Examples of Recent Thinking in Higher Education
An article by Knight (2001) provides a convincing argument for the superiority of a process
approach to curriculum development in higher education by outlining the problems with an
“outcomes-led rational approach” to curriculum planning. Knight’s major point, however, is not
to advocate one approach over another, but to stress the necessity of coherence in a curriculum.
He returns to Jerome Bruner’s concept of the spiral curriculum, saying “Bruner depicted good
curriculum as a spiral of repeated engagements to improve and deepen skills, concepts, attitudes
and values, and extend their reach. The spiral curriculum has coherence, progression and, I
claim, value” (p. 371). Contending that it is possible to provide coherence and progression in a
process curriculum as well as in a product curriculum, he writes, “a good curriculum would plan
for learning to take place through communities of practice in which group work and peer
evaluation are normal, interpersonal contact is common and networks of engagement are
extensive” (p. 377).