disciplinebased

Disciplinebased is an adjective used to describe approaches, curricula, assessments, or research anchored in the norms, methodologies, and epistemologies of a particular academic discipline. It emphasizes disciplinary literacy and practices rather than broad general education.

In education, disciplinebased education research (DBER) studies how students learn within a specific discipline and develops disciplinebased teaching methods, assessments, and curricula. The term is used across disciplines such as physics, chemistry, biology, history, and mathematics. It contrasts with cross-disciplinary or general pedagogy by prioritizing the disciplinary ways of knowing.

Examples include disciplinebased assessment instruments like concept inventories in physics and other sciences and discipline-specific performance tasks that require applying core disciplinary principles. Curriculum design often aligns learning objectives with core practices of the discipline, such as the scientific method in science or argumentation in history.

Benefits of disciplinebased approaches include greater relevance to professional practice, improved mastery of discipline-specific concepts and skills, and clearer alignment between standards and classroom activities. Limitations include potential narrowness of focus, challenges in integrating cross-disciplinary skills, and greater resource demands for development and implementation.

See also: discipline-based education research, disciplinary literacy, subject-specific pedagogy.