Navigating Curricular Crossroads: Exploring Science Teachers’ Enactment of Competence-Oriented Curriculum Reforms

This thesis examines how a group of lower secondary science teachers in Denmark engage with and navigate a competence-oriented curriculum reform and the factors influencing their abilities to align with intended curriculum goals. As educational policies worldwide increasingly emphasize competence-based education to prepare students for a rapidly changing world, the success of such reforms depends significantly on teachers, who serve as both implementors and interpreters of policy initiatives (Fullan, 2015; Priestley et al., 2015). However, research on how teachers experience, respond to, and navigate such reforms remains limited, especially in authentic contexts. This thesis aims to bridge this gap by exploring Danish science teachers’ enactment of a curriculum reform, through four empirical papers addressing the overall research question:

How do science teachers enact and navigate competence-oriented curriculum reforms, and what factors influence their ability to align their practices with the intended curriculum goals?

5 Abstract This thesis examines how a group of lower secondary science teachers in Denmark engage with and navigate a competence-oriented curriculum reform and the factors influencing their abilities to align with intended curriculum goals. As educational policies worldwide increasingly emphasize competence-based education to prepare students for a rapidly changing world, the success of such reforms depends significantly on teachers, who serve as both implementors and interpreters of policy initiatives (Fullan, 2015; Priestley et al., 2015). However, research on how teachers experience, respond to, and navigate such reforms remains limited, especially in authentic contexts. This thesis aims to bridge this gap by exploring Danish science teachers’ enactment of a curriculum reform, through four empirical papers addressing the overall research question: How do science teachers enact and navigate competence-oriented curriculum reforms, and what factors influence their ability to align their practices with the intended curriculum goals? The question is operationalized through five sub-questions explored in the four papers constituting the thesis. First, the study systematically explored how the implications of curriculum revisions for science teachers have been studied in the past, and what factors that affect their implementations of competence-oriented curriculum revisions. This was explored through a systematic qualitative literature review. Findings show that science teachers’ practices are deeply influenced by systemic factors, including assessment frameworks, institutional support, and access to professional development. The review also revealed a dominant reliance on interventionist research approaches that often overlook the contextual factors influencing teachers’ approaches to reform implementation. These insights emphasized a need for research that voices teachers’ perspectives and experiences within their lived contexts. Second, the study drew on the model of teacher agency (Priestley et al., 2015) to analyze Danish science teachers’ construction of agency in their planning and discussions about a key aspect of the competenceoriented curriculum reform: multidisciplinary teaching units. The results highlighted that in their constructions of agency, the teachers drew heavily on their professional horizons by relying on established practices and experiences, which constrained their abilities to fully adopt the objectives of the curriculum. Third, the study applied the Future Workshop method (Jungk & Müllert, 1987), to explore how the science teachers navigate in the context of the curriculum reform. Findings illuminated the tensions teachers face between the intended goals inherent in the curriculum and the practical difficulties meeting the demands. Furthermore, the results outlined that while teachers often showed a willingness to adapt the curriculum, many felt constrained by organizational factors, which resulted in compromises and reduced ambitions. Fourth, the study explored the teachers’ practices in the new oral exam format introduced with the revised curriculum by investigating the types and distributions of questions the teachers and external assessors ask during the exams to elicit information about the students’ levels of scientific competence. The results showed that although the curriculum prioritizes development and achievement of scientific competences, assessors often draw on closed, factual questions that fail to effectively assess students’ competence levels. Overall, the findings from this thesis indicate a misalignment between curricular intentions and teacher enactment. Teachers adapt and reinterpret reforms based on their professional horizons and contextual realities, often in ways that diverge from policymakers’ original intentions. The findings suggest that effective curriculum enactment necessitates both individual and systemic support. This includes recognizing the realities of teachers’ curriculum enactment and addressing contextual factors that influence such practices. Such support is critical for empowering teachers to navigate the tensions between existing practices and new requirements.