The Curriculum, Assessment and Pedagogy: International Perspectives course focuses on critical engagement with international trends, underpinning values and theories which impact on decisions on policy and practice in curriculum, assessment and pedagogy. Drawing on knowledge of practice and policy in familiar and unfamiliar contexts, course participants will analyse recent powerful influences on issues of student and teacher agency, equity and student competences.

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This course is summatively assessed by a written assignment equivalent to 4,000 words in which participants will demonstrate and apply their knowledge, understanding, skills and attributes developed in the course. Using two contexts, at least one of which will be unfamiliar, participants will critically compare aspects of policy and practice in curriculum, assessment and pedagogy which relate to teacher and student agency, equity and future oriented competences; the report will include critical analyses of underpinning values and theories and of the impact of relevant major international initiatives.

The aims of this course are to enable course participants to critically engage with values and theories, explicit and implicit, which underpin decisions on policy and practice in curriculum, pedagogy and assessment. Participants will also develop and apply critical knowledge and understanding of international trends in curriculum, assessment and pedagogy policy and practice related to; teacher and student agency, equity and development of student competences relevant to a complex and unpredictable future.

By the end of this course students will be able to:

■ Critically discuss the values and theories, including those related to teacher and student agency, that underpin decisions on curriculum, assessment and pedagogy in different national contexts.

■ critically review international assessment programmes and international policy advice and identify potential implications of these for national curriculum, assessment and pedagogy policies

■ provide a critical account of issues of equity in education and present an analysis of potential implications of these issues for curriculum, assessment and pedagogy policy and practice

■ engage critically with concepts of student competences to be developed through future oriented curriculum, assessment and pedagogy policy and practice.

Students must submit at least 75% by weight of the components (including examinations) of the course's summative assessment.