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JOURNAL OF CURRICULUM STUDIES
Volume /Number 1/Novemberp 1968
THE HUMANITIES CURRICULUM PROJECTLawrence Stenhouse
Offprint
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Lawrence StenhcntseHumanities CurriCulum Project
The Project has been funded for three years jointly by
theFoundation and the Schools Council, and has been given
theremit:
To offer to schools and to teachers such stivnulus, support
arals as may be appropriate to the mounting, as an element
education of enquiry-based courses, which cross the subject
bbetween English, history, ylz studies asit-Ma-7TE project is
expected to concentrate on such- stiiTiin icular meet the needs of
adolescent pupils of average 2average academic ability.
This is essentially a curriculum project, that is to say, it
isconcerned with the content of education. Any observations abroom
strategies and methods must be seen in the_settingsLthg
om we understand by the humanities the study of both human 1
and human experience. The study of human behaviour is
broacTIScern of the social sciences: history, human geography,
psych(sociology. In some sense, these studies aspire to examine
human 1objectively, viewing it as caused or as dictated by purposes
whirunderstood from observation rather than detailed subjectiveThe
study of human experience is reflected in the arts and ingraphical
aspect of history. It is concerned with the subjectivtential
aspects of human life, and one important criterion byrents of the
arts are made is fidelity to human experience.
The claim of the humanities in education rests upon the
arse:their study enhances understanding and judgment in those
areascal living which involve complex considerations of values
anctraditions. This claim has commonly been made for a classical
eand R. S. Peters has recently stated it in a form which
sharpenvance to a project such as ours:
But surely the strongest case for Classics is that it is a field
o
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pelling, seem to offer rich possibilities. Topics such as
transport, water orlocal government seem difficult to justify in a
humanities curriculum;they are derived from a different logic,
perhaps that associated with theteaching of the conventional school
subjects across disciplines on a projector enquiry base. Moreover,
they raise too few issues of value, and dealrather in facts and
techniques.
Such distinctions as those made above are important. There are
manydifferent curricular experiments afoot, and if they are to make
their maxi-mum contribution, each must be clear about its own frame
of reference.
Areas of study should have an internal logical coherence, and
should notbe based on casual associations. Thus, the juxtaposition
of political powerand power as energy in the physical sense is
unsatisfactory, as is the associ-ation of irrigation, boiling
kettles, swimming and water on the knee in aunit on "water." Themes
should probably seem inevitable, rather thanclever. All areas of
study selected for a humanities course should leadstudents not only
to a consideration of human beha 'o - y 'yerame o re - - .. ; r
agmative sympathy with subjective
There is a tendency to come]boundaries in terms of the needs
aseem a helpful approach. Of couiand relevant to the students,
butselection of material. In a humanitithose topics which are of
endurirportance in the human situation.these areas precisely
because of tltradition. No concession is beingshare these interests
with their stu
In a curriculum development co.of a central team?Its main tasks
would appear to be
(r) to help to found a traditionthis curriculum by helping
themconfidence in appropriate classrooijudgments of the quality of
studen
(2) to provide, as elmnples,express this tradition and
embody
(3) to evaluate the impact of itssituation, and the strengths
anddeveloping round them.
It is important that the limitati
islize curricula which cross subject[ interests of students.
This does not, the curriculum must be interestingese are not
sufficient reasons for thecurriculum one selects for
adolescentshuman interest because of their im-ae school can make a
contribution init central importance in our culturalde: the
teachers may be expected to
in these terms, what is the place
Mich will support teachers working inselect materials, by
increasing their
strategies and by making secure their' work;trials for use in
the classroom which
standards;Lirriculum materials on the classroom7eaknesses of the
teaching tradition
is of a central team should be recog-
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Second, the teaching strategy will be enquiry-based. We take
this toimply groups of pupils discussing issues in the light of
evidence and underthe guidance of the teacher. Distinctions may be
drawn between instruc-tion-based, discovery-based and enquiry-based
teaching. Instruction-based teaching implies that the task in hand
is the teacher's passing on tohis pupils knowledge or skills of
which he is master. In discovery-basedteaching the teacher
introduces his pupils into situations so selected ordevised that
they embody in implicit or hidden form principles or know-ledge
which he wishes them to learn. Thus, Cuisensire rods
embodynumerical principles, and certain scientific "experiments"
used in educa-tional settings reveal scientific principles.
Instruction and discovery areappropriate in the classroom whenever
the desirable outcome of teachingcan be specified in some detail
and is broadly the same for every pupil.
Where a curriculum area is in a divergent, rather than in a
convergent,field, i.e. where there is no simple correct or
incorrect outcome, but ratheran emphasis on the individual
responses and judgments of the students,the case for an
enquiry-based approach is at its strongest. This is thesituation in
the humanities.
This basic strategy of classroom procedure can be argued, we
maintain,from the nature of the content area. Considerations of
professional ethicsare also involved.
Each of the areas of study we have chosen involves highly
controversialvalue judgments of a kind which divide opinion in our
society, and this isbound to be so. It is just this controversial
aspect of the work which offersthe prospect of live significance;
and conscientious teachers will quiteproperly feel diffidence in
entering these areas unless their classroomstrategy gives some
assurance that the pupils will not have their horizonslimited by
their teacher's biases. Moreover, teachers are bound to
findthemselves working in areas of knowledge outside their own
specialistqualifications and they ought to feel some reserve about
playing an in-structional role in this situation. A further
consideration is that many ofthe subjects proposed for study may
well be just those most likely toexacerbate the inter-generational
and the inter-social class conflicts be-tween teacher and pupil to
which recent studies have drawn attention.
On all these grounds, it seems reasonable to assert that an
enquiry-based strategy is demanded in the classroom when the school
adopts ahumanities curriculum as we have defined it. In short,
enquiry is notsimply a dispensible means to an end which could be
reached by otherroutes.
The classroom strategy of enquiry is by no means new. Many of
theideas behind it can be seen in project work, for example. It is
our view,
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teachers can draW as they embark upon this style of teaching;
btbanks which ask for further deposits of materials found by
th,themselves. They will provide the teacher with resources for
exption, opening up a range of possibilities rather than
confining.
The structuring of these collections of material is of great
ircThe collections Must be logically coherent, adapted to the
proporoom strategy and yet flexible. We hope to break down each
ofof enquiry into 4 number of points for discussion which evokin
the classroom and are also Si! I ificant and a - .i5feanli '
materia w i raise each point, and these will be sun .=
- Cinema filmessential for averskeyed into the sti
One of the mathe materials, bepupils with whomstanding, which
:there is that of 11as the problem o:too much, of ourour pupils.
Onlysome of our offer
In the case ofwide divergence (problem of finditdisposal. In
thestrategy. First, vmediately below-teachers in ordermaintaining
acceiof levels of diffici
In 1968-9 devetions on war; &As soon as work Iing and
evaluatin
This problemmaterials and thecan adapt their vsented to
teacherdecide whether it
i of reievanteven t.important in this kind of teaching, and
is
;e pupils. A film hire service is being built up,icture of the
collections to be offered to schoot acute problems is that of
controlling the suiiring in mind the age and wide range of abiliwe
are concerned. First, there is the problemcrudely expressed as that
of reading levels.
ndling sensitive material, which expresses itselcensorship. At
the experimental stage, some
material ought really to be too difficult for thethis way can we
establish a ceiling. By the sat
ngs must be censored by the majority of teacheading difficulty
the problem is made more aif view among experienced teachers and by
the
enough simple and direct evidence in the titace of these
problems, we have adopted a cole hope to aim initially at the
averageat CSEand subsequently to enlist the help of a large nto
adapt down the ability range as far as we (table quality. Second,
we hope to include a wfty in our trial materials.opment schools
will begin to work with the firacation; the family; and relations
between tegins in the schools we shall face the problem; it.las
three main aspects. Feed-back evaluaticeaching strategy must reach
the project team soirk in the light of experience. Evidence musso
that they can evaluate what is offered to t
has a potential in their own school setting. In p
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