Competence-Oriented Curricula and the Promotion of Bildung: the example of philosophy teaching in Norway

This article examines the concept of Bildung within competence-oriented curriculum work, using philosophy teaching in the most recent 2020 Norwegian curriculum reform (LK20) as an example. The purpose is to clarify what characterizes Bildung-promoting teaching in subject curricula aimed at the students’ development of competences. The article uses document analysis to investigate the understanding of Bildung in two of LK20’s key policy documents and how this understanding is reflected in the description of philosophy teaching in three of LK20’s subject curricula. The results suggest that while LK20 aims to strengthen students’ participation in society, the representation of Bildung-promoting philosophy teaching deviates from some of the core ideas of Bildung according to the north-west European Didaktik tradition. The article concludes that, if Bildung relies on adaptive teaching and philosophy teaching is meant to promote Bildung, it would be advisable to further expand the understanding in Norway’s national curriculum of what philosophy is and how to teach it. The article contributes to the field of curriculum studies by showing how representations of Bildung in education policy can translate into and be identified within-subject curricula, and by presenting the current state of philosophy teaching in Norway.