Curriculum development has undergone many transitions since
the inception of medical education in the United States in the
1800’s. In this chapter, we briefly review the history of
curriculum development in medical education. We discuss the
landmark models of curriculum development including the
concept of a curriculum map and Harden’s SPICES model of
educational strategy, detail the six steps of Kern’s foundational
framework, and provide an overview of the PRISMS strategy.
We address the importance of adult learning theory and the
advancing understanding of education for the millennial
generation, including implementation of the flipped classroom
model of education. Finally, we turn our focus on contemporary
applications of curriculum design, including the application of
simulation to medical education, the rise of massive open
online courses (MOOC), and the implementation of free open
access medical education (FOAM) within undergraduate and
graduate medical curricula.