ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the phenomenon of curriculum development as part of the social reform movement in education in the 1960s and 1970s and, in the light of recent Marxist debate in the sociology of education, examines the theory and practice of implementation which influenced such development. Another interpretation of teacher reaction might be that the assumptions of curriculum developers are not sufficiently grounded within the practitioners' frames of reference. Curriculum development may perhaps be most aptly described as a product of affluence and expansion for which the expressed raison detre was to reformulate and accelerate the transmission of knowledge from one sector of the educational system to another. Such perspectives have offered critically significant insights into the ideological function of schooling which may be brought to bear on future attempts to formulate educational alternatives. M. F. D. Young raises a similar point where he criticises the Schools Council funding process, which confirms rather than transcends such disjuncture.
