A curriculum of questions for a schooling system prefaced on right answers
1
Chris Bigum
This is a somewhat modified version of a short piece I wrote in 2003. It was hatched late one night in
2003 at Burwood, in conversation with Alan Reid who was, at the time, a DEST Fellow and working
on the question of national curriculum. I should point out that the crazy ideas expressed below are
not attributable to Alan.
The current period in education is characterised by considerable interest in curriculum. In most states
and overseas there appears to be an unease about the suitability of current curriculum for preparing
the young for a world that is much changed from the period when most contemporary curricula were
developed. New curriculum initiatives can be found in many states. Debates about these initiatives
ask questions such as: what is worth knowing, what are ‘essential’ or ‘basic’ knowledges, and should
there be more emphasis on process or content?
For education curriculum/policy makers, contemporary computer-based resources such as the
Internet appear to place an emphasis on knowledge (as per the knowledge economy) which
subsequently slides into debates about content, i.e. curriculum is about content, and, more often than
not, its consumption. Significantly, the social character of knowledge is largely ignored2.
The irony of schooling systems placing an emphasis on the consumption of various forms of
knowledge at a time when the production and leveraging of knowledge and research skills are prized,
appears lost in current debates.
My own view of curriculum is that it is the stories the elders of the tribe tell the young. I want to
suggest that increasingly these stories, in this era, are less narratives and more questions, i.e. how
should we live in the world? what does it mean to be an Australian? how do we relate to our
geographical neighbours? how do we understand global phenomena such as finance, terrorism and
entertainment?
As a way out of the problem of deciding in advance what is appropriate content to equip students to
participate as active citizens I propose that we might think about curriculum in terms of questions.
Importantly, this device might be used to engage the Australian community in contributing to the
construction of a set of questions.
One way to operationalise this notion would be to poll a large subset of Australians to nominate, say
5 or 6 questions that they believe to be important to Australia now and in the future. A variety of
events, protocols might be employed to arrive at a set of national questions, which would be the basis
1
http://www.chrisbigum.com
2
See, for example Moore & Young (2001).
1
1
Chris Bigum
This is a somewhat modified version of a short piece I wrote in 2003. It was hatched late one night in
2003 at Burwood, in conversation with Alan Reid who was, at the time, a DEST Fellow and working
on the question of national curriculum. I should point out that the crazy ideas expressed below are
not attributable to Alan.
The current period in education is characterised by considerable interest in curriculum. In most states
and overseas there appears to be an unease about the suitability of current curriculum for preparing
the young for a world that is much changed from the period when most contemporary curricula were
developed. New curriculum initiatives can be found in many states. Debates about these initiatives
ask questions such as: what is worth knowing, what are ‘essential’ or ‘basic’ knowledges, and should
there be more emphasis on process or content?
For education curriculum/policy makers, contemporary computer-based resources such as the
Internet appear to place an emphasis on knowledge (as per the knowledge economy) which
subsequently slides into debates about content, i.e. curriculum is about content, and, more often than
not, its consumption. Significantly, the social character of knowledge is largely ignored2.
The irony of schooling systems placing an emphasis on the consumption of various forms of
knowledge at a time when the production and leveraging of knowledge and research skills are prized,
appears lost in current debates.
My own view of curriculum is that it is the stories the elders of the tribe tell the young. I want to
suggest that increasingly these stories, in this era, are less narratives and more questions, i.e. how
should we live in the world? what does it mean to be an Australian? how do we relate to our
geographical neighbours? how do we understand global phenomena such as finance, terrorism and
entertainment?
As a way out of the problem of deciding in advance what is appropriate content to equip students to
participate as active citizens I propose that we might think about curriculum in terms of questions.
Importantly, this device might be used to engage the Australian community in contributing to the
construction of a set of questions.
One way to operationalise this notion would be to poll a large subset of Australians to nominate, say
5 or 6 questions that they believe to be important to Australia now and in the future. A variety of
events, protocols might be employed to arrive at a set of national questions, which would be the basis
1
http://www.chrisbigum.com
2
See, for example Moore & Young (2001).
1
