Subjects keep schools from effectively tying education into students' lives. Some examples are politics, trucks, and animals. A domain is, like a subject, a collection of skills, cases, and facts. Domains, however, have a much more eclectic mode of organization. Domains organize things according to how they cluster in everyday human experience.
Domains have three interesting properties.
First, domains tend to cut across subjects. Any of the above domains can be used as a vehicle to teach the subjects of physics, biology, or history. Second, peoples' goals and interests tend to flow along the lines of domains, not subjects. Third, apart from superficial differences, many domains tend to be quite similar to each other. This means they can serve as convenient mechanisms to negotiate between the interests students naturally have and the subjects educators want to teach.