A Look over Curriculum from the Point of View of Critical Thinkers: Freire, Giroux and Apple

Abstract

The present paper investigates the approaches of three major critical thinkers about curriculum. Henry Giroux with his theory of "Border Pedagogy" combining critical, post-modern, feminist and reconceptualist views tries to help educators and learners understand manifests of traditional borders of power, knowledge, decision-making, and sociocultural curriculums could be criticized in their pedagogies and they could even go beyond them. Then borders of existing pedagogies created by imperialism would be challenged and redefined. Freire utilizes the "Emancipatory Concept" from Habermas and Frankfurt school, uses it in the field of education and manages to provide a critical ground in educational system in which critical dialogue does not merely solve the problem but discusses new issues. Michael Apple emphasizes the role of "Hidden Curriculum" in the formation of predefined goals of imperialism and offers new solutions in this regard.

Keywords: Critical education; Freire; Giroux; Apple; Curriculum