Curriculum development need and importance (B.Ed. Notes)

Curriculum development need and importance is a topic that comes under the paper Knowledge and Curriculum for B.Ed. second year. We really hope this page helps you in preperation for your exams.

Meaning and concept of curriculum development

Curriculum development in its word meaning stands for the development of the curriculum.

1. Rogers and Taylor:-

Curriculum development describes all the ways in which teaching or training organization plans and guides learning. This learning can take place in groups or with individual learners. It can take place inside or outside the classroom. It can take place in an institutional setting like school, college, training center, or in a village or a field. It is central to the teaching-learning process.

1. Curriculum development is a process involving activities like

• conceptualizing the curriculum,
• selecting and organizing the content, material and learning experiences
• suggesting the method and ways of providing these experiences
• Evaluating the learning outcomes in terms of attainment of desired educational objectives.

What is curriculum

In simple words

A curriculum refers to a defined and prescribed course of studies, which students must fulfill in order to pass a certain level of education.

Some influential definitions combining various elements to describe curriculum are as follows

•  John Kerr:- According to John Kerr, a curriculum is planned and guided by the school, whether it is carried on in groups, individually inside or outside the school.
• The curriculum is a total learning experience provided by the school. It includes the content of courses (the syllabus), the method employed (strategies) and other aspects like norms and values, which relate to the way schools are organized.
• Thus a curriculum is neither development nor a sequence of experiences. It is a plan for facilitating learning for students.
• This plan starts with where the child is. It enumerates all the aspects and dimensions of learning that are considered necessary. It gives a reason why such learning is considered necessary and what educational aims it would serve.

In a nutshell,

• the curriculum is a means followed by the teachers and students for achieving the set goals and the aims or objectives of education being provided in the school.
• Curriculum, in every sense, is supposed to be used for all experiences. These may be curricular or co-curricular, imparted by the school for the realization of the stipulated aims and objectives of the school education.

Need and importance of curriculum development (or construction)

• Curriculum development is a purposeful activity.
• It is undertaken to design or redesign for the realization of certain specific educational objectives.
• The curriculum is the heart of the student’s college/school experience.
• The curriculum should be reviewed and revised on a regular basis so that it is able to serve the changing needs of both students and society.
• The following points iterate the needs and importance of curriculum development.

1. Clear purpose and goals:-  Curriculum construction provide written curricular goals which are nothing but intended student development outcomes. These goals and objectives are specified in considerable detail and in behavioral language.
2. Continuous assessment and improvement of quality:- Valid and reliable assessment of the curriculum is necessary. The curriculum followed by an institution should be reviewed regularly in order to maintain it’s effectiveness in regards to the changing needs of the society as a whole.
3. A rational sequence:- In a curriculum educational activities are carefully ordered in a developmental sequence. This developmental sequence helps to form a well planned (or coherent)curriculum based on intended goals and outcomes of the curriculum and its constituent courses.
4. Making strategy in teaching and learning:- Curriculum development helps in suggesting suitable teaching-learning strategies, teaching methods, instructional materials, etc. It helps in providing for the proper implementation of the curriculum on the part of teachers and learners.
5. Helps in the selection of learning experiences:- Curriculum development is needed for appropriate selection and organization of learning experiences. It helps in the selection of study matter and other activities so that learners are able to acquire goals and objectives of teaching.

1. The process of curriculum development is needed for conceptualizing a curriculum in terms of the determination of educational objectives for teaching-learning at a particular grade of school education.
2. Helps in continuous and comprehensive education:-

Curriculum development considers the need of providing a scheme of education for CCE of the teaching-learning outcomes. With proper feedback, it helps to bring necessary improvement in the teaching-learning process and environment.

The next articles which you can study are about principles of curriculum development and bases of curriculum development.