WHAT IS CURRICULUM

Summary of Additional Reading

The additional reading describing curriculum was presented as a foundational component required to understand curriculum mapping. It has been argued that curriculum is an impossibly broad concept resisting definition. In fact, it is so broad it is challenging to describe. That said curriculum does include several key characteristics. 

Curriculum is said to occur at a number of different sites, and each of these sites requires a different function and structure of curriculum. It is important to note that people who are aware of and competent with the function of curriculum at any one site may not be aware of the function curriculum at any other site.

Curriculum may also be represented as several different types each with a different purpose. Some of these types of curriculum refer to formal, documented, or written curriculum. Other types of curriculum refer to unstated, or avoided curriculum. Finally, other types of curriculum refer extensively to the student experience, including learned, and tested curriculum. While as many types of curriculum exist as theorists, what is important to note is that these types of curriculum tend to fall into three categories. These categories are:

1. Intended Curriculum
2. Unintended Curriculum
3. Student Experience Curriculum

As curriculum is so broad and a reasonable understanding of the curricula involved is required for the process of curriculum mapping, the concept of curriculum inquiry was discussed. Curriculum inquiry is a process of exploration where practitioners define the questions they have of the content and context of a curriculum, then seek to find and document the answers to these questions.  While many formal examples of modes, models, and genres of Curricular Inquiry exist, this resource recommends distilling these into three key components. These are reflection, critical thinking, and investigation. Using this model of curriculum inquiry helps identify the key critical roles that educators and Subject Matter Experts acting as curriculum development teams play in the creation, implementation, review, and revision of curriculum. In this way, we can see instructors – not technicians, working a pre-defined path with established tools, goals, and outcomes – rather the instructor is more like an artist using preferred tools to create a cohesive image from nothing. Like a sculptor removing specific parts of the medium to reveal a sculpture (Joseph, 2011).

What is clear from this discussion of curriculum is at its core, it consists of two things: context and content. Understanding each and the factors influencing and constraining each is critical to the process of Curriculum Mapping.

What is curriculum mapping

As stated above, Curriculum Mapping is the process of discovering and documenting the context and content of a curriculum. The result from this process yields a document providing clarity around the context of the curriculum development, as well as a matrix document providing a graphic portrayal of the intersection between educational activity outcomes. This Matrix document is also called a Curriculum Map. In addition to detailing educational outcomes, the Curriculum Map can show where, when, and how these outcomes are achieved.

A Curriculum Development Team will use the Curriculum Mapping Process to document their curricula inquiry, plot their intended outcomes for an educational activity, and situate their personal interests and biases that were relevant during the creation of the curriculum. The Curriculum Review Team will use the same process to document their curricular inquiry, situate their personal interests and biases, and determine if the context detailed during the development of the curriculum is still valid at the time of the review. The Review Team’s recommendations will address both consistencies and deviations. If the context or content deviates too much, the curriculum review team may recommend Curriculum revision. A Curriculum Revision Team will use the Curriculum Mapping Process to document a current Curricular Inquiry, situate their personal interests and biases, and plot their intended outcomes for an educational activity that is relevant for the current time and immediate future of the discipline.  This Team’s documentation of context will address the concerns outlined by the Curriculum Review Team and outline the steps taken to ameliorate these concerns. An educator implementing a curriculum may use the Curriculum Mapping Process to situate their personal interests and biases in relation to the personal interests and biases of the most recent Curriculum Development or Revision Team. Going through this process allows greater insight for the educator in understanding the development and context of the curriculum they are implementing.

Curriculum Maps and the mapping process will reflect the totality of curriculum. Curriculum Maps do simplify the presentation and representation of the total curriculum, and they can still be quite complex depending on the educational activity depicted. As a result, it is not unusual to see Curriculum Maps that have been compressed, that is maps that only display information relevant to a specific purpose. It must be understood that these are partial Curriculum Maps compressed for a specific purpose and are derived from the complete map representing the total curriculum.

As extensively discussed in the additional information section, curriculum is quite complex. This complexity makes describing or explaining curriculum quite difficult. Rather than write it out in its entirety, it is much more attainable to represent the curriculum visually. Most often the visual representation of curriculum is presented in a matrix document detailing specific components of curriculum content. This is often referred to as a Curriculum Map. As described in the previous section, in order to come to the current understanding of the content it is important to understand the context that has influenced the choices made regarding the content.

Curriculum mapping therefore is the process of discovering and documenting the context and content of a curriculum. The process of curriculum mapping yields three main components. These are the Exploration of Factors, Curriculum Map Matrix and Context documents.

With these items complete, two important functions are now possible. These are:

• Transparency and communication are both possible
• The curriculum can be assessed for completeness and thoughtful structure.

Why do it?

There are many benefits to the process of Curriculum Mapping and using Curriculum Maps. Two of the key benefits previously described include improving transparency and communication and providing an ability to assess curriculum for completeness and thoughtful structure.

Finally, Curriculum Maps are used as a tool to assess Curricular Quality.  Government and other guiding organizations at the Macro and Meso Curriculum Sites are requiring Maps be produced for approval of new and continuing programs of study. 

There is inherent value in developing Maps through a curriculum Mapping Process. Most of this is consistent with educator interest and values, and some of the need is imposed (Chan, Fong, Luk, and Ho, 2017). It is important for educators to focus on the aspects they value when engaging in Curriculum Mapping. The resulting documents will be well thought out, discipline specific, student-centred, and high quality. It will also satisfy imposed needs.

Curriculum mapping documents

As stated earlier, the Curriculum mapping process involves discovering and documenting the context and content of a curriculum. This will yield multiple documents providing clarity around the context of the curriculum, that is the environment, influences, and restrictions under which the curriculum was developed.

Purpose of curriculum mapping documents

As has been discussed, Curriculum Mapping is an arduous process that seeks to qualify all the aspects that contribute to a curriculum in two documents and a Curriculum Map. These documents can vary in size, depth and complexity, depending on the size, duration, prescribed nature, and exceptions from the recommendation in the program. In the case of a 30-credit academic certificate, the Curriculum Map may be able to be fully represented on one page. In the case of an Advanced- level vocational credential, that is highly specialized, prescriptive and broad in content, such as an advanced medical credential, the map may be far to large and complex to accurately represent the full or complete map.  Moreover, for specific tasks requiring a curriculum map, the full picture may be too complex for the purpose at hand.

For specific purposes, specific maps map be more efficient and effective.  For the purpose of this resources, we will refer to these as Curriculum maps compressed for specific purposes as Compressed Maps.  It is important to note that these Compressed Maps as presented are products of the development of the full complete Curriculum Map Matrix Document.  Given the complexity of some curriculum maps, and the purpose driven form of Compressed Maps, there is often a push from Curriculum Teams or Administration overseeing a program at the department or Institutional level to develop the compressed map only.  There is no short cut to developing a compressed map, they are usually derived only from Completed Curriculum maps.