What is Curriculum?

Defining Curriculum
Curriculum refers to the means and materials with which students will interact for the purpose of achieving identified educational outcomes. Arising in medieval Europe was the trivium, an educational curriculum based upon the study of grammar, rhetoric, and logic. The later quadrivium (referring to four subjects rather than three as represented by the trivium) emphasized the study of arithmetic, geometry, music, and astronomy. These seven liberal arts should sound a lot like what you experienced during your formal education.

Continue…
Some educators would say that the curriculum consists of all the planned experiences that the school offers as part of its educational responsibility. Then there are those who contend that the curriculum includes not only the planned, but also the unplanned experiences as well. For example, incidents of violence that have occurred at a number of schools across the nation are hardly a planned component of the curriculum. However, the manner in which violence is addressed before, during, and after the actual event sends a very definite message about how people in our culture interact and how the laws of our nation are applied.