Professor Ivor Goodson has spent the last 30 years researching, thinking and writing about some of the key and enduring issues in education. He has contributed over 40 books and 600 articles to the field.
In this book, he brings together 20 key writings in one place. Starting with a specially written Introduction, which gives an overview of Ivor's career and contextualizes his selection within the development of the field, the chapters cover:
- Curriculum history and policy
- Classroom pedagogy and strategies for professional development
- Life history, narrative and...

The process of curriculum development is highly political, as Goodson shows in this enlarged anniversary third edition of his seminal work. The position of subjects and their development within the curriculum is illustrated by looking at how school subjects, in particular, geography and biology, gained academic and intellectual respectability within the whole curriculum during the late 1960s and early 1970s. He highlights how subjects owe their formation and accreditation to competing status and their power to compete in the provision of worthwhile knowledge and considers subjects as...

The first edition of The Making of Curriculum was published in 1988 and reviewers hailed it as a seminal work in the field. In that work Goodson explored a number of aspects of the so-called traditional subjects and described the way they develop over time to a point where they can be promoted as 'academic' disciplines. He showed that the claim to be academic was in fact the result of a substantial political contest covering a century or more. The traditional subject was, in short, invented. The first edition of this book provided a series of challenging insights for those desiring to make...

First published in 2004. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

First published in 2004. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

School subjects and how they are viewed and positioned within education is the focus of this text. It argues that, as part of rethinking the whole school curriculum, there has been a failure to look at the historical and social background of school subjects.

School subjects and how they are viewed and positioned within education is the focus of this text. It argues that, as part of rethinking the whole school curriculum, there has been a failure to look at the historical and social background of school subjects.

School knowledge has been a subject for historians, notably in the field of history of education. By concentrating on the educational aspects of particular historical periods, however, links with contemporary education have often remained undeveloped.

School knowledge has been a subject for historians, notably in the field of history of education. By concentrating on the educational aspects of particular historical periods, however, links with contemporary education have often remained undeveloped.

Investigating the Teachers Life and Work attempts to bring together the methodological and substantive aspects of studying the teachers life and work. Some of the chapters in the book provide a "how to do" approach for those wishing to study the teachers life and work employing a life history method; whilst other chapters provide the kind of substantive and generic findings which might be anticipated when conducting life history work.


The focus on professional life and work has been growing rapidly in the last two or three decades. There are a number of reasons for this. Firstly there...