ABSTRACT
Chapter 2 has clarified the statutory position regarding the discretion that schools can now exercise in their whole curriculum planning in order to ensure relevance. While breadth remains an entitlement, we suggest that curricular balance should be managed so as to encompass a flexible range of possibilities, changing from year to year, from pupil to pupil, in order to maintain a focus upon priority needs. Chapter 3 has given a practical means of translating whole curriculum debate into formal policy. Curriculum planning may then be used to control breadth and balance across the whole curriculum and within subjects. Long-term plans should show, for instance, that an appropriate proportion of curriculum time is devoted to the aims and content of the core subjects of the National Curriculum while ensuring the place of other priorities for pupils with learning difficulties within the whole curriculum.
