The Role of the School Curriculum and the Assessment of Childrens Essay

The Role of the School Curriculum and the Assessment of Childrens Learning - Essay Example This essay stresses that the school curriculum essentially answers two questions: what should be taught in schools and how it should be taught. Curriculum planners will typically establish a standard for teaching and learning and will determine expected outcomes and what should be taught and who teaching should be conducted in order to achieve expected outcomes. However, teachers are responsible for the implementation and development of the curriculum. All too often however, teachers have demonstrated a tendency to ignore the curriculum or make only a half-hearted attempt to fully implement the curriculum. This paper makes a conclusion that England’s school curriculum policy directs that all publically funded schools are required to develop a curriculum that is ‘balanced and broadly based’ and ‘promotes the spiritual, moral, cultural, mental and physical development of pupils at the school and of society’. The school curriculum must also ‘prepare pupils at the school for the opportunities, responsibilities and experiences of later life’. The national curriculum, which is a compulsory part of the school curriculum, ‘introduces’ student to the ‘best that has been thought and said; and helps engender an appreciation of human creativity and achievement’. In this regard, the national curriculum outlines main areas of education that students are at liberty to enhance and incorporate in lessons for helping children learn and develop skills and knowledge in compliance with the school’s curriculum.