Curriculum and Aims

The revised Fifth Edition of Curriculum and Aims provides a broad perspective on the basic curriculum questions educators face regarding the purposes, content, design, and structure of educational programs. After examining aims that have been proposed by classical educational thinkers and reviewing the dominant educational debate of the 20th century between traditionalists and progressives, authors Decker F. Walker and Jonas F. Soltis deal with fundamental contemporary issues of curriculum theory and instructional practice.

As in the other volumes in the Thinking About Education Series, this new edition provides realistic case studies that inspire pre-service teachers to grapple with the issues of curriculum and aims in the context of classroom situations. The Fifth Edition features a new case on Education and Equity: Closing the Achievement Gap and includes updated references to important recent ideas in a new section at the end of each chapter called For Further Inquiry.

Curriculum and Aims is one of the five books in the highly regarded Teachers College Press THINKING ABOUT EDUCATION SERIES, now in its Fifth Edition. All of the books in this series are designed to help pre- and in-service teachers bridge the gap between theory and practice.

Decker F. Walker is Professor of Education at Stanford University and is the author of Fundamentals of Curriculum. Jonas F. Soltis is William Heard Kilpatrick Professor Emeritus of Philosophy and Education at Teachers College, Columbia University. Frances Schoonmaker is Emeritus Professor of Curriculum at Teachers College, Columbia University.

Educational Theory says…

“(This series) does a masterful job of bringing together the basic issues and teaching methods that should frame social and philosophical foundations curricula.”

— Reviewing the first edition