TIME DIMENSION (SCOPE/STUDYLOAD)

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Are you curious for more? Would you like to get in touch? Feel free to contact our lead directly for any questions or inquiries you may have. tikvah@studioblended.com +31 6 42 47 29 69

Time matters. How long should a course or degree last? Or to put it differently: How do we know if the scope of your content fits?

Ultimately, time is a very strategic component of your course/degree as it is part of your triple constraint of quality, cost and time.

‘Form aids function’ - our alliteration on the architectural ‘form follows function’. Like ‘a priori architecture’ you can make time boundaries work for you.

ECTS - the European Credit Transfer and Accumulation System - are a way to demarcate time, and weigh educational programmes in order to allow exchange of students.

More at the course level, we can calculate how much studyload certain activities represent.

But: what does the content need itself in matters of time, to be taught well?


Figure: Your golden triangle or so-called project constraint triangle - quality, cost and time investment. After Project Management for Development Professionals (PMDPro4), 2017, p. 15

Time is not just functional, it is also deeply philosophical. 
Time is poetic, and time is liquid. Usually, we feel time is now, and time is up. There is no time. Slogans of our accelerating time are everywhere (after Kozminska and Ruiz 2024). Education is also characterized by different temporal scales, such as how much time a knowledge video clip may last, or how much time we allow a novice to our field to learn. The multiplicity of velocities and viewpoints, creates different timelines. What is more, we need an approach of ‘timefulness’ (after Bjorrnerud 2018): just like buildings, a course or degree and their elements are not only what they are now, but also what they were before, and what they can become in the future, and anything in between at the same time. And time is money. Time in your course or degree has a price tag. Time also matters at your human level, you shouldn’t waste precious time of your life on anything really.

So, how can you balance off time and good pedagogy?

First of all, there is the tacit knowledge of a teacher, in how much time a subject needs to be taught well, to a particular group of learners. The acknowledgement of the know how of teachers (after Bulterman 2024) and dialogue with them is pivotal here for good curriculum design.

Education that minds the existentional dimension of it - that is, how students discover how to be in the world - ‘needs to work with the principle of suspension - of slowing down, of giving time, so that students can meet the world, meet themselves in relation to the world, and “work through” all this (Biesta 2022, p. 50).

A very good way to approach ‘time’ in an iterative way, is with our ‘fit for purpose framework’ for curriculum design. Curious for more? Why not set up a call and discover how this could help your course or degree.

Related publications

Follows end 2025. Resilient education that stands the test of time - by design. Thinkpiece.

Our Audio Podcast

🎙 Guest interview Atefeh Aghaee, team lead blended learning advisors, Delft University of Technology (TU/D)
Prefer to read? Transcript
Listen on: Acast Spotify Apple
Release spring ‘25


🎙 Guest interview dr. Alonso Ayala,Senior expert in housing and Human Settlement Planning, Institute for Housing and Urban Development Studies (IHS), Erasmus University Rotterdam.Prefer to read? Transcript
Listen on: Acast Spotify Apple
Release spring ‘25

Prefer to read? Looking for resources? Transcript
Listen to A) dosage on: Acast Spotify Apple Listen to B) slow productivity on: Acast Spotify Apple
Release March 20 / June 21 ‘23

References

Biesta, G. (2022) World-Centered Education; A view for the present. New York and London: Routledge.

Bjorrnerud, M. (2018) Timefulness: How Thinking as a Geologist Can Help Save the World. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. 

Bulterman, J. (2024) Het lerarentekort: pleidooi voor vakmanschap [Teacher shortage: a plea for craftsmanship]. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2nd edition [Dutch].

Kozminska, U. & Allen, N.R. (2024) Time Matters. Berlin: Ruby Press.

More design angles we use

Technical resilience
Big ideas
Paradigm shifts/decade strong
Human resilience
Modular
Time dimension
Evidence-based design
Financial health and resilience by (re)design
Innovative and deep pedagogy
Assesment / evaluation
Multi- Inter- and transdisciplinary
Designed to be green (and technological simplicity)
Nature and aspirations
Flexibilisation and personalisation
Simplicity and decluttering
Artificial Intelligence



Curios? Feel free to contact our senior advisor and teacher trainer directly:
tikvah@studioblended.com

Innovative and deep pedagogy and resilient education that stands the test of time - by design.