Abstract
In recent years we have witnessed unprecedented rapid and substantial curriculum change in state schools. This paper provides a case‐study of how this is being mediated through a secondary school. A student perspective is presented. The focus is on how central government policy initiatives and internal institutional curriculum restructuring have served to disrupt, albeit unintendedly, the conditions for students' learning. They point to the general impact of the current changes and how they are differentially structured, experienced and responded to by different social groups. What emerges is the limitation of quantitative‐based curriculum innovation. It fails to acknowledge the cultural specificity of pedagogic social relations that are essentially experienced as a human social activity.

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