HTAA Interim Response to the Draft Ancient History & Modern History Curriculum Documents

 13 June 2010

This is an interim response. It is the outcome of a meeting of the HTAA National Executive senior curriculum sub-committee. This discussion was informed by some substantial early feedback from members. However, with consultation extending until the end of July, we expect to refine this response and further develop the recommendations.  

General

 As with the K-10 course, the challenge with the senior courses will be to achieve balance with both topic selection and the range of perspectives and curriculum approaches that can be accommodated. It will be difficult to do this in a way that will satisfy everyone. However, as will be evident from the remainder of this response, HTAA believes that the focus needs to be on the complex practicalities of curriculum development. Speculation about attempts to promote particular causes or ideologies is an unhelpful distraction.

 Developing senior history courses that will be well-received around the country is going to be especially challenging for a variety of reasons:

• All states and territories currently teach senior history courses but there is great diversity in what is taught, how it is taught and how it is examined.
• History teachers are passionate about their senior courses. This, and the fact that the senior courses are associated with end of school credentialing, means that there is a great deal at stake.
• At the moment a number of states are implementing new courses that were designed independently of the national curriculum process. Even where courses have been running for some time, they are highly valued and there is not a widespread perception that urgent change is needed.
• It is not clear that the senior national courses have been based on a well-developed philosophy. There has been little attempt to discuss or bring together the differing approaches around the country. Nor have we been inspired with an imaginative new rationale for the study of history at the senior level. Instead, there is the impression of an ad hoc process that has attempted to cobble together existing diverse elements.

 In general, initial responses to the senior draft documents range from disappointment to an acceptance that they may be workable in some revised form. They are both relatively conservative documents and it has been suggested that there has been a missed opportunity in terms of creating exciting new courses for the 21^st century. While there is significant variation in responses from different states and territories, Ancient History has gained a better acceptance than Modern History, where significant changes will be recommended.

 A six unit/module approach was originally suggested by HTAA as a practical way of addressing the challenges inherent in developing senior history courses that could be implemented in all states and territories. It is not evident that the potential of this approach has been fully realised:

• Currently, different states and territories run senior courses over a semester, a year or two years. Some would like to allow for students to swap between Ancient and Modern. Others would like the ability to teach Year 11 and Year 12 in a composite class. All of this would be catered for in a modular approach that was flexible. In the current drafts, however, flexibility has been restricted and it appears that only two year courses are envisaged.
• With states and territories having the opportunity to create their own courses out of the units/modules, there was the opportunity to present a range of approaches and topics. Longer term, there would be the possibility of developing the curriculum dynamically, with single modules being replaced by others that might be developed in response to teacher and student demand or developments in historiography. It is not clear that this exciting potential has been embraced.
• An obvious use of the modular approach might be to develop at least one module in each course to address the needs of the ever-increasing number of students who are not ‘university-bound’. How to cater for these students is major concern for teachers.
• It is disappointing that the opportunity for experimentation and freshness presented by the modular approach has resulted in a largely predictable offering of safe topics. With teachers (or perhaps state and territory authorities) free to choose a pathway of four modules through the six, there could be more opportunity for the adventurous. Puzzling, in this respect, is the failure to propose a 6^th module for Ancient History.

 

Modern History

 Strengths

 While there are some serious concerns outlined below, it is important to put these in perspective:

• The Modern History draft does propose quite a number of well-established topics that are currently well-taught, well-resourced and viewed as significant. These will be well received by many teachers and it will be important to ensure that this ‘comfort zone’ of familiar topics is preserved.
• With the exception of Unit 1, the topic outlines have been generally well drafted and expectations are reasonably clear.
• While the overall impression is one of conservatism, many teachers will be pleased to have the opportunity to teach topics such First Nations and Women’s Struggle for Equality. 
• While there is discussion below about the merits of mandating it, Unit 4 presents an interesting opportunity to introduce Asian history in an accessible way and combine it, to some extent, with the study of American and Australian history.
• At this early stage of consultation HTAA would suggest that the current draft is teachable but unexciting. While very significant refinement will be recommended, there are sound elements in the current format and it could be used as a foundation for a final draft.

 

Areas of Significant Discussion

 There are a number of areas where there has been significant discussion:

• It has been suggested that it is difficult to perceive coherence or an over-arching rationale for the course. While Units 1 and 4 are presented as starting and concluding units, for example, the reason for this may not have been successfully communicated. Alternatives, discussed below, include allowing teachers the freedom to construct their own pathway or developing a new concluding unit that is more appropriate to a 21^st century course.
• Some units assume that a topic will be taught for a semester. While this is the current practice in some states and territories, it is not in others. In the absence of discussion about the merits of teaching to this level of depth, an obvious option would be to allow state or territory authorities to decide whether one or two topics should be taught over a semester.
• It is noted that there is only limited opportunity to teach 18^th or 19^th century topics. This will concern some teachers. Of greater concern, however, will be the limited opportunity to take students into the 21^st century in a course that will begin to be taught almost 15 years into that century.
• Currently, Australian history is studied to varying degrees at the senior level and expectations of how much Australian history should be in the Modern History course tend to reflect this experience. While the draft course does offer the opportunity to study aspects of Australian history in a number of places, this may not satisfy those who would like to see a substantial Australian stream. On the other hand, there will be resistance to any mandating of Australian history at the senior level from those who are concerned about its limited appeal, especially to students who have just completed the new mandatory history course in Years 9 & 10. A complicating factor here is a level of uncertainty about the ability of states and territories to maintain existing Australian history courses.
• For Unit 2A it might be worth examining the extent to which each study actually lends itself to an examination of ‘national identity’.
• The repetition of what appear to be a generic listing of skills at the start of each unit seems odd. With simplicity of presentation always a priority, it is assumed that teachers will be able to access skills elsewhere in the document. As suggested below, it may be much more helpful to replace these course generic listings with either an extended rationale for each unit or an outline of concepts/key questions/themes/problems and issues, either specific to each topic or generic to each unit.

 

Major Concerns

The following have been identified as major concerns:

• There is a limited opportunity for the study of social history or ‘non-conflict’ history.
• For a course that will be implemented and taught well into the 21^st century, there is very limited opportunity for the study of contemporary history. If what is regarded as contemporary history now is not included, the course will become dated very quickly and students will not have the opportunity to investigate obviously relevant and engaging topics. With the 10^th anniversary of the September 11 attacks fast approaching, for example, the absence of a major topic on the rise of terrorism in the modern world is a significant omission.
• With topics such as World War I and the Cold War prominent in the draft document, there is concern about student perception of repetition. The difficulty here is that in Years 9-10 students will study Australia in the modern world from a global perspective. With this focus on the same area as senior Modern History and the expectation that there will be Depth Studies in the junior course, avoiding significant overlap, whether actual or apparent, will not be easy. At the moment, with the junior and senior courses being developed separately, it is not clear how this issue is being addressed.
• While the dot point outlines for topics may present an adequate summary, all topics would benefit from a more developed framework to guide teachers in understanding how to navigate their way through the detail. This may take the form of an extended rationale and/or an outline of concepts/key questions/themes/problems and issues. Whether or not these were generic for each unit or specific to each topic is something that could be explored. From the point of view of developing coherence and comparability, it might be helpful to develop an approach that was generic to each unit.
• The draft document states that units ‘have been designed so that Units 3a, 3b and 4 are more conceptually and cognitively demanding than Units 1, 2a and 2b’. This is unconvincing – experienced teachers would argue that most of the units are interchangeable and the level of treatment easily adapted. The concern is that this statement restricts the flexibility that is inherent in the unit structure. Similarly, while the designation of Unit 1 as a mandatory introductory unit makes some sense, the mandating of Unit 4 is restrictive. The resulting lack of flexibility is a concern for those states and territories that do not have a two-year course structure.
• Unit 3 B Revolutions creates a particular problem for Victoria, where the current Revolutions course is successfully run over a year rather than a semester. There is very strong support in Victoria for continuing to offer the existing course. At the same time, the study of revolutions has an obvious place in a Modern History course and some other states and territories are keen to see this option offered in a significant form.
• Unit 1 needs work. It stands as a mandatory introductory unit. It will give students their first experience of senior history and it will represent half a year’s work for a Year 11 student. At the moment, however, it simply does not leap off the page as being engaging and it is not clear what the intention is. The mandating of units 1 and 4, in their current form, is a concern.   

 

Recommendations

 1. HTAA urges ACARA to accept the need for greater flexibility in the refinement of the senior drafts. This is not to suggest that we are promoting a proliferation of topics without regard for comparability, significance or the diverse requirements of assessment. It also does not rule out the mandating of some units or topics. However, we are concerned about an attitude towards flexibility that may be at odds with the history teaching profession and which may stand in the way of suggestions that follow. It is essential that a Modern History course for the 21^st century contains some option for adventure!

2. Potential pathways through the units need to be made more flexible:

• Teachers, schools or local jurisdictions should be given the option of selecting the middle four units to teach in either Year 11 or Year 12. Not only would this recognise the diversity of programming that currently operates across the country, but it could create an environment where teachers could more easily experiment with newer topics. 
• While the mandating of an introductory unit makes some sense, the current Unit 1 needs a clearer rationale, more creativity and more specific guidance.
• The mandating of a final unit needs to be reconsidered in the light of recommendations that follow.
• State and territory authorities should be give the option of specifying whether a topic within a unit should be studied for a semester of half a semester (offering the option of studying two topics per unit) in units such as 2B and 3A.

3. A rationale, including key concepts or questions, should be developed either for each unit or each topic. 

 4. There is a desperate need for more contemporary history and social history. HTAA recommends the development of topics around, for example: Terrorism in the 20^th Century, Popular Culture, the United Nations, Technology & Globalisation.

5. HTAA would like to see urgent discussion around the issue of how Years 9-10 will articulate with senior Modern History.

 6. There is a very strong view from Victoria that the full semester unit on revolutions should be deleted. HTAA supports this view, but also recommends:

• Adding China and Russia to the national studies, where their revolutions could be studied.
• Creating the opportunity for the study of revolution in other units – this would be needed to satisfy the interest of other states and territories in this topic.
• The development of another unit – see next point.

7. If the current revolutions unit is eliminated, a new unit could be developed around either ‘21^st Century Studies’ or large themes that link the 20^th and 21^st centuries. This would satisfy a number of needs including the desire for more broad thematic studies. It is also possible that this unit could have an Australian option. If such a unit were developed it might make a more natural mandatory unit than the current Unit 4. Alternatively, it might be better to have no final mandatory unit.

 8. HTAA urges ACARA to develop a response to the needs of students who are not ‘university-bound’ and who may not be well-catered for with either of the current course proposals.     

9. The wider consultation feedback on the Modern History draft may not point to an obvious consensus. The work of refining the current draft will need to be based on some careful discussion of concerns and the re-drafting will be challenging. Regardless of any timeline that has been imposed, HTAA feels that there needs to be time given to developing a clearer course rationale that addresses and explains the approaches that have been adopted.

 

Ancient History

 Strengths

 While there are some concerns outlined below, it is important to put these in perspective:

• The Ancient History draft does propose quite a number of well-established topics that are currently well-taught, well-resourced and viewed as significant. These will be well-received by many teachers and it will be important to ensure that this ‘comfort zone’ of familiar topics is preserved.
• The topic outlines have been generally well drafted and expectations are reasonably clear.
• While there is discussion below about differing approaches to Ancient History, the expectation is that these can be accommodated with a degree of flexibility and some refinement.  
• At this early stage of consultation HTAA would suggest that the current draft is teachable and, assuming some refinement, may be better received than the Modern History draft.     

 

Areas of Significant Discussion

 There are a number of areas where there has been significant discussion:

• ‘Human origins’ seems like a reasonable controversy to deal with in Ancient History and it is regrettable that the example nominated has attracted ill-informed interest.
• In Unit 3 there can be two approaches to the study of an individual: an individual can be studied from outside the time period previously studied or an individual can be studied from within the time period already studied. The first approach may achieve more breadth of study while the second approach might achieve more depth. Views are divided as to what is preferable and the suggestion is that either approach be permitted. 
  • In Unit 3 there was also discussion about whether or not it was appropriate to specify the individual to be studied in relation to each period. A concern was that by setting the individual it may skew the perspective of the course. For example, for ‘Greece: Athens, Sparta and the Peloponnesian War’ the individual specified is Pericles – he is Athenian, he dies within 4 years of the war although his policy is influential throughout the war. Nevertheless, teachers may wish to study another Athenian or a Spartan individual. An alternative to specifying the individual would be to allow for a choice of individuals with the stipulation that ‘the individual studied has affected the time period being studied’.
  • At the moment it seems possible for students to study the same region (eg Egypt, Near East, Greece or Rome) for three units. This does not provide for breadth of study. This would be addressed by specifying that no more than two units of either Egypt, the Near East, Greece or Rome can be studied across the four units. An additional specification might be that in Units 3 and 4 students must study no more that one of either Egypt, the Near East, Greece or Rome.
  • As with Modern History, it is puzzling why apparently generic skills have been added to each unit.
  • The approach to Classics, Archaeology and Ancient History differs. In some states and territories the distinctions have merged at senior secondary level while in others there is a much clearer separation. As a result, some have perceived an over-emphasis on Archaeology and Literary Studies while others feel that the mix is appropriate. While some would prefer to see these elements integrated as options in all units, others would welcome stand-alone units that focused on these elements. There may need to be more discussion around this issue or, as is recommended below, there should be sufficient flexibility to allow for differing approaches.
  • There has also been some discussion about whether studies of modern representations of the past should be incorporated as a method of approach throughout the course and/or be the focus of a separate unit.

 

Major Concerns

 While there has been a great deal of discussion about the merits of the Ancient History draft, at this early stage there has been no identification of a consensus around major concerns.

 

Recommendations

1. Most of the concerns mentioned above can be addressed by ensuring that there is flexibility so that teachers, schools or local jurisdictions can make their own decisions regarding, for example:

• Approaches to the study of an individual.
• Whether or not an individual is specified in relation to each period.
• The study of Classics or Archaeology within Ancient History.

 2. There should be more discussion around the issue of specifying limitations on the area of study.

 3. Consideration should be given to developing a sixth unit for Ancient History. This would make a more attractive offering and assist with meeting some of the concerns about the need for greater flexibility to accommodate differing approaches. Consistency with Modern History, and even the potential for moving between the two courses, could also be a consideration here. 

 4. HTAA urges ACARA to develop a specific response to the needs of students who are not ‘university-bound’ and who may not be well-catered for with either of the current course proposals.    

 5. As with Modern History, refining the current draft will need to be based on some careful discussion of concerns and the re-drafting will be challenging. Regardless of any timeline that has been imposed, HTAA feels that there needs to be time given to developing a clearer course rationale that addresses and explains the approaches that have been adopted.

Paul Kiem

President

HTAA

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HTAA Interim Response to the Draft K-10 History Curriculum

 

13 May 2010

_________________________________________

 

This is an interim response based on submissions from state and territory HTAs and consultation with teachers around the country. It has been written prior to the publication of senior course draft documents and may need to be refined to reflect ongoing consultation and discussion that will be generated by the release of the senior documents.

 

Major Strengths

While there are a number of very significant concerns outlined below, it is important to put this in the context of a broadly positive response:

·        Teachers are generally supportive of and even excited by the prospect of a national curriculum.   

·        The ‘return of history’ as a discipline has been widely welcomed.

·        There is broad approval for the skills and understandings outlined, even though there is major concern about whether the course will give teachers the opportunity to develop them.  

·        The broad scope of content proposed for Years 7-10 has been welcomed, particularly in Years 7-8.

·        The teaching of Australian history in a global context has been welcomed, even though it has been noted that this does not appear to apply to primary.

·        The early introduction of ‘source work’ in primary years has been welcomed.

·        The proposal is seen as reasonably inclusive.

·        Broadly, there is a reasonable balance of topics and perspectives.

·        The school developed options in Years 7-9 provide some scope for local history.

 

Areas of Significant Discussion

There are a number of areas where there has been significant discussion:

·        There has been both support for and concern expressed about the ‘expanding communities’ approach to history in primary.

·        There have been questions asked about the achievement standards and how adequate they will be as a basis for developing an approach to assessment. Some have a preference for an outcomes approach.

·        The elaborations have given rise to some confusion and questions have been raised about their status and ultimate usefulness. There has also been some confusion about the extent of prescription in the content outlines. Some of this may be related to issues around presentation and formatting, dealt with below.

·        While many primary teachers seem happy with the topics proposed, others have expressed regret about the limited opportunity for dealing with either local history or history beyond Australia.  

·        There is a perception that there has been an at times heavy-handed attempt to satisfy the demands of certain lobby groups or particular perspectives. This can impact on coherence.

·        There has been some discussion around the placement of a ‘What is History?’ unit at the start of Year 7. However, views about its appropriateness are divided. Perhaps there needs to be more discussion around the rationale for this unit in its present location.     

·        There has been considerable discussion about the need for key terms, themes, concepts or questions as topic organisers and guides.

·        There is a great deal of uncertainty about pedagogy and assessment. While the stated intention is to leave decisions in these areas to jurisdictions and teachers, there is concern that the content selection and presentation is inevitably making assumptions about pedagogy and assessment. It was always going to be a difficult proposition to develop curriculum in isolation from pedagogy and assessment and there is now widespread concern about the lack of information from state and territory governments, who will apparently be responsible for developing approaches to pedagogy and assessment once the curriculum is delivered.  

·        Many teachers have asked about the possibility of programs being supplied as models for at least a selection of the topics. With the school developed options in Years 7-9, for example, there is a view that their potential needs to be demonstrated. On another level, the programming of at least some topics would be an ideal way for ACARA to test the feasibility of what is proposed.

·        There is a view that skills and understandings should be more explicitly integrated with the knowledge outlines. On the other hand, there is also a view that this is not only unnecessary but would be difficult to do consistently well, could be over-prescriptive and may have the potential to produce awkward approaches to assessment.     

 

Major Concerns

The following have been identified as major concerns:

·        There is enormous uncertainty around implementation. From the start of the process HTAA has expressed concern that the courses are being developed without any specification about the teaching time that will be required. The issue here has always been that we have been asked to judge the feasibility of courses without knowing how much teaching time will be allocated. This uncertainty qualifies any other consideration and makes it impossible, for example, to gauge how much depth will be achieved or how effectively skills may be taught. Nevertheless, ACARA has now confirmed that there will be no specification of teaching time: 

ACARA will not specify required hours for learning areas. ACARA has provided indicative time allocations for each phase one learning area to help guide the curriculum writers. ACARA recognises that time allocations for subject areas vary across jurisdictions, education systems and schools.

http://www.acara.edu.au/verve/_resources/Implementation_file.pdf

[11 April 2010]

While it would appear that we now need to live with this, there is also a significant acknowledgement here – despite writers being given a time to write to, implementation will be inconsistent. In fact, there are many other reasons why implementation of the Australian national curriculum will be inconsistent – Year 7 is a primary class in some jurisdictions and a secondary class in others, many primary students are taught in composite classes, SOSE traditions and structures are stronger in some sectors and jurisdictions than others, Year 10 has a different status in some areas and there is the option in junior secondary schools of history being timetabled over a stage, a year or a semester. The level of uncertainty around implementation is only compounded by the fact that, at this very late stage in the process, we have yet to hear anything definite about either teacher pre-service training or professional development. All of this uncertainty must be taken into account in the refinement of the draft curriculum documents. It would be unrealistic and even irresponsible to ignore it.

·        While the response from primary teachers to the draft proposal has been mixed, there is very significant concern about how the discipline of history will be programmed and taught in a diverse range of primary settings according to well-accepted and understood primary methods. This reflects a more general concern about the draft proposal being developed with only very limited primary input. 

·        Broadly, but particularly for Years 9-10, the amount of content proposed is far too ambitious for the amount of school timetable space the subject is likely to be given. Thus, even though the draft document places considerable emphasis on the development of ‘transferrable skills’, the fear is that dealing with content will overwhelm everything else.

·        A related concern is that many of the proposed Depth Studies suggested for Years 7-10 are simply not Depth Studies. While an Overview-Depth Study approach to these years is appropriate and has been welcomed, it must be strongly suggested here that the current model has been poorly developed and is simply not working. Not only are many of the Depth Studies not offering the opportunity to actually teach in depth, but the function of the Overviews has not been clearly developed. Once again, the lack of opportunity to deal with at least some topics in genuine depth will make it very difficult to address skills development. Of equal concern is the potential for widespread student disengagement if the course is reduced to a superficial rush through content.

·        At the moment it appears that there will be only a very limited opportunity for considered evaluation of the senior course proposals alongside the K-10 proposal. This makes it difficult to assess how well the different courses articulate, something that has the potential for significant impact on the future health of history in the senior years. This is not an easy issue to deal with because the prospect of some topic areas appearing in both Year 10 and Modern History, for example, is inevitable and will not necessarily have a negative impact. However, the approach to topics in Year 10 will be critical and at the moment the Overview-Depth Study template does not give a clear indication of how this will work.

·        There has been a good deal of disappointment expressed about the web-based presentation of the document. It has been a struggle to gain an overview or sense of coherence and colleagues have been frustrated in their search for clarity around either large or small intent. There is a danger that the web-based format, with its various filters and other attractions, may get in the way of clear communication.       

·        In a recent address to teachers at Macquarie University Professor Stuart Macintyre referred to the impact of ‘capricious’ decision making on curriculum development. This echoes HTAA’s well-founded concerns about what has been a relatively unsophisticated process up to this point. As a consequence, there is now considerable anxiety about ACARA’s capacity to respond to consultation effectively and put in place the refinements that are so desperately needed. This anxiety is not helped by the fact that, at the very time when careful and well-considered work will be needed, the process already appears to be under pressure from the artificial urgency imposed by the current timeline. With talk now of ‘in school’ implementation not happening until 2012, there is time to focus on ‘getting it right’ rather than just ‘getting it out’. 

 

HTAA Recommendations

 

1. ACARA needs to embrace FLEXIBILITY as a guiding principle in the refinement of the proposal. While this may appear to challenge entrenched notions about ‘commonality’ and a national ‘learning entitlement’, not only would greater flexibility sit well with how history is most effectively taught but it would be a realistic response to the unresolved uncertainties surrounding implementation and the diverse circumstances in which the courses will be delivered. Moreover, once the need for greater flexibility is accepted, it would pave the way for a better balance between mandatory and optional topics and help resolve the widely accepted problem of content overload.

 

2. ACARA needs to shift the focus from WHAT students must learn to HOW they learn. This would bring to the forefront students, teachers and real learning situations, something that may have been lost sight of in a community-political driven process that sees history as a series of events. In other words, we would like to see ‘commonality’ and the ‘learning entitlement’ focus more on the development of the skills and understandings that are highlighted in the draft document. Once again, this sits easily with how history is most effectively taught.

 

3. The clearest message coming through from history educators is that ACARA will need to cull content. At the same time, numerous lobby groups will be demanding that their topics stay, are enhanced or are added to the final course document. At this stage it is vital that the process moves beyond the influence of lobby groups and commits to a rational process for reducing prescribed content. At the moment, for example, it is not clear that the current content outlines have been developed on the basis of agreement about SIGNIFICANT KNOWLEDGE. HTAA’s suggestion is that there needs to be discussion aimed at establishing agreement around a minimalist approach to significant content that would form a mandatory core. All other content would be presented as optional and there would also be greater scope for both local history and teacher/student choice.

 

4. The YEAR 7-10 OVERVIEW/DEPTH STUDY approach needs to be rethought. It is diffcult to see how effective refinement can occur within the current template. HTAA strongly recommends that time be taken to develop and consider a range of options, consistent with an overview/depth approach, for either replacing or improving the current template.

 

5. The PRIMARY proposal needs greater primary input with a view to shaping it for primary implementation and supporting primary teachers with this implementation. HTAA strongly recommends that ACARA involves educators with specific primary expertise in both advisory and writing roles. As with the 7-10 approach, there needs to be an early opportunity to develop and consider a range of options for dealing with consultation feedback and the major concerns of primary teachers.    

 

6. HTAA feels that a new national curriculum should inspire teachers and, ultimately, students. This inspiration will come from the substance of the document but the presentation is also relevant. At the moment the WEB SITE PRESENTATION is not inspiring. On another level, it is essential that all involved in refining the draft have a very clear understanding of the presentation template they will be writing for. Once again, HTAA recommends that further work should only go ahead once this understanding has been established.      

 

7. HTAA has long expressed concern about PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT & PRE-SERVICE TEACHER TRAINING. We would now like ACARA to take up this concern with policy-makers.

 

8. A number of the recommendations above incorporate a call for a pause and time for genuine evaluation of consultation feedback and consideration of a range of proposals before there is any focus on detail. In other words, some big questions need to be dealt with and clear and transparent guidelines established. Otherwise, especially under the pressure of a tight timeline, there is the real danger that the process will revert to the ad-hoc rearrangement of content. Regardless of the timeline that is being imposed, there is clearly a need for early broad-ranging discussion to establish clear guidelines for refinement and then some intensive and sustained writing. HTAA’s expectation is that there will be TRANSPARENCY in the development of such guidelines, with advisors and writers given a clear understanding of and justification for the parameters in which the process will operate.

 

 

 

 

Paul Kiem

President, HTAA

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To read press release click here

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On Monday 1 March 2010, the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA) will publish the draft K-10 Australian Curriculum in English, mathematics, science and history for a period of national consultation. The consultation period closes on 23 May 2010.

 

The draft curriculum and all the resources required to provide feedback are published at: www.australiancurriculum.edu.au. At this address, you will find the draft curriculum which you can comment on, a survey which you can complete and other resources such as videos, information sheets and frequently asked questions.

 

On visiting the website, you will need to register your details in a simple process that will provide you with an ongoing login and password and ensures you the opportunity to save and return to your feedback over time and as often as you wish.

 

The draft curriculum in the same four learning areas, for the senior secondary years, will be published online and available for public consultation between April and June 2010. More details on consultation on the senior years’ curriculum will be provided in March.

 

HTAA and its state and territory affiliates will be gathering feedback from members in various forums during the consultation period.

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HTAA Pre-service Statement
On the capacity of current pre-service training programs to prepare history teachers capable of successfully implementing new national courses.
To read statement please Click here

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December 2009

www.acara.edu.au/home_page.html

 

It is not possible to comment in any detail on draft course material. Nevertheless, it is clear that the consultation and writing process to this point has resulted in significant improvements on earlier drafts. With regard to the senior courses, in particular, HTAA has been very encouraged by ACARA’s willingness to embrace a HTAA proposal aimed at developing imaginative options that have the potential to combine a range of existing interests with some fresh ideas. It will now be interesting to see how much imagination is brought to the task when this proposal is scrutinised during the consultation period.

 

While the quality of draft curriculum documents continues to improve, the timelines remain tight and this gives rise to a number of concerns. The period of consultation beginning in February 2010 obviously needs to be productive. The documents presented need to be fully developed. They must have a clear rationale and be presented with specific explanation. The consultation events need to be well-structured and certainly more subject-specific and less open-ended than they have been previously. At the moment there must be some anxiety about a timeline that has an essential period of sustained writing scheduled during December-January, while ACARA is moving office from Melbourne to Sydney. It is also not clear how piloting of the draft material will work at the same time as consultation.

Beyond the writing and consultation,  everything is as uncertain as it has been since the start of the process. HTAA’s consistent support for the national curriculum project has been based upon a concern for the whole process – the development of new national courses and their successful implementation in schools. Our frustration has been that it has proved very difficult to locate either organisations or individuals who share this larger concern. While there is no shortage of rhetoric, there is very little detail available on how national curriculum will actually work. At the moment it appears that states and territories will have considerable flexibility in how they implement new courses. Some have given a little indication of their intentions. Most have not. There has certainly been no commitment to the allocation of teaching time and it is not even certain that history will be mandatory. All of this raises questions about the extent to which we will actually have a national curriculum. There is also the danger that truncated courses or tokenistic implementation will be counter-productive rather than, as some may hope, at least a step in the right direction.

 

HTAA’s oft-stated concerns about resourcing, teacher preparation and professional development remain largely unaddressed. Indeed, recent comments addressed to a gathering of association representatives by a federal bureaucrat on professional development and teacher training were complacent and disturbingly ill-informed.

 

Well over eighteen months into this long march, I would like to acknowledge the work, good sense and support of the HTAA national executive. From the beginning, we have had a unity of purpose that has underwritten the success of our commitment to inform, consult and represent.   

 

Spare a thought for our colleagues working through the holiday period as ACARA officials or on the writing teams. 

 

Paul Kiem

President, HTAA

 

 

 

 

 

 

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September 2009

 

K-10 Courses  

In early September practitioner representatives from around the country were invited to offer feedback on a first draft of the national curriculum history document, K-10. This feedback will be used to fine tune the document prior to its release for public consultation at the start of 2010. According to ACARA’s timeline, the new courses are due for national implementation in 2011. Further details are available on ACARA’s website: www.acara.edu.au (ACARA – the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority – is the new title for the national curriculum body formerly known as NCB – the National Curriculum Board.)

 

It is not possible to comment on the draft material until it is released for public consultation. Nevertheless, it is worth noting that nothing has been said over the past three months to address concerns about implementation. While ACARA’s position has been that implementation is ‘beyond its remit’, we have now well and truly reached a point where teachers are seeking answers to a range of questions concerning how the new courses will be implemented in the various states and territories. Even when it is possible to find someone willing to deal with these questions, the responses are stalled at the stage of vague reassurance and platitudes about the important role of classroom teachers.

 

A particular concern is the fact that there has been no commitment to the allocation of teaching time for the new courses. This is already a significant issue for anyone attempting to evaluate the draft material. In summary, what they will be attempting to judge is whether what is proposed is too ambitious or not ambitious enough. No matter what insight or perspective is brought to the task, it is hard to see how such judgments can be made when there is no common understanding of the time that can be reasonably expected to be given to the courses.

 

Senior Years 

At the end of August ACARA released a draft Position Paper on National Curriculum in the Senior Years. This paper has been posted on ACARA’s website (www.acara.edu.au) and feedback has been invited until the end of September.  

 

HTAA feels that the Senior Years Position Paper proposes a number of sound guidelines for the development of senior courses. These include (numbers refer to clauses in the document):

·        States and territories will continue to offer senior courses that complement national courses (22 & 25).

·        Senior courses will be developed as four sequential semester units (30). Presumably, this will allow schools or local authorities to specify the study of the courses as semester, one year or two year courses.

·        Each semester unit will be developed to be taught in 50-60 hours (31). This is realistic and, assuming that it has been agreed to by states and territories, provides a degree of certainty about teaching time that is lacking in the junior years.

 

On balance, however, there are many significant concerns:

·        This paper was developed in consultation with state and territory curriculum bodies but has no practitioner input (4). This is very disappointing. Not only does it tend to undermine commitments to consultation and transparency and ignore the passionate interest teachers have in senior courses, it clearly affects the quality of what has been produced.

·        In outlining a range of factors that will need to be taken into account in the development of senior courses, no mention is made of teacher training, professional development etc (6).

·        There is acknowledgement of the range of students that will undertake senior year courses (9-13 & 14c.) However, there is no clear commitment that history will be given the opportunity to cater for the full range of students and there is considerable qualification about the ‘capacity of providers to deliver a range of courses’ (14c & f). It seems that while English and Maths will be able to offer differentiated courses, History will only be able to offer two specialised courses – Ancient and Modern History (23, 24). The assumption that either History course is able to cater for ‘students with a wide range of achievement in previous years of schooling, interests and future intention for study and work’ even though Maths and English need four differentiated courses to do this, is obviously open to challenge. While HTAA is not proposing a proliferation of differentiated senior history courses, we would like to see wider discussion and some imagination addressed to the task of ensuring that senior courses are accessible to the full range of students.

·        The attitude towards elective topics is not clear. While ‘a range of optional contexts’ is proposed, it is also suggested that ‘electives are to be kept to a minimum’ (24, 37). While HTAA expects that senior courses would specify ‘core content’, we would also expect there to be substantial opportunity to offer options. This is not only consistent with the way History is best taught by passionate experts but it would offer a way of building on the best of what is currently offered in the different states and territories.

·        There are very brief proposals for Ancient and Modern History (24). In the absence of any elaboration in the previous Shaping and Framing Papers, this offers very little guidance to teachers attempting to understand what is being considered. Terms such as ‘themes or topics’, ‘contexts for learning’ and ‘optional contexts’ are imprecise and require discussion.

·        Most disappointingly, the discussion of implementation matters completely overlooks the role of teacher professional associations in supporting implementation. This oversight might be addressed by inserting a statement such as the following as a necessary complement to clauses 53 and 54:

When new courses are introduced, professional associations generally play a major role in providing information, producing resources and organising professional development to support teachers with implementation. Important features of such support include the classroom expertise involved, cost-effectiveness, timeliness and responsiveness to classroom practitioner concerns. It will be critical to the success of implementation for all curriculum authorities and funding bodies to recognise the significant role played by professional associations.

·        Other statements about implementation and governance, for example clauses 56, 58 and 60, provide very little in terms of concrete detail. While it is encouraging to learn that states and territories will develop an implementation plan, it must be suggested that this process should be more advanced.  There is certainly a growing concern amongst teachers and those responsible for planning at a school level about how little information is being passed on by state and territory authorities. This does little to address uncertainty about the extent of commitment to national curriculum and its implementation around the country. Nor does reference to the requirement for a ‘governance partnership’ adequately deal with anxiety about the potential for national curriculum to become politicised or fall victim to buck-passing between various agencies.

 

Paul Kiem

President

HTAA

 

 

 

 

 

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ACARA welcomes inaugural Chief Executive Officer

The Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA) today welcomed Dr Peter Hill as the authority’s first Chief Executive Officer. 
The full press release is available under ‘Latest News’ on the ACARA website – www.acara.edu.au

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August 2009

ACARA has recently posted its Senior Secondary Years Curriculum Position Paper and is inviting feedback till September 30th 2009 -
For more details see: http://www.acara.edu.au/position_papers.html

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June 2009

The Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA) has commenced its work. It replaces the National Curriculum Board (NCB)
The ACARA website is now live: www.acara.edu.au

The new board is listed and a number of new documents have been posted, including a Curriculum Design Paper that sets out hours for history courses. National Curriculum Update

In early May the National Curriculum Board (NCB) published a number of important documents including the Framing Paper Consultation Report: History, which summarises the consultation feedback on the original Framing Paper, and The Shape of the Australian Curriculum: History. This second document, the Shaping Paper, is an updated version of the Framing Paper and it will now be used as a brief for the curriculum writing team. The writing team came together in mid-May and has now begun the task of producing a national history curriculum. The National Curriculum Board’s timelines envisage a K-10 writing period that will take up most of the remainder of this year. It will be followed by a period of consultation. Implementation is due to begin in 2011. At the moment, it appears that curriculum development for the senior years will be delayed by at least some months. The board’s documents and timeline are published on its website: www.ncb.org.au

 

Years K-10: Optimism

In relation to Years K-10, the Shaping Paper is encouraging. While it retains the rationale and many of the features that were welcomed in the original Framing Paper, it has also taken into account much of what came through in the consultation. In particular, suggestions for topics have been trimmed, the need to be mindful of student engagement has been taken into account and there appears to be an acceptance of the need to provide for options and school developed courses. What is proposed for the primary years is certainly more attractive. There is room for more clarity around what is actually meant by Depth Study & Overview and the approach to sequencing and setting achievement levels for skills development needs more thought. Nevertheless, the Shaping Paper now presents writers with a manageable task. HTAA has confidence in our colleagues engaged in this work. If they are given appropriate flexibility and support, the outlook for K-10 is optimistic.

 

There are two significant qualifications to this optimism. Firstly, there is a tremendous weight of expectation on the 7-10 years. Every interest group wants to see its topics included. In the end, difficult choices will have to be made if we are to have a feasible and coherent curriculum rather than a bunch of topics that need to be ticked off to satisfy the interest groups. Secondly, while the original Framing Paper suggested 400 hours for a 7-10 course, the Shaping Paper does not specify any hours. This is discussed below.  

 

Years 11-12: Uncertainty

HTAA’s submission on the Framing Paper noted that the section on the senior years was so inadequately developed as to make meaningful feedback impossible. The board’s Consultation Report noted that this inability to comment due a lack of detail was a widespread concern. What is now very puzzling is that the Shaping Paper contains even less detail on the senior years. A proposal for a range of courses, welcomed in the consultation, has been cut back to two courses: Ancient History and Modern History. Even though the Shaping Paper expresses a hope that ‘the majority of students will continue with history’ in the senior years, this complex and important area of the curriculum is dealt with in six sentences. Mention of a ‘first phase’ and other courses being continued by individual jurisdictions raises more questions than it answers. While some delay in the development of senior courses will be welcomed by most teachers, there is an expectation that this time must be used to promote widespread discussion in an area where there is intense interest. At the moment, the Shaping Paper tells us that the writers will receive ‘further advice’ but there is no indication of where this advice will come from or how it will have been developed. This is a good deal less than transparent.

 

Uncertainty about the senior years means that it is difficult to see how articulation between the 7-10 course and the senior years will be addressed. There is a danger, for example, that large slabs of a senior Modern History course could be written into a Year 10 course. The fact that we seem to be operating without a genuine K-12 continuum in mind also raises questions about the skills development sequence and the matching of topics and concepts to the cognitive development of students – uncertainty about the senior years may serve to encourage those who seek to load everything into the 7-10 course, irrespective of appropriateness.

 

There was support from around the country for an Extension course. There are also compelling arguments for the development of both an Asia-Pacific course and a senior course for less academic students. Any such proposals have now been consigned to a vague future. This will disappoint those of us who saw the national education revolution as an opportunity to not only preserve the best of what we have but to apply some imagination to the development of exciting new courses. Such a proliferation of courses would present its own challenges but, again, there may be imaginative solutions such as creating semester or yearly modular courses that different jurisdictions could adapt to their own systems.

 

‘Outside the Remit’: Urgent Action is Needed

In its conclusion, the original Framing Paper emphasised the fact that its proposal was ‘premised on schools making a substantial commitment to teaching history’. It went on to specify the hours that would be needed for courses and highlighted major concerns around teacher training and professional development. Despite HTAA’s strong endorsement of this conclusion, we now find that all such references have been deleted from the Shaping Paper. Indeed, the Consultation Report responds to these concerns by repeating what threatens to become an annoying mantra: serious issues relating to implementation are ‘outside the remit of the Board’. We are at the stage where this response needs to be challenged. What is the point of putting energy and expectation into curriculum development when there are no guarantees around implementation? How confident can we be that even well-developed national curriculum courses will not fall victim to buck-passing between various state and federal agencies when we see no evidence of timely planning for implementation?

 

Urgent action is now required in each of these areas:

1. Timing of Courses – While writing teams are now working on courses that are meant to be taught in a certain number of hours, at the moment there is no guarantee that states and territories will be committed to these hours. The number of hours envisaged for English, Maths and Science, the fact that more national curriculum courses are being planned in other disciplines and legitimate fears about an already crowded curriculum make this a very complex issue. Nevertheless, unless we can get some agreement there is a danger that we will see a variety of truncated versions of national history courses being introduced around the country. At the very least, we would like to see curriculum documents specify the minimum number of teaching hours they have been written for. 

2. Teacher Training – The historical understandings outlined in the Shaping Paper assume that students will be presented with a relatively sophisticated understanding of history. It is difficult to see how this can happen merely by putting a sophisticated syllabus in the hands of a non-specialist teacher. Indeed, it might be suggested that the result could be entirely counter-productive. Nevertheless, the urgent issue of teacher training has yet to be addressed. HTAA’s statement on teacher training is available on its website: www.historyteacher.org.au

3. Resourcing – At the moment it is still not clear whether we will be given prescriptive curriculum documents or somewhat minimalist guidelines. If it is the latter, then there is a distinct possibility that the first resources produced will become a de facto syllabus. This must raise some concern about the sort of history teaching that will result, especially when it can be predicted that there will be a good deal of reliance on the first resources that are rushed out. Nevertheless, even though it emerged as a popular proposal during consultation, the NCB insists that ‘the provision of templates and model units to guide teachers’ is beyond its remit. This is particularly disappointing given the situation of Year 7, which is taught in primary school in a number of states. The provision of templates, model units and best practice examples would be one obvious way of assisting primary teachers of history in Year 7. 

4. Professional Development – Professional Development will be critical to the successful implementation of new courses. Nevertheless, there has been no planning in this area and certainly no discussion with HTAA. At the moment there is only vague talk about bureaucratic and commercial involvement. This does not inspire confidence.

 

HTAA feels that it is now time for the NCB to begin pushing energetically beyond its remit. At the same time, we acknowledge a complex educational environment – it is also time we saw more transparency and commitment from state and territory agencies, politicians at all levels and the universities.

 

Paul Kiem

President HTAA 

 

 

 

 

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