The seminar focuses on different approaches to conceptualize education and curriculum reforms where the importance of contexts and actors are put to the fore. Professor Jan Nespor’s contribution highlights how times and temporalities are constructed in curriculum documents and the testing systems associated with them and how these temporalities are used to shape the rhythms and pace of teaching and learning and define the public meanings of school time. Professor Petter Aasen’ point of departure is to discuss today’s knowledge regimes and contradictions in educational reforms.