Australian Curriculum: English 7-10
Speaker’s notes to accompany the presentation
Slides
Notes
Australian Curriculum: English 7-10
Information and briefing for NSWDET schools
A PowerPoint to facilitate discussion of the new draft curriculum at
School Development Day, Monday 19 April 2010
Events to date …
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The National Curriculum Board is now called the Australian
Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA).
Note how much has already been achieved in a short period.
The draft English curriculum is underpinned by a series of three
papers, each a development on the previous one.
DET teachers were encouraged to provide feedback regarding
the English framing paper, written by a team led by Professor
Peter Freebody.
The most recent paper, the shaping paper, showed that
ACARA had been responsive to feedback
What’s next?
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NSW has not yet announced a plan for the implementation of
the Australian curriculum.
Any decision about such a timeline will take into account the
extent of change involved in moving from the state syllabuses
to the Australian curriculum.
Explore the Australian Curriculum - English
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© NSW Department of Education and Training 2010
The ACARA website link is at the top of the slide. You
need to remember to register first if you want to look at the
Australian English curriculum. There are is also information
about how you can navigate this information on the
ACARA website.
CLICK - You will see that English is organised into Years
K-10.
CLICK - It is also organised into strands. You can select
which strands you want to look at. You can look across
grades by strand if you want to or look at all strands in the
one grade.
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CLICK - The general capabilities, cross-curriculum
dimensions and modes can also be selected.
CLICK - You can then click on apply filters to sort your
view.
CLICK - This example shows a search for Kindergarten
showing all the strands with their content descriptions.
The introduction (found in Learn) to this curriculum is very
important to download and read.
The strands
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The curriculum is organised into three strands: language,
literature and literacy. These will be discussed in the next
slide.
CLICK - The modes are familiar to teachers in NSW.
Note that the composing of multimodal texts, with a
visual component, is called creating in the draft
Australian curriculum – in NSW we call this mode
representing.
The mode of viewing has been subsumed under reading
and creating has been included in writing – an
organisation which is similar to that used in the NSW
English K-6 Syllabus.
The modes are woven through each of the strands.
The strands
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The three strands are presented discretely, but the
curriculum emphasises that these strands should be
“interwoven” in the classroom.
Note that this is a summary of the information in the
introductory section of the English curriculum.
Discuss the definition of literature – aligns with the range
of texts that are the subject of interpretation,
appreciation, evaluation and creation in NSW.
The strands
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© NSW Department of Education and Training 2010
Thinking about what these strands represent and how
they work together is important to this curriculum.
The draft English curriculum strongly emphasises the
need to integrate the three strands in classroom
teaching.
How much time is devoted to each strand may vary
according to the requirements for the year level as well
as the previous learning and needs of students.
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Language, literacy and literature
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This diagram represents an attempt by the English Unit
at Curriculum Directorate to show the relationships
between the three strands.
Language is mostly learning about language and how it
works. Literacy is generally learning to listen, view, read,
speak and write and create texts. These two strands
would nearly always work hand in hand.
Literature is the most significant way in which students
use their knowledge and skills of language and literacy in
the study of English – they learn through literature.
Content description and elaborations
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The curriculum is organised according to years, not
stages.
Within each strand for each year there are several points
of content description.
The content elaborations provide examples of the
content descriptions – they are not as comprehensive as
the NSW syllabus content that sits beneath the
outcomes.
ACARA plans to add resources to support the content
descriptions, but they are not evident in the draft
curriculum.
The achievement standards describe the levels of
student achievement typical of a given year.
Student work samples are provided to illustrate the
achievement standards. Some work samples are now
available for Years 6 and 7, but ACARA obviously plans
to add more work samples in the future.
Content descriptions with elaborations
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© NSW Department of Education and Training 2010
This is an example of the Year 6 content descriptions
with elaborations.
The layout is the same for Years 7 to 10.
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Achievement standards
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This slide shows an example of achievement standards
for Kindergarten.
CLICK - The achievement standards are organised
according to the modes.
This is similar in design to the K-12 stage statements in
the English 7-10 Syllabus.
What should be familiar?
A good starting point in exploring the Australian English
curriculum is to consider and acknowledge what is familiar to
teachers.
What may be less familiar?
These possible differences have been suggested in earlier
consultations.
Evaluating the Australian English curriculum
The next four slides relate to suggestions for approaches you
may take when looking at the Australian English curriculum.
(Read the slide)
Two ways to view
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© NSW Department of Education and Training 2010
There are several approaches you can take to reading
the draft curriculum for the purpose of evaluating it.
The website filter easily allows you to read the draft
syllabus in particular ways.
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Looking forward – looking back
This is a draft curriculum that is open for consultation and
feedback. Our focus with this consultation is to work towards
making this curriculum the best it can be for our students now
and in the future. Therefore it is important that we look forward
and consider what we want as well as looking back and
mapping it against our current syllabus.
(Read slide)
Key questions
These key questions might be used to evaluate any new
curriculum.
Identifying the issues
Some possible issues have already been identified in earlier
consultations.
Teachers may require support to deal with these aspects of
the new curriculum.
Sharing your views: DET online forum
To register for the forum:
http://currk12.janison.com/curriculum/register/register.htm
 If you have any problems with registering please contact
Chris Dorbis via email or telephone 98867496.
If you have been issued a password, please click on the
following link to enter the forum.
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To enter the forum:
http://currk12.janison.com/toolbox/desktop/logon.asp
 The latest version of the Australian English curriculum
and this PowerPoint are available in the forum.
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Sharing your views: other avenues
Secondary English teachers may also choose to
share their views about the Australian English
curriculum via:
 English Teachers’ Association
http://www.englishteacher.com.au/
 NSW Board of Studies
http://www.boardofstudies.nsw.edu.au/
 or directly to ACARA
http://www.acara.edu.au/home_page.html
© NSW Department of Education and Training 2010
Sharing your views
A 7-10 online forum has been established to enable DET
teachers to have their say about the Australian English
curriculum.
You must register before entering this forum.
The forum also allows you to read the views of other English
teachers and to engage in a professional dialogue with them.
Sharing your views: other avenues
These other avenues are available to English teachers to
share their views about the draft Australian English curriculum.
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