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reached between the users, the experts’ and designer’s vision becomes the deciding factor.
Moreover, this approach is also driven by verbal strategies because curriculum users (society) strive for the curriculum to meet their needs. Furthermore, this approach is also driven by the principle of decolonisation of physical structures as stakeholders involved in curriculum development may suggest classrooms and a learning environment that suits the curriculum users. Creativity is essential in curriculum development to integrate the different necessary skills.
2.6.4 Artistic approach
An artistic approach assures creativity of the designer to develop a unique and relevant curriculum (Berkvens et al., 2014; Thijs & Van den Akker, 2009a). This approach does not have any stages to be followed, rather the designer uses his experiences and perceptions to design the curriculum. Furthermore, the designer is an artist who works according to his own views and ideas by looking at the needs of the target group. This suggests that in this approach, curriculum design is a subjective process as he uses his own habitual tastes and preferences to design the curriculum. Eisner (1979) and Oolbekkink-Marchand, Hadar, Smith, Helleve, and Ulvik (2017) assert the importance of putting the lecturer at the centre of teaching and learning.
Moreover, this approach maintains that curriculum enactment must meet the needs of the students. For instance, in this case the lecturer is an artist who from personal experience knows what students needs and designs a curriculum that suits these needs. Both Taole (2015) and Bianchini et al. (2015) affirm that lecturers as implementers of the curriculum should have the chance to develop the curriculum based on their experiences and the student’s needs. Moreover, Oolbekkink-Marchand et al. (2017) and Bridgstock (2016) concur that scholars and researchers are not familiar with the class environment and therefore lecturers should be allowed to exercise their agency to creatively design a curriculum suitable for their students’ needs in the classroom. The artistic approach relates to habitual strategy, because lecturers, (artists) develop the curriculum based on their personal experiences and preferences. Furthermore the artistic approach may relate to the principle of decolonisation of the mind as the curriculum designer already knows what is needed in the curriculum as an artist. Developing a flexible curriculum is needed to meet the needs of the majority of students.
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which knowledge is most worth learning in institutions such as universities and schools and organisation of such knowledge is specified in modules to achieve educational goals according to the needs of curriculum users (Hoadley & Jansen, 2013; Thijs & Van den Akker, 2009a).
This suggests that curriculum development deals with combining specified needs of educational stakeholders to come up with a curriculum that best suits their needs, such as choice of knowledge to be included in certain modules such as English. Thijs and Van den Akker (2009a) introduce the following chronological stages of curriculum development: analysis, design, development, implementation and evaluation. These are displayed in figure 2.2 below.
Figure 2. 2: Five cyclical activities to curriculum development by (Van den Akker, 2013, p.
16)
29 2.7.1 Analysis stage
Thijs and Van den Akker (2009a) introduce analysis as the first stage in curriculum development. In line with this, an interpretive case study conducted by Ulla and Winitkun (2017) on 72 English and Engineering students aimed to identify the students’ needs, which are recognised as lack of linguistic needs and language skills. The study reveals that through needs analysis students are be able to feel ownership of the curriculum, as this is designed for them. The study further mentions that the purpose of a needs analysis is for English course instructors to know more about their students’ preferences in English language learning. This suggests that needs analysis outlines the current needs of students, which helps lecturers to develop a curriculum that will adequately satisfy students’ needs. Moreover, other studies (Pinar, 2005; Ramrathan, 2017; Thijs & Van den Akker, 2009a) outline that needs analysis is regarded as the most important factor in the curriculum, and is also seen as the foundation in curriculum development because the result thereof is used to design a student-centred curriculum. In other words, through a thorough analysis of students’ needs lecturers get to learn what students need presently and what will still be necessary in the future. Moreover, Ingman, Lohmiller, Cutforth, Borley, and Belansky (2017) as well as Thijs and Van den Akker (2009a) assert that different studies realise the importance of needs analysis in language teaching to design and develop an appropriate curriculum that meets students’ needs.
The above discussion suggests that curriculum change and development should be embarked on after a comprehensive analysis of students’ needs to develop a curriculum relevant to the stakeholders in education. For instance, there can be curriculum change influenced by decolonisation of curriculum. Thus, lecturers in South African universities may take part in the analysis stage by proper analysis of students’ needs and an indication of what they need, such as the inclusion of local content in the curriculum compared to one that is dominated by work from Western scholars. As Heleta (2016) and Mbembe (2016) argue, in the post-apartheid period the South African curriculum remains largely Eurocentric and continues to reinforce white and Western dominance and privilege. This suggests that any change in the South African curriculum after the analysis stage may be driven by both verbal and written strategies, since choice of curriculum depends on the lecturers’ choice of content, and lecturers’ choices are based on students’ needs identified though proper analysis. The curriculum design stage follows immediately after the students’ needs analysis, as discussed below.
30 2.7.2 Design stage
Curriculum design includes consideration of aims, intended learning outcomes, syllabus, learning and teaching methods, and assessment (Chugh, Ledger, & Shields, 2017; Thijs & Van den Akker, 2009a). This is the second stage in the curriculum development cycle. The design requirements are carefully established, tested and refined into a relevant and usable product.
Bozarth (2012) concurs with Thijs and Van den Akker (2009a) that the design stage defines a problem and formulates a solution. This suggests that after the problem has been identified in the analysis stage, design helps to find a possible solution to the earlier identified problem. For instance, the solution may be for lecturers teaching the English module to design a new curriculum that can address the issue of including local content to decolonise the curriculum.
As a result, the design stage seeks lecturers to be influenced by both written and verbal strategies, since selection of relevant content to be included in the English module relates to the intended curriculum. This then suggests that without problem identification and analysis the design of a new curriculum cannot be possible, as this might imply that everything is well with the current curriculum (Bozarth, 2012; Chugh et al., 2017; Thijs & Van den Akker, 2009a). Development of the curriculum is another stage that needs to be considered during curriculum development.
2.7.3 Development stage
Development is the third stage in the cycle of curriculum development of(Thijs & Van den Akker, 2009a). Ingman et al. (2017) as well as Thijs and Van den Akker (2009a) state that this stage allows stakeholders in education to contribute to curriculum development after the curriculum document has been designed. As earlier mentioned, curriculum design can take any approach, so in this stage society is given a chance to decide on the areas of improvement in the curriculum before implementation. Consequently societal needs are being addressed with the aim of having a curriculum product that directly addresses students’ needs as identified through needs analysis in the first stage (Thijs & Van den Akker, 2009a; Ulla & Winitkun, 2017). This suggests that whatever the approach used to design the curriculum, stakeholders’
suggestions remain necessary. In the context of this study, this stage may require English lecturers to exercise verbal strategies to curriculum development with the aim of allowing students’ input to the curriculum reform to ensure that a fair curriculum unfolds and to satisfy the needs of the students in higher education. Ulla and Winitkun (2017) concur with Thijs and Van den Akker (2009b) that good curriculum development is identified by addressing students’
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needs through a ‘Communicative needs processor’. Further to this, curriculum implementation is necessary to examine the newly designed curriculum.
2.7.4 Implementation stage
“Implementation is critical to a success of any curriculum” (Thijs & Van den Akker, 2009a, p.
39). Moreover, Khoza (2015b) and Pinar (2004) assert that after the curriculum has been prescribed in writing, practice is very important to examine whether the proposed curriculum is working or not. Studies (Berkvens et al., 2014; Khoza, 2016a) further outline that curriculum implementation involves several components, such as identifying relevant resources, offering support and addressing barriers to implementation. For instance, after the introduction of the new curriculum in an institution certain regulations are put in place, such as adoption of indigenous knowledge in the curriculum. In other words, the implementation stage may allow lecturers to use their habitual strategies in order to bring in local content to enhance understanding in the module content. As a result, the curriculum implementation stage is influenced by both habitual and verbal strategy. Consequently, methods/teaching approaches may be suggested for better implementation of the English curriculum. Evaluation of the curriculum is very important and needs to be considered to examine the progress of a newly implemented curriculum (Black, 2015; Ramrathan, 2017).
2.7.5 Evaluation stage
Evaluation and feedback is the final stage in curriculum development. Luce and Kirnan (2016) as well as Zondi (2015) state that the purpose of evaluation may be to improve the curriculum and also to gain support and possible resources for it as well as to answer questions about the effectiveness of a specific curriculum. This suggests that after the curriculum has been implemented, evaluation is necessary for follow-up purposes in order to see if the different needs (personal, discipline and societal) are addressed; this feedback may be witnessed after an enacted curriculum has been conducted. Firmino and Leite (2014) concur with Harlen and James (1997) in outlining the importance of giving feedback after the assessment has been conducted to ensure subsequent improvement. This stage is influenced by both written and verbal strategies because lecturers give feedback formally based on certain criteria, and for the curriculum to meet the standards it has to meet some specific requirements. Thus the development stages require lecturers to operate under a certain framework so that their strategies may be useful in decolonising any university curriculum. The success of all stages in
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curriculum development is dependent on the lecturers’ understanding of curriculum concepts (Van den Akker, 2013).