Curriculum reform in the context of massification in China : a case study of BIPT, Foreign language department

Abstract

As early as 1971, the collection of papers which make up the book Knowledge and Control (Young, 1971) had a remarkable impact on an enormous numbers of teachers and students of education in the 10 years or more after its appearance (David Halpin, 1990). Moreover, Knowledge and Control played a crucial role in encouraging a wave of innovative and analytical thinking about the school curriculum (Whitty & Young, 1976; Young and Whitty, 1977).

Nowadays, curriculum is undertaking numerous changes while the significance to research into the curriculum reform has been lifted to the academic schedule. Mary Henkel (2000) believed, “English was a fragmented discipline, which gave individuals relatively unrestricted space in which to carve out their own identities” (p.198-9). The aim of this master thesis is to explore the general curriculum change in the English majors of Chinese higher education institutions in the recent years and the main causes.

The context includes study of policy change on the English majors curriculum reform at the national level, national syllabus for English majors, specific institutional curriculum guideline, English major coursework and field work. My intention is through the case study of BIPT, popularize the result to the situation of English major study in China. After reading through the thesis, readers might have a general impression on how is the situation of English learning in the field of higher education.