Core Curriculum

As a prominent professional term in the field of curriculum studies, core curriculum has served as one of the classic battlegrounds for the struggle for the U.S. curriculum. The term came to represent the common knowledge most important for all students. Serving as a curricular response to the perennial dilemma, what knowledge is of most worth, core curriculum has been known by various terms: stem course, unified studies, integrated studies, common learnings, cultural epoch program, broad fields core, and general education. Core curriculum was even described as a slang term by staff of the 1930 to 1940s Eight Year Study. Although the term has appeared in postsecondary curriculum literature, its primary use in curriculum design and development emerged at the secondary and middle school levels. ...