| The history of family studies/home economics is a long and proud one but its future is full of uncertainty. Boards of education have targeted family studies/home economics programs across the country, and around the globe, for review--often resulting in elimination, or integration with, or replacement by technological programs which are thought to incorporate elements of the family studies curriculum. Teachers are struggling with understanding the effects of these changes to their discipline, to their profession, to their lives.;This research uses a hermeneutic critical approach to examine, and to question historical and current writings and documents, in an attempt to come to a deeper understanding of the challenges that technological education and its advancement are posing for family studies/home economics education. Family studies/home economics education, technological education, the ideals of persons educated in each discipline, curriculum models and the design challenge process, are critically examined to lend insight to the research question guiding this thesis, as well as to re-think their own teaching.;The subject matter of family studies/home economics, taught from interpretive and critical perspectives, has perhaps never been more important than it is in today's society. This challenges family studies/home economics teachers to deeply question, re-think and re-construct the possible effects of educational technology on their discipline. |
