At Rosewood
State School we implement the Australian Curriculum. Australian Curriculum
Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA), is responsible for the
development of the Australian Curriculum. The following information is
provided by ACARA regarding the Australian Curriculum.
Structure of the Australian Curriculum
The
Australian Curriculum sets out what all young Australians are to be taught, and
the expected standards of achievement as they progress through schooling. For
additional information view the Foundation to Year 10 Australian
Curriculum.
What are the elements of the curriculum?
The overall
structure of the curriculum is consistent across learning areas and includes
the following elements:
A rationale
that explains the place and purpose of the learning area in the school
curriculum.
Aims that
identify the major learning that students will be able to demonstrate as a
result of learning from the curriculum.
An
organisation section that provides an overview of how the curriculum in the
learning area will be organised from Foundation to Year 12.
Content
descriptions that specify what teachers are expected to teach. These are
accompanied by elaborations that illustrate the content descriptions.
Achievement
standards that describe what students are typically able to understand and able
to do, and which are accompanied by work samples that illustrate the
achievement standards through annotated student work.
General
capabilities that describe a set of knowledge, skills, behaviours and
dispositions that can be developed and applied across subject-based content.
Cross-curriculum
priorities that ensure the Australian Curriculum is relevant to the lives of
students and addresses the contemporary issues they face.
What are the content descriptions?
The content
descriptions specify what teachers are expected to teach. They include the
knowledge, skills and understanding for each learning area as student’s
progress through schooling. The content descriptions provide a well-researched
scope and sequence of teaching, within which teachers determine how best to
cater for individual students’ learning needs and interests.
What are the achievement standards?
An
achievement standard describes what students are typically able to understand
and able to do as they progress through schooling. An achievement standard
comprises a written description with illustrative student work samples.
The
sequence of achievement standards across the Foundation to Year 10 Australian
Curriculum describes and illustrates progress in the learning area. This
assists teachers to plan for and monitor learning and to make judgments about
their teaching to support student learning. The achievement standards can
support formative and summative assessment practices and provide a basis for
consistency of assessment and reporting.
Work
samples play a key role in establishing and communicating expectations
described in the achievement standards. The examples of student work include
the task and a student’s response, with annotations about the learning evident
in that response in relation to relevant parts of the achievement standard.
What are the general capabilities and cross-curriculum
priorities?
The Australian
Curriculum pays explicit attention to how seven general capabilities and three
cross curriculum priorities contribute to, and can be developed through,
teaching in each learning area.
The seven
general capabilities are:
- Literacy
- Numeracy
- Information and communication technology (ICT)
capability
- Critical and creative thinking
- Personal and social capability
- Ethical understanding
- Intercultural understanding
The three
cross-curriculum priorities are:
- Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories
and cultures
- Asia and Australia’s engagement with Asia
- Sustainability
Further
detail is available by visiting the ACARA website.