Process and Product Curriculum
A distinction between curriculum models that begin from pre-specified outcomes (product) and those that begin from principles for valuable educational experiences (process). The clearest articulation is Lawrence Stenhouse's An Introduction to Curriculum Research and Development (Heinemann, 1975), which positioned the process model as a critical alternative to the objectives tradition descending from Tyler's Rationale.
Stenhouse's Argument
Stenhouse accepted that planning needs structure but rejected the assumption that all educationally worthwhile learning can be specified in advance as behavioural objectives. Drawing on his work on the Humanities Curriculum Project, he proposed defining curriculum by principles of procedure rather than measurable end states. A curriculum, on this view, should specify what teachers and learners will do and why those activities are educationally valuable on their own terms.
His often-cited claim is that knowledge worth teaching has its own internal standards of inquiry, and that reducing it to objectives distorts both the knowledge and the act of learning. Education, Stenhouse argued, is an induction into forms of thought, not the production of pre-specified performances.
Product vs Process
| Dimension | Product model | Process model |
|---|---|---|
| Starting point | Statement of objectives or outcomes | Principles of procedure and content selection |
| Locus of value | End-state behaviours | Quality of activities and inquiry |
| Teacher role | Implementer of specified plan | Researcher of own practice |
| Evaluation | Measurement against objectives | Critical appraisal of activities |
| Risk | Trivialises what cannot be specified | Hard to demonstrate accountability |
The framing is analytic rather than absolute. Most actual curricula combine both, and Stenhouse himself accepted that some training-style learning fits the product model adequately.
Relevance to ELT
The product-process distinction maps usefully onto Jack C. Richards's three-way scheme in "Curriculum Approaches in Language Teaching: Forward, Central, and Backward Design" (RELC Journal, 2013).
- Forward Design sets a syllabus first, then methodology, then assessment. It is product-leaning when its syllabus prescribes outcomes, but procedural when content is treated as input for emergent learning.
- Central Design starts from method and classroom processes; outcomes and syllabus are not specified in advance. This is the closest language-teaching analogue of Stenhouse's process model. Examples include Community Language Learning, the Silent Way, and strong TBLT versions where tasks are the primary unit and learning is what occurs through them.
- Backward Design starts from outcomes and reasons backwards to assessment and methodology. It is the contemporary articulation of the product tradition.
Process-leaning approaches dominate teacher-research, action-research, and exploratory-practice traditions in ELT. Product-leaning approaches dominate exam preparation, ESP, and large-scale public programmes where accountability requires specified outcomes.
Limitations
Critics argue the process model under-serves contexts in which learners, employers, or governments need explicit accountability for outcomes. Defenders reply that product specifications, taken literally, narrow what counts as learning and produce washback toward test-shaped instruction (see Washback). The mature position treats the two as complementary lenses rather than rival programmes.
References
- Stenhouse, L. (1975). An Introduction to Curriculum Research and Development. Heinemann.
- Richards, J. C. (2013). Curriculum approaches in language teaching: Forward, central, and backward design. RELC Journal, 44(1), 5–33.
- Elliott, J. (1998). The Curriculum Experiment: Meeting the Challenge of Social Change. Open University Press.
- Kelly, A. V. (2009). The Curriculum: Theory and Practice (6th ed.). Sage.