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This paper introduces the knowledge path concept to research on curriculum change. Vis-a-vis existing inquiries into curriculum making, the paper explores the usefulness of the knowledge path concept in an empirical analysis of curriculum change that primary education in Turkey underwent at the turn of the century. Based on the documentary interpretation of expert interviews and other material, the paper enquires into the processes that instigated and enabled the curriculum change and rendered it durable. This concept may contribute to four previously identified research approaches to curriculum change: empirical case studies, ideology-critical and New Institutionalist inquiries, and a focus on organizational politics. It emphasizes the significance of time and sequentiality during change processes and underpins the differentiated power of actors.

This paper analyses tuitional practices after a major curriculum change (2005) in primary schools of Turkey. Group discussions conducted with teachers and parents in five maximally contrasting schools (e.g. schools in a squatter and a middle-class neighbourhood of Istanbul) show that tuitional practices, being only ‘loosely coupled’ with the official curriculum, are strongly influenced by generation-specific orientations in teachers’ organisational milieus, by orientations prevalent in the social milieus of pupils and their parents, and by different forms of capital on the part of teachers, parents and school organisations. Combined with empirical analysis, the paper proposes a theoretical framework that complements the assumptions of New Institutionalism by using the basic concepts of the sociology of knowledge and Bourdieu’s concept of capital. This framework offers a new way to understand the intrinsic logic of the growing differences and inequalities within and between school organisations in complex ...

Dieser Aufsatz beschaftigt sich mit der Einfuhrung eines neuen, als konstruktivistisch apostrophierten Curriculums in turkischen Primarschulen. Im Vordergrund steht die Frage, ob das alte, als behavioristisch bezeichnete Curriculum tatsachlich durch eine neue Bildungskultur abgelost wurde. Doch im Zuge der Untersuchung wurde deutlich, dass neben dem neuen Curriculum eine weitere Bildungskultur die Praktiken in Primarschulen pragt: die Vorbereitung auf die zentralen, multiple choice-basierten Aufnahmeprufungen fur das Gymnasium. Wie die dokumentarische Interpretation von Gruppendiskussionen mit LehrerInnen und Eltern zeigt, kommt es – je nach generationeller Lage der Lehrpersonal oder der sozialgeographisch-okonomischen Lage der Schule – zu unterschiedlichen Gemengelagen dieser beiden Bildungskulturen, die bisweilen sogar im Widerstreit miteinander liegen.