Today, English is considered to be one of the subjects that should emphasize Bildung in Norwegian education.19 The process of turning English into a broader subject of
Bildung started in upper secondary school sometime after the Second World War, when teachers used authentic texts in order to put a greater emphasis on culture, social studies, history, and literature (Fenner, 2005, p. 90). In the compulsory English subject in primary and lower secondary schools, however, Bildung did not begin to emerge until the reforms in the 1970s. The reforms in the 1980s and 1990s continued this development, and the introduction of the core curriculum was especially important (Fenner, 2005, p. 93).
As discussed above, the current curriculum is competence-based, and this is largely the result of OECD testing and a general tendency in Western countries for curricula to emphasize competences. For subject English, there has been another important international influence on the curriculum, namely the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR). CEFR was developed by the Council of Europe in order to “provide a transparent, coherent and comprehensive basis for the elaboration of language syllabuses and curriculum guidelines, the design of teaching and learning materials, and the assessment of foreign language proficiency”, and is currently
19 The Norwegian phrase is “engelskfaget er både et redskapsfag og et dannelsesfag” (Udir, 2013b, p.1), and this
is translated as “English as a school subject is both a tool and a way of gaining knowledge and personal insight” (Udir, 2013a, p.1).
available in 40 different languages (Council of Europe, 2018). An Official Norwegian Report20 which addressed the future of education in Norway stated that,
the curriculum in English is […] inspired by the main idea behind the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR), meaning that it emphasizes how language is used (reading, writing, listening, speaking), but the curricula do not follow CEFR in terms of descriptors and content (Ludvigsen et al., 2014, p. 79, my translation).
The competence-based curricula inspired by CEFR have been criticized for lacking specific content descriptions, and they have been contrasted with a student-centered, constructivist approach (Bland, 2013, p. 4). Mike Fleming states that this criticism is especially relevant when it comes to literature teaching, as “it might be argued that […] the action-orientated competence approach adopted by the Common European Framework is appropriate for language acquisition but too crude for capturing the subtleties of the development of literary awareness” (2007b, p. 49). However, Fleming also suggests that focusing on inputs, exploration, and understanding rather than on skills would make assessment more difficult (p. 49).
The move towards competences in the subject English curriculum has three possible consequences for literature teaching. Firstly, since these curricula do not regulate the total amount of reading to be done, this may influence how much students read in the subject. Some students, classes, or study programs may read less than others, but it is difficult to say whether this is the case. There is research suggesting that the reading skills of students who study elective, advanced English courses in upper secondary school are not significantly better than those students who only complete the compulsory English course (Hellekjær, 2012). This indicates that students’ reading skills do not improve significantly when they study more advanced English, which means that reading may not be the area which teachers emphasize the most. However, it should be noted that the curriculum also allows for teachers to use a lot of literature if they wish to do so; some teachers may prioritize reading and literature over other areas, while others may not. The second possible consequence is, as argued by Fleming
above, that the focus on output and skills reduces the focus on individual understanding that is central when studying literature for literature’s sake. This might lead to literature being used more as a resource to achieve other goals, than literature being read for the sake of reading literature.21 The third possible consequence of the competence-based curriculum is that it may influence which texts are taught, since specific texts and/or authors are not mentioned as required reading in the curriculum. This means that teachers and students do not have a common syllabus to refer to across schools or perhaps even within schools, and that examinations do not require knowledge of specific texts.
Despite the strong focus on competences, Bildung is still important in Norwegian schools in general and in subject English in particular. Its influence can be seen in three main areas. Firstly, the term is included in the law regulating education: education is supposed to foster “Bildung and the desire to learn” (see § 1-1 in Opplæringslova, 1998, my translation). Secondly, the core curriculum emphasizes values that are central to the Bildung tradition, and this curriculum is supposed to underpin everything that goes on in Norwegian schools. Thirdly, vocational students in upper secondary education have the same curricula in subject English and the other compulsory general subjects as students enrolled in general study programs, which means that all students should, ideally, be part of the same educational tradition.