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Articles on National Curriculum

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They’re calling it ObamaCore? Not all that again. Michael Reynolds/EPA

Explainer: what is all the fuss about the Common Core?

When it comes to US public education, few topics engender such heated debate as a new set of maths and English standards for school children known as the Common Core. Since the final standards were released…
There’s more to history than kings and queens. wallg

School history exams shouldn’t just be a test of Britishness

The government has recently announced changes to the content of GCSE and A level history exams in England. As in previous reforms to the history curriculum, the documents set out the proportion of British…
What’s the use of this? Lab Science Career

Are we focusing too much on examining practical science?

Science evokes images of Bunsen burners, coloured liquids, vapours rising from flasks, white coats and safety goggles. But are we making too much of the rigid assessment of the practical parts of science…
There are areas in which our schools need reform, a national curriculum isn’t one of them. www.shutterstock.com.au

Three things our nation’s schools need (none is a national curriculum)

On January 10 most electors were still brushing sand from their toes and basking in the afterglow of the Ashes victory. It was on that day that the federal Minister for Education Christopher Pyne announced…
The Australian Primary Principals’ Association is worried the primary curriculum is too difficult. AAP

Is education really all about the content?

The Australian Primary Principals Association (APPA) submission to the review of the Australian National Curriculum has stated the primary curriculum is overcrowded and some complex content is unnecessary…
Education minister Christopher Pyne’s national curriculum review has the potential to erase the realities and lives of LGBT people and the discrimination they face from our classrooms. AAP/Stefan Postles

Australian schools must promote LGBT-inclusive education

Earlier this month, it was revealed that Kevin Donnelly, one of the men tasked with reviewing Australia’s national curriculum, had argued in a 2004 book that “many parents” think the “sexual practices…
Not just for games. flickingerbrad

Backlash against computing curriculum misses the point

Computing is an important subject, but it is only one of many that schools have to teach, and few would argue that it is more important than English, maths, or science. But as a high-profile debate continues…
Western civilisation and history have a darker side of genocide and land dispossession: a history that is often ignored. Wikimedia Commons

Curriculum review: Western civilisation’s legacy has a dark side

The push is currently on for Australia’s national curriculum to place more emphasis on the history of Western civilisation and its values. But if we accept that the purpose of such an education is to achieve…
The parents’ voice has been left out of the curriculum conversation. AAP/Dan Peled

It’s time for parents to have their say on the national curriculum

Australia’s national curriculum, which is set to be reviewed, is an easy document for anyone to find and read. It really doesn’t require two experts – or six months – to report on it. Over the past six…
The emphasis on grammar and language construction in the current national curriculum is stronger than in many previous state curricula. So why the attacks on it? AAP/Stefan Postles

Curriculum review set to reignite the ‘literacy wars’

Kevin Donnelly, the conservative education critic who is set to review Australia’s national curriculum, has a long history of partisan criticism of teachers, teaching subject associations, academics and…
Christopher Pyne wants to purge the national curriculum of political ‘bias’, but the curriculum is nearly party-politics free. AAP/Dan Peled

A lesson for Christopher Pyne: kids hate political history

Announcing his review into the national curriculum late last week, education minister Christopher Pyne said that the government fears it has a partisan leaning towards leftist politics and doesn’t recognise…
Christopher Pyne says students need to be taught ‘the significance of Judeo-Christian values’ to Australia, but where in the discourse did ‘Judeo-Christian’ come from? AAP/Dave Hunt

Curriculum review: where did ‘Judeo-Christian’ come from?

Education minister Christopher Pyne has copped it from the Left with both barrels for demanding that the Australian education curriculum teach students “the significance of Judeo-Christian values to our…
Education minister Christopher Pyne has announced a review of the national curriculum, citing a need to remove its ‘partisan bias’. AAP/Alan Porritt

National curriculum the latest target of Coalition’s culture wars

Education minister Christopher Pyne has announced a sweeping review of Australia’s national curriculum to weed out a supposed “partisan bias” in what’s taught in Australia’s classrooms. Announcing the…
Opposition leader Tony Abbott has signalled he’d like to see the history curriculum change. But is it a good idea for government to intervene? AAP Image/AFP Pool, Saeed Khan

Culture wars II: why Abbott should leave the history curriculum alone

In the last week of the campaign, some naggingly familiar comments came out from the Coalition. Then opposition leader Tony Abbott said he wanted to see the national curriculum in history changed because…

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