Proper

Abstract

The objective of this study was to investigate the feasibility of the South Korean integrated curriculum as a method to integrate the curriculums of South and North Korean elementary schools to prepare for unification. Integration of curriculums is important as it lays the foundation for integration of the people. To this end, this study comparatively analyzed the elementary school curriculums of both countries: South Korea’s “2015 Revised National Curriculum” and North Korea’s “2013 Revised Education Platform.” The results of the discussions are as follows. First, with regard to content, the integrated curriculum was found to provide learning content about topics that were common to both South and North Korean life. Thus, it could be immediately applied comprehensively to the current North Korean curriculum with little modifications in a post-unification scenario, especially in the lower grades 1 and 2. Second, the integrated curriculum was found to be the most suitable because it provided all the necessary grounding and preparation for life in a democratic society; thus, it was found to be the most suitable replacement for North Korea’s ideology-related subjects. Finally, the study found that the successful implementation of the integrated curriculum would depend on the degree of flexibility in terms of organization and operation between the two systems, especially in the cases of grades 3-6.