


































 

The Quest for a Unitary Curriculum 
 

Ann L. Winter Sokoloff 

Princeton Regional School District, NJ 

 

Abstract 

Contemporary educators are rediscovering 

the need for a more unitary curriculum, often 

without cognizance of the long struggle for 

curriculum synthesis as evidenced in the 

curriculum literature. In the face of increasing 

knowledge specialism and fragmentation and an 

increasingly multicultural society, the need for a 

more unitary curriculum as exemplified in the 

unit of work is examined.  

 

The concept of democracy has received 

renewed recognition through worldwide events 

with the close of the twentieth century.  This 

renaissance of democratic ideals and values on a 

global scale impelled American educators to give 

renewed attention to the function of public 

education in a democratic society. 

Paradoxically, although the subject-

centered curriculum continues to dominate in an 

era of national and statewide standardized 

achievement testing as the chief measure of 

school quality (Epstein 1996), renewed attention 

is being given to the contributions of John Dewey 

and other experimentalist-progressive educators 

who promoted the idea and practices for building 

a more unitary curriculum.  Dewey saw very 

clearly that the form of the curriculum must 

follow its function.  In effect, Dewey turned the 

concept of the curriculum ―essentials‖ on its head 

when he declared, 

 

The scheme of a curriculum must take 

account of the adaptation of studies to 

the needs of the existing community life; 

it must select with the intention of 

improving the life we live in common so 

that the future shall be better than the 

past.  Moreover, the curriculum must be 

planned with the reference to placing 

essentials first, and refinements second.  

The things that are socially most 

fundamental, that is, which have to do 

with the experiences in which the widest 

groups share, are the essentials.  The 

things that represent the needs of 

specialized groups and technical pursuits 

are secondary.  (1916, 191) 

 

Contemporary educators are rediscovering 

the need for a more unitary (interdisciplinary) 

curriculum, often without cognizance of the long 

struggle for curriculum synthesis as evidenced in 

the curriculum literature.  Unitary curriculum has 

a rich heritage in the integrated units of work 

practiced at the Dewey‘s Laboratory School in 

Chicago and other progressive schools.  Initially, 

the development of the unit-of-work involved the 

identification and formulation of realistic 

problems, themes, topics for study and devising 

the ways and means of investigation into a variety 

of relevant sources of data.  This required 

articulation of the curriculum both vertically, 

through the grades, and horizontally, across the 

subject areas.  The unit-of-work ―orchestrated a 

carefully considered body of related activities of 

significance to the pupil and so planned as to 

develop insight, skill, understanding, and control 

of some important aspect of human experience‖  

(Leonard 1955,  436). The integrated unit-of-

work purported to connect the curriculum to the 



126 

 

nature of the learner and to the life of the learner 

in and for a free society.  The unit-of-work 

emphasized student engagement in the actual 

application of knowledge through investigative 

activities involving projects that related to life 

experiences.  In the face of increasing knowledge 

specialism and fragmentation, the need for a more 

unitary curriculum as exemplified in the unit-of-

work is evident.  In an increasingly multicultural 

society, the need for a more unified curriculum is 

increasingly paramount—a curriculum that takes 

full account of the nature of the learner in 

harmony with the democratic prospect. 

Contemporary educational leaders need to 

recognize the rich body of knowledge in the 

curriculum field. 

 

Origins 

 The unit-of work as a curricular approach 

evolved during the experimentalist-progressive 

movement in the United States. Understanding 

the impetus for the progressive movement in 

education provides insight into the development 

of the unit-of-work curricular approach.  

According to Cremin (1964), the progressive 

movement in education began in the 1890‘s with 

Joseph Rice precisely because he saw it as a 

movement.  Rice, a young New York 

pediatrician, fueled the movement with his 

monthly articles on American public school 

systems, published in 1892 in The Forum, a New 

York monthly.  After touring 36 cities, visiting 

their public school systems and talking with 1,200 

teachers, Rice publicized his dismal findings 

(Cremin 1964).  The American schools were 

dimly lit, poorly heated, frequently unsanitary, 

and overcrowded.  Public apathy, political 

interference, corruption, and teacher 

incompetence were prevalent in the schools.  The 

students were subjected to endless drill, rote 

repetition, and meaningless language exercises 

(Cremin 1964). 

Yet, Rice‘s publications faced strong 

opposition.  The national reports and policies 

issued by the National Education Association in 

the 1890‘s supported the subject-centered, 

traditional modes of education (Tanner and 

Tanner 1990). The progressive movement in 

education spearheaded by Rice emerged in the 

midst of strong opposition against the politically 

controlled, mechanical system of American 

public education.  While Rice provided the 

―rallying cry‖ for the progressive movement in 

education, other visionaries during the last half of 

the 19
th

 century developed new approaches to 

curriculum reform.  The unit-of-work exemplified 

one of these new approaches to curriculum, which 

took shape in the newly established laboratory 

and demonstration schools, spearheaded by 

Kilpatrick and Dewey in Chicago during the early 

1900‘s. 

Today‘s progressive educational ideas 

represent an important renaissance of the 

progressive movement from the opening of the 

20
th

 century.  Progressive educational ideas 

uniquely address educational issues in historical 

and modern day American democracy.  The 

dominant practices from both time periods 

include discipline-centered curriculum that 

hinders American students by: emphasizing 

testing and measuring statistical data, developing 

curriculum without considering students‘ 

interests, and ignoring the need to foster a sense 

of democratic stewardship in young Americans 

(Eisner 1994). The resulting educational issues 

associated with American democracy include: 

increasing knowledge specialization that produces 

an overcrowded, fragmented curriculum in our 

schools, and an increasingly multicultural society. 

Arthur Schlesinger describes the problems 

associated with an increasingly multicultural 



127 

 

society in his book, The Disuniting of America  

(1992). As contemporary progressive educators 

rediscover the need for a more unitary curriculum, 

they address the current educational issues in 

American democracy:  overcrowded, fragmented 

curriculum in our schools that lacks the unifying 

form needed in an increasingly multicultural 

society. 

During the past few decades, 

contemporary progressive educators demonstrated 

a renewed interest in a form of curriculum called 

the Integrated Unit of Work (Beane 1991).  

Dewey, one of our nation‘s curriculum leaders, 

clearly saw that the form of curriculum must 

follow the function of a democratic society. The 

integrated unit-of-work developed at his 

Laboratory School in Chicago not only connects 

the curriculum to the nature of the learner, but 

connects to the life of the learner in and for a free 

society.  This form of curriculum emphasizes 

student learning through hands-on investigative 

activities involving projects related to life 

experiences. 

Dewey was just one of our nation‘s 

curriculum leaders that supported the integrated 

unit-of-work because it complements the 

curriculum paradigm that evolved throughout the 

20
th

 century.  Dewey argued that curriculum 

development should include three fundamental 

factors that interdependently make up what he 

called the educative process:  (1) the learner (― the 

immature, undeveloped being‖); (2) society 

(―certain social aims, meanings, values incarnate 

with the matured experience of the adult‖); and 

(3) organized subject matter (―the specialization 

and divisions of the curriculum‖) (Dewey 1902, 

181-185).  Simply put, the structure and function 

of the curriculum must be in harmony with the 

nature and needs of the learner and the life of the 

learner as a member of a free society (Tanner and 

Tanner 1995). 

Dewey‘s fundamental factors in the 

educative process were formulated from the work 

in his Laboratory School at the University of 

Chicago.  Dewey‘s fundamental factors or 

sources of curriculum development were further 

developed and refined by Inglis (1918), Rugg 

(1926), Bode (1927), Giles, McCutchen, and 

Zechiel (1942), Taba (1962), Tyler (1949) and 

Tanner and Tanner (1995).  They were used to 

guide the program of curriculum development 

and evaluation by the staff in the Eight-Year 

Study (1932-1940) that will be discussed later.  

The paradigm can be utilized to evaluate 

approaches to curriculum development. 

 

The paradigm calls into consideration 

the most profound philosophical, social, 

and psychological questions, such as:  

What knowledge is of most worth?  How 

is this knowledge to be reconstructed as 

curriculum?  How is it to become 

transformed as working power for the 

individual learner in the school and 

society?  How is it to affect a significant 

bearing on societal improvements? 

(Tanner, L. 1982,  410). 

 

The unit-of-work approach to curriculum 

development addresses Dewey‘s three 

fundamental factors in the educative process, 

namely: (1) the nature of the learner, (2) the 

values and aims of a democratic society and (3) 

the selection, organization and treatment of 

knowledge in that thing that is called the 

curriculum.  Dewey‘s three fundamental factors 

in the education process, the learner, society, and 

the organized subject matter, act as both sources 

and influences upon the development of 

curriculum.  Differences in how each of the three 

factors is conceived are linked to the priorities 

and biases of differing schools of educational 

psychology and philosophy. 



128 

 

Dewey supported cognitive-

developmental psychology that garnered support 

from progressive educators throughout the 20
th

 

century.  Dewey (1910), Piaget (1950), 

Havighurst (1972), and others recognized that the 

learners‘ mental growth is developmental and 

changes qualitatively and re-forms throughout the 

maturational process. The Tanners (1995) offered 

support to Dewey‘s, Piaget‘s, and Havighurst‘s 

developmental stages and their connection to 

curriculum development. They presented a three-

dimensional schema showing the interdependence 

of the various cognitive, affective, and biosocial 

developmental processes  (Tanner and Tanner  

1995,  288). 

Dewey opposed the traditional, rote 

memorization methods of that day based on the 

theory of mental-discipline.    The theory of 

mental-discipline was built on faculty 

psychology, which held that the mind consisted of 

separate faculties, or powers, that were developed 

and improved by exercise (Tanner and Tanner 

1990).  The theory of mental-discipline ascribed 

to the belief that students‘ minds had innate 

mental capacities that needed to be exercised like 

a muscle or filled to capacity like vessels; thus 

students‘ innate intellect differed only in quantity 

and not quality. Teachers taught a body of facts 

from separate subjects to their students.  With 

varying mental capabilities, the students 

memorized the facts and regurgitated them in 

recitation and examinations (Tanner & Tanner, 

1990). 

Dewey felt that if education was to 

advance knowledge and educational practices, it 

must utilize the scientific method of inquiry or 

problem method of investigation.  The problem 

method of education is an evolving process rather 

than a fixed means of instruction (Dewey 1910). 

Dewey‘s problem-solving method elaborated on 

Ward‘s (1883) more general ideas about 

curriculum development presented in Dynamic 

Sociology and made them functional (Tanner and 

Tanner 1995).  Dewey identified the following 

essentials of reflection for the problem method: 

 

They are first that the pupil have a 

genuine situation of experience-that 

there be a continuous activity in which 

he is interested for its own sake; 

secondly, that a genuine problem 

develop within this situation as a 

stimulus to thought; third, that he 

possess the information and make the 

observations needed to deal with it; 

fourth, that suggested solutions occur to 

him which he shall be responsible for 

developing in an orderly way; fifth, that 

he may have the opportunity and 

occasion to test his ideas by application, 

to make their meaning clear and to 

discover for himself their validity 

(Dewey 1916,  150; Dewey 1910,  72-

78; Tanner and Tanner 1995,  169). 

 

Dewey‘s problem method of investigation was 

utilized in the development of the units of work at 

his Chicago Laboratory School (Mayhew and 

Edwards 1936; Tanner, L.  1997). 

 

Separate and Not Equal 

By contrast disciplined-centered 

curriculum represented separate and isolated 

subjects with subject matter organized as 

―content‖ to be ―recalled‖ by the learner for 

recitation and testing.  It mitigated the curriculum 

paradigm (the fundamental factors in the 

education process): (1) the design and structure of 

the curriculum to meet the macrocurricular 

function of general education in a free society and 

(2) to meet the nature and needs of the learner 

(Dewey 1902; Giles, McCutchen, and Zechiel 

1942; Tanner and Tanner 1995; Alirangues 2003).   

The curriculum paradigm has been useful in 



129 

 

establishing the criteria for evaluating the efficacy 

of educational reform proposals and in 

determining the causes of failure of various 

reform efforts  

(Tanner and Tanner 1995; Presseisen 1985; 

Hlebowitsh 1987). In her study, Unlearned 

Lessons, Presseisen (1985) surmised that the 

majority of educational reforms failed because 

they violated the fundamental factors in the 

paradigm and ignored past findings in the 

curriculum field. This is also consistent with Peter 

Hlebowitsh‘s 1987 study that found many of the 

reforms failed because they ignored or neglected 

the nature of the learner and aligned the 

curriculum to narrow nationalistic purposes rather 

than the problems and prospects for a democratic 

society. 

In fact, history is full of lessons that reveal 

the effects of curriculum that violates the 

curriculum paradigm.  For example, the launching 

of Sputnik I in 1957 by the Soviets left the 

Americans racing to establish their superiority in 

the space race.  The curriculum was turned to 

defeating the Soviets in the drive for global 

political and military dominance.  The emerging 

discipline-centered curriculum heavily favored 

the sciences and mathematics over all other 

subjects. There was a redirection of guidance 

programs to talent search for gifted students in 

math and science; an emphasis on knowledge 

specialization, purity and abstraction by the 

university-scholar-specialists to the neglect of 

practical knowledge relating to the life of the 

learner in and for a democratic society. 

Vocational education, physical education, and the 

arts were devalued as a result of the narrow 

national curricular priorities. As a result, 

curriculum from the 1960s represented separate 

and isolated subjects with subject matter 

organized as ―content‖ to be recalled by the 

learner for recitation and testing.  During the 

discipline-centered period of the 1960s, national 

reports and policies devalued unitary curriculum. 

It is this violation of the curriculum paradigm that 

caused student disengagement, as evidenced in 

the student protests and their call for curricular 

relevance (Engler 1973).  

More recently, further evidence reveals 

that the dominant discipline-centered curriculum 

fails to meet the needs of our democratic society.  

In the 1992 Sandi Report, the minority and urban 

students in America continued to demonstrate low 

achievement.  Similarly in 2007, although 

minority students in America have shown some 

improvement on certain math and reading 

achievement tests, there is still needed room for 

improvement (NCES 2007). Yet, in the face of 

historical evidence that reveals that the discipline-

centered curriculum does not connect with or 

address the needs and interests of our minority 

students, this type of curriculum continues to 

dominate and weaken our American democracy. 

Concurrently, in the 1990‘s, there was a 

call for accountability, a call for national 

assessment of students‘ progress. In 1991, 

President George H. W. Bush announced the 

issuance of America 2000: An Educational 

Strategy. It presented as a long-range plan to 

move every community in America toward the 

National Educational Goals adopted by the 

President and the Governors in 1990 (U. S. 

Department of Education, America 2000:  An 

Educational Strategy  1991). America 2000 called 

upon the National Educational Goals Panel to 

develop world-class standards for each of the five 

core subjects. After taking office, President 

Clinton endorsed all of the elements of America 

2000 with the exception of Bush‘s call for school 

vouchers. Under the rubric of Goals 2000  (1992), 

President Clinton promoted a test-driven 

curriculum that would be assessed by ―New 

World Class Standards‖ through American 



130 

 

Achievement Tests.  President George W. Bush 

continued to advocate high national educational 

standards and test driven discipline-centered 

curricula as evidenced in his support of the No 

Child Left Behind Act in 2003.  

This move for accountability of public 

schools has been spurred on by publications and 

press releases as well.  The publication of the 

1983 report of the National Commission on 

Excellence, A Nation at Risk, helped to generate 

the idea that the public schools were responsible 

for the fundamental erosions of quality of life in 

America (Hlebowitsh 1996).  The negative and 

often inaccurate national media coverage of 

American public education has further 

contributed to the widespread lack of recognition 

of the attainment of American public schools 

(Hlebowitsh 1996).  

As a result, in response to the call for 

accountability, the dominant discipline-centered 

curriculum has been aligned to the states‘ 

educational standards. These standards represent 

the curriculum priorities of an elite group and do 

not adequately address the needs of the 

disadvantaged.  They devalue the arts and 

vocational education.  

Compounding the problem, the discipline-

centered curriculum that is aligned to state 

standards is measured by achievement tests.  

According to Madaus‘ research in 1988, as the 

chief measure of state standards, the standardized 

tests tend to measure math and reading skill 

acquisition rather than higher level thinking skills.  

Standardized tests have been modified in an 

attempt to address these issues.  However, high 

stakes testing puts pressure on teachers to teach to 

the test to produce acceptable scores (Madaus and 

Kellaghan 1992; Epstein 1996) and narrows the 

curriculum and pedagogical practices. 

Consequently, in this high stakes testing 

environment, teachers‘ creativity and spontaneity 

are hindered and devalued. Madaus states, ―If 

important decisions are presumed to be related to 

test results, then teachers will teach to the test‖ 

(1988, 90).  Further, continues Madaus, 

 

Examples include tests directly linked to 

such important decisions as: (a)     

graduation, promotion, or placement of 

students; (b) the evaluation or rewarding 

of teachers or administrators; (c) the 

allocation of resources to schools or 

school districts; and (d) school or school 

system certification. (1988, 87) 

 

Educators might well ask, ―If the current 

standardized tests tend to measure math and 

reading skill acquisition rather than higher level 

thinking skills and teachers are pressured to teach 

to the test, then what do these tests really reveal?‖  

Madaus and Haney offer this response: The goal 

of increasing student learning is supplanted by 

improving average tests scores, which has the 

effect of distorting and corrupting the educational 

process it is intended to monitor (Madaus 1988,  

89; Haney and Madaus 1986,  14). 

 

Community of Learners 

 Contemporary educators are rediscovering 

the need for a more unitary curriculum, in an 

ahistorical manner often without cognizance of 

the long struggle for curriculum synthesis as 

evidenced in the curriculum literature.  Unitary 

curriculum has a rich heritage in the integrated 

units of work practiced at Dewey‘s Laboratory 

School in Chicago.  Many schools like the Dewey 

School used the unit-of-work in curriculum 

development during the progressive era of 

education during the first half of the 20
th

 century.  

This approach in its exemplary form 

characteristically grew to encompass: practical 

and generalized knowledge, horizontal and 

vertical articulation of curriculum, synthesis of 



131 

 

studies, reflective thinking for problem solving, 

instruction for individual differences, instruction 

through activities and projects, varied teaching 

resources, discovery learning, concrete 

educational experiences, field trips, varied forms 

of evaluation, spiral learning, teachers acting as 

guides, developmental learning, the recognition of 

students‘ interests and needs, and the concern for 

fostering of democratic citizens and the 

betterment of American democracy (Dewey and 

Dewey 1915; Lincoln School Staff  1927; Aikin 

1942; Rugg and Shumaker 1969). 

Historical research reveals the onset of 

planning a more unitary curriculum entailed the 

reorganization of school schedules in both the 

elementary grades, and the middle school and 

high school grades.  Blocks of time were 

scheduled daily for elementary teachers and core 

teachers on the secondary level to work with 

students.  When deemed necessary and 

appropriate, students developed and practiced 

their skills during designated periods (A 

Description of the Curricular Experiences at the 

University School for the School Year of 1938-

1939; Sokoloff  2004).  The unitary curriculum 

has been criticized for not providing time during 

the day for students to practice their basic skills 

(Baxter, 1929).  However, teachers can schedule 

time for students to practice their skills as needed, 

and the teachers at the University School in 

Columbus, Ohio demonstrated just that.  Skill 

acquisition was purposefully connected to 

projects, activities, and the problem method of 

instruction.   Students applied their skills to real 

life experiences as opposed to contrived artificial 

exercises that lacked meaning for the students‘ 

lives.   

Perhaps some examples will make this 

clear.  At the University School the students 

applied and practiced their skills in age 

appropriate units of work such as:  the first-grade 

unit-of-work, Toys (1938-1939) that provided 

time for students to construct toys and puppets 

from around the world while learning how springs 

and weights worked in them; the fourth-grade 

unit-of-work, How the People of China Are Like 

Us and How They Are Different From Us (1948-

1949) that allowed students time to study Chinese 

music and theatre and perform the play, ―The 

Story of the Willow Plate‖; the eight-grade unit-

of-work, Uncle Sam’s Work (1936-1937) that 

provided students time to compile a 67-page book 

that examined the United States government, 

welfare system, crime, national defense, 

immigration, conservation and food control, 

weather forecasting, money and coinage, 

highways and bridges and national parks; and the 

twelfth-grade unit-of-work, Were We Guinea 

Pigs? (1937-1938), an account of the students‘ 

school experiences through the course of the 

Eight-Year Study.   Holt published the students‘ 

303-page book that included photos, charts, 

graphics, and a bibliography.  In all the 

aforementioned units of work, students‘ 

interdisciplinary skills were applied and practiced 

through meaningful and collaborative work 

(Sokoloff  2004). 

Historical research reveals that the unit-of-

work approach to curriculum was tested in the 

field during the Eight-Year Study (1933-1942).  

The Eight-Year Study conducted in the 1930‘s 

examined thirty schools that used experimental 

curriculum approaches, one being the unit-of-

work.  The study included nearly 3,000 students 

enrolled in 300 colleges to determine the effect of 

traditional academic subject admission 

requirements on the success of college students.  

Compared to their matches in traditional 

discipline-centered curriculum programs, the 

graduates of the 30 schools that utilized 

experimental curriculum such as the unit-of-work: 

earned higher grade point averages, received 



132 

 

more academic honors, demonstrated more 

precise, systematic, and objective problem 

solving skills, and exercised more intellectual 

curiosity. Because much of our society exists 

outside the classroom, it is also interesting to note 

that these students: became more actively 

concerned about what happened in society, earned 

more nonacademic honors, and proved more 

resourceful in meeting new situations (Aikin 

1942; Tanner and Tanner 1990).  

The popularity of the unit-of-work as a 

form of curriculum spread through the first half of 

the 20
th

 century and acquired other names such 

as:  the teaching unit, the core unit, the problem 

method, and the project method (Billet 1932).  

The term core curriculum was often used in 

conjunction with the unit-of-work during the 

progressive era.  However, there was a difference 

between core curriculum and the unit-of-work.  

The unit-of-work was one example of an 

integrated approach to curriculum development.  

The unit-of-work, as mentioned intended as: 

 

A complete experience based upon a 

meaningful situation in child or adult 

life.  The unit-of-work was a fusion of 

mental, emotional, and sensory 

experience; it proceeded in a physical 

and social setting that resembled life in 

so far as possible; and it was directed 

toward the accomplishment of goals that 

resulted in some improvement of life. 

(Harap  1931,  2; Tanner and Tanner 

1990) 

 

By contrast, the core curriculum was far 

more inclusive in being conceived as common 

learnings or general education organized as an 

integrated curriculum related to common themes 

or problems as required study for all students.  

Core curriculum implied that the separate subjects 

would be articulated through various approaches 

to curriculum organization and articulation 

through correlation (connections between separate 

courses such as U.S. history and American 

literature), broad fields (interrelated subjects such 

as civics, geography, history, and economics), 

fusion (combined courses such as U.S. history 

and American literature), and even 

interdisciplinary problems such as Problems of 

Democracy.  Core teachers often correlated two 

subjects such as history and English or math and 

science.  The problem-focused core curriculum 

was intended to make the curriculum relevant to 

the learner‘s life.  It might replace all or part of 

the subject curriculum in general education with 

the purpose of engaging students from various 

backgrounds in working together toward solving 

problems of life in a democratic society (Tanner 

and Tanner 1995).  A unit-of-work may be one of 

many units in a subject or broad field. 

The term project method was often used 

simultaneously with the unit-of-work during the 

progressive era.  However, there was a difference 

between the project method and the unit-of-work.  

Both projects and units were used in the Dewey 

School (Mayhew and Edwards 1936) before the 

turn of the century and in the Francis W. Parker 

School as early as 1901 (Tanner and Tanner 

1990).  However, it was Kilpatrick , a professor at 

Teachers College who systematized projects into 

a method in 1918.  According to Kilpatrick, there 

was only one criteria for a project:  ―the presence 

of a dominating purpose‖ (1918, 321 and 324).  It 

was the attitude of the learner toward his or her 

work that was important.  For Kilpatrick, a 

project was a ―wholehearted purposeful activity 

proceeding in a social environment‖ (1918, 320).  

In, Foundations of Method, Kilpatrick stated that 

it was preferable for children to have practice in 

all four steps of any given project:  purposing, 

planning, executing, and judging.  Yet, he stated 

that it was acceptable for the child to adopt the 

teacher‘s suggestion for a project as his or her 



133 

 

own (1941, 212).  The project method was mainly 

a method.  It did not necessarily link education 

with social problem solving and the progressive 

improvement of society, but neither did the unit-

of-work.  Although, the integrated unit-of-work 

as developed by the experimentalist-progressive 

educators, purported to connect the curriculum to 

the nature of the learner and the life of the learner 

in and for a free society (Alberty 1927; Tanner 

and Tanner 1990). 

Varied definitions surfaced as well.  The 

various definitions, types, and sources for the 

unit-of-work generated confusion and criticism 

within the field of education (Caswell and 

Campbell 1935; Taba 1962). This confusion and 

criticism from the past is reflected in the 

profession today. Yet, the legacy of the unit-of-

work as a conceptual development to provide 

unitary teaching and learning through the 

thoughtful planning of a coherent curriculum 

endured. The distinctive characteristic of a unit-

of-work was significant understanding of a 

central thematic body of knowledge engaging the 

learner in activities and projects as related to the 

life of the learner (Caswell and Campbell 1935; 

Harap 1931).   

During the progressive era, teachers at the 

Lincoln School in NY such as Emily Barnes and 

Bess Young received tremendous guidance from 

the faculty at Teachers College.  They developed 

many exemplary units of work for students and 

resource units for the teachers to use.  Their unit-

of-work entitled Children and Architecture took 

their sixth-grade students in to the real world to 

visit the Riverside Church to observe the details 

on the doorway of a modern Gothic Cathedral and 

its stained-glass windows.  Later their students 

were afforded opportunities to make stained-glass 

windows and construct models of different kinds 

of bridges with the assistance of their industrial 

arts teacher.  These projects required the use of 

skills in geometry and measurement.  The 

students extended their knowledge about stained-

glass windows and learned about the history of 

rose windows.  Greek and Roman legends were 

read that gave accounts about the building of 

famous churches and buildings.  Poems were 

written by the students that related to the central 

theme of study:  Architecture.  The students wrote 

and published the play, ―The Wonderful Doors.‖  

Much of the action in the play took place in front 

of a replica of the famous carved doors in 

Florence.  Their students learned how to scale 

architectural drawings and make blueprints.  They 

wrote and illustrated research reports that 

reflected their own interests in architecture.  

Barnes‘ and Young‘s unit-of-work Children and 

Architecture provided for varied forms of 

evaluation (pretests, posttests, quizzes, research 

reports, projects, and observations) that measured 

students‘ social, emotional, and cognitive 

progress, individual differences, stimulated their 

students to widen their interests, connected their 

students with the needs of society, offered their 

students opportunities to use a variety of 

academic skills, and created a classroom 

environment that promoted cooperative and 

collaborative learning for their students (Young 

and Barnes 1932).     

Unfortunately, over the years the concept 

of the unit-of-work has become a veritable cliché 

for any topical organization of subject matter and 

is even used to designate sections in textbooks.  

This distortion neglected the nature and interests 

of the learners and violated the curriculum 

paradigm.  In part, the distortion occurred because 

teachers often lacked the education, training, 

material resources, scheduling accommodations, 

and time required for planning, developing, and 

implementing unitary curriculum. Also, in part, 

the distortion occurred due to the influential, 

efficiency movement in education that was at its 



134 

 

height during the years 1910 to 1930. This 

systematic, linear approach to planning 

curriculum defines goals, identifies tasks, and 

organizes the tasks from simple to complex so 

that as the child proceeds along the way, progress 

toward the ultimate goal is assured (Morrison 

1926).  The most prevalent misinterpretation of 

the concept of the unit-of-work was the Morrison 

Plan.   

The Morrison Plan was very mechanistic, 

linear, teacher directed and executed. Little room 

for digression was permissible and mastery of 

content was the end goal (Morrison 1926). The 

Morrison Plan eventually led to the present-day 

subject or discipline-centered units of work and 

was more closely aligned to the goals of the 

efficiency movement than the progressive 

movement of education. Many contemporary 

units of work followed Morrison‘s linear 

behavioristic strategies for learning and ignored 

the interests and needs of the learners and society.  

Thus, they violated the curriculum paradigm.  In 

addition, the Morrison Plan allowed for units of 

subject matter to be called units of work as long 

as they included a wide variety of teaching 

strategies (Morrison, 1926).  In effect, Morrison 

advocated that the unit-of- work would be based 

upon subject-matter encompassing a significant 

aspect of environment or culture. By contrast, the 

unit-of-work approach to curriculum development 

required teachers to guide students on a long 

personal educational journey that led to 

significant understanding of a central thematic 

body of knowledge engaging the learner in 

activities and projects as related to the life of the 

learner.  The experiential unit-of-work, as 

conceived in the Dewey Laboratory School and 

the Lincoln School did seek to connect the pupil 

experiences with the democratic social prospect. 

The distortion of the original concept of the unit-

of-work is still with us today, with textbooks 

commonly organized as chapters into units, which 

merely represent groupings of chapters, and not 

integrated units of work.  Yet, the legacies of 

unitary curriculum endured as evidenced by 

contemporary writings. 

 

Form Follows Function  

 In 1991, Beane stated ―knowledge and 

skill need to be taken out of abstract subject 

categories and repositioned in the context of 

thematic units where they are more likely to 

develop.  In an era of rapid knowledge explosion, 

this kind of curriculum is both appropriate and 

realistic.‖  Thematic units are not a new idea.  The 

unit-of-work, Children and Architecture, 

developed at the Lincoln School in NY utilized 

all the disciplines including the studio arts and 

industrial arts.  In 1936, the Building America 

series developed originally by the Society of 

Curriculum sought to meet the need for relevant 

curriculum that addressed the interests and needs 

of the learners and our democratic society. Each 

volume was organized according to themes and 

problems of American social, political, economic, 

cultural or international life—such as health, 

crime, education, energy, war, taxes, housing, 

food, and civil liberties.  The units of study 

treated America‘s contemporary problems frankly 

and objectively (Hanna, 1936-1938; Tanner, D., 

1988). These exemplary thematic units can serve 

as paradigms for educators today.  In 1984, Vars 

reminded us that the National Association for 

Core Curriculum published a bibliography of 

research on the effectiveness of block-time, core, 

and interdisciplinary team teaching.  Historic 

research reminds us that public, private, and 

laboratory schools nationwide in the Eight-Year 

Study (1942) successfully utilized unitary 

teaching, team teaching, and school scheduling 

that supported unitary curriculum. Brunkhorst 

stated, ―since so much of modern scientific 



135 

 

research occurs at the interface of science 

disciplines (geophysics, biochemistry, human 

ecology), science must now be taught in a way 

that makes connections among the sciences and 

with the real world of the student‖ (1991, 37). 

The exemplary unit-of-work, Civics For 

Democracy, (Isaac 1992) advocated real life 

experiences for students such as investigating and 

evaluating community waste disposal programs, 

including plans for future landfills or incinerators.  

Historical research reminds educators that real life 

community research projects were conducted at 

the Ohio State University School during the 

Eight-Year Study.  

  In 1994, Perkins and Blythe advocated the 

idea that ―understanding‖ is being able to carry 

out a variety of ―performances‖ that show one‘s 

understanding of a topic and at the same time 

advance it.  Current educators need to be 

reminded that unitary teaching at Dewey‘s 

Laboratory School promoted active learning and 

performance based evaluation through projects 

and activities such as planting and caring for a 

garden and constructing and furnishing a 

clubhouse.  In 1994, Perrone discussed 

engagement of students in learning.  He stated ―to 

draw students into the depth and complexity of a 

subject, we must look for topics that relate to 

students‘ lives.‖  The Foxfire Books published by 

Wigginton from 1972-1993 cite numerous 

examples of students involved in real life projects 

relating to their Appalachian Mountain 

Community in north Georgia.  The students wrote 

about their heritage in English class and in doing 

so, developed a deep appreciation for their 

ancestors. Writing across the curriculum unifies 

the curriculum and addresses the current 

educational problem of an overcrowded 

curriculum.  

Gardner‘s work on multiple intelligences 

in 1983 called for a more equitable curriculum 

that meets the needs of all types of learners. 

During the Eight-Year Study, the Dalton School 

in New York City introduced the course, Nursery-

Biology that did just that. It was met with a great 

deal of enthusiasm from the ninth-grade girls and 

proved to be very successful.  The freshmen 

program was built around the work in the Dalton 

School Nursery.  Human biology was taught in 

relation to the Nursery School that was placed in 

charge of the teacher of biology who had 

experience in children‘s hospitals.  The students 

spent one week in the nursery as a worker during 

each semester.  They made out individual daily 

health charts, graphed the babies‘ weights, 

heights, and temperatures, and recorded food 

intake and caloric value of their diets.  The 

students‘ evaluation was performance based. 

Unitary curriculum involves a wide variety of 

experiences and activities that address and 

evaluate various learning styles (PEA 1943).  The 

exemplary unit-of-work The Nature of Recreation 

published in 1972 involved not only reading 

about recreational facilities in a community, but 

provided blueprints to design and construct a 

model community with a variety of recreational 

facilities.  This unit–of-work offers a variety of 

activities and projects that address and evaluate 

various types of learners and learning styles for 

contemporary educators to use with their students.  

In 1993, Wiggins stressed authentic 

evaluation that measures student growth.  Nearly 

half a century earlier, the Ohio State University 

School (June 1945) used authentic evaluation that 

measured the students‘ social, emotional as well 

as academic growth.  Standardized tests were 

viewed as one piece of evidence to evaluate 

student progress and often were utilized for 

diagnostic purposes.  For example, at the 

University School at Ohio State University, 

intelligence tests, reading readiness tests, reading 

achievement tests, math achievement tests, were 



136 

 

administered.  In high school, aptitude tests and 

American Council Psychology assessments were 

administered.  In addition, teacher-made 

evaluations of students‘ values, social acceptance, 

thinking skills, library skills, interests, and 

psychological profiles were compiled.  Teachers 

in grades K through 12 at the University School 

compiled individual portfolios of students‘ work, 

teacher observations, and comments about 

students‘ progress.  Evaluation was continuous, 

concerned with end products and the means to 

reach those ends and cooperative.  All those who 

were affected by the evaluation participated in 

it—administrators, teachers, pupils and parents 

(Ohio State University school 1945). 

In 1995, Tanner wrote about our social 

fragmentation and multicultural conflict in our 

schools.  He states: 

 

The great problems of our age involve 

social fragmentation and multicultural 

conflict.  The challenge of the twentieth 

century for our school has been to build 

intercultural understandings through a 

unified core curriculum while 

simultaneously providing diversified 

studies for a cosmopolitan student 

population. This is an ever-greater 

challenge as society becomes 

increasingly multicultural (Tanner and 

Tanner 1995). 

 

The same idea is reiterated in Schlesinger‘s, The 

Disuniting of America.   

 

Instead of a transformative nation with 

an identity all its own, America 

increasingly sees itself in this new light 

as preservative of diverse alien 

identities.  Instead of a nation composed 

of the individuals making their own 

unhampered choices, America 

increasingly sees itself as composed of 

groups more or less ineradicable in their 

ethnic character.  The multiethnic dogma 

abandons historic purposes, replacing 

assimilation by fragmentation, 

integration by separatism.  It belittles 

‗unum‘ and glories ‗pluribus.‘ (1992, 16-

17) 

 

Echoing Tanners‘ and Schlesinger‘s thoughts, 

Wraga (1995) wrote, ―it‘s time to recover the 

unifying function of the comprehensive high 

school through a ‗Common Learnings Course‘.‖  

Interestingly, ―Columbia University has 

established a national reputation for its core 

curriculum, a required series of classes that 

includes a yearlong contemporary civilization 

course. Students study Homer‘s epic Odyssey, the 

Bible, Plato‘s Republic and selections from Marx 

and Darwin.  They feel the course provides them 

with a common cultural literacy (U.S. News and 

World Report, 2006, 52) Regardless of the 

educational grade level; this form of curriculum 

addresses our social fragmentation and 

multicultural conflict.  Adding further support, 

Tanners‘ write interdisciplinary curriculum 

provides horizontal articulation and recognizes 

the reality that experience is integrated; the school 

should enable students to understand the complex 

interrelatedness of experiences (Wraga 2007,  92; 

Tanner and Tanner 2007, Chapter 10).  

Current research has found that students in 

interdisciplinary school environments learn 

subject matter as well or even better than do 

students in subject-centered school environments 

(Vars 1996; Caskey 2006; Wraga 2009).  Hoy 

makes the argument that students tend to learn 

better when they perceive a connection between 

their concerns and what they are asked to learn 

(Hoy and Hoy 2006, 150; Wraga 2009). This 

complements Tyler‘s earlier findings that 

interdisciplinary curriculum, both vertically and 

horizontally fosters the cumulative impact of all 

learning experiences for students through 



137 

 

unification of the subjects (Tyler 1949; Wraga 

2009). 

 Various forms of curriculum used in the 

past acquire new names and parade as the latest 

educational fashion without being subjected to 

historical evaluation.  This type of evaluation is 

an essential part of the curriculum development 

process for our school based curriculum 

committees. For example, historical research 

supports field trips that have historical roots in the 

work of Francis Parker (1837-1902) the 

superintendent of the public school system of 

Quincy, Massachusetts. Field trips then and now 

provide valuable real life experiences for students 

to learn from and write about. John Dewey 

referred to Parker as the father of progressive 

education (Cremin 1964). Parker encouraged 

teachers to introduce their own teaching materials 

into the classrooms.  He emphasized: discovery 

learning, field trips, the whole language approach, 

the reading and writing connection, individual 

expression, conversations about experiences, 

drawing, and curriculum synthesis (Cremin 

1964).  The current research of preschool 

education reveals that preschool education helps 

to narrow the achievement gap between students 

from different socio-economic backgrounds 

(Hohmann and Weikart  2002). This research 

builds on the research from the High/Scope Perry 

Preschool Study initiated in 1962 (Schweinhart, 

Barnes, Weikart, Barnett, and Epstein 1993). 

Writing across the curriculum unifies the 

curriculum and addresses the current educational 

problem of an overcrowded curriculum. Again, it 

has historical roots in the work of Francis Parker 

(1837-1902).  Community service projects offer 

students an opportunity to improve their own as 

well as other communities.  This idea of fostering 

a better society was evident in Dewey‘s 

Laboratory School in Chicago and a key 

characteristic of the unit-of-work approach to 

curriculum (Dewey 1916).  

Our educational leaders need to embrace 

and build upon the history of the unit-of-work 

approach to curriculum.  Too often, educators 

spend unnecessary time and effort reinventing the 

wheel.  Evaluating past curriculum work helps 

educators to build upon the successful approaches 

and avoid repeating those that failed. Our 

students‘ learning 

experiences today are hindered because the 

dominate discipline-centered curriculum violates 

the curriculum paradigm by: emphasizing testing 

and measuring statistical data, developing 

curriculum without considering student‘s 

interests, and ignoring the need to foster a more 

unified curriculum in an increasingly 

multicultural society. As contemporary 

progressive educators rediscover the need for a 

more unitary curriculum, the current educational 

issues associated with American democracy are 

addressed. The need for a more unified 

curriculum is increasingly important—a 

curriculum that addresses the increasing 

knowledge specialism and fragmentation and 

takes full account of the nature of the learner in 

harmony with the democratic prospect.  Dewey 

eloquently stated that the need for universal 

equity in education is essential to democracy: 

 

What the best and wisest parent wants 

for his own child, that must the 

community want for all of its children.  

Any other ideal for our schools is narrow 

and unlovely; acted upon, it destroys our 

democracy.  All that society has 

accomplished for itself is put, through 

the agency of the school, at the disposal 

of its future members.  All its better 

thoughts of itself it hopes to realize 

through the new possibilities thus 

opened to its future self.  Here 

individualism and socialism are at one.  



138 

 

Only by being true to the full growth of 

all the individuals who make it up can 

society by any chance be true to itself. 

(1900, 7) 

 

Dewey saw very clearly that the form of the 

curriculum must follow its function (Dewey 

1916). 

 

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