The Australian national curriculum

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The Australian national curriculum

• Briefing 9 July 2009
• to AFMLTA Assembly

2
Structure of the session

• Curriculum development process
• Timelines
• Curriculum design
• Discussion workshops

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Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting
Authority (ACARA)

• Responsible for
• national curriculum
• national assessment
• a national data collection and reporting program

4
National curriculum -recent developments

• ACARA commenced operation this month assumed
  responsibility for national curriculum work
• Induction of writers and advisory group members
  writing has commenced for learning areas in the
  first phase
• The Arts are now in the second phase with
  Geography and Languages
• Curriculum secretariat arrangements

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Curriculum development process

• A process of curriculum development in each
  learning area that
• provides opportunities for consultation
• establishes achievable timelines
• ensures high quality curriculum documents.
• The proposed process involves four phases
• I. Curriculum framing
• II. Curriculum writing
• III. Implementation
• IV. Curriculum evaluation and review

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Timeline - Phase 1
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Timeline - Phase 2NB The Arts (TBC)
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Other learning areas

• ACARA to report to MCEETYA in October
• 2009 on
• the approach that will be taken to health and
  physical education, ICT, design and technology,
  economics, business and civics and citizenship

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LANGUAGESPosition Paper (July-September 2009)

• Undertake environmental scan and scope of the
  languages area
• Develop position paper
• Prepare for writing of shape paper

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Shape of the national languages curriculum
(October 2009-May 2010)

• Develop draft languages shaping paper
• Consult on draft shape paper and analyse feedback
• Prepare initial draft report with proposed
  responses
• Consult on revised draft report and languages
  shaping paper
• Revise languages shaping paper

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Curriculum Development February 2010-August
2011

• Select writing teams and advisory panels
• Conduct writers induction
• Develop broad outline of curriculum
• Develop detailed draft of curriculum documents
• Consult on approved draft of curriculum documents
  
• Finalise curriculum documents
• Publish approved curriculum documents

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Key issues for consideration

• What is the rationale or purpose for language
  learning?
• Studied by which students? At what year(s)?
• Which languages will form part of the suite of
  the languages national curriculum?
• Who are key individuals, groups and organizations
  to be consulted? Engaged?

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Curriculum design

• Rationale
• Aims of the learning area
• Organisation of the learning area curriculum
• Content
• Achievement standards
• General capabilities
• Cross-curriculum dimensions
• Links to other learning areas

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Curriculum design considerations

• The nature of the learner and learning.
• The whole curriculum and how national curriculum
  learning areas relate to it.
• Structural matters, including commencement and
  completion of school and transition points.
• Inclusivity and how the national curriculum will
  provide for the educational needs of every child.
• General capabilities, describing how the national
  curriculum will attend to general capabilities
  learning.
• Cross-curriculum dimensions, describing
  perspectives to be included in each learning area.

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• Content
• The content descriptions are being written first
• Will explicitly incorporate ICT, literacy,
  numeracy, thinking skills, creativity
• Other capabilities and perspectives will be
  evident in each learning area, in ways
  appropriate to that area

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What does the national curriculum look like?

• By year
• Clear
• Layered
• Digital
• Hyper-linked

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Achievement Standards

• An achievement standard is an expectation
• of the quality of learning that students
• should reach by a particular point in their
• schooling (i.e. the depth of their
• understanding, the extent of their
• knowledge and the sophistication of their
• skills).

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Achievement standards

• For K-10, they will be represented at every year
  by
• a statement of the learning expected of students
  for that year
• a set of grade descriptors that provide a
  language to describe the extent to which a
  student has met the achievement standard for
  that year
• a set of work samples that will illustrate
  expected learning in relation to the grade
  descriptors

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Curriculum for the senior secondary years

• Assumptions
• the curriculum will be designed to meet the needs
  of the full range of students
• state and territory certifying agencies will
  continue to be responsible for assessment,
  certification and its quality assurance
• the extent of the senior secondary national
  curriculum in the first four subjects, and in
  other subjects, may grow over time
• where a course is developed nationally that
  covers the scope of learning in existing courses,
  states and territories will not offer existing
  courses.

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Curriculum for the senior secondary years

• Course structure and time allocation
• four sequential units, units 1 2 designed for
  Year 11, units 3 4 designed for Year 12
• each unit will be designed to be taught in about
  half a school year of approx. 50-60 hours
  duration
• courses will specify core content, electives will
  be kept to a minimum

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Writing progress to date

• Writers are currently drafting and developing
  content descriptions for each strand K-10
• Conceptual work has commenced on the purpose,
  nature and content of senior secondary courses
• Writers and advisory panels are meeting and
  working in online collaborative spaces.

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Implementation (from 2011)

• Factors that influence implementation
• The extent of difference between existing
  curriculum requirements, in terms of what is to
  be taught and assessed, in any particular year or
  over a sequence of years.
• The extent of change in how the curriculum
  content is organised, (e.g. by years of
  schooling) and how achievement standards are
  presented.
• The extent to which state and territory
  credentialing or other arrangements require
  additional material to be developed and made
  available to teachers
• The extent and place in the cycle of curriculum
  change

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Further information and documents
www.acara.edu.au