Towards the end of the fifties Otaicar Chlup came forward with the theory of basic teaching material, in which he presented the problem of selecting and arranging the content of instruction in a new theoretical form. He eleborated this theory from the viewpoint of qualitatively new conditions and the needs of constructing a developed socialist society. In this study an analysis is made of some historical roots of the basic teaching material theory, its substance, methodological aspects of its delimitation, development and application in the reform of the Czechoslovak elementary and secondary school after 1959. Chlup’s basic teaching material theory is characterized in this study as an original and modern stage in the process of solving theoretical questions of the content of education in Marxist pedagogy and in the socialist school. Special attention has been paid to an analysis of the methodological aspects of the basic teaching material theory. The results obtained are useful for the further study of problems concerning the content of education.