Conceptions of Core Curriculum: The Evolution of an Appellation

• In Event: Millennium Hotel Roundtable Session 15
  In Roundtable Session: Curriculum and the Culture(s) of Memory, Time, and History

Abstract

This paper presents a historical analysis of the meanings and use of the term ‘core’ in the literature on curriculum from the middle of the 20th century to the present. It traces the term’s foundations in democratic, student-centered understandings of the purpose of education, to later utility with the project of cultural preservation and transmission, to its most recent manifestation in the Common Core State Standards.

Authors

• Isabel Nunez, Indiana University - Purdue University at Fort Wayne

• Donald Joseph Ohlinger, Indiana University - Purdue University at Fort Wayne