Education

In many English schools that offer formal education, the curriculum would be the set of courses, content and course work which they provide. The curriculum could be partially or entirely decided upon by an external or authoritative body like the National Curriculum for England for English schools.

Curriculum essentially means two things. First, it is the range of courses that students can choose from. Second, it is the term used to refer to the teaching, the learning and the assessment materials and resources that are available for a specific learning program or a given course of study.

A regular curricula of an English school would usually include subjects such as: mathematics, including algebra, business mathematics, trigonometry, statistics, geometry and calculus; English, including reading and media education; science, including general science, biology, geology, chemistry and physics; languages, including German language courses and other foreign language courses teaching English, French, Spanish, Russian and Chinese courses, classical languages like Latin and Greek; art, including visual arts, music and theater; physical education; political education; sexual education; social studies, including modern studies, history, economics, civics, geography and psychology; design technology; military education; computing studies; home economics; religious education; home economics; public speaking; vocational education; and study skills. A german language school (Sprachschule) which teaches speaking German offers a different curriculum which covers all the essential skills that are needed to be fluent in the German language or to be good in speaking German.

Today, a spiral curriculum has also been used by several educational institutions, as it allows students to go over the content of a specific subject matter once again as the subject matter develops. This curriculum employs the constructivist approach, which proposes that students are able to learn better through discovery learning or the active engagement with their educational environment.

An important aspect of the curriculum would be the proper definition of all the course objectives which are usually expressed as learning outcomes. This would include the assessment strategy which would be used for the program. These outcomes and assessments would be grouped as modules or units, with each unit comprising of a specific or specialized part of the curriculum. German language schools also allot a certain number of units for each of the courses that they offer, ensuring that the education their students are getting would be sufficient.

Similar to other educational institutions such as traditional colleges and universities, often a German language school (alemania.ch/de/tipps_lernen.html) have curricula that cover a lot of specialized subjects, including those that teach speaking German and learning more about the German culture.