ABSTRACT
In this chapter we shift our attention from subject-and teacher-orientated forms of knowledge to the curricular ‘packaging’ that official policymakers produce and require teachers to ‘implement’ and ‘transmit’. If you are a beginner or experienced languages teacher in England you are doubtless already very familiar with at least some of the detail of the NC for FL. However, what you may not yet have done is to reflect on the value systems and knowledge perspectives that underpin the official framework of the FL curriculum in which you are asked to operate. In our view critical reflection on the value systems and approaches adopted in the curriculum provides teachers with a clearer view of the direction in which they are working and to which their day-to-day pedagogical decisions contribute. From the point of view of broader professional understanding, engagement with curricular knowledge is justified because it is important for teachers to recognise that curricula inherently reflect particular views of society and the distribution of life chances; also, societies tend to rely on the school curriculum to give their next generation access to existing knowledge (see Young, 1999, p. 469). It seems essential, therefore, to examine closely what values and assumptions are inherent in the curriculum, in our case the FL curriculum.
