Abstract:
The study was conducted to investigate the opinion of the parents (Class IX & X
students), English teachers, students of secondary classes and experts in curriculum field
about the purpose of studying English and selection of contents accordingly. In addition
the experts in curriculum field were also consulted on the procedures and processes used
at present for selection of content. The focus was on four major areas i.e. social forces in
society /community values and purposes, knowledge and its treatment, the nature of
learning and the learner and human growth and development that are fundamental to any
curriculum.
Content and construct reliability and validity of the questionnaires were ensured
through pre-testing as well as by obtaining experts opinion. For data collection a sample
of 1000 English teachers, 2000 students, 2000 parents and 50 curriculum experts from all
the four provinces and the federal capital was selected by adopting multi-stage random
sampling procedure. It was ensured that the sample represents the population from rural
and urban areas, Urdu and English mediums and public and private schools for both male
and female in the right proportion.
The key conclusions based on the descriptive and statistical evidences indicated
that the people of Pakistan attach great importance to values and purposes related to
religious teachings and want to promote these through schooling. It also revealed that the
people are very keen to learn English as it is the language of knowledge and higher
learning in all fields. The findings of the study indicated that in the present textbooks of
English speaking is least emphasized as compared to other skills. The findings of the
study also gave a fairly good idea of themes and sub-themes that the majority of
population wants to include as content of English for classes IX–X. Based on statistical
analysis of the data, criteria for selection of contents for teaching English in Secondary
Schools has been developed and weightage suggested for each which have been validated
by the Textbook Boards and Curriculum Bureaus in the country.
