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This article reports on some of the findings from case studies conducted with six secondary school music teachers in New Zealand. The purpose of the study was to investigate and explain the ways in which teachers manage the relationship between classical and popular music in their elective classroom programs, utilizing a theoretical framework drawn from the work of educational sociologist Basil Bernstein and more recent social realist theory. In each case, the focus of the research was the teacher and the influences on their curriculum decision-making. Students in each music department were interviewed to triangulate teacher interviews and observations. The findings indicate that a significant tension is present between the affirmation and validation of students' musical interests and pre-existing skills, and the development of the knowledge considered fundamental within the discipline. It is teachers' ability to 'find a balance' between these central concerns of their educational work that is significant in maintaining the epistemic integrity of a subject which has become strongly influenced by socio-cultural influences.

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In this paper I present a curriculum design Model that extends the 'Powerful Knowledge' ideas of social realist theory. The Model called 'Curriculum Design Coherence' describes an approach in which the interrelationship between 'knowledge-that' (epistemically structured academic knowledge) and 'know-how-to' (procedural knowledge) is central to the design process. The Model also differentiates and then links subject concepts, content, subject competencies, and assessment. The underlying premise is that deep learning for students is more likely if teachers utilise and make visible the epistemic structure of the area of study, the subject concepts and subject competencies to be taught and their inter-relationships.Content selection and learning activities elaborate and 'make real' the concepts, and assessment takes its rightful place as a means to identify students' developing ability to make judgements through intelligent 'knowing-how-to' and 'knowing-why'.

Link to this article: http://journals.cambridge.org/abstract_S0265051712000058How to cite this article: Graham McPhail (2012). From singular to over-crowded region: Curriculum change in senior secondary school music in New Zealand.