ABSTRACT
The most comprehensive and authoritative government statement on the secondary curriculum is probably Better Schools. The extent to which it has been mediated to the practitioners and to the public at large is questionable, but Better Schools states the government belief that for most pupils the period of compulsory education should continue to culminate in assessment through public examinations. Many would maintain it follows from the above that there are strong grounds for a 14-19 curriculum core, based in part at least on the generic needs of adolescence. Whether the curriculum design employs modules, single subjects, and/or a core, the success of the design must depend on the quality of guidance and negotiation that supports the choice of options that are available. It could be argued that any curriculum, claiming to be responsive to individual needs, implies some negotiation. It is at the curriculum design stage that a proper approach to negotiation begins.
