Australian Curriculum goes digital

The updated and approved Australian Curriculum, Version 9.0, is now online.

The specially built website has been designed with teachers, for teachers, and it is one of the few digitalised curriculums in the world.

ACARA CEO David de Carvalho said the website will give teachers control over the way they view the curriculum, as well as making their work easier.

“Teachers will be able to quickly and intuitively find relevant information, and lessons can be more easily planned,” he said.

The new Australian Curriculum sets high expectations and standards for what all students should know and be able to do, and was endorsed by education ministers on 1 April 2022.

de Carvalho said the new national curriculum is a “more stripped-back and teachable curriculum” that supports deeper conceptual understanding and improvement in educational performance.

“A key aim of reviewing the curriculum was to give teachers time to teach for deeper understanding. For the curriculum to be effectively delivered in the classroom, it also has to be presented in a way that is useful,” he said.

“Teachers from across Australia have been involved in the design and user experience testing,” said Sharon Foster, ACARA’s Director of Curriculum.

“The website has been designed so teachers can clearly see and explore the connections between the three dimensions of the curriculum — the learning areas, general capabilities and cross-curriculum priorities.

“They can view multiple learning areas side by side and see the alignment of achievement standards to content descriptions. There is also an inline glossary showing definitions for key terms as pop-ups if needed.”

Teachers have easy access to all areas of the curriculum through a selector tool and the website includes advice about planning and implementation, exploring the different dimensions and how to access various resources.

Updates to the functionality of the website and further teacher resources will be rolled out in subsequent releases as they are developed to support teaching the new curriculum.

The website meets the terms of reference of the Australian Curriculum Review, which included improving “the digital presentation of the Australian Curriculum in line with agreed content changes and user experience requirements”.

The new curriculum will be implemented by schools according to the timelines and approaches set by each state and territory education authority. Some jurisdictions may start supporting their teachers to become familiar with Version 9.0 in 2022 in preparation for starting to teach some or all learning areas from 2023.

ACARA will maintain the existing Australian Curriculum website with the Version 8.4 curriculum and all support resources while Version 9.0 is now available on the new website. Both websites will remain live until all states and territories have transitioned fully to the Australian Curriculum, Version 9.0.

Image credit: ©stock.adobe.com/au/magele-picture