Designing an English program to close the startling discrepancy between high educational aims and current teaching practices requires a delineation of learning objectives. A rationale that would achieve a clarification of goals should be based on a sound theory of the learning process and be guided by the writings of such educational philosophers and psychologists as Robert Mager, Benjamin Bloom, David Krathwohl, John Dewey, and Foster McMurray. This study would prepare curriculum designers to (1) determine realistic behavioral and cognitive learning objectives, (2) effect, through discovering and organizing their own goals and values, internally consistent and readily demonstrable curriculum decisions, and (3) base their selection of curricular materials on an understanding of the learning process in a democracy, the school's function as a social institution, and the subject matter of English. (JB)