has tore-examine the very ideas and ideals that are striving totake over the society and are increasingly becomingdominant in education, and one has to combat themnot through the trendy workshops but through creatinga more enabling vision of school and the process ofeducation.

Children are being mercilessly overschooled in thismisdirected educational system. That is one alarmingaspect of Indian school education today. The otherequally alarming aspect is millions of children grow upwithout entering a school, and many of those who enterdrop out of unconcerned schools without learninganything.

A very brief survey of the present-day classroomswould be enough to convince a keen observer that themost marked features of most of our educationalpractices in schools are a dull routine, bored teachersand students, and rote learning. A perusal of the presentpractices followed for the development and use ofcurriculum, syllabi, and textbooks does not provide avery encouraging picture in terms of either eliminating

this gloom in the classroom or pursuing the higher goalsof education in a more meaningful manner. It is largelya monolithic system, perpetuating a kind of educationthat aims at producing standardised products that canpass certain examinations, rather than thinking,sensitive, capable, and responsible people.

Nevertheless, this gloom in the classroom is notunchallenged. There are a number of examples, fromboth the government and the non-government sectors,where efforts have been made to develop innovativecurricular approaches leading to encouraging results interms of both classroom practices and children’slearning. These experiences provide examples ofexploring possibilities, teachers who are moreautonomous, children who participate meaningfully inthe process of education, cheerful classes, and increasedlearning. This position paper makes an effort to providea framework to explore possibilities of increasedchoices for the schools and teachers, and a greater rolefor children and community in making those choices,on a large scale.

One of the most important features of the presentset of practices adopted for development ofcurriculum, syllabi, and textbooks is that it is guided bythe patterns and requirements of the examinationsystem, rather than by a mix of criteria based on thechild’s learning requirements, aims of education, andthe socio-economic and cultural contexts of learners.In most cases, the term curriculum is used to meanvery different things by different users and even by thesame user in different contexts. It is usually referred toas the scheme of studies, where different subjects areseen in isolation and the subject-knowledge is embodiedin the respective textbooks, to be memorised by allchildren. The socio-political, geographical, and culturaldiversities that exist across different areas are usuallyignored and the same textbook is viewed solely as

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representing the entire gamut of curricular needs andis used in the entire state. Despite several policydocuments, curricular frameworks, and programmaticapproaches mentioning the need for furtherdecentralisation of curricular material development, atleast up to the district level, there has rarely been anyeffort to facilitate this. The changes that have comeover the years are either largely superficial in nature,leading to some tinkering here and there, or iterativewhere one or two new subjects/topics have beenintroduced because of one or more kinds of pressures,from central organisations, the judiciary, or some otherpressure group.

The frame for the present practices followed forthe development of curriculum, syllabi, and textbooksis largely guided by the national policies adopted sinceearly 1970s. Starting from the early seventies, almostall states have adopted the 10+2 pattern of schooleducation structure with a few exceptions where +2 orthe senior secondary stage still continues to be partiallymanaged by college education and governed by theuniversity system. The adoption of 10+2 structure ofeducation was promoted to mitigate the markeddifferences in the schemes of studies and bring somesort of harmony in the curriculum, syllabi, andexamination patterns. The states were also encouragedto have autonomous examination boards to determinethe curricula and examination pattern at both secondaryand senior secondary levels. Although the role andfunctions of different boards, and the ways in whichthey undertake similar functions, vary greatly, they areviewed as mere examination conducting bodies andwhose main responsibility is certification. As such, thenature and pattern of examination becomes the bindingdirection for the curricular approaches rather than thisbeing the other way round. Some kinds of curriculumapproval bodies also exist in some states. What is

interesting is that the nature of structures that existguides the nature of the curricular approach rather thanthe curricular approach determining the nature ofstructures required.

Barring a few states, elementary or the first sevenor eight years of education was kept outside the purviewof state education boards in most states. The StateCouncil of Educational Research and Training (SCERT;known by a different name in some states), which cameinto existence around the same time as the boards,mainly by merging some of the existing teacher traininginstitutions, are usually responsible for developing thesyllabi and textbooks at the elementary level. The natureand functioning of the SCERTs also varies in certainrespects. The National Council of EducationalResearch and Training (NCERT), the apex body at thenational level, is expected to guide the states byproviding a national framework for curriculumdevelopment and by building capacities at the state levelboth at the elementary and secondary level.

For a variety of reasons, the space forexperimentation has been relatively greater, and hencethe presence of creative experiences has also beenhigher at the elementary level. In certain cases, the statesthemselves have attempted to redefine curriculum andaccordingly develop textbooks and other materials. Forinstance, Kerala adopted a new curricular approach,the process of developing textbooks, and teachersupport materials for the primary stage under theDistrict Primary Education Project (DPEP). TheDPEP did encourage states to undertake such exercisesbut the nature, intensity, and depth of such initiativesvaried from one state to the other. Much before theDPEP was implemented in selected districts and states,Eklavya, a voluntary organisation in Madhya Pradesh,developed a different approach for primary education,known as Prathmik Shiksha Karyakram (Prashika). This

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was developed based on real experiences of teachingin government primary schools in rural areas. Thisexperience later became an important reference pointfor those exploring new possibilities and the basis fora curricular package called ‘Seekhna Sikhana’ in MadhyaPradesh. Digantar, a small NGO in Rajasthan runninga few schools for children coming from lower socio-economic strata in the outskirts of Jaipur, has beenfollowing a different curricular approach for more thantwo decades. The organisation has been actively sharingits conceptions and experiences with other governmentand non-government agencies. The curricular designand the pedagogy of the Alternative Schooling systembuilt in Madhya Pradesh under the DPEP was basedon Digantar’s philosophy and approach. Several districtsin Karnataka have adopted a textbook-free approachof teaching where the progression is guided anddetermined by a series of activities. This approach hasbeen guided by the experiences of the Rishi Valley, anNGO working in Andhra Pradesh.

The very presence of these examples suggests theneed for going into the reasons as to why was theprevalent practice considered inadequate and/orunsuitable. It is important to analyse whether theexisting policy and curricular frameworks provideunambiguous aims and facilitate development offlexible and appropriate curricular approaches forachieving those aims. What are and what ought to bethe conceptions of curriculum, syllabi, and textbooksif seen from the multiple lenses of the democraticpolity, human philosophy, and theories of learning?How best can the principles of the various aspects ofcurriculum be defined so as to facilitate an educationprocess which is stimulating and leads to developmentof rational, responsible, and caring human beingsworking towards a society which values equality, justice,democracy, and plurality? This position paper makes

an attempt in this direction through exploringpossibilities of providing greater space for choices tothe teachers and students, as one recent graduate ofschool education in a conversation with one of thegroup members remarked “the children should be allowedto think and the teachers should be allowed to teach as theyconsider fit”.

2. A POLICY PERSPECTIVE

2.1 A Curriculum for Equality?

The commitment towards achieving equality througheducation has consistently and unequivocally beenvoiced through the policy documents of independentIndia, including the reports of the two Commissionsrelated to school education and the National Policy onEducation 1986 with its review in 1992. The SecondaryEducation Commission Report (1952) had envisagedschools to play a crucial role in developing democraticcitizenship, emphasising that “democracy is based onfaith and in the dignity and worth of every singleindividual”, where the “innate ‘worthfulness’ cannotbe eclipsed either by economic or racial or socialconsideration (p. 20).” As the first commission onschool education of an independent country carvedout of a traumatic partition, it sought schools thatwould lay the foundation for patriotism andcooperation, based on “an openness of mind andlargeness of heart”, and not through the “dragooningof different beliefs, ideas, tastes and interests intouniformity, which may possibly make for efficiency ina narrow and inferior sense, but inevitably impoverishlife and curb the free expression of the human spirit.”It called for educational opportunities that wouldtranslate into practice a passion for social justice “inspiredby the faith that social purposes are worth striving for, that lifein a democratic set up is not playing for one’s own hand but callsfor a strenuous endeavour to equalise opportunities for all, and anunremitting fight for justice for the under-privileged.” (p. 21)

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The subsequent Education Commission (GOI,1966) had focused on a socialist democratic vision ofnational development, where equality of “education isdeliberately used to develop more and more potentialtalent”. Warning that “History shows numerousinstances where small social groups have used educationas a prerogative of their rule and as a tool formaintaining their hegemony” (Section 1.16), it hadstrongly recommended the Common School System(Section 1.36). It declared that: “It is the responsibilityof the education system to bring different social classesand groups together and thus promote the emergenceof an egalitarian and integrated society. But at present,instead of doing so, education is itself tending toincrease social segregation and to perpetuate and widenclass distinctions…. The position is thus undemocraticand inconsistent with the ideal of an egalitarian society.The children of the masses are compelled to receivesub-standard education … while the economicallyprivileged parents are able to ‘buy’ good education fortheir children. This is bad not only for the children ofthe poor but also for children from the rich andprivileged groups. It gives them a short-term advantagein so far as it enables them to perpetuate and consolidatetheir position…. By segregating their children, theyprevent them from sharing the life and experiences ofthe children of the poor and coming into contact withthe realities of life. In addition to weakening socialcohesion, they also render the education of their ownchildren anaemic and incomplete” (Section 1.36, 1.37).It proposed the ‘neighbourhood school’ to “compelthe rich, privileged and powerful classes to take aninterest in the system of public education and therebybring about its early improvement” (Section 10.19).

This proposal was subsequently upheld by theNational Policy on Education (NPE) 1986, whichrecommended that “up to a given level, all students,

irrespective of caste, creed, location or sex, have accessto education of comparable quality” (Section 3.2). Thecommitment to provide education that promotesequality through ‘removal of disparities’ was againexpressed by the Review of the NPE in the Report ofthe Ramamurthy Committee (1992): “To promoteequality, it will be necessary to provide for equalopportunity to all not only in access, but also in theconditions for success. Besides, awareness of theinherent equality of all will be created through the corecurriculum. The purpose is to remove prejudices andcomplexes transmitted through the social environmentand the accident of birth (section 3.6)”. Itrecommended that government schools betransformed through quality improvement into genuineneighbourhood schools and that private schools should alsobe made freely accessible. “The new Policy will lay specialemphasis on the removal of disparities and onequalising educational opportunity by attending to thespecific needs of those who have been denied equalityso far (section 4.1)”. Moreover, despite reservationsabout the iniquitous programme of a few well-endowedNavodaya Vidyalayas set up by the government, thepolicy could not change the course of things to come.

As it stands today, the system of public educationhas been rendered more unequal and differentiated thanever before, with increasing numbers of poor-qualityand low-cost centres and ‘alternative schools’ beingestablished for the poor. Moreover, the vocationalstream remains the least sought after, being perceivedas one meant for the ‘less able’, while poor familiesdespair that schools alienate their children from theirown vocations and livelihoods. This has happeneddespite the Ramamurthy Committee (1992)recommendations to link work with school through acommon curricular stream having both vocational andnon-vocational components, and different options with

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varying proportions of the two components. It hadstated that vocationalisation of school education must be seenin the context of equity and social justice, contrary to the presentsystem where the vocational stream is clearly viewed as the onemeant for the less able and the less fortunate (Section 2.2.6).

2.2 Contested Conceptions of Uniformity and

Flexibility

The challenge of translating the vision of equality intoa curricular framework has remained unanswered, andas reflected in the series of Curriculum Frameworkdocuments (NCERT 1975, 1988, 2000) that followed,these wishful statements were not always matched withconsonant conceptions of what formed a democraticand ‘equalising’ curriculum. The first doubts andtensions appeared in the 1975 document on theCurriculum for the Ten-year School, where it was statedthat “For a vast country like ours with its diversity oflanguages, social customs, manners, mores and uneveneconomic development, the needs and demands ofindividuals and society will have differential pulls onthe school curriculum, varying from one region to theother. For the sake of uniformity of standards and ofnational identity, therefore it is necessary to develop acommon curriculum within a broad framework ofacceptable principles and values” (Section 2.1).

This central concern for what was thenambiguously called ‘uniformity of standards andnational identity’ served as a justification for thecentralising tendency in curriculum construction. Whilethe 1975 Curricular Framework confessed that the taskof effecting ‘internal transformation’ of education toaddress the life, needs, and aspirations of the nationwas becoming increasingly difficult under the mountingpressure of growing numbers of children, and owingto ‘rigid postures and orthodox attitudes’, it could notradically transcend these limitations. Some broad

statements of objectives were made, which providedno indication of how a curriculum was to be designedto address the vision of education for children fromdiverse cultural and social backgrounds, while thedocument moved directly to the teaching and contentof subject areas.

That children learn through active engagement withtheir experiences, and that their learning anddevelopment is shaped by their cultural capital,including how their societies have looked at the socialand physical world around them, was neveracknowledged. Also, the concern articulated by policydocuments that the existing format of schooling,including the selection of the syllabus, the teachingapproaches, and the examinations, was alienating mostchildren and consistently reinforcing inequality wasnever addressed. The 1975 document continued tospeak of the diverse requirements of children only interms of “the special needs of the talented, thebackward, and those coming from non-formalchannels”. In fact, its section on ‘The Core Curriculumand Beyond’ delineates how schools would need to gobeyond the core curriculum to provide ‘additionalinputs’ for those who may offer to study ‘advancedunits’; similarly, “students coming from the lessfortunate schools or from non-formal education mayalso need remedial units or bridging units which schoolswould have to provide” (section 2.15).

2.3 Limited Notions of the ‘Curriculum’ and

‘Beyond the Core Curriculum’

The basic problem in conceptualising ‘flexibility’ or‘diversity’ was closely tied to the system’s inherentlimitation and inability to define the role of the‘curriculum’ in the first place. What was understood tobe the ‘curriculum’? It seemed to inevitably imply afixed core content, which was variously called the

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‘syllabus’ and also the ‘standards’, and was in the formof a list of topics derived from the subjects to be taught,so that going ‘beyond the core’ meant only providingeither ‘enrichment for the talented’ or ‘remedial inputsfor the backward’.

This limited view of ‘curriculum’ was againmanifested in the 1988 document ‘National Curriculumfor Elementary and Secondary Education: AFramework’, which tried to define the ‘core’ throughwhat were called the ‘Minimum Levels of Learning(MLL)’ (Section 2.2). There were several problems withthis formulation and we shall not dwell on these here;it may suffice here to point out that the ‘levels’ wereattempted to be defined in behavioural terms, and weredictated by the belief that differences lie in terms ofhierarchical ‘levels’ rather than in equally valid butdifferent ways of learning. We find in Section 2.2 thestatement that:

A high degree of flexibility and local initiatives are

envisaged in designing and introducing remedial and

enrichment programmes and materials not only by the

State educational authorities but also by the individual

schools and teachers to cater to the needs of slow and

fast learners studying in the same class/grade in a

school. However, the scope for f lexibility in

methodology and approach to transaction of

curriculum is not expected to be used for introducing

differential courses or similar measures which would

accentuate disparities in standards of education in

different parts of the country.

This reluctance of the system to allow for trueplurality and flexibility in the curriculum, as well as therestricted meaning of the term ‘curriculum’ itself, wasmost clearly evident when the National AdvisoryCommittee presented its report ‘Learning WithoutBurden’ (GOI, 1993). Some of the recommendationsof the Committee were as follows:

The process of curriculum framing and preparation oftextbooks be decentralised so as to increase teachers’involvement in these tasks. Decentralisation shouldmean greater autonomy, within state-level apparatus,to district level boards or other relevant authority, andto heads of schools and classroom teachers to developcurricular materials on their own, best suited to needsof local environment. All the schools (must) beencouraged to innovate in all aspects of curriculum,including choice of textbooks and other materials(Recommendation No. 2a). Voluntary organisationswith a specific commitment to pedagogical innovationswithin the formal or non-formal system (must) beprovided greater freedom and support in developmentof curriculum, textbooks and teacher training(Recommendation No. 2b).

The schools affiliated to CBSE in the states otherthan Delhi enjoy the prestige of being elite schools.The CBSE curriculum becomes a trend-setter for theState Boards leading to heavier curriculum for majorityof children, Therefore the Committee recommendsthat jurisdiction of CBSE be restricted to KendriyaVidyalayas and Navodaya Vidyalayas and all otherschools be affiliated to the respective State Boards(Recommendation No. 4).The Ministry subsequently set up its own Group,

chaired by Y.N. Chaturvedi and constituted mainly ofbureaucrats, to give views on the ‘feasibility ofimplementing the recommendations’ of the AdvisoryCommittee. This Group countered most of the radicalrecommendations of the Committee, giving commentsthat reflected both its failure to appreciate the importof the Report and its own orthodoxy in educationalmatters. In fact, wherever the Committee speaks ofthe ‘curriculum’, the Group responds using the word‘syllabus’, showing that it considers these terms to beidentical. It also completely misses the point about theneed for decentralisation in curriculum development,through local participation and ownership, and in which

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evaluation and certification constitute an important andoften the most crucial component. It concedes at bestto different curricula for ‘different socio-culturalgeographical zones’ but that too developed centrallyby the national/state agencies.

For instance, the Group’s responses to theRecommendations 2 and 4 quoted above state that:

The Group feels that while the size of committees atnational or state level cannot be increased beyond alimit, a meaningful way of improving teachers’participation would be for either the NCERT/CBSE/Sate Boards/SCERTs to prepare the draft syllabus andfinalise it after subjecting it to regional or district levelconsideration by a large body of teachers or, in thealternative, to get multiple syllabi developed at regionaland district levels on the basis of which the final syllabicould be prepared at the state/national level. TheGroup however, does not recommend decentralisationin the preparation of syllabi or textbooks at the districtor school level because it will be difficult to ensureadequate projection of national identity and of composite cultureof India. Also in such a situation, the adherence to even minimumstandards in all parts of the country may become difficult (p.5,emphasis added.).The Group however, shares the concern of the YashpalCommittee that many textbooks presently tend toproject predominantly the urban middle class life style.Therefore, the Group recommends that… in stateswhich have distinct socio-cultural geographical zones,different and parallel sets of textbooks with the samelearning objectives should be prepared and used… Thetextbook preparation agencies should undertakesystematic review of all textbooks to ensure that anytrivial matter which may have got included in thetextbooks is weeded out (p.6).As for CBSE it relies heavily on the NCERT fordeveloping syllabi and preparing textbooks….Rightlythe NCERT keeps in view the existing standards inthe country, the capability of students, and standardsin developed countries…If there is unnecessary

material in some of the NCERT books, it should beeliminated. However, there is not adequate material on recordto substantiate that the CBSE syllabi or NCERT books perse are overloaded. …If affiliation to the CBSE is good forKendriya and Navodaya Vidyalayas it cannot be bad for otherschools (p.10).

2.4 The Role of the Textbook and

‘National Standards’

The Secondary Education Commission (1952) hadpointed out that the then curriculum was “narrow,bookish and theoretical” with an overloaded syllabusand unsuitable textbooks. It had suggested that thecurriculum should not be divided into a number ofwatertight subjects, but that all subjects should be inter-related and should include relevant and significantcontent so that it could touch the lives of students. Italso recommended that a high powered committee beset up in every State for selecting textbooks and forlaying down appropriate criteria, emphasising that “Nosingle textbook should be prescribed for any subjectof study, but a reasonable number which satisfy thestandards laid down, should be recommended, leavingthe choice to the schools concerned” (p 83).

The subsequent Education Commission (1964–66)continued to highlight the poor quality of schooleducation and commented on the low quality oftextbooks, owing to the lack of research related to theirpreparation and production, and the lack of interestof top ranking scholars in this area. It called for thedefinition of ‘national standards’ and recommendedcentralised textbook production to conform to those,starting at the national level and also supportingestablishment of bodies at the State level. In hindsight,we can see that the problematic role of the textbookcontinuing from the colonial education system, whichhas assumed a sacrosanct position in the school andthe classroom, marginalising the role of the curriculum

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and the syllabus, was further strengthened from thethen expectation that the ‘nationally produced’ textbookwould ‘far more precisely’ indicate the nationalstandards.

The definition of these (national) standards as well asthe organisation of a programme for their practicalimplementation will be greatly facilitated by theproduction of textbooks at the national level. Such bookscan indicate the expected standard of attainment far moreprecisely than any curricula or syllabi; and their practicaluse in schools is the surest method to raise standardsand make the teaching in schools in different parts ofthe country fairly comparable. In a subject like scienceand mathematics there is not much scope for localvariations and the adoption of common textbooks inall parts of the country is not only feasible but alsodesirable from several points of view… History isanother difficult subject to teach, especially from thepoint of view of social and national integration, andauthoritative well written books on the subject can beof immense help to all teachers. At present there is hardlyany common book which all the students in India read and isone of the reasons why our educational system contributes solittle to national integration (Section 9.19).

There are problems in the notion of ‘common’textbooks across the country, in either science or history,especially since now, forty years later, there is a morenuanced understanding of child development andpedagogy that shows that learning happens when the‘content’ of curricula is contextualised in the child’sexperiences and cultural knowledge, whether of plants,animals, people, or processes. However, at that time therecommendations seem to be guided more by the needto attract the best ‘national’ talent to contribute to theimprovement of school education. Indeed, theEducation Commission also saw this process ofproducing ‘national books’ as one that would help buildcapacities and “stimulate other centres into activity andespecially promote similar enterprise at the State levels”(Section 9.20). “Even in areas where national books are

available, independent attempts by States will stimulateeach other and the Centre itself ”. For this it hadrecommended “a separate agency, preferably functioningon an autonomous and commercial basis, in close liaisonwith the Education Department” (Section 9.21).

Moreover, its own dilemma in proposing‘nationalisation’ of textbooks is apparent when itattempts to somehow mitigate the problem ofuniformity and homogenisation and calls for amultiplicity of textbooks:

No useful purpose it served by having only onetextbook in a subject for a given class – this is almostinvariably the position under the existing programmesof nationalisation. It should be an important objectiveof policy to have at least three or four books in eachsubject for each class and leave it open to the teachersto choose the book best suited to the school. This isnecessary even if there were to be a common syllabusfor all schools. We have recommended, however, thatthere should be more than one approved syllabus andthat each school should be permitted to adopt thesyllabus best suited to its own condition (Section 9.21).

2.5 Supporting Decentralised Curriculum

Development

The past ambiguity in decentralising and diversifyingcurricula and textbooks reflects a perceived need forappropriate mechanisms to ensure quality, conformancewith common ‘standards of attainment’ as well as to abroad national democratic vision. It becomes necessaryto see how these concerns can be viewed and addressedin the present context. At the present juncture in time, onthe one hand, several States have already initiated theprocess of developing their own textbooks, and conducttheir own Board Examinations. In fact, the notions ofcurriculum and syllabus effectively lie collapsed in thetextbook, which is taken to be the only indicator of whatneeds to be ‘covered’ for the examination. What is actuallylearnt by children and how the curriculum helps shapetheir development has thus got obscured.

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This subversive role of the textbook has not onlydistorted its academic purpose but also allowed it tobe used as a means of political and ideologicalpropaganda by the State. In addition, private schoolsare increasingly opting for alternative textbooks byprivate publishers in classes that are relatively free frompressures of the Board Examination, and the marketis increasingly exercising its influence, looking for waysto circumvent the control of the Board. The concernsfor ensuring quality, broad ‘standards of performance’and avoiding subversion of democratic norms get evenmore amplified in this scenario.

The present programme for universalisation ofelementary education, namely the Sarva ShikshaAbhiyan, also calls for decentralisation of curriculumdevelopment to be done at the district level, highlightingthe need to build capacities of District Institute ofEducation and Training (DIETs) and other relatedorganisations. We endorse this need and recommendthat the NCERT and other national bodies mustconsciously promote building of capacities indecentralised curriculum development and textbookproduction, in the States and at the district level. Thearticulation of broad standards of performance couldbe undertaken as part of the present NationalCurricular Review.

It is also suggested that appropriate regulatorymechanisms be created by establishing an independentbody at the State level with a federal national structureto approve different curricular packages, which includetextbooks, teacher training and recruitment processes,assessment and examinations, etc. The nationalstructure may be answerable to the Central AdvisoryBoard of Education (CABE), and should produceprofessionally developed criteria and guidelines,

conduct documentation and review, and ensureappropriate consultation and sharing among the Statebodies. It must also ensure that the process of regulationis kept transparent and all reports are made public. TheState body must be constituted of persons withprofessional experience in education and also fromNGOs and State Commissions on women, SC/ST, etc.

We envisage that this State body will review andapprove all curricular packages developed and used indifferent districts, and share its reports and materialsat the National level. It must be ensured that this Statebody and the national structure must itself not haveany conflict of interest and must not itself be involvedin the development of curricular packages, includingproduction of textbooks, conduct of examinations, etc.In the light of this process, all textbooks, even thoseproduced by private publishers would be reviewed andapproved by the State bodies. Moreover, our groupstrongly recommends that the regulatory mechanismmust be professionally worked out to carefully avoidthe attendant distortions and problems that may ariseout of bureaucratic and political pressures, vestedinterests or even corrupt practices, within bodiesestablished to approve the curricular packages1.

3. MAPPING THE CONCEPTUAL FIELD:NOTIONS OF CURRICULUM, SYLLABUS

AND TEXTBOOK

3.1 The Existing Scenario

The notions of curriculum and syllabi as existing inthe three National Curricular Frameworks (NCFs) areclose to each other. The NCF 75 actually defines thecurriculum and syllabi. However, this notion ofcurriculum and syllabi does not include aims ofeducation; it rather sees the aims as guiding the

1 One member of the group disagrees with the recommendation of setting up such a national body.

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curriculum from outside. The other two documentsalso do not take up the task of defining but largelyfollow the same definition. All the NCFs emphasisethe concerns and issues but do not make a very clearconnection between the concerns, aims, and curricularcontent. The pedagogy and the view on knowledge alsoremain hazily defined. Thus, though the NCFs seemto have some form of definition for curriculum andsyllabus, the relative importance of elements within theform and their interconnections remain eitherunexplored or even entirely neglected. The rationalefor almost all prescriptions is left unstated.

Most of the state level curricular documents arepoor imitations of the NCFs and the emphasis is mainlyon the scheme of study—time and weightageallocation—and syllabi. Most of them do not even seethe larger picture of curriculum. Educational writingand discussion largely remains equivocal in the use ofthese terms. Even the most of innovative programmes,which have taken a much more flexible approach tocurriculum, do not seem to have seen the entire picture.They often amplify their chosen aspect of educationdisproportionately.

The view taken on learning is often articulated innational and state documents, and most fervently inthe NGO documents. The overall impression one getsin the national discourse on education is that a theoryof learning, even if defined loosely and not very clearly,is all that is needed to plan education in general andcurriculum in particular. There is hardly any mentionof a view taken on knowledge beyond what isnecessitated to articulate the chosen view of learning.

3.2 A Conceptual Framework and Operational

Definitions

As mentioned above, the term ‘curriculum’ is one ofthe most ambiguous terms in present-day educationaldiscourse in our country. It may be used to denote amere subject-wise list of topics to be taught in aparticular class on the one hand, and something thatencompasses “the total experience provided to thechildren in as well as out of school”2 on the other. Therecan be umpteen positions between these two ends ofthe spectrum and as many views of ‘curriculum’3. Thesituation seems to be somewhat similar in many othercountries. “Unfortunately”, writes Christopher Winch,discussion of what aught to be taught “is sometimesmade opaque by an either too wide or too narrowdefinition of what constitutes the curriculum. So, forinstance, we have heard it said – by a Governmentappointed Inspector of Education – that the curriculumis ‘everything that goes on in school’ which would makethe colour the school walls are painted a question ofcurriculum choice and bullying a part of curriculumcontent (see also Whitfield 1971). Conversely a definitionsuch as a ‘planned, sustained and regular learning, whichis taken seriously, which has a distinct and structuredcontent and which proceeds via some kind of stages oflearning’ (Wilson 1977) would make some activities whichchildren engage in at school but which, arguably, are nottaken seriously, e.g. woodwork, not part of thecurriculum. The key to understanding the question ofcurriculum choice is to visualise the relationship betweenthe curriculum and the aims of education. The curriculumis the plan for the implementation of educational aims.”4

2 Primary Education Curriculum, Government of Kerala. (Emphasis added.)3 Digantar, Activity Based Teaching in Kerala and its Achievements: A study of pedagogical interventions in DPEP, ,.2002.4 Christopher Winch, Key Concepts in Philosophy of Education, Routlrdge, London, UK

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In India, there is a tendency to take too wide adefinition of curriculum in much of recent literature.All the publications under DPEP, many innovativeNGOs, and recent discussions in curriculum seem tosay too often that everything that happens in the schoolis part of the curriculum. On the other hand, at practicallevel, syllabus, construed as a list of objectives andtopics in a particular subject, is often referred to ascurriculum. These two tendencies may lookcontradictory in the first glance—literature claimseverything to be curriculum and the planned/provisioned view covers an extremely narrow part ofthe school experience—but the very declaration thateverything is curriculum is a challenge to planning.Therefore, what is considered essential is planned, andrest of the ‘broad vision’ of curriculum is left tohappening by chance.

In an attempt to construct a meaningful notion ofcurriculum, it is important to note that in spite of alldifferences the main question that curriculum isconcerned with is ‘what sort of things we ought toteach in our educational institutions…. It is importantto note that the question is one concerning prescription(what ought to be the case), and not merely ofdescription (what actually is the case). And this questionis the question of curriculum choice.” [Winch] In thesame vein, the four fundamental questions that formthe basis of Ralf Tyler’s classic book Basic principles ofcurriculum and instruction still provide a good guide tomove in this direction:

1. What educational purposes should the schoolsseek to attain?

2. What educational experiences can be providedthat are likely to attain these purposes?

3. How can these educational experiences beeffectively organised?

4. How can we determine whether thesepurposes are being attained? (Tyler, 1949, 1)

In 1975, the Curriculum Committee that wrote ‘Thecurriculum for ten-year school: A framework’ definedwhat it meant by the term ‘curriculum’: “A curriculummay be regarded as the sum total of all the deliberatelyplanned set of educational experiences provided to thechild by the school. As such it is concerned with

(i) the general objectives of education at aparticular stage or class

(ii) subject-wise instructional objectives andcontent

(iii) courses of studies and time allocation(iv) teaching–learning experiences(v) instructional aids and materials(vi) evaluation of learning outcomes and feedback

to pupils, teachers and parents.”This definition seems to engage with the four

fundamental questions asked by Tyler, barring the factthat it is reluctant to address the first one of themsquarely. The definition, though talks of “the generalobjectives of education at a particular stage or class”,leaves the general aims of education to guide thecurricular efforts from outside. It would be difficult toimagine any curriculum in the absence of generaleducational aims; therefore, one might speculate,perhaps the committee considered the issue of aimsmore as a matter of policy than as a matter ofcurriculum. Therefore, it sees curriculum as more orless synonymous with syllabus (if one can use thesingular term ‘syllabus’ for a ‘set of all syllabi of schoolsubjects’).

There seems to be an ambiguity as to whether, as perthe definition, curriculum is ‘concerned’ with ‘theunderlying principles to decide’ or with ‘detaileddescriptions’ of what is listed in points (ii) to (vi). If it is

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the detailed description that is intended, then the definitionis clearly that of syllabus. And if propagated as‘curriculum’, it would limit choices that should be madeby the schools and teachers keeping in view the profile oftheir students. A curriculum, seen from a widerperspective, is different from a course of study; it providesa basis for a course of study rather than being itself acourse of study.

Another question that arises in connection to thisdefinition is that of justification. What are thejustifications for accepting stated curricular objectives,content to be taught, methods to be adopted, and soon? Justifications or basis for curricular choices are veryimportant. Almost all curricular choices admit analternative point of view; in fact, the very notion of achoice implies picking up one alternative from severalavailable ones. A random picking up can hardly be calleda choice. It merits calling a choice only if there aresharable grounds for the selection made. Thus,curricular choices need to be justified on commonlyacceptable grounds.Thus a fuller and usable definition of curriculum canbe: “Curriculum is, perhaps, best thought of as that set ofplanned activities which are designed to implement a particulareducational aim – set of such aims – in terms of the content ofwhat is to be taught and the knowledge, skills and attitudeswhich are to be deliberately fostered” (Winch) together withstatements of criteria for selection of content, and choices inmethods, materials and evaluation. (Stenhouse)

The six boxes shown here represent six broad andslightly overlapping areas of choices, their usual namesare indicated but their ‘content’ has not been suggested.The bullets (*) shown in the boxes mean that somethinghas to be written there, these boxes are just a convenientway to indicate groups of questions. If one takesdevelopment of ‘autonomy based on reason’ as anexample of a general aim of education, it can be writtennext to one of the bullets in the area demarcated for

aims. Similarly, when all the questions are appropriatelyanswered, keeping in mind the linkages and consistencybetween different answers, this structure would be anexample of a curriculum.

As understood here, a curriculum is neither adocument nor a sequence of experiences. It is a planof facilitating learning for the child. This plan startsfrom where the child is, enumerates all the aspects anddimensions of learning that are considered necessary,gives reasons why such and such learning is considerednecessary, and what educational aims it would serve.The plan also defines stage-specific objectives, whatcontent to teach, and how to organise it. It alsorecommends general principles of teaching methodsand evaluation and criteria for good teaching–learningmaterial. Such a plan, of course, is almost always set ina document or a set of documents and implementedthrough organised experiences for children underteachers’ guidance; but perhaps conceptually the planshould remain in focus, while the document remains acontingent reality and the course of experiences asimplementation of a plan.

What one needs to keep in mind is that all theseterms evolve historically and serve certain purposes ina discourse. They are part of attempts to evolve betterconceptual tools to reflect on practice and graduallyrefine it. Therefore, as it is possible to constructappropriate and very useful concepts, it is also possibleto construct unhelpful concepts and definitions thatblur the discourse rather than enlightening it. One needsto have no quarrel with any concept per se, but shouldcarefully consider its suitability and coherence with thepurpose, on the one hand, and acceptability in thegeneral discourse on education, on the other.

3.3 Detailing for Implementation

The curriculum, as defined here, is more of aconceptual structure for decision making rather than

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details of what is to be done in the classroom. Thestructure suggested above requires workable principlesand criteria in most of the slots and not detaileddescriptions or lists. For example, it demands ‘principles’on the basis of which content could be selected andorganised for students but does not require ‘selected andorganised content’ that is to be taught. However, workingin a classroom most definitely requires selected andorganised content and detailed ways of interacting withthe children and classroom organisation. One needs actualteaching learning material and not only the criteria onwhich it could be developed or chosen, which means thatfurther detailing on the basis of this curriculum would beneeded to complete the picture.

On the basis of ‘stage-specific objectives’ and‘principles of content selection and organisation’, a selectionof well-connected concepts, information, principles ofknowledge construction, validation criteria, skills, values,attitudes, etc. could be made and formed into an organisedbody of knowledge suitable for the particular stage forwhich it is being planned. Thus, a syllabus for a particularstage could be generated from a given/accepted curriculum.

It must be emphasised here that what is to beincluded and what is not to be included in the syllabuswill also be informed by the methods of teaching thatare going to be used, or in other words, decisions onmethods of teaching would have to be madesimultaneously with the choice of content. But then,there can also be occasions when it might seem to bedesirable that a particular topic should be taught (onthe basis of implication of objectives and/or principlesof content organisation) at a certain stage, andsubsequently one looks for selection of appropriateways of teaching it. If there is a situation where a topicX is seen as desirable to be taught at stage Y, but thereare no appropriate methods available to introduce it tothat age group of children, then perhaps the bettercourse of action would be to wait for development ofappropriate methods rather than insisting onintroducing the topic.

In a similar manner, actual teaching would requiredetails of methods, a variety of teaching–learningmaterial, and a suitable evaluation system. The newpicture would be somewhat like the diagram below:

Aims of education

Stage Specific objectives

Principles of content selection and organisation

Criteria for good methods

Criteria for good material

Principles of evaluation

CURRICULUM CORE

Details of syllabus

Recommendedclassroom practices

Textbooks and TLM

Evaluation scheme

CURRICULUM DETAILS

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The curriculum details provide the teacher withactual tools of classroom practices, while the curriculumcore provides a rationale, up to a certain extent, foradopting those practices. Thus, the classroom practicescan be connected with the larger goals of education. Itcould be plausibly argued that this conceptual structureenables the teacher to create a dynamic ‘discourse’between theory and practice, and between educationalideals and educational practices.

When a teacher starts working with children inclassrooms, he/she has some ‘content’ that he/shewants to teach them. They also have, at least in theirminds, some ‘methods’ of teaching. They also use somematerial, minimal or elaborate, and have some ideaabout what it would mean to ‘have learnt something’and what would be the appropriate indicators of thatlearning. In other words, they have a syllabus,appropriate methodology, a set of teaching–learningmaterial, and a system of evaluation. That is theminimum academic preparation to embark uponteaching.

However, that does not mean that each one ofthese components of classroom practices is welldefined and clear in the teacher’s mind. Very often, theonly thing a teacher has is the textbook. The textbookbecomes an embodiment of syllabus—all that is in ithas to be taught, and that is all that is to be taught. It becomesa methodological guide—has to be read and substantialportions memorised through repeated reading. It also becomesthe evaluation system—questions at the end of each chapterhave to be answered orally and in writing, reproducing the textfrom the book itself. Here the textbook is an embodimentof the syllabus and of all aspects of classroom practices.

But this undistinguished way of looking at thetextbook and teaching is totally unreflective. It becomesa very binding, routine, and mundane activity, whichhas very little to do with growth of children’s

understanding and their capabilities. All because theconceptual model that guides teachers’ practices isincapable of helping them to learn from their ownexperiences, to connect their activity of teaching tohuman life, and to take into consideration children’sexperiences. It is a necessary (only necessary, notsufficient) condition for the teachers to understand thenature and purpose of their activity to liberatethemselves and their students from the oppressivetyranny of the mundane routine imposed by such anunreflective use of textbooks. Then only can theybecome dynamic decision makers in the classroom andcan be able to engage not only with the textbook butalso with the children’s minds.

Understanding that the textbook is only a tool, aconvenient organisational mechanism to collecttogether at one place what the children are expected tolearn, and awareness of the conceptual differencebetween the syllabus and the textbook are the twoimportant conditions that enable the teacher to lookbeyond the textbook. The possibility of experiencesof children being considered within the classroom getsa little boost with this distinction. In turn, the possibilityof choice between the textbook and other experiences/resources encourages reflection on the choices madeand, eventually, on the possibility of an improvedtextbook itself. Similar arguments could be madeconcerning conceptual distinction of teaching methods,evaluation, and between textbook and other material.

The point being deliberated here is development ofreflective teaching practices is a necessary condition for learningfrom one’s own experience. Reflective practices necessarilyrequire theoretical models to organise experience intoknowledge that can be shared, publicly examined, andused in situations other than in which this knowledgearises. It can also be argued that there is no teacherwho does not have the ideas of syllabus, pedagogy,

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material, and evaluation. But there are very few whohave them well articulated, rigorously examined, andreasonably justified on the basis of more general andwidely shared principles and assumptions. Also, thereare very few teachers who have rigorously worked outimplications of the ideas held by them for classroompractices. The teachers are neither expected to makethese distinctions nor provided with any opportunityto do so. Introduction of theoretical models, of whichthere is a variety, is a potent way of engenderingreflective practices and encouraging autonomy of theteacher. The question is not what particular model doesone have; it is whether the model an educator has canbe shared with others and debated about.

However, linking classroom practices with syllabus,pedagogical choices, variety of teaching–learningmaterial, and evaluation system is just the first steptowards reflective practices. What is being taught, how,with what material, and how the learning shall beassessed can be explained and reflected in terms ofsyllabus, etc. But what forms the basis for the choicesmade in syllabus, pedagogical decisions, textbooks, etc.?We have seen that what we called curriculum shoulddetail the reasons for these choices. But those reasonsthemselves may require further explanations andgrounds for accepting them. Even at the cost ofreiteration, let us take an example to understand thisissue.

Suppose we want children at the upper primarylevel to notice, as part of their social sciencescurriculum, the difference in treatment meted out togirls and boys in their village. And we want it to be‘learnt’ through an active engagement with observingparents when they interact with their children andinterviewing children themselves. Suppose one asks theteacher: Why do you want the children to notice this differenceand then keep this information in mind?

Dialogue A

Answer : Because it is written in the syllabus, and shall formpart of the examination.Question: Why should it be part of the syllabus at all?Answer : So that the children can understand the disadvantagesgirls face in their bringing up and social living.Question: Why, as teachers, are we interested in whatdisadvantages girls face?Answer : Because this will become the basis of children’s furtherunderstanding of issues of social justice, equity, and their socio-economic reasons.Question: Why is this knowledge and understanding supposedto be of interest?Answer : Because it seems to be a reasonably effective way ofdeveloping sensitivity to issues of social justice, a commitment toequity and capability to act to correct the balance.

Of course, one can carry on the dialogue by furtherdemanding: Why should we bother about sensitivity to socialjustice, commitment to equity and capability to act in favour ofthese values? But this brief series of questions andanswers is enough to illustrate the points that need tobe made here. One, in order to justify a small piece ofcontent (it is only a way of elaborating, there can be nopiece of content disconnected from the whole bodyof knowledge) in syllabus one has to refer to broaderprinciples and values. These principles and valueswould point towards the kind of society considereddesirable and how one thinks human beings shouldlive. Looking from the other side, if education issupposed to contribute to actualisation of certain valuesin society, the curriculum framework would need tobring forth their connections to bear upon the selectionof content. Two, a teacher who is aware of theseconnections should be able to make better choicesabout what route to take for development of suchvalues and abilities.

It is possible to construct a similar dialogue aboutwhy the teacher chooses the observation and interview

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route to teach children this simple fact of differentialtreatment between boys and girls? Why does he/shenot consider it enough to simply read this ‘fact’ fromthe textbook? In such a dialogue, the teacher will haveto defend the choices by referring to assumptions/principles concerning human learning.

It seems reasonable to draw a conclusion that theprinciples of content selection, criteria for goodmethods, material, and evaluation that are formulatedfor curriculum are based on a large number ofassumptions, which one can perhaps call ‘foundationalassumptions’ for quick reference. It could be claimedthat the more aware the teachers, paper setters forexaminations, and textbook writers are of theseunderlying assumptions, the better equipped they wouldbe to keep the system consistent through suitablecurriculum, syllabus, material, evaluation, and classroompractices. Also, the educational decision makers wouldbe better prepared to reflect on their own practices,and therefore, better equipped to generate reliableprofessional knowledge. The system as a whole in sucha situation should be less hesitant to recommendflexibility and better equipped to use the flexibilityavailable. In short, it seems to be a necessary conditionfor promoting or enhancing the autonomy of theteacher; and a sure step towards sensitive engagementwith the child.

The set of foundational assumptions a curriculumframework uses needs to be internally consistent, asclearly articulated as possible, and acceptable to allstakeholders. If there is a workable agreement on acore set of such well-articulated principles/assumptions, it should give a firm ground for informeddebate and resolution of disputes about the content,methodology, etc. But the problem is that success in acomplete and consistent articulation of all theseassumptions always remains limited. One way of doing

a reasonably good job in this area is to carefully examinethe nature and connections of these foundationalassumptions. A tentative suggestion could be that onthe basis of this examination of their nature andconnections, the bulk of foundational assumptions canbe put into four slightly overlapping groups:

assumptions concerning human being andsociety or socio-political assumptions,epistemological assumptions,assumptions about learning, andassumptions concerning the child and itscontext.

Assumptions Concerning Human Being and

Society (Socio-political)

The values that are promoted through education, andthat guide all further curricular efforts, themselvesspring from the notions of a desirable society and ofhuman beings prevalent among the decision makers. Atypical foundational statement in this area could be:Education should aim at a pluralistic democratic society basedon justice, equity and freedom. Or a closely related socialvision could be autonomous collectives of autonomous humanbeings connected with each other in mutual appreciation andknowledge. These are just two examples. A curriculumframework makes many assumptions about what isvaluable in human life and how to live together, whichcould be called politico-ethical in nature.

This group of assumptions is perhaps the mostimportant one and needs clearer consensus of all theconcerned people. Also, though it allows for a great rangeof different articulations depending upon individualpreferences, it is the least tolerant to violation of the agreedupon principles. If we want a usable curriculumframework that can be debated meaningfully and thatpeople can identify with, then we need to state our basicassumptions/principles in this area clearly. The aims andobjectives are mostly, though not exclusively, derived fromor are simply rephrased versions of these assumptions.

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Epistemological Assumptions

In education, the only route permissible to realise thevalues and dreams a society cherishes is the path oflearning. If pluralistic society be a desirable goal, theonly help education can render is through developingunderstanding, making information available, andteaching critical appraisal of ideas. Thus, the fulcrumof all educational endeavour is knowledge in its widestsense—including understanding, ways of thinking,values, and skills. An educator has to assume thatknowing influences belief and action. If he/she deniesthis assumption, the very foundation of his/hereducational effort would vanish.

The issues of selection of knowledge to teach, theirordering, integrated versus subject-wise curricula, theinformation versus knowledge versus abilities debate,etc. heavily rely on the epistemological assumptionsdifferent participants in these debates make. One veryimportant reason why not much headway is made inresolving educational debates is that the participantsnever get to the fundamental assumptions made. Thecurricular content selection and organisation heavilydepends on the epistemological assumptions togetherwith the assumptions about learning.Assumptions about Learning

During the last ten years or so, due to DPEP and severalother large-scale programmes, classroom practices andorganisation have come into sharper focus. All thepositively interpreted loaded expressions like ‘activity-based teaching’, ‘child-centred teaching’, ‘joyfullearning’, etc. make use of a host of assumptions abouthow children learn. Actually, this has been the focusof educational debates in the last decade almost totallybypassing the desirable society and epistemologicalconsiderations. A clear articulation of the assumptionsabout the child and human learning in general shouldbe able to inform the classroom practices better and

also show the limitations that psychology alone asfoundation of curriculum has. Since this is a well-accepted part of curriculum, we need no furtherarguments to establish the need for articulation ofassumptions about learning.Assumptions Concerning Children and their

Context

All curricular material ultimately is for the teacher tobe able to meaningfully engage with the child. Thatmakes it necessary to understand how the child seesthe world. The child’s worldview, in turn, depends onthe life experiences he/she has and the immediatesocio-cultural and physical environment he/she livesin. This area involves assumptions regarding the child’snature (here there is a slight overlap with theassumptions about learning) and his/her social context.The social context has its own influence on the ideasabout desirable society and how human beings areunderstood. Thus, this set of assumptions has anothersignificant overlap with assumptions concerning humanbeings and society. Its main significance is in bringingthe immediate socio-cultural aspect in—in other words,contexualisation of assumptions regarding desirablesociety and psychology of learning.

If one takes this last discussion into consideration,the graphical representation of curriculum would beas shown on the top on the next page.Such a structure facilitates understanding of the terms‘curriculum framework’, ‘curriculum’, ‘syllabus’,textbooks and other teaching learning material, andclassroom practices in a connected manner. To aneducationist who is used to dealing with such concepts,these simple structures perhaps do not offer much,but to people who are grappling with educationaldecision making at various levels, it can offer help as atool to organise different elements of education andsee connections between them. It also allows one to

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understand the influence of these notions on each otherand, therefore, provides a theoretical background forthe debate on flexibility in curriculum, multiplicity oftextbooks, and decentralisation.

At this stage, it would be useful to recapitulate whathas been said and look at various emerging definitionsand relationships. It has been assumed that the centralproblem a curriculum addresses is that of helping thechild to progress from her present level of understandingand capabilities to a desired level in areas that are coherentwith the aims of education accepted in the child’s society.In other words, a curriculum is a planned/pre-figuredcoordination between the aims of education and the child’scapabilities; therefore, it has to have a well-thought-outdirection, reliable routes of progress, and ample flexibilityto accommodate unpredictable directions taken by thechild’s progress and interests, and still retain its directionand broadly planned routes.

In discussion of the problems arising out of thisenterprise and attempts to find solutions to these

problems, a framework of ideas and concepts has beendeveloped that has three levels of articulation andjustification. In the graphical representation of thisframework, the left-most block contains assumptionsregarding humans, society, knowledge, learning, child, andhis/her context. All this put together could be called‘foundations of curriculum’. The middle block, whichcontains aims of education, curricular objectives,principles of selection and organisation of content, criteriafor methods, material and evaluation, could be termed as‘the curriculum’. And, the right-most block containsdetailed syllabi, details of methods, textbooks and material,and evaluation system, and could be called ‘curriculardetails’.Curriculum Framework: It is a plan that interpretseducational aims, vis-à-vis both individual and society,to arrive at an understanding of the kinds of learningexperiences schools must provide to children.(Paraphrased from a short document circulated inSteering Committee, titled ‘Reviewing the Curriculum

The Graphical Representation of Curriculum Framework

Stage Specific objectives

Principles of content selection and organisation

Criteria for good methods

Criteria for good material

Principles of evaluation

CURRICULUM CORE

Aims of education

Details of syllabus

Recommendedclassroom practices

Textbooks and TLM

Evaluation scheme

CURRICULUMDETAILS

Assumptions concerning humanbeings and society

Epistemological Assumptions

Assumptions about learning

Assumed understanding of thechild and her context

FOUNDATIONS OFCURRICULUM

CURRICULUM FRAMEWORK

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2004: Some notes for consideration’.) This plan shouldinclude the foundational assumptions and basis ofchoice for experiences.Curriculum: As mentioned earlier in this paper,curriculum is, perhaps, best thought of as that set of plannedactivities which are designed to implement a particular educationalaim —a set of such aims—in terms of the content of what isto be taught and the knowledge, skills, and attitudes that are tobe deliberately fostered, together with statements of criteria forselection of content, and choices in methods, materials, andevaluation. In reference to the framework above, it wouldmean the ‘curriculum core’ and ‘syllabus’ put together.Syllabus: It refers to the content of what is to be taughtand the knowledge, skills, and attitudes that are to bedeliberately fostered, together with stage-specificobjectives.

In education of a country, very few things apartfrom the broad principles like justice, equity, democracy,etc. can be finally decided. Therefore, a terrain map ofcurriculum framework, curriculum, and syllabus canonly highlight the significance of various issues,establish connections between different components,highlight the significance of questions raised, andprovide hints at different kinds of answers. In short, aconceptual framework can provide a theoretical toolfor investigation and coherent debate only.

The component of the suggested conceptualframework that is called ‘foundations of curriculum’here is by nature a perpetually contested one. What is ahuman being? What kind of society do we want? Howshall we determine how much progress have we madein the desired direction? What helps or hinders inmoving in the desired direction? All these and similarquestions admit no final answers. Similarly, there arecontesting theories in epistemology and psychology oflearning, and various interpretations of contextualdifferences and understanding of children. Therefore,

the foundational assumptions have to be articulatedwith great care and sufficient generality to provide spacefor all legitimate variations. This area is a matter ofconstant debate, study, and discourse. Stating theassumptions here provides a general direction to thedebate and can keep the national discourse coherentand intelligible.

One can afford to be slightly more specific in themiddle area, curriculum core, where the general notionsof human values, stated assumptions in foundationalarea (in spite of being contested), Indian Constitution,Human Rights declarations, etc. provide a firmerground for statement of aims and general concerns.The choice of epistemology and psychology we happento make allow enunciation of general principles ofcontent selection and methods, etc. Therefore, itbecomes possible to articulate certain general principlesin this area at the central and state levels, with roomfor interpretations and additions at the district level.

The third component, curricular details, needs tobe worked out in concrete terms and in detail as thename suggests. In this block, the syllabus perhaps canbe worked out at the state/district level, with provisionsfor district and school level reorganisation. Themethods, materials and evaluation, in the givenparameters, should be the choices made at the schoollevel.

4. GROUP’S ESSENTIAL POSITION

4.1 The Approach

The National Curriculum Framework documents havealways advocated flexibility within a framework ofprinciples. Other important concerns expressed in thethree curricular documents are national integrity,democratic values, and standards of education. In thiscontext, the National Focus Group (NFG) onCurriculum, Syllabus, and Textbooks recommends acurriculum framework that

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facilitates schools and teachers to makedecisions about choice of content, pedagogy,teaching–learning material, evaluation, etc. atthe school level; in other words, a nationalcurriculum framework for increased autonomyof the school;provides help to the teacher in becoming areflective practitioner who learns from her ownexperiences;emphasises learning with understanding andlearning to learn;helps children develop their ownunderstanding based on their day-to-dayexperiences; andcan be used as a tool for informed decisionmaking by schools and the teachers, and byschool systems including various teachereducation and administration structures.

4.2 Position on Elements of Curriculum

4.2.1 The General Aims of Education

I. Aims in Policies and Committees/Commissions/ReportsAlmost all policy and curricular documents oneducation in India contain some form of aims ofeducation. These are nearly always preceded by anaccount of national concerns and priorities, and therole perceived for education in nation building. Since1947, the key policy documents on education broughtout are by the University Education Commission (UEC)1948-49, the Secondary Education Commission (SEC)1952-53, the Education Commission (REC) 1964-66,Ishwarbahai Patel Review Committee (IPRC) 1970,National Policy on Education (NPE) 1986, ReviewCommittee on the National Policy on Education(NPERC) 1990, Learning Without Burden (LWB) 1993;also three curricular frameworks have been preparedin 1975, 1988, and 2000.

Perusal of the sections on aims of education in each ofthese documents is revealing. For instance, the UEC states:

We must have a conception of the social order forwhich we are educating our youth…our educationalsystem must find its guiding principle in the aims ofthe social order for which it prepares, in the nature ofthe civilization it hopes to build….The outline of social philosophy which should governall our institutions, educational as well as economicaland political, are indicated in the preamble of ourConstitution, ‘We the people of India, having resolvedto constitute India into a sovereign, democraticRepublic and to secure to all its citizens: Justice, social,economic and political; Liberty of thought, expression,belief, faith and worship; Equality of status,opportunity; and to promote among all, Fraternityassuring the dignity of the individual and unity of thenation…We are engaged in a quest for democracythrough the realisation of justice, liberty, equality andfraternity.’

Under each of these ideas, the Commission introducesa clusters of aims.

The SEC also bases its rationale for aims on thePreamble (and also indicates that school educationpolicy should have preceded university policy!):India has recently achieved its political freedom, andhas, after careful consideration, decided to transformitself into a secular, democratic republic. This meansthat the educational system must make its contributionto the development of habits, attitudes and qualitiesof character, which will enable its citizens to bearworthily the responsibilities of democratic citizenshipand to counteract all those fissiparous tendencies whichhinder the emergence of a broad, national and secularoutlook…. It is clear that we have to formulate ouraims with reference to these broad categories—thetraining of character to fit the students to participatecreatively as citizens in the emerging democratic socialorder, the improvement of their practical andvocational efficiency so that they may play a part in

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building up the economic prosperity of the country,and the development of their literary, artistic and culturalinterests, which are necessary for the self-expression andfor the full development of the human personality.Both these documents are significant in that they

were the first policy documents on university andsecondary education after independence. Both recognisethe need for renewal and re-organisation in the lightof the changed political situation in India. Both thesedocuments, in their own ways, pay great attention toaims of education, their rationale, the sources uponwhich they are to be based, and the broad categoriesin which they are to be placed. Perhaps this was due tothe socio-political energy prevalent in the country thatwas evolving its first ever free Constitution, perhapsthe memory of the struggles that led to this historicmoment was still fresh in the minds of the educationpolicy makers.

The REC of 1964-66, which offered the fineststatement on how to achieve equality, the key aim ofeducation, by adopting the common school system, is,paradoxically, also the first policy document to blurthe clarity of educational aims. The IPRC dismembersaims from school education, looking at it from anentirely different angle: “Having considered the NCERTFramework and keeping in mind the ConstitutionalDirective contained in Article 45 which enjoins that‘the State shall provide free and compulsory educationfor all children until they complete the age of 14 years’we feel that the objectives of the compulsory stage ofschool education must necessarily be distinct from theobjectives of education beyond this stage.”

By 1986, the NPE offered more angles to the aims.Invoking the Constitution, it introduces a notion ofcommon core that would include history of freedom

struggle, constitutional obligations, content essential tonurture national identity including value of India’scommon cultural heritage, egalitarianism, democracy,secularism, equality of sexes, protection ofenvironment, removal of social barriers, small familynorm, scientific temper, and equality of educationalopportunity. Apart from listing disparate things in ajumbled way, it is important to note that the thrust onself-development that the first two policies were soconscious of, that got re-defined as a ‘resource’ by 1966,now does not even find mention in the aims. On theone hand, it states that it is committed to equality (forexample, women’s equality, vowing to redress“accumulated distortions of the past”); on the otherhand, it offers a non-formal centre for the less privileged,where children engaged in child labour can learn (ifthey are not asleep through exhaustion), a couple ofhours after labour, some alphabet and numbers in thename of non-formal education. Thus in policydocuments and commission reports, there seems tobe a gradual de-emphasis on articulation of aims.II. Aims in the Documents on Curriculum FrameworksAll three national curriculum frameworks want to domuch of the work that a carefully formulated statementof aims should be doing through variously articulatedconcerns. The concerns are certainly important, andmight even be of immense help in articulatingeducational aims in a society, but they cannot be readilyused as aims in educational decision making.

Again, all these documents talk of objectives ofeducation (the Curriculum for Ten-year School, 1975,talks of stage-wise general objectives, and not forgeneral objectives of education) and produce a long,somewhat disparate, list to serve for such objectives.The list form of aims though is easier to agree upon5

5 John White, New aims for a new national Curriculum, in The National Curriculum Beyond 2000: the QCA and the aims of Education. Institute of Education,University of London, 1998.

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usually ends up being self-contradictory and is foundincapable of providing a rationale for furthereducational decision making6. Such lists cannot helppedagogically because the listed principles are not broadenough and do not carry the logical force of anargument. Socio-politically, they fail to reflect aspirationsof all people.III. Need of and Criteria for Good Educational AimsSocio-political Standpoint: The aims reflectcollective aspirations of all sections of the society andhelp develop capability to define the kind of social lifethat is seen as desirable, which should hold good forall in a democracy, and pursue it. That implies certainvalues. The Constitution is an embodiment of thosevalues as they are understood today. Education has adual job—understanding and respecting those valuesand Constitution, and also going beyond anddeveloping a critical appreciation of them. Therefore,though the aims have to be in agreement with theConstitution, they cannot solely be justified on the basisof it. Similarly, the international documents like theDeclaration of Human Rights and Child RightsConventions, though rooted in a broad vision ofhumanity, (1) cannot sufficiently reflect a specific visionof a particular society, (2) are often used as coercivetools to selectively embarrass or inflict punishment bythe international agencies and powers, and (3) againneed to be critically reflected upon. Therefore,justification of aims of education has to be rooted inthe vision of humanity in the society at the particulartime of their articulation.Pedagogical Standpoint: Educational aims are whatmake varied activities in schools and other educationalinstitutions part of a pattern and distinguishable as‘educational’ in character. An educational aim helps theteacher connect his present activity to a cherished future

outcome without making it instrumental at present, and,therefore, give direction without divorcing from thepresent. Dewey puts it very succinctly: “The aim as aforeseen end gives direction to the activity; it is not anidle view of a mere spectator, but influences the stepstaken to reach the end. The foresight functions in threeways. In the first place, it involves careful observationof the given conditions to see what are the meansavailable for reaching the end, and to discover thehindrances in the way.” In case of a school this meansa careful study of what children at age, say, of 6 yearsare capable of and what socio-cultural conditionsprevail. “In the second place”, Dewey goes on, “itsuggests the proper order or sequence in the use ofmeans. It facilitates an economical selection andarrangement.” For schools, that means making decisionson what to teach and in which sequence. “In the thirdplace, it makes choice of alternatives possible. If wecan predict the outcome of acting this way or that, wecan then compare the value of the two courses ofaction; we can pass judgment upon their relativedesirability.” That would give us the criteria for choice.In this regards Dewey declares, “[T]he net conclusionis that acting with an aim is all one with actingintelligently.” (John Dewey, Democracy and Education,Chapter 8, Section 1, “The nature of an aim”)IV. What We ProposeThe articulation of aims needs to serve the two above-mentioned purposes of aligning the whole educationaleffort to social aspirations and to provide direction toeach individual activity in that total educational effort.We have discussed the ground for aims in the sectionon basic assumptions, and since this document is onlyto serve as a position paper, here the aims are statedonly as principles and no elaborate justifications and/or explanations are provided.

6 Rohit Dhankar, On Curriculum Framework, Seminar, issue 493, September 2000. New Delhi.

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Two-part Articulation

A: Values and ideals education should promote insociety, as well as help the learner develop a rationalcommitment to. They are:

• Equality—of status and opportunity• Freedom—thought, expression, belief, faith and

worship, and as a value in life• Autonomy of mind—as independence of

thinking, based on reason• Autonomy of action—freedom to chose, ability

and freedom to decide, and ability and freedomto act

• Care and respect for others—going beyondrespecting their own freedom and autonomy,concern about well-being and sensitivity to allmembers of the society

• Justice—social, economic, and politicalEducation should help learners to not only cherish thesevalues for themselves but also to respect equality,freedom, autonomy, etc. of others.B: Capabilities of individual human beings thatare likely to help in development of values and idealsarticulated in Section A.

• Knowledge base: There should be a sufficientlybroad knowledge base encompassing all crucialareas of socio-political life, and all basic waysof investigation and validation of knowledge.

• Sensitivity to others: Sensitivity to others’ well-being and feelings, coupled with knowledge,should form the basis of rational commitmentto values. ‘Others’ should include all life forms.

• Rational/critical attitude: Critical rationality is theonly way to autonomy of thought and action.

• Learning to learn: The future needs ofdevelopment of knowledge, reason, sensitivity,and skills cannot be determined in advance.Therefore, ability to learn as new needs arise

in new situations is necessary to functionautonomously in a democratic society.

• Work and ability to participate in economic processes:Choices in life and ability to participate in thedemocratic processes depend on ability tocontribute to the society in its variousfunctions.

• Aesthetic appreciation/creation: Appreciation ofbeauty and art forms are an integral part ofhuman life.

4.2.2 Stage-wise General Objectives of Education

The stage-wise objectives need to be arrived at bykeeping in mind the general aims of education, thedevelopmental stages of children, nature of knowledgein general and curricular subject areas in particular, andthe child’s socio-political context. They cannot be onlyin the form of subject-specific knowledge. Objectiveshere would be more of stage-specific interpretationof the general aims of education and, therefore, haveto be articulated in terms of capabilities, values,attitudes, and knowledge base in general. The objectivesalso have to be specific enough to be used as guidelinesfor content selection and organisation.

Articulation of curricular objectives should alsotake cue from the statement of aims and could bewritten in two parts for each stage. The stages shouldbe defined as:

1. Primary-I: 2 years of schooling, roughly 5–7years of age

2. Primary-II: 3–5 years of schooling, roughly8–11 years of age

3. Upper Primary: 6–8 years of schooling, 12–14years of age

4. Secondary: 9–10 years schooling, 15–16 yearsof age

5. Higher Secondary: 11–12 years of schooling,17–18 years of age

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There is no need for year-wise division ofobjectives; stage-wise achievement of objectives wouldbe enough. The syllabus can be further divided, if needbe. Though a stage-wise syllabus would give the schooland teachers much more freedom and flexibility.

Part one at each stage should interpret thecorresponding part of the general aims, say, democraticvalues, and what form they would take at the end ofprimary, upper primary, and so on. Part two shouldstate the levels of learning expected to be reached atthat stage. These levels should be attainments expectedof the part one of the concerned stage.

Curricular objectives for all but the last stage, i.e.,senior higher secondary, can be formulated at the stateand district level and each school can reorganise themas per needs of their children and teachers.4.2.3 Principles of Content Selection and

Organisation

One of the constant demands faced in curriculumplanning is to create new subjects, add new topics, andinclude material favoured by various interest groups.This is a healthy trend in a democracy as it expressespublic expectations from education and sees curriculumplanning as a contested area open for negotiation. Butthis demand can become problematic in the absenceof well-defined criteria for content selection andorganisation of content in subject areas, and that is thesituation we are facing today. Secondly, the problemof curricular load is substantially the problem of ajumbled heap of information in absence of organisingprinciples and conceptual frameworks for investigationand understanding. Both these problems are debatedat present more from the pedagogical point of view(the child cannot learn so much at such and such astage) and from standards’ point of view (if ourchildren do not learn this much, we as a nation will

always remain backward). The third perspective ofsocial relevance surfaces only in the context of someissues.

The social vision and epistemologicalconsiderations have a lot of potential for arbitrating inthis debate and that potential remains unexplored. Thecriteria for selection and organisation of content shouldtake into consideration these aspects as well and shouldbe able to suggest solutions to the above-mentionedproblems.

School curricula are usually organised in varioussubjects. The subjects themselves have their basis intraditions and disciplinary knowledge. Though thesubject-based organisation of curriculum is largelyaccepted, this is also criticised for putting knowledgein watertight compartments, and thereby, fragmentisingit. This alluded ‘fragmentisation’ of knowledge is saidto be alien to the child’s way of looking at the worldand, therefore, is unsuitable for developing a properunderstanding of the world in which the child lives.Another related problem is concerned with adequatebasis for introduction of new subjects or reorganisationof the existing subject areas.

The issues of what should be included in thecurriculum and proper sequencing of what is selectedfor inclusion are constantly debated. Many considerthe lack of clarity on criteria for making choices onthese issues as the main cause of increasing curricularload. In brief, the issues of basis of subject areas,inclusion of subject areas in curriculum, selection ofcontent in each subject area and its sequencing, integratedcurriculum, theme-based teaching, relative weightagegiven to subject areas in terms of teaching time andmarks allocation, and curricular load are all related tothe criteria for selection and organisation of thecurricular knowledge.

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It is suggested here that the problem of selectionand organisation of curricular knowledge should beconsidered from at least four different perspectives;those of aims of education, epistemological, child’s learningand mental development, and the child’s context. A briefconsideration of each of these perspectives in turnwould be useful here.Aims of EducationThe issue of what students should know is a directcorollary of what education is expected to achieve forthem. In other words ‘what is worth teaching’ is aderivative of ‘what aims are worth pursuing’ in education;any justification of what is being chosen for teachingwill necessarily involve a reference to the aims the choicein question will help achieve. The aims of education, inturn, are guided by the desirable socio-political (socio-political here is meant to include cultural and economicas well) conditions in a society. Aims of educationarticulate (a) the capabilities and values of individualsthat are thought to be necessary for the desirable society,and (b) key principles of the socio-political vision ofthe society that education is supposed to help realise.Since, generally there is a set of aims rather than a singleaim of education, it also implies that the content shouldbe selected to do justice to the entire set of aims.Therefore, comprehensiveness and balance areimportant factors in curricular choices. From thisperspective, curriculum should select experiences thatbuild a knowledge base, capabilities to think rationally,ability to learn, capacity to work and to participate ineconomic processes, sensitivity to others, and aestheticappreciation—suitable for the development of arational commitment to the democratic values ofequality, freedom, autonomy of mind, autonomy ofaction, care and respect for others, and justice.

Articulation of a criteria at this level of generality,however, cannot provide sufficient guidance at a

concrete level. For example, if we take ‘developmentof capability to think rationally’, on unpacking, it pointsto abilities to gather and make sense of information,consideration from as many perspectives as possible,fair amount of proficiency in logical reasoning, abilityto spot inconsistency and incoherence, and an attitudeto avoid inconsistency. But what specific information,experiences, and principles (knowledge) are likely tohelp develop these capabilities is still an unansweredquestion. In order to bring this principle to bear uponthe actual task of curriculum development, a host ofconceptual tools (information, principles, assumptions)are required. The preceding considerations will providepart of that set of tools.Epistemological ConsiderationsThe most influential factor in selection and organisationof curricular knowledge is the assumed nature ofknowledge itself. Knowledge seen as a bundle ofinformation and a finished product to be ‘transferred’to the child’s mind immediately demands a set ofpedagogically important assumptions. One, it demandspostulation of an ultimate store-house of humanknowledge (all the disciplines and encyclopaedias puttogether). The boundaries of disciplines acquire sanctitybased on authority of tradition and masters who createdthe knowledge enshrined in the disciplines. Textbooksbecome packages of knowledge specially designed tobe transferred in specified time periods, one after theother. In absence of any higher order principles, theincreased flow of information becomes daunting, asall that has to find place in the child’s mind in a limitedtime. Together with a perfect recipe for mentalconfusion, attempts to capture all that informationbecomes a source of burden, and causes scope fordeveloping arguments as to pushing up new fancysubjects on the one hand and rigid adherence to theold disciplines on the other.

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Knowledge seen as a finished product to betransferred into the child’s mind also encouragesconception of the learner as a passive receptor. Furtheron, it encourages the thinking that knowledge can beacquired without understanding it, and it can beunderstood without developing the ability to use/applyit. Therefore, knowledge is reduced to grammaticallycorrect use of certain terms and is shorn ofunderstanding, reflection, and use in construction ofmeaning.

Alternatively, we can conceive of knowledge asexperience organised, mainly through language, intopatterns of thought (or structures of concepts), thuscreating meaning, which in turn helps in understandingthe world we live in. Human beings, over time, haveevolved both a wealth of knowledge in this sense, andalso, a repertoire of ways of thinking and constructingmore knowledge. Each new entrant in the field ofhuman thought has to re-create a significant part ofthis wealth in her own mind. This is important (a) as abasis for further thinking and for acting appropriatelyin this world, and (b) as examples to learn to participatein the very process of knowledge creation, constructingmeaning, and human action. This conception ofknowledge allows us to respect the body of knowledgecreated together with its principles of organisation andcreation, and, still, allows significant flexibility to lookfor alternative and better-suited principles.

The process of acquisition of knowledge becomesthe process of active creation by the learner. Thetextbook becomes a tool to provide examples, pointers,programmes to be perused, and introduction ofprinciples. The increased information flow becomesan object of interest in the light of general principlesto accommodate in the existing body of knowledge,and also becomes a challenge to necessitate re-evaluation of principles and reorganise the existing

body to make a better sense of the new information.Therefore, the increased flow of information becomesilluminating rather than daunting. The burden of non-comprehension can be substantially reduced, andinformed choices regarding what to include and whatnot to become possible with this altered conceptionof knowledge as the basis.

From this perspective, grasp on the ways ofcreation of knowledge and its validation, organisation,and bringing to bear upon decision making and actionbecome more important in order to achieve aims ofeducation than mastering a vast repertoire ofinformation. It points to a very dynamic engagementwith the world through observing, feeling, reflecting,acting, and sharing as a way of knowledge acquisition.

For the curricular purposes, all capabilities that areimportant to achieve the aims of education can beorganised as follows:

1. Basic capabilities: These are capabilities thatform the basis of all learning and meaningfulparticipation and experiences in social life.a. Language: It provides the basis for all human

meaning making and, therefore, createspossibilities of development ofunderstanding and knowledge. It providesthe ability to symbolise to codify allknowledge, but claims none of it exclusivelyof its own. Development of language fora child is synonymous with developmentof understanding, identity, and largely,particularly after the initial stages, capabilityto relate with others. A substantial part ofpractical aspect of performing arts andliterature is very closely related to the basisof all meaning making.

b. Relationships: It could be called socialdevelopment with some justification, but

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relating to the natural world and aspectsof ones own personality, though might bedependent on social relationships, alsohave a very special flavour of their own.This is the area of constructing self-identity, relating it with others, emotionalrichness, sensitivity, and values.

c. Capabilities for work and action: These aremore like a cluster of wide range ofabilities drawing upon physical skills,values, and understanding. The practicalaspect of fine arts should become asignificant part of this area.

Forms of understandingOrganisation of knowledge for curricular purposes isextremely important, as we have argued above.Knowledge is creation of human mind. It necessarilyinvolves experience, concept formation, ways ofinvestigation and ways of validation. In other wordsall this means there has to be some kind of experiencebase for knowledge. That experience has to be madeintelligible and sharable with others through language,which involves use of concepts. If one finds any gapesin the given knowledge base new questions arise. Suchquestions cannot be answered randomly, to findsatisfactory answers one has to investigate, therefore,gradual building of knowledge presupposes ways ofinvestigation. All knowledge claims cannot beconsidered valid automatically, they have to be testedsome how, therefore, one needs some validationprocedures. Thus our earlier claim that knowledgeformation requires: experience, concept formation,investigation methods, and validation procedures.

If we want children to be rationally autonomous,perhaps it would be necessary for them to have a graspon the process of knowledge formation as well as aninitial knowledge base. So far our education system has

been emphasising only the ‘knowledge base’ somewhatinadequately understood as ‘collection of information’.If we want to emphasise the process of knowledgeformation and principles of organisation then perhapsthrough curriculum we would give as wide anexperience to our children as possible. The selectionand organisation of curricular content then becomes avery important question for the development ofindependence of thought and action, and fordevelopment of creativity.

A relevant question here would be: can there be arational criteria for such a selection? Or it always hasto be a random somewhat arbitrary choice? To answerthis question one has to see if it is possible to organisehuman knowledge on the basis of the four criteria wehave mentioned above, namely: experience, concepts,investigation procedures, and validation procedures. Inother word: does mathematics involves the same kindsof experiences, concepts, methods and validation ashistory does? Are there any fundamental differencesin the concepts and validation procedures used insciences on the one hand and ethics on the other?

The answer seems to be yes, there are fundamentaldifferences. But there could be more than oneorganisational schemes based on these criteria. Whatwe are proposing is that a curriculum has to presupposesome such scheme or other, without that there shall beno basis for selection and organisation of content. Itis a matter of research and serious study to developsuch a scheme of organisation, no totally satisfactoryscheme is readily available at present, but it is certainlypossible to formulate a working hypothesis. We arepresenting one such scheme below as an example. Thisscheme organises human knowledge in to seven basicforms of understanding. What is meant by ‘basic’ formsof understanding is that each form of understandingmentioned has some speciality of its own in terms of

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its concepts, validation procedures and/or investigationmethods that can not be completely reduced to otherforms. Also, it mean that such differences are significantfor development of independence of thought and waysof knowing the world. In addition, it implies that ashuman understanding stands today, the proposedscheme encompasses, by no means all, but most of it.Therefore it could be used as a tool for curriculardecision making, at least till we have a better schemeavailable to us.

A caution before we present the said scheme: theforms of understanding as explained below are notuniversity disciplines, nor are they school subjects. They

are just the basic ways of looking at the world andorganising experience. We shall return to this pointagain after a brief presentation of the scheme.

This scheme of organisation of knowledgeconsiders seven basic forms of understanding, namely:mathematics, natural sciences, social sciences, history,aesthetic, ethics, and philosophy. It is given in a tabularform fo the sake of brevity and clarity. This wholescheme draws heavily on works of P.H. Hirst1 andR.F. Dearden2 but also modifies their basic ideas verysignificantly. The idea is just to illustrate the point, thereis not enough space available here to do justice to theissue.

Forms of understanding3

S.No. Form Content & concepts Truth Criteria Investigation Certainty/

Precision

methodology

1. Mathematics Highly abstract Logical Step by step Absolute.concepts, clear deduction logical Very high inconceptual deduction. precision.relationships on the basis

of axioms,definitions,acceptedtheorems.

2. Natural Natural Mathematical Involves Fallibility enters,Sciences phenomena, criteria used, hypothesis is a strength of

description, but alone formulation, science ratherexplanation, remain logical derivation than its weakness.

1 Liberal education and the nature of knowledge, in Education and Development of Reason, edited by RF Dearden, PH Hirst and R.S. Peters, Routledge andKegan Paul, London.2 The philosophy of primary education, RF Dearden, Routledge and Kegan Paul, London.3 Rohit Dhankar, An epistemological perspective on school curriculum, Paper presented in the Ninth East-West Philosophers’ Conference, Hawaii University,Honolulu, 2005.

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causal relations. inadequate, of predictions, Certain enoughConcepts describe empirical devising ways to act, notof explain observation of empirical enough toexperience, (of nature) is verification of forgetempirically necessary. predictions. revision. grounded. Revision of Highly precise.

hypothesis.Progresseson falsifiability.

3. Social Sciences Social phenomena, Methods used In addition Lot of roomdescription, in science, to science, for revise-ability,explanation, ‘observation’ investigation guess,causal relations of human into human uncertain trendsyes, but idealsand ‘reasons’. and patterns.‘reasons’ choice laden The subject Precision‘rationalisations’ of actions. matter can appropriatehuman mind enter. not be treated to human world.Concepts describe as ‘objects’of explain experience, of enquiry.empirically grounded. The veryHuman purposes observationand welfare becomes may changeimportant, the reality.understanding tochangethe reality.

4. History The past happenings, Use the Construction Probable truthconstruction of methods of of a narrative at the most.narrative based social science, on the basis Important thingon evidence. but of evidence, is coherence

comparative the ‘facts’ of the narrative,worth, themselves and itscross-validation themselves richness inin a community have to meaning forof investigators, established, present day.

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and procedural creation ofnorms. facts is

inseparablefrom buildingof narrative.Projectinginto other remoteminds, times..Interpretation interms of humanpurposes,projecting onesideas into‘construction ofothers’ ideas.

5. Ethics Values (moral), Accepted Weighing pros Difficult toactions, reasons, knowledge, and cons, decide.concepts, values, logic. Open choices,relations. human contested claims.

well-being,logic.

6. Aesthetics Values (aesthetic), Accepted Creation More openreasons, concepts, knowledge, and not choices,relations. values, investigation very difficult

human is the to decide.well-being, issue.aesthetic Creationexperience, has nologic. predefined

methods.

7. Philosophy All the above. All of the All of the Depends ofabove above the issue under

investigation.

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This kind of classification can be used to maintaina balance in constructing school subjects and organisinglearning experiences for the children in the school.Perhaps it will increase the chances of giving adequateimportance all ways of making sense of experience.These forms of understanding should not be confusedwith the university disciplines, though all the disciplinesdo use the methods of one or more of these formsof understanding.Child’s Mental DevelopmentSelection as well as organisation of content is closelylinked to the stage of mental development of the childand pedagogy assumed. Possibility of creating the child’sinterest, level of abstraction and generalisation that achild can handle, etc. all form important considerations.Creation or re-creation of all knowledge needs anexperience base, language abilities, association with otherhuman beings, and interaction with the natural world.At the time when the child enters school, this commonbase for all knowledge is very well developed, butentirely in an intuitive manner. At the first stage in school,then, there may be a greater need for building on thisbase in a more conscious and engaged manner. Thedivision into subjects here may not be very importantbeyond recognising place for language and mathematicsin organising activities (even of that distinction the childneed not be conscious; it would be enough for theteacher to plan in a conscious manner). The rest of theschool experience can be totally integrated, if richenough in interaction, with the natural and socialenvironment. Understanding, doing and aestheticappreciation all could easily be made parts of thisengagement.

One important point in this connection is that thecurriculum and the teachers should be aware of thefuture development of the forms of knowledge, andthe learners’ experiences should be organised to developbasis for all areas. The learner neither needs to know

nor could be expected to be aware that the experiencesare chosen with forms of knowledge in mind.At the primary level there may not be enoughconceptual basis for any clear demarcation of sciencesand social sciences, but it could be possible to introduceways of looking at the social and natural world in theform of activities, ways of data collection, and makingsense out of them.

Upper primary may be the place for emergenceof more clearly defined subject areas, taking intoconsideration the above-mentioned forms ofknowledge. Even here, ethical understanding andphilosophy (in the general sense of recognising largerpatterns across subject areas, precision in understandingconcepts, and looking for justifications for accepting/rejecting claims) should run more across the curriculumthan being separate subjects. However, a space fordialogical explorations into social issues and knowledgeat this stage could go a long way in encouraging rationalthinking.

By the time children reach the secondary educationstage, they acquire sufficient knowledge base,experience, language abilities, and maturity to engagewith forms of knowledge in their full sense: concepts,structure of body of knowledge, investigationmethods, and validation procedures. Therefore, thesubjects could be more closely linked with the basicforms as listed above and the disciplines as they arerecognised in higher education today.

The issues of adequate representation of all formsof knowledge and emphasis on similarities, specialcharacteristics, and widest possible interconnectionsbetween them become important when the subjectareas are more clearly defined.The Child’s ContextThe child’s language abilities, knowledge and skill base,and values and attitude all develop in the process ofliving in his/her natural and social context. Any

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possibility of either being interested in or engaging withnew ideas and ways of thinking has to be mediated byher existing experience and knowledge base. Thecurricular objectives in general as well as objectives ofdifferent subject areas within the curriculum wouldcertainly admit a great flexibility in choice of whatparticular concepts, principles, and information shouldbe selected to achieve them. This choice itself has todepend on the concrete examples and experiences thatcould be made available to the learner. Therefore, theselection of topics within subjects and how they shouldbe taught has to be very much context dependent.A suggested checklist for selection and organisationof content based on the above discussion:

• Agreement with objectives, and guided byaims

• Agreement with national expectations oflearning

• Epistemic priority to understand the natureof the discipline

• Conceptual connections—priority, sequencing

• Investigation methodology and validationprocedures—teaching as well as organisationof subject area

• Interconnections between disciplines andrelationship to life

• Psychologically appropriate

• Useful in further learning—broadestconnections

• Connection with local life and with the rest ofthe world

• Possible contribution to development ofimagination

Criteria should be defined at the national level, structure at thestate/district, and selection of individual items at district/school/classroom level.

4.2.4 Teaching-learning Methods and

Classroom Practices

Classroom, or any other surrounding where learnersare undergoing experiences that help them achieve thedesired curricular objectives, is the place where the coreof educational activity takes place. As such, the choiceof pedagogy is essentially linked with all the aspectsthat have been discussed so far, i.e., aims of education,curricular objectives, scheme of studies, stage ofschooling, knowledge areas, and contents. In addition,it is to be linked to the assumptions about learningbased on theoretical and experiential underpinnings,and the social, economic, and age-specific context ofthe learner. The choice of textbooks and otherteaching–learning materials, to be discussed in thefollowing section, is essentially linked to the choice ofmethods and classroom processes. The basic principlesthat should guide the choice of classroom practicescould be outlined as follows.Understanding that Children Construct their Own KnowledgeEvery individual including children is capable ofconstructing, and does construct, his/her ownknowledge. The responsibility of the school andteachers is to enable this process through appropriatemeans and processes, and with adequate direction andsupport. There are several ways of construction ofknowledge, and there could be several ways ofgeneralising as well as validating the knowledgeconstructed. Once children are taken through variousprocesses of knowledge generation and validation, theynot only develop an understanding at that point oftime or relating to that particular content area, but alsothe capacity to build their own understanding in variousother circumstances and situations.Importance of Experiences in LearningExperience has an important place in the process ofknowledge construction or understanding of a concept.

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Experience is perhaps the most important step in theprocess of discovery through which individuals canbe made to feel, reflect, and arrive at ideas. Anunderstanding of the experiential base of children isalso important in the choice of pedagogy. Relating towhat they have already experienced helps in the processof reflection. It is a continuous challenge for teachersto look for suitable ways of ‘creating’ and ‘drawingupon’ experiences. New experiences could be organisedfor children in several ways. It could be through aprocess of observing something happen (e.g.,observing the process of plant germination in a realsituation, or observing different stages of milk collectionand processing and packaging of different kinds ofproducts in a dairy farm); participating in an exerciseinvolving body and mind (planning a role-play arounda theme and presenting that); or going through themental process of reflecting on something the childhas experienced (e.g., dialogue on gender-differentiatedpractices in the family and society, or participating in amental game of numbers). Lived experiences, either inthe form of exercises that help to relate to life outsidethe school or in terms of created experiences in theschool, have value at all stages of education; only thenature, kind, and complexity of the experiences thatthe school wants to plan for children need to changeover the years.Active Engagement of Learners is Important for Constructionof KnowledgeIn order to construct their own knowledge, learnersneed to be actively engaged. Active engagement refersto engagement of body and mind. A number ofphysical activities involve engagement of the mind, butsome physical activities, especially if those do not requireany simultaneous mental application, could also be asun-engaging and mechanical (therefore, mentallypassive) as copying something from the notebook or

blackboard is, or as the process of rote-memorizationis. The repetitive acts of copying and rote-memorizationdo not lead to conceptual understanding and analyticalcapacities. Playing sports is a good example ofsimultaneous physical and mental engagement, whichinvolves anticipation, reflection, response, andcoordination.

Learners can be actively engaged only when theyare motivated to learn. The very choice of work needsto be such that it encourages learners to participate andapply themselves. Active engagement involves enquiry,exploration, questioning, debate, application, andreflection leading to theory building and creation ofideas/positions. This implies that it would be importantto create opportunities for questioning, enquiry, debate,reflection, and arriving at concepts or creating new ideas.An element of challenge is critical for the process ofactive engagement and learning various concepts, skills,and positions through the process. What is challengingfor a particular age group may become easy anduninteresting for another age group, and may be remoteand un-interesting for still another stage. Therefore,challenge has to be understood in the context ofcapabilities of children at that stage. Creating or drawingupon experience helps in arriving at abstract conceptionsfor all age groups of children but the nature ofexperience as well as level of abstractions would vary.Language is the key to organizing experiences and hencea proper coordination between the kind of experienceand the level of language developed would beimportant in early years of schooling.Learners’ AgeLearner’s age and cognitive levels are important aspectsthat influence the choice of methods and processes.The same topic can be taught at several levels throughvaried processes having different levels of complexitiesand experiences.

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Individual Child’s SpecificityEvery individual is unique and therefore the way he/she constructs his/her own knowledge is also uniqueto some extent. Some children might find a particularkind of process challenging and enjoyable while othersmight not enjoy it as much, and the level of theirengagement could vary. Although it is difficult torespond to each child’s preferences in everything ateacher does, it would help to have a broadunderstanding of the patterns of their thinking andresponse processes. If the teacher remains flexible andinvolves children in planning her class work, individualunique abilities of children will bring tremendousrichness to classroom processes.

The specificity of a child could also be understoodin terms of certain other specific requirements. Forinstance, children with minor hearing or speechlimitations would require special attention and somespecial devices from the teachers’ side. The specificitycould be in terms of personality. What would help is arealisation that the needs of individuals could vary, andsensitivity towards that is very important in learning. Italso implies that teachers need to address diverse needsin the same classroom, and should be prepared forthat.Variety of Situations and Multiplicity of Methods Importantfor Creating Diverse ExperiencesDifferent kinds of situations provide different kindsof learning experiences to students. Exposure to avariety of learning situations such as self-work, smallgroup work, and whole class (or large group) work helpsin widening the experiential base. It also helps indeveloping diverse perspectives. Therefore, it becomesimportant to have opportunities for self-learning, peerlearning, and learning through interacting with teachers.The experience of working in diverse situations alsohelps in developing the skills for, and realizing the

necessity of, inter-dependence and cooperation. Theexperiences of self-learning could help in developingcapability for independent action.

Similarly, there could be several ways of enquiryand exploration. If classroom questioning and dialoguecould be suitable for something, collecting informationthrough observation followed by processing, analysis,and theory building would be more appropriate forsomething else. A place for work with hands wouldalso be important in many cases. Similarly, it is alsoimportant for learners to be familiar with differentforms of expressions, verbal and non-verbal, as wellas ideas, and therefore teachers need to create spacefor opportunities that allow these to happen. It couldhelp to include certain theme-based activities to createopportunities for application of various skills,information, and knowledge to understand differentaspects of a topic/concept leading to an understandingand appreciation of the connectedness.

The established principle of ‘from known tounknown’ is helpful but needs to be interpreted fromthe learner’s perspective. At times, the adult’sperspective of ‘known’ is different from a child orlearner’s perspective of ‘known’. In this context, itwould be important to understand that the process oflearning is not linear and hence the progression alsoneeds to be non-linear. The relationship between theknown and the unknown or between the local and theglobal is not linear; it is rather complex and web-like intexture. Therefore, a simplistic interpretation can bemisleading. The definition of ‘known’ changes withplace, area, age, and needs to be treated accordingly.

Not only the nature of subject or knowledge areaand age of the learners but also a number of otherobjective criteria, including location of the school (rural,urban, remote, and so on) the environment (close toforest, close to water sources, and so on), and the

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neighbourhood (mixed social group, exclusive castegroup, economic and livelihood bases, and so on)determine the particular choice and the combinationof the methods. For instance, rural schools could bemore resourceful because of their proximity to a varietyof flora and fauna to create certain real-life experiencesfor understanding the environment. The worldviewof learners depends on the kind of place they live inand are exposed to, and teachers would need to beaware of that in order to be able to draw upon them.Again, for instance, the issue of water scarcity is a dailyway of life in desert areas and has a differentsignificance as compared to water abundant areas.

Time management is a critical aspect of classroomprocess. Considering that teachers operate under a formof schooling with structures of grade and periods,they also need to decide about the issue of timeallocation. The school system largely follows a rigidsystem of division of ‘periods’ usually of about30–50 minutes duration. The rationale of such decisionis not clear as different kinds of activities have differentkinds of time requirements depending on their natureand purpose. While certain activities or processes canbe easily divided without harming the process ofreflection and learning, certain others might require acontinuous process. The important factors determiningthe choice should be the facilitation of the desiredlearning process and the ability of teachers to manageit in the desired manner. Children’s attention spandepends on the nature of the process and how it isbeing managed.

Also important is the issue of classroom organization.Although grade-wise organization is the usual practice,the potential for organizing groups of children of differentage and level for certain activities could also be considered.A diverse mix of learners with varied learning experiencesand levels helps in enabling a process of peer learning,which is not possible in a homogenous group.

The Implications of Aims for Classrooms PracticesThe various aims of education articulated earlier haveimplications for choices being made for classroompractices. The entire organization of the classroom andlearning experiences needs to be such that they promotethe same ethos, values, and principles. For instance,the aims of promoting equity, democracy, freedom, andplurality through education have to be reflected in allaspects of pedagogy including the method, the teacher–student relationship, and the kind and nature of learningexperiences. Learners need to experience what equityentails, what democracy is, how it functions, and whatit means to respect plurality in their classrooms. Forinstance, to provide a simple example, it would bedifficult to promote equity and democracy through aclassroom where teachers do not allow children to askquestions, where the teacher does not make extra effortto make a relatively silent child speak and participate,and where varying opinions are not encouraged to bevoiced and debated, and so on. In other words,democracy or equality is not taught only by coveringthese as knowledge areas but have to be made part ofthe regular classroom process. The same principlewould apply to other areas also. Certain specificactivities could be chosen to break the existingstereotypes in the society, e.g., encouraging girls to playfootball or do cycling in those parts where such activitiesare not common at all. A conscious effort for preparingchildren for action in real life would also be valuable.The Socio-economic Context and Identity of the LearnerThe socio-economic context of the learner hassignificance for classroom practices. For instance, theeconomic background of the learners has implicationsfor their health, nutrition level, and also their physicalappearance. This could affect their concentration,energy level, and image based on their physicalappearance, and all this has implications for their level

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of engagement and sense of belonging to the class.The teacher should be responsible for making the learnerfeel comfortable and acceptable in the class, which isone of the first requirements for learning to happen.Similarly, religion or caste forms part of the identityand self-image of most, including young children. Thesex of a child too is part of the identity. Social as wellas gender relations have power connotations andtherefore implications for the learner’s self-image,expectations from self, peer relations and also theteacher–child relations. The teacher needs to be awareof these and the impact that these factors have on thechild’s relations and learning, and have devices thatwould help facilitate a classroom where each childbelongs and feels interested in learning.

What is required is an understanding of these issuesand practices, and sensitivity in dealing with the variousneeds of learners. For instance, if girls are usually notforthcoming in taking initiatives on their own, itbecomes important for teachers to create moreopportunities for them to speak and expressthemselves. Similarly, if a dalit child in an upper-casteconcentrated classroom feels marginalised, teachersneed to give greater attention to him/her. In certaincircumstances, the issues of gender or caste or any otheraspect relating to identity or society can be discusseddirectly, and sensitively, to initiate a process ofintrospection and reflection.

Considering that many of our schools are nowgetting a good number of students who are first-generation ‘school students’ and therefore do not comefrom a background where the culture of formalschooling exists, it would be important to understandits implications for the pedagogy. Teachers need to besensitive to the fact that such children are morevulnerable and, therefore, could be irregular or less-attentive for a variety of reasons: the need to help

parents in work, high incidence of illness of self orothers at home, and so on. In their early years ofschooling, home language could be different from themain language of instruction and has implications forthe teaching–learning approach.

Diverse cultural practices should also be looked atas resources. An understanding of these practices wouldhelp teachers not only in understanding how to relateto the learners’ perspective of the social and physicalworld around them, but also in building diverseperspectives and in developing a respect for plurality.An Enabling Teacher–Child RelationshipEven if it means reiterating the obvious, it is importantto highlight the criticality of an enabling teacher–childrelationship in the process of schooling and learning.The process of learning requires an uninhibitedparticipation and engagement of learners in a processthat is largely guided and facilitated by teachers.Teachers’ expectations from students has proved to bean important factor in determining their motivation tolearn, and consequently the pace and level of learning.However, the conception of a student being ‘bright’or ‘weak’ has a direct association with the learner’smotivation, and affects his/her interest level. Thesenotions also often have caste and gender connotations.Teachers need to realize that each individual has thepotential to learn and they need to understand how totranslate this potential into reality. Therefore, it isimportant for teachers to develop an affectionate andequal kind of relationship with students, irrespectiveof their background and specificities.The Role of and Space for Parents and CommunityWhile school is a structured space for guided learning,the process of constructing knowledge is a continuousone, which goes on even outside the school. Providingsome space to community in the classroom processesas part of the curricular plan could help in developing

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greater coordination and mutual appreciation. Parentsor community members could be seen as resourcepersons for exposure to certain ideas and conceptsand could be requested to share some of theirexperiences with students. For instance, a potter couldshare his/her skill, machines, and important aspects ofhis/her work, while a banker could share his/herknowledge about the process of banking as well asthe essential features of banking systems in a particularcontext. The choice would depend on particularcurricular plan and the kind of expertise that is availableand accessible. What is needed is active involvementof parents in the process of learning. The relationshipwould help in sharing the pedagogy and the contentand thereby in maintaining the continuity.

The choice of desirable methods and practicesdepends to a large extent on the teacher–student ratio.The national and international experiences have clearlyshown that a ratio higher than 1:30 is not desirable atany stage of school education. The KothariCommission report had also recommended this ratioway back in 1968. The need for adequate andappropriate teacher training coupled with continuoussupport and facilitation would also be critical forcreating an enabling environment and generating newideas.4.2.5 Teaching-learning Material and Textbooks

Textbook-dominated Classroom PracticesThe present day classroom practices are, in almost allschools of the country, totally dominated by textbooks.All premises of flexibility of the curriculum and syllabusand freedom of the teacher are completely forgottenby the time an educational plan reaches the classroom.The teacher is seen as either incompetent or unwillingor both, the school is seen as devoid of all learningmaterial, and the environment is seen as of no use inthe child’s learning. The textbook emerges as the single

solution to all these problems. It is sought to collect allthe knowledge that a child is supposed acquire at agiven stage or class and is planned so that the childnever needs to look beyond it. Thus ‘teaching thetextbook’ becomes the whole of education.

As a result of this undue importance given to thetextbook, it has acquired an aura of supremacy and astandard format. It has to be completed from coverto cover in a strict sequence, has developed a languageof its own that is difficult to comprehend, and is ladenwith dense concepts. (The recent attempts in certainstates to tackle this problem have led to writing rathervacuous textbooks with very little conceptual contentto understand.) It has become a symbol of authoritydifficult to ignore or disobey.Moving from Textbook to Teaching–learning MaterialIn this paper, we have been talking of a curriculumframework that enables schools and teacher to makechoices and move towards greater autonomy. Such amovement towards school autonomy is seen in apositive light by all major policy and curriculumdocuments. It has also been well recognised that thechoices at the level of school and teacher could bemade possible only within an accepted framework ofbasic principles. We have talked about these principlesin connection with the general aims of education(nationally accepted), stage-specific objectives (acceptedstate and district level in agreement with the nationallevel standards for the final stage of school education),and selection of content (at district and school level, inguidance of, perhaps, a state-level syllabus). When wecome to decisions regarding methods of teaching, paceof learning, material, and concrete examples to be used,we reach the level of school and the classroom. Theseare concrete decisions that can be made only for specificclassrooms and children, as the actual learning happensonly in the child’s mind and depends totally on what

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has been learnt earlier. Therefore, the reinterpretationof the content, methods, and materials are completelywithin the sphere of practical decisions to be made bythe teacher.

Clearly, in the light of this argument, what is neededis not a single textbook but a package of teaching–learning material that could be used to engage the childin active learning. At an early stage, it may containconcrete objects that help formation of concepts (i.e.,shapes, counting objects, etc.), equipment to helpobservation, and charts and cards to illustrate, play with,and so on. At a later stage of school education, it couldmean a variety of books on the relevant issues. Thetextbook as part of this package becomes one tool toengage the child in learning. The teacher in classroompractices can use a variety of activities, concrete learningmaterial, as well as textbooks.

What is to be learnt is planned as per the objectivesand the syllabus; what is to be evaluated is decided onthe basis of stage-specific objectives. There have beenseveral successful initiatives both in state-run schoolsystems and the NGOs where a package of teaching–learning materials is used and the textbook is either notused at all or used only as one of the materials available.Nalli-kali in Karnataka government schools, Mirambikaas one experimental school in a city like Delhi, Schoolsrun by the two NGOs, Digantar and Bodh in Rajasthan,and a few experimental schools supported by CARE-India in Hardoi district of Uttar Pradesh are somesuch examples.

The textbook itself, as part of such a package, willhave to change both in form and function. A textbookmay not necessarily cover the entire syllabus of oneclass/stage and it may not necessarily be for the wholeyear. Any good textbook should lead the child to interactwith the environment, peers, other people, etc. ratherthan be self-contained. It should function as a guide toconstruct understanding through active engagement with

text, ideas, things, environment, and people rather than‘transferring knowledge as a finished product’.Context and the Teaching Learning MaterialA package of teaching–learning material that relateswith the child cannot be developed only with the child’scontext in mind. No single package, however well andprofessionally designed, can address all the contextualsituations in a country as large as India. Therefore, alarge number of packages should be developed at stateand district levels with adequate provision for clusterand school-level modifications and supplementarymaterials.

In addition to squarely contextualising theeducational processes, the production of TLM packageat local levels will also increase avenues for teacherparticipation at a hitherto unprecedented large scale.This should significantly enhance the quality of local-level educational discourse, and is likely to improveupon the ownership of material and methods by theteachers.Multiplicity of Teaching Learning MaterialFurther, there is no reason why each district or blockhas to have only one TLM package. Availability of anumber of alternative TLM packages, all of approvedquality, would certainly increase the choice of theteachers. Such packages could be developed andpublished by private publishers. Each school or teachershould be able to choose the package of her liking,given that she is committed to achieve the requiredlearning levels and all available packages are of provenquality. Freedom to choose methods and materials islikely to enhance the teacher’s self-image andresponsibility.Process of Development of Teaching Learning Materials IncludingTextbooksState-run institutions alone cannot develop a largeumber of TLM packages and involvement of privatepublishers would become inevitable. If a large number

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of TLM packages are to be made available all overthe country involving both private and state bodies, itwould be important to develop clearly outlinedmechanisms of quality control including theestablishment of some standards for the very processof development. The government institutions likeDIETs should lead the way in developing andestablishing such standards. For example, trialling oftextbooks and other TLM in a certain number ofschools and for a certain time period can be mademandatory for any TLM package that is to be sold inthe open market or implemented in a large number ofschools. Another such condition could be theparticipation of practicing teachers in the developmentprocess. The DIETs and other government agenciescan take lead in fine-tuning and establishing such norms.4.2.6 Evaluation

Assessment and Evaluation of the Learner in the SchoolEvaluation, every bit of it—the research, the

implementation, the training of evaluators, the

evaluation manuals and workshops, the huge buildings

full of people devoted to inventing new and even more

foul evaluation techniques—in other words, the whole

antiquated evaluation process, should as speedily as

possible be hurled lock, stock and barrel out of the

windows of our educational system in just the same

way as the chamber pots were emptied in eighteenth

century London, the period and the contents are

identical…. Evaluation has been one of the most

important forces in the gradual degeneration of all

school education over the last thirty years: evaluation

with its craze for more and more objectivity in marking,

with its endless desire to ensure that children fill their

tender minds with numerous snippets of supremely

useless information (Who built the Suez Canal? Where

is the sun on November 19th? Who was Hare and

what do you know about his apparatus?) has reduced

education to a kind of gigantic and crazy quiz

programme, where the winners get a free ticket to heaven

via the IAS and the second-rankers a ticket to purgatory

via the IITs and top executive posts; the others, without

ranks, can walk—but neither to heaven nor to purgatory.

– David Horsburgh

The above quote brings out the havoc that thepresent system of evaluation creates. The learners arethought of, it could be argued, as being clean slates.The teacher imparts knowledge to pupils, leading themfrom darkness to light. Many of the trained teacherswould have been familiar with the views of variouseducation Commissions as a part of their training inTeacher College, but need frequent reminders of theaims and purpose of education. Most of the teacherslive in some fear of inspectorial visits and examinationperformance should their pupils fail to reproduce thecorrect facts on being examined. Records of inspectors’visits to schools reveal that drill and repetitioncomprised the main teaching techniques. The repetitionof factual content completely dominates othersignificant learning elements such as demonstrating,observation, articulation, reflection, sharing, and analysis.The fact that this was not considered desirable wasbrought out clearly in the Yash Pal Committee Report.The report ‘Learning Without Burden’ notes that thepublic examinations at the end of classes X and XIIshould be reviewed with a view to ensure replacementof the prevailing text-based and ‘quiz-type’ questioningby concept-based questioning. This single reform, itstates, is sufficient to improve the quality of learningand save children from the tyranny of rotememorisation.

To this situation is added the view of the rulingclasses and the planners, as is seen in therecommendations of the Viswa Bharati AmendmentBill document, which in fact follows the suggestions

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of the World Bank that has laid down that for thedeveloping countries, specifically the low-incomecountries including India, “the development of upperlevels of formal education will be selective and carefullyplanned, taking into account the limited absorptivecapacity of the modern sector for labour, and the needsof both the public and private sectors for managerialand technical skills to meet the needs of increasinglysophisticated economies will have priority.”7

It is necessary to do some soul-searching as to whythere are concerns about ‘falling standards’ and ‘highfailure rates’ among our school going children. Is it nota reflection of the failings of the system of curriculum,syllabus, textbooks, and the teaching–learningapproaches we now follow? It is to address theseconcerns that the approach is further discussed.The Purpose of AssessmentEvaluation is a relative term. In education, it is alwaysassociated with objectives and implementation. By itself,it is a process that determines the course of action andrecommends changes for the better of the individual,society, nation, and mankind. If we consider educationas preparation for a meaningful life, the process ofevaluation followed now, which measures and assessesa very limited range of faculties of mind, is highlyinadequate and fails to give a true picture of anindividual’s abilities or progress towards aims ofeducation.

The first consideration is that there is no need tohave a similarity in the evaluation procedures whetherin university or primary schools. The evaluation has tobe formulated and stated in advance by the teacherand should include all techniques of assessment. Nextis that the assessment is a process of collecting,analysing, and interpreting evidence to judge the extent

of students’ learning, not just the quality of students’achievement, in different domains of learning for thepurpose of improving performance and not makinga variety of decisions on the levels of learning.

The purpose of assessment is necessarily to improvethe teaching–learning process and materials, and be ableto review the objectives that have been identified fordifferent stages of school education. Also, assessmentis meant to gauge the degree to which objectives areachieved and capabilities of the learners are developed,and not just to know how many snippets of facts havebeen memorised. A tailor-made uniform testmeasuring and assessing the memory and evenunderstanding of the mind of the learner is obsoleteand outdated. In the modern times, where creativity,innovativeness, and the development of the entirepersonality are the hallmarks, we need to redefine andsearch for new ways of evaluation and feedback.

Lastly, the need for assessment is to give a meaningfulreport for interschool transfer of the learner, certificateof completion of a course, and periodic reports to theguardians, employers, and community about the qualityand level of the learners’ progress. It is not a means toencourage competition, and if one is looking for qualityattainment then segregating children and injecting a senseof inferiority into them is not the way.The Assessment of the LearnerIn view of generating a meaningful report on qualityand level of individual learner’s progress, it is necessaryto assess each child’s learning. In addition to the learner’sachievement levels, this should also encompass herattitude, interest, and ability to learn independently. Tounderstand all this, one, of course, has to change thenature of classroom evaluation so that it is based onthe very experiences that the learner goes through during

7 Education Sector Policy Paper April 1980, p.87.

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learning. The very process of learning is assessed, anddecisions are made on the quality and nature of eachlearner without comparison, classification, orcategorization into slow and fast learners. Competencyattained or not attained type of judgments or givingonly marks or grades based on single observations arenot desirable. Observation, especially self-observation,is a powerful tool where a teacher learns a lot aboutothers. Maintaining a daily diary based on observationhelps in continuous and comprehensive evaluation. Anextraction from the diary of a teacher for a weekmentions, “Kiran enjoyed his work. He took an instant likingto the books that were informative and brief. He says that helikes simple and clear language. In noting down facts, he goes forshort answers. He says that it helps him understand things easily.He favours a practical approach.”

Similarly, methods of keeping records of the child’swork, a systematic collection of the ways the learninghas improved and grown, as seen in the writing, materialproduced, and ideas articulated should be included ina statement reporting about the child along with themarks if that is felt to be necessary.The Use and Nature of ExaminationsIn our view, the purpose of examination must be anevaluation of well-defined and sensible achievementlevels at all stages, and not the test of meaninglesstransient memory.8 Revamping the examination methodultimately is the first and most important step of anymeaningful educational change. It needs to be clearlyrealized that examination determines what becomesof any content and method in practical terms. As longas it stresses on simple recall and the exact repetitionof the content as stated in the textbook, all innovationswill get frustrated by it.

For a subject based on the objectives outlined atthe outset, the examination method must mean an

evaluation of not just the achievement levels in the skillsand abilities mentioned, but the processes of thinkingthat the learner uses and whether she knows where theinformation could be found, how it could be used,and also how to analyse/evaluate and generateinformation. The best way to do this is the open-booktype examination, which emphasises the application ofthe child’s learning competencies related to thinking andexperimenting, involves statistical methods, and isconducted by the teachers themselves. Such an efforthas been successfully demonstrated by various smallinitiatives including the Hoshangabad Science TeachingProject (HSTP). But change in the examination methodsis not an easy task, not because of any inherentproblems of devising alternate methods, but becauseof its political implications. It is a great wonder thatexamination reforms were allowed by the MadhyaPradesh government for the HSTP. The experience inBombay Municipal schools and the Khirodaexperiment shows that both these innovative effortsultimately floundered because the authorities did notallow examination reforms.

Since examinations are supposed to provide theinterface, either with higher education or employment,any change at each stage is linked to what happens atthe next stage. As such, a change in the examinationmethod can be effected only if the total educationalprocess is considered as a whole—the IIT entranceexamination, the medical entrance examinations, andthe PET and PMT examinations of the states are,perhaps, a great stumbling block for any examinationreform. A wilful decision by the government to effecta total change in examination is the first and mostimportant step for concerned people to get togetherto suggest various models for trial, feedback, and finalacceptance. It will be necessary to change such entrance

8 Teaching of Science Report and Recommendations of the National Seminar on Science Teaching Held at Bhopal, Nov. 15-17, 1985 ibid.

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examinations in order to make sensible changes inschool-level examination. And until that is done, and awill to do so exists, only cosmetic educational changesshall come through, no matter how many ‘new’ policiesof education are formulated.Comprehensive Continuous Assessment—its Processes andImplicationsThe present attempts at Continuous Comprehensiveevaluation, in which the percentage of marks is basedon tests, project work, and assignments, are left to theteacher. The marks given are added to the year-endexamination or the external examination held by theBoard at the end of classes 5, 8, 10, and 12. Based onthese, at the end of 10 and 12 years, the learner isgiven certification of completion of studies. In orderto make the model of continuous comprehensiveevaluation effective, there has to be a collectiveunderstanding among all concerned–child, teacher,parent, institutions of higher education and employer—about what is being evaluated.

Some suggestions to improve upon the system:

• Strive for excellence in all aspects of learning,especially in the preparation of materials,correction of work, monitoring students’progress, and responding to enquiries by thelearners.

• The role of the assessment is to gauge theprogress that the learner and teacher have madetowards achieving the aims that have been setand appraising how this could be done better.Opportunity for revision and improvement ofperformance should constantly be availablewithout exams and evaluation being used as athreat to study. Deduction of marks cannot bean alternative to motivating learners.

• The learning experience itself must be evaluatedand not merely its outcomes. Learners are happyto comment on the totality of their experience,and this information can be used to modifythe learning system as a whole. The learner mustbe able to assess her learning experiences bothindividually and as a part of a group.

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