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Article Excerpt
Abstract
Curriculum that is truly interdisciplinary reflects the emerging consensus definition of interdisciplinarity and addresses the core elements of interdisciplinarity. These elements include (1) addressing a complex problem or focus question that cannot be resolved by using a single disciplinary approach, (2) drawing on insights generated by disciplines, interdisciplines, or schools of thought, including non-disciplinary knowledge formations, (3) integrating insights, and (4) producing an interdisciplinary understanding of the problem or question. Integrating these dements into curriculum at all levels should reduce much of the semantic evasiveness surrounding the term "interdisciplinary," foster integrative learning, and enhance meaningful assessment of interdisciplinary courses and programs.
Introduction
Writing in the Chronicle of Higher Education, Jeffrey N. Wasserstrom (2006, January 20) complains that interdisciplinarity has become "so fuzzy that a university's commitment to it is close to meaningless" (p. B5). If programs claiming to be interdisciplinarity are fuzzy in their understanding of what interdisciplinarity is, then their curriculum will not provide the proven educational outcomes for students that interdisciplinarity promises. This, in turn, will severely compromise meaningful assessment of these programs. Klein (1999) argues in Mapping Interdisciplinary Studies that interdisciplinary curriculum must make sense locally and yet, to achieve quality, also ought to be informed by research and the national conversation (p. 16). Designing interdisciplinary curriculum, therefore, requires familiarity with the extensive literature on interdisciplinarity.
This literature addresses theory, research process, innovative pedagogies, assessment, institutional context, and faculty support strategies, and can be mined profitably for core design elements that typically characterize interdisciplinarity curriculum. Two essays by Newell provide a good place to start: "Designing Interdisciplinary Courses" (1994) provides a step-by-step guide to designing interdisciplinary courses, examines their theoretical rationale, and identifies expected learning outcomes; and "Powerful Pedagogies" (2001b) examines new assessment techniques, educational benefits of integrative learning, and ancillaries to formal courses such as learning communities, experiential learning, and study abroad. The essays in Interdisciplinary General Education: Questioning Outside the Lines edited by Seabury (1999) explain how to design general education curricula that will build students' integrative skills. Davis (1995) in Interdisciplinary Courses and Team Teaching: New Arrangements for Learning traces the development of five interdisciplinary courses at the University of Denver from conception and planning to evaluation and revision. The essays in Innovations in Interdisciplinary Teaching edited by Haynes (2002) provide invaluable insights into interdisciplinary teaching, learning, and curriculum design for new and experienced faculty. The Association for Integrative Studies (AIS) website offers a wealth of information on curricula design, including papers, syllabi, back issues of Issues in Integrative Studies, and useful links.
Designers of interdisciplinary curriculum should also consult recent work on interdisciplinary assessment, the psychology of cognitive interdisciplinarity, and the interdisciplinary research process. Until recently, interdisciplinary assessment lacked clear guidelines, meaning that faculty and administrators had to rely on discipline-based measures that privileged tests as proof that a student had command of key concepts and skills (Klein, 1999, pp. 18-19). Works by Field, Lee, and Field (1994), Farmer and Napieralski (1997), Schilling (2001), McGann (2001), Tommerup (2001), Field and Stowe (2002), and Wolfe and Haynes (2003), as well as the several reports by Harvard University's Project Zero, document the shift from quantitative to qualitative approaches, from summative to formative evaluation, and from reliance on inputs to emphasis on outcomes. The new field of cognitive interdisciplinarity is developing a "psychological approach" to interdisciplinarity that identifies the cognitive prerequisites and processes involved in integrative thought and activity (e.g., Bromine, 2000). Newell (2001, 2007), Szostak (2004), Klein (2005), and Repko (2005) offer models of the interdisciplinary research process that subsume disciplinary methods, while Spooner (2004) examines the links between the interdisciplinary research process and creativity, proposing tools for promoting integrative thinking and understanding.
The purpose of this essay is to extract from this literature the core design elements that typically define curricula as interdisciplinary, though...
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