This chapter offers an overview of the curriculum landscape in South Africa spanning the last four centuries, beginning with the precolonial period in 1488 when the first European ship entered South African ports, up to the present-day post-apartheid curriculum. Employing an interpretive lens and drawing on Pinar’s reconceptualization discourse, I explore how the curriculum has influenced the existence and growth of the child, prompting our central inquiry: What impact have these curricula had on the African child? In addressing this question, the author examines the underlying objectives of each curriculum framework, asserting that the ideological aim of South African curricula has been to marginalize learners through intentionally and purposefully crafted policies. Instead of approaching the curriculum with an emphasis on understanding, I show how the focus remain on curriculum development, where teachers are perceived as invisible agents of the government’s agenda, and learners are seen as raw material to be preserved for the future.