Traces of the secondary Geography curriculum

Abstract

Expressions of dissatisfaction about the post-compulsory Geography curriculum in the early 1970s were unusually concerted, leading to the creation of a National Geography Curriculum Committee. This essay reviews this history and the resulting Syllabus for Schools: Geography Forms 5–7 as a prelude to a discussion of contemporary curriculum development. The essay argues that curriculum development from 1975 and the ‘education reforms’ of the late 1980s failed to produce conditions in which satisfactory outcomes for a Geography curriculum can be assured in 2005, and that a new and concerted period of participation in curriculum discussion is required. Some goals for this process are outlined in the final section of the paper.