Knowledge, Content, Curriculum and Didaktik: Beyond Social Realism

Bringing to bear a wealth of literature from curriculum theory, Didaktik, philosophy of education and teacher education, this book broadens and enriches the conversation initiated by Michael Young and his colleagues on 'bringing knowledge back in' (Young, 2007). Knowledge, Content, Curriculum and Didaktik is distinctive in providing a comprehensive and multifaceted analysis of the role of knowledge, and in particular curriculum content, in relation to curriculum policy, curriculum planning and classroom teaching. It makes a case for linking knowledge and content to the development of human powers or capabilities needed for the 21st century and unpacks the challenges for curriculum policy, curriculum planning and classroom teaching. The book discusses, among other issues:

• Educational aims and theories of knowledge
• School subjects and academic disciplines: differences and relationships
• School subjects and theories of content
• Understanding the content for teaching

The book will be relevant for scholars, researchers, policy makers and curriculum developers who seek a more sophisticated, more balanced and philosophically better grounded understanding of the role of knowledge and content in education and curriculum.

Zongyi Deng is Professor of Curriculum and Pedagogy at the UCL Institute of Education, University College London. He is also an executive editor of the Journal of Curriculum Studies (JCS) and has held faculty positions at Nanyang Technological University and the University of Hong Kong. His interest areas include curriculum content or subject matter, curriculum theory, didactics (Didaktik), curriculum policy and reform, and comparative and international education. His publications appear in JCS, Curriculum Inquiry, Comparative Education, Teaching and Teacher Education, Teachers and Teaching, Cambridge Journal of Education, Science Education and other international journals. Edited books include Re-envisioning Chinese Education: The Meaning of Person-Making in a New Age (with Guoping Zhao; 2015) and Globalization and the Singapore Curriculum: From Policy to Classroom (with S. Gopinathan and Christine Lee; 2013).