فصلنامه مطالعات برنامه درسی
پیاپی 23 (زمستان 1390)

Grounded theory is regarded as a powerful research method for theory building in social sciences, even though it has not found its deserved place among educational research methods as expected. This study was conducted in order to introduce this research method and develop an innovative synthetic model for applying grounded theory research in addressing educationalissues. The model has been developed based on a review of related theoretical and empirical literature. In this model, the grounded theory is inductively formed through theoretical sampling and the systematic process of collecting andanalyzing data simultaneously. It requires that the researcher attain a level of competency, experience and knowledge about the research problem to be able to analyze the data precisely and deeply so that the credibility and dependability of findings would not be undermined.

Civil behavior implies confidence and respect to others or strangers. Development of civil behavior in contemporary societies that consist of millions of strangers has gained more importance. In economically, socially and politically developed societies this type of behavior plays a crucial role. The present paper evaluates manifestation of civil behavior in coursebooks of elementary school in Iran’s educational system. After enumeration of civil behavior categories, by using content analysis the content of 2nd and 3rd class Persian literature books are examined. The paper also makes a comparison between the present coursebook (2008) and the one taught before the 1979 Revolution (published in 1967). The conclusion section shows which aspects of civil behavior training are strong and which aspects are weak.

The purpose of this article is to analyze the status of ethnicity in the hidden curriculum of the secondary school and to explain views implicitly taught to the students with regard to this status.the qualitative method of ethnography is applied.The participants in the research were the students and teachers of a secondary school in the city of Tehran. Purposeful sampling was employed for data collection and the tools that the researcher used during one year of ethnography were observation, interviews,daily note takings, photographs, video tapings,analysis of documentaries,voice recordings, and performance of focus groups.Findings of this research show that respecting different ethnicities in the hidden curriculum does not have a desirable place and the students did not have much knowledge about each other's ethnicity.The students’ daily experiences do not guarantee that they receive those cultural elements that the society and the Explicit/formal curriculum believe that they should possess.

The main objective of this research was to decide on the possibility of launching and promoting decentralization in Iran’s curriculum development system and ultimately design an effective model for regional curriculum development. The paper consists of four main sections: reviewing related local and foreign literature on decentralization of curriculum development systems, designing a sixteen-step model for Iran's regional curriculum development, verification of the developed model by university specialists and experts and practitioners of the Education Ministry. At the last stage, nearly the entire group of experts verified the designed model’s various elements and details.

This research was based on a descriptive design by which using content analysis the elements of information literacy were studied. For this purpose, initially a list of the standards of information literacy in the USA, Australia, England, and New Zealand was prepared and the common features were extracted. At the next stage, the extracted pattern was adapted to the socio-cultural conditions of Iran as well as the children’s age and language development stage. Finally, a listcontaining eight elements and forty five indices was prepared. The study showed that in general, information literacy in none of the books was explicitly referred to and the method of content organization was not based on the concept of information literacy, although the Let’s Read coursebook was richer in terms of frequency and diversity of elements under study. The study also showed that in both books, legal, economic and ethical issues, was not considered at all.

This study evaluated elementary school’s science curriculum by using the Akker's curriculum components. The three research questions were studied using descriptive methods. The population consisted of elementary science teachers and education experts. Through stratified random sampling 381 teachers were recruited, while experts were fully enumerated (46). Data were collected using a checklist (with a reliability of 0.797), questionnaires (teachers with the reliability of 0.968 and experts with the reliability of 0.943). Data analysis method consisted of measures of central tendency, factor analysis and the Friedman test. The results showed Akker's curriculum components classification for the evaluation of a curriculum is not perfect and factors such as curriculum integration, flexibility in implementation, with appropriate content for learning, student-centered etc. should also be considered. Elementary science teachers and experts believed the curriculum is at an acceptable state. Teachers believed the emphasis in terms of objectives was on coverage of physics’ concepts, knowing the environment, essential scientific knowledge, observation skill and the concept of health.

The purpose of this study was to investigate the status of physical education curriculum in high Schools of Markazi Province. The sample -based on Morgan sampling table- included 15 managers, 176 principals, 176 physical education teachers, and 382 students. The research instrument was questionnaire and Kruskal-Wallis, Wilcox, and Friedman tests were used for data analysis. Results demonstrated that the current curriculum, instruction, and evaluation enjoyed moderate status. There weren’t any significant differences between fifteen educational districts in terms of current curriculums. However, there were significant differences between the current state of instruction, and evaluation in 15 districts. There were significant differences between current and optimum state of the three components. Hence, it seems that taking into considerations expectation for three components can be help to improve the state physical education.