While late-twentieth-century educational policy shifts have been widely studied, research has often relied on selective empirical material, privileging policy documents-the stories of the victors-while obscuring messier political processes and broader developments. This study broadens educational policy research by analyzing public discourse, specifically newspapers. It examines the historical emergence and meaning of the Swedish term m & aring;lstyrning, commonly associated with the introduction of New Public Management in Swedish education. Drawing on conceptual history and corpus linguistics, the study analyses 1,470 newspaper articles using the term. The findings show that m & aring;lstyrning emerged in Swedish newspaper discourse from the 1960s, coinciding with longer-term shifts towards instrumental and outcome-oriented logics in education and public administration. We argue that m & aring;lstyrning filled a conceptual void by providing a linguistic and ideological framework for these changes, and that NPM reforms in Swedish education should be understood as part of much longer historical developments. The study highlights the risks of overreliance on policy texts, which may exaggerate the novelty and radicalism of policy change.
Assessment, as part of the tested curriculum, plays an important role internationally in certifying student achievement in secondary education. Following global trends, a recent reform of Junior Cycle curricula (lower secondary level) in Ireland introduced school-based assessments (SBAs) alongside traditional state examinations. Known locally as Classroom-Based Assessments (CBAs), they are part of a 'dual assessment' system, combining centralized examinations with non-certified assessments conducted by teachers. This study examines the perspectives of mathematics teachers towards these changes in their subject. An online survey, using a non-probability sampling method, collected 196 responses. While certain advantages were identified, including the promotion of independent learning and the incorporation of real-life applications, the findings also reveal persistent concerns among mathematics teachers regarding the introduction of CBAs. Key challenges include the significant amount of class time required, limited student engagement, and the potential to exacerbate existing student inequities. These concerns raise important questions about the ongoing implementation of CBAs in their current format within the Junior Cycle Mathematics Specification (JCMS). The findings are also considered in relation to broader international debates on curriculum and assessment reform, highlighting common challenges and enhancing understanding of how policy initiatives are interpreted, mediated, and contested across educational contexts.
This article critically examines the revised history curriculum in francophone Belgium, developed under the Pact for Teaching Excellence, which seeks to modernize education and reduce inequalities. Positioned within broader conversations on the decolonization of education, and more specifically within debates of the modernity/coloniality group, the article explores how Eurocentric epistemologies continue to shape curricular content and structure despite efforts to foster greater inclusivity. Through analysis of the official curriculum and five interviews with actors involved in the reform process, the study investigates how themes such as colonization, racism, and multiculturalism are incorporated, framed, or marginalized. While the curriculum introduces more explicit references to colonial history and cultural diversity, these shifts often remain surface-level, constrained by linear conceptions of time, national narratives, and Western epistemological dominance. Interviewees highlight tensions between ambitious objectives and implementation realities, shaped by structural constraints, political compromises, and technocratic logics. The article draws on the concept of monocultures to show how seemingly progressive reforms can reproduce exclusionary logics. It concludes that meaningful transformation requires more than adding diverse content; it demands rethinking how knowledge is defined, whose perspectives are centred, and how historical narratives can foster epistemic justice rather than reproduce inherited hierarchies.
Previous studies have shown that teachers are vital in the implementation of educational reforms, despite variation in the extent to which teachers manifest their agency and how they involve themselves in the implementation. This study adds to the existing literature by investigating teachers' curricular uptake of the national reform (LK20) in Norway. We investigated teachers' reported uptake of curricular concepts during 3 years (2021-24) following LK20, acknowledging the value of capturing teachers' perspectives. The purpose was to identify the degree to which teachers reported planning and uptake of three specific curricular concepts: life skills, inquiry/exploration and digital competence. This study used daily reports from 74 teachers in seven secondary schools describing their uptake of the concepts during naturally occurring teaching. We analysed the daily reports that the teachers provided from before and after a total of 663 lessons in 168 classes in seven school subjects. Using a one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA), we identified patterns among concepts and subjects. Teachers' reported degrees of uptake indicated transformative agency despite variation among concepts and subjects. The study indicates that emphasizing teachers' transformative agency might contribute to greater autonomy in implementing curricular reforms.
In order to establish virtual schooling in the midst of COVID-19, educators negotiated often conflicting responsibilities to their students and the institution. Focused on how this negotiation impacted pedagogy during the ongoing crisis, this paper conceptualizes pedagogical triage as a critical determinative sensemaking process that narrows and adjusts curricula and practice. Using qualitative survey data collected from over 850 Chicago area educators on their experience of the COVID-19 school, I reveal patterns in how educators re-evaluated and adjusted their practice based on the perceived or real needs of students as well as educators' professional responsibilities. The paper leans on frameworks of inhabited institutionalism and sensemaking to define how crisis, in combination with educators' interactions with and responsibilities to students, result in a practice of pedagogical triage. By conceptualizing COVID-19 as a slow-moving disaster, I argue that this pedagogical triage is relevant to the high-stress reality of educators teaching in the context of polycrisis.
This study examines how preservice teachers in Iraqi Kurdistan Reframe the tensions between standardized, product-oriented curriculum delivery and inclusive, process-driven pedagogy. Grounded in Stenhouse's curriculum-as-process theory (1975) and Bourdieu's concepts of field, habitus, and capital (1992), the research explores the development of 'curriculum-making capital', a novel construct distinct from pedagogical capital or curriculum agency, emphasizing accumulated resources for Resolving product-process tensions among seven preservice teachers in Erbil, Iraqi Kurdistan. Data from semi-structured interviews and concept maps reveal that, despite rigid curriculum delivery mandates, teachers actively integrate local cultural and linguistic elements to foster inclusive learning environments. The study identifies significant challenges, including inflexible lesson plans and institutional resistance, which constrain teacher agency. However, adaptive strategies such as reflective practice, collaborative planning, and mentorship emerge as effective means to overcome these limitations. Findings underscore the need for reforms in initial teacher education that empower educators to reconcile standardized content with culturally responsive approaches, ultimately enhancing teacher agency and educational equity in diverse, post-conflict settings and inform critical future policy reforms.
Inclusive assessment is a decisive basis for lesson design in heterogeneous learning groups. Curricula can provide a helpful baseline for inclusive teaching practices. However, how inclusive assessment is implemented at the curricular level has yet to be determined. The present study examined how various forms of assessment are implemented in German-language core curricula in a German state (Lower Saxony) and a Swiss canton (Bern). The paper thus presents a case study of German-speaking countries. In this way, two local curriculum frameworks under different national conditions (Switzerland with multiple national languages and a more uniform approach to curriculum design and Germany with one national language and a more federal approach to curriculum design) were analysed. The results showed different approaches to inclusive assessment based on the considered student backgrounds. While Bern's curricula largely focus on Switzerland's four national languages in this regard Lower Saxony's curricula have a more open approach to other migration-related first languages besides the national language.
This study reconceptualizes political education as a means for cultivating democratic values, emotional engagement, political literacy, critical thinking, and active citizenship. Using a qualitative design with 48 Israeli public-school teachers (24 interviews and four focus groups), it mapped pedagogical strategies for addressing socio-political issues in classrooms following the 7 October 2023, attack and the subsequent war. Based on the findings, we developed the REACT model, which includes five interrelated elements that can be integrated across subjects and curricula: (R) recognizing emotional responses, (E) enriching political knowledge, (A) analysing critically, (C) concluding and formulating positions, and (T) taking action through civic engagement. The model offers a systematic framework for teaching democratic and political literacy while fostering emotional awareness and respectful dialogue in classrooms marked by diversity of opinion and heightened tension. The study reveals that controversial issues emerged both spontaneously from students and intentionally through teacher initiatives, highlighting the dynamic interplay between emotional and cognitive dimensions of learning during crisis. While grounded in the Israeli context, the REACT model contributes to a theoretically grounded and practically applicable roadmap for educators worldwide seeking to strengthen civic resilience and democratic commitments amid polarization, misinformation, and social fragmentation.
Indoctrination is widely considered a reprehensible teaching practice that has long been associated with religious instruction. For over 50 years, the concept of indoctrination has been subject to extensive philosophical analysis. However, there has been little attempt to operationalize it for empirical educational research. This study attempted to do just that in order to evaluate controversial religious instruction (RI) curricula taught in Australian government primary schools. The curricula are examples of confessional religious education, whereby students receive instruction in the beliefs and practices of one religion, with the aim of nurturing their adherence to that religion. Critics argue that RI constitutes indoctrination. Drawing on a popular notion of indoctrination as teaching practice that results in closedmindedness, in conjunction with Bloom's Taxonomy Revised, a content analysis of five sets of RI curriculum materials was conducted. All five curricula promote practices associated with indoctrination: minimal opportunity for higher-order thinking (e.g. critical thinking), as evidenced by an overemphasis on lower-order thinking in the teaching methods and learning outcomes (>85% of outcomes emphasize lower-order thinking), together with emotional manipulation. It is argued that worldviews education may foster a more openminded, critical and meaningful engagement with religions.
This paper elaborates on the Swedish vocational education and training (VET) in massified schooling of 16-19 years old between 1975 and 2025 to show how VET has come to articulate with the institution and 'grammar' of the school. Three major education reforms are considered. The findings show a set of institutional responses that furthered massification of the upper-secondary school by incorporating VET. One aspect is the integration on an organizational plane. Another aspect deals with the handling of vocational contents in the standardized curriculum, e.g. through a delayed differentiation of content, its re-packaging and the work component. Altogether, these institutional responses indicate a strong political interest in attracting the young at the same time showing persistent difficulties in reconciling VET with the institution of the school in Sweden, shown in upper-secondary vocational education and training's fluctuating appeal in the time span.
This study reconceptualizes curriculum integration through new materialist philosophy, addressing fundamental limitations in conventional integration discourse. While traditional approaches to curriculum integration have emphasized holistic education and meaningful learning, they paradoxically remain confined within subject-centred frameworks and technical-methodological strategies. Drawing on Karen Barad's agential realism and key new materialist concepts-intra-action, agential cut, and diffraction-this paper philosophically re-examines three foundational questions of curriculum integration: why, what, and how to integrate. The analysis reveals that curriculum integration should be understood not as technical connections between pre-existing subjects but as ethico-onto-epistemological practice emerging through relational entanglements. Specifically, the study reframes integration as: first, ethical response to an already entangled world rather than artificial linking of fragmented disciplines; second, intra-acting phenomena constituted through material-discursive practices rather than combinations of fixed subjects; and third, diffractive practice generating new meanings through difference rather than reflective methods reproducing sameness. The paper concludes by proposing three practical implications: creating spaces and gaps for emergent possibilities, developing tentacular thinking to sense relationships with various human and non-human actors, and embracing the capacity to begin from the halfway. This new materialist approach transforms curriculum integration from instrumental strategy into ethical practice of becoming-with in educational settings.
This essay explores the possibility of achieving two concurrent visions in secondary school mathematics: a civic education in mathematics for all students (Mathematics for All) and specialized preparation for future experts in mathematics, science, and technology. Historically, it has been difficult to achieve both visions at the same time. We investigate in what respect Sweden has managed to do so. The analysis focuses on the evolution of Swedish mathematics curriculum, particularly the distinction between a civic education at lower secondary level and upper secondary advanced courses. The essay is based on existing research on Swedish mathematics education. New facts have been gathered using official statistics. The main result is that Mathematics for All to large degree has been implemented in Sweden at lower secondary level and in certain periods of time it functioned with success and both visions were achieved. But, not without setbacks, even during the successful years. A Mathematic for All curriculum, at the lower secondary level, with a strong focus on basic mathematics and everyday applications seems to have a selective, rather than inclusive, function in relation to advanced mathematics courses at the upper secondary level.
IntroductionWith the global increase in the number of learners suffering from stress and anxiety, especially due to the pressure to achieve, a shift is needed in the educational praxis dominated by a 'measurement culture'-a shift that recognizes teacher artistry: the pedagogy of inviting learners to engage in movement, work with affect and emotions, and learn to give shape to their environments. Teacher artistry is typically characterized by invention and creation, constantly in conversation with learners-as-subjects instead of firing (in)effective interventions at learners-as-objects. With worldwide a strong focus on standard cognitive qualification in education, however, there is little attention for engaging with the world as learners, and meaningful relationships between learners and teachers.MethodsWe take an enactive view on the mind and its relation to body and world as a solid theoretical grounding for a holistic approach to the current experienced learners' poor wellbeing. Then, learners' wellbeing becomes a pedagogical issue. In two vignettes, based on vignette research through participatory observations at two different schools, is explored how teachers can stimulate their learners' flourishing through embodied subjectifying education.ConclusionThis is not something 'extra': relating, engagement, emotional expression, reflection and reflexivity is relatively easily to integrate in all types of lessons.
Diversity is a common school feature, and according to UNESCO, teachers have to develop knowledge that prepares them to deal with it. This study aimed to explore how reading novels addressing diversity can provide preservice teachers the opportunity to gain insight into new perspectives and how such perspective-taking may be analysed in the light of transactional theory. The data consist of preservice teachers' assignments related to the curriculum of an intercultural studies course in a teacher education programme. Preservice teachers read novels that broach diversity, followed by completing a three-part assignment: 1) written reflection, 2) group conversation between preservice teachers who read the same novel and 3) group conversation between preservice teachers who read different novels. We found that the novels were an invitation for the preservice teachers to see themselves from the outside and enabled taking others' perspectives. We argue that transactional theory is useful for understanding the value of preservice teachers' perspective-taking through reading and discussing a novel. The findings indicated the value of incorporating fiction into teacher education curricula.
IntroductionGlobally, Indigenous students are more marginalized with lower levels of attendance, engagement and retention than other students. This is the case for First Nations Australian students living in remote communities.MethodsUsing Indigenist methodologies, and collecting data using 'Yarning', we explore the perspectives of those most impacted by these outcomes. The data in this study consisted of 139 yarns undertaken with Elders and community members, school staff, principals or school leaders, and students living and working in remote communities. Thematic analysis of the qualitative data was undertaken.FindingsThe key themes emerging from the data were Country-informed pedagogy; Culturally safe pedagogy; Remote teaching strategies; and Family as teachers. We discuss issues identified by participants within these themes.ConclusionSuggested targeted educational support structures, practices and strategies to improve student attendance, engagement and retention in remote and very remote schools of Northern Territory and Western Australia are outlined. Some suggestions are outside the control of schools; however, several possibilities for change have been identified.
PurposeThis paper examines the revised Tripartite Curriculum Model by Valverde et al. (2002), a frequently cited framework in mathematics textbook research. It focuses on the empirical support for the models' assumed relationships between textbooks and other curriculum levels.MethodsThe paper combines a scoping review of 284 articles to structure the current state of research on the model's conceptualized relationships between textbooks and other curriculum levels and a qualitative systematic review of 63 articles to synthesize research on textbook effects on the implemented and attained curriculum.FindingsThe scoping review identifies a persistent emphasis on textbook analysis and comparison and significant gaps in empirical research regarding the assumption that textbooks directly influence the implemented and indirectly influence the attained curriculum. The qualitative systematic review suggests that while textbooks are widely utilized, implementation varies, possibly due to teacher, student and contextual factors. Furthermore, results indicate potential textbook effects on student outcomes, although no study examined the model's indirect pathway via the implemented curriculum, and many studies' limitations restrict generalizability.ConclusionThe findings highlight a critical gap in the empirical support for the model, suggesting a reorientation of research towards a comprehensive understanding of the interplay between textbooks, teaching, and student learning. A complementary perspective to incorporate teachers' and students' active role and contextual factors in the implementation process is proposed for future research.
Existing violence, both at schools and the wider society, increasingly demands educational responses that can offer sustainable approaches and interventions to tackle it. This conceptual paper proposes a curriculum framework centered on nonviolence as a proactive, developmental, and relational approach to peace education. Drawing on Galtung's taxonomy of direct, structural, and cultural violence, Butler's account of interdependence as a moral foundation, and Wikstr & ouml;m and Treiber's Situational Action Theory, the paper argues for a deeper understanding of the multidimensional roots of violence and for a systematical pedagogical design anchored in nonviolence philosophy. Two illustrative examples - the transformations of R. Derek Black and Luis J. Rodriguez - are analysed through three interrelated mechanisms: dialogic encounter, the disruption of inherited moral frameworks, and empathy grounded in structural awareness. These analyses inform a three-strand curriculum model integrating intrapersonal nonviolence (silence, mindfulness, and emotional regulation), interpersonal nonviolence (empathy, nonviolent communication, and appreciation of difference), and intergroup nonviolence (equal status, common goals, cooperation, and institutional support). The framework positions nonviolence as both educational means and ethical end, offering curriculum theorists, peace educators, and practitioners a coherent foundation for fostering personal transformation alongside structural and cultural change.
This study explores how Finnish history (N = 12) and primary student teachers (N = 112) studied multiple sources of a controversial historical event and the types of accounts they subsequently produced. The students' writings were analysed by applying the theoretical model of multisource reading. The results suggest that primary student teachers face challenges in mastering multisource literacy and a multiperspective approach to history. Even some history student teachers produced single-perspective accounts rather than writing from multiple perspectives. The findings reveal gaps in students' epistemological understanding of history and indicate a tendency to adopt a textbook-like way of describing historical events.
