Curriculum Change and Selective Teaching Traditions: Consequences for Democracy and the Role of Education

Abstract

AbstractThe purpose of this chapter is twofold: it provides an introduction to research and discussions about selective teaching traditions and discusses the possible consequences for education for sustainable development at lower secondary school level following the implementation of a new Swedish national curriculum in 2011. By comparing a former national report (2002) and a small-scale empirical study (2020), this research shows that the distribution of teaching traditions amongst science teachers teaching environmental education/education for sustainable development changed with the introduction of the new curriculum in 2011. The possible consequences of this shift towards a more fact-based teaching are discussed in the light of Dewey’s view of democracy and Biesta’s functions of education. The core content that was introduced for science subjects in the new curriculum made science teachers emphasise factual content knowledge and reduce the time for group work. Opportunities for teachers to teach in accordance with a pluralistic teaching tradition have decreased as a result of the new curriculum, where the overall role of education is now less focused on enhancing pupils’ emancipation by an education aimed at subjectification. These two consequences of the curriculum change risk limiting science teachers’ democratic teaching of education for sustainable development, thereby reducing their possibilities to support pupils’ development of an action competence.KeywordsTeaching traditionsSelective traditionsDemocracy in educationFunctions of educationAction competence