What do you think?
Rate this book
Australia's Curriculum Dilemmas: State Cultures and the Big Issues
Australia's Curriculum Dilemmas tells the story of Australia's recent attempts to come to grips with the big challenges of curriculum and sets up the background to understanding the debates that continue to surface as we move for the first time towards a national approach.
Detailing some of the inside stories and arguments of the last 30 years about what schools should do, as well as some of the politics and lessons that have been learnt along the way, it brings together accounts from a national research project and reflections from people who have been actively involved in developing curriculum policies for each state. Expert contributors examine the challenges of the public management of curriculum, drawing on the different experiences of curriculum reforms in different states. They take up the problems of framing vocational and academic education for the new century and of confronting equity and diversity issues. They show the fundamental differences that exist in Australia regarding the impact of examinations and assessment, and the very different policy approaches that have been taken to tackle these issues.
Many people in this country are unaware of how much their experience of education has been formed by the particular values of the state in which they were educated. For the first time, this book demonstrates the effects of those differences, now and into the future.
Detailing some of the inside stories and arguments of the last 30 years about what schools should do, as well as some of the politics and lessons that have been learnt along the way, it brings together accounts from a national research project and reflections from people who have been actively involved in developing curriculum policies for each state. Expert contributors examine the challenges of the public management of curriculum, drawing on the different experiences of curriculum reforms in different states. They take up the problems of framing vocational and academic education for the new century and of confronting equity and diversity issues. They show the fundamental differences that exist in Australia regarding the impact of examinations and assessment, and the very different policy approaches that have been taken to tackle these issues.
Many people in this country are unaware of how much their experience of education has been formed by the particular values of the state in which they were educated. For the first time, this book demonstrates the effects of those differences, now and into the future.
256 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2011
9 people want to read
About the author
Lyn Yates
16 booksProf Lyn Yates is an academic involved in theoretical and empirical projects related to knowledge, identities, inequalities and education policy and practice in Australia. She is a past president of the Australian Association for Research in Education, a fellow of the Australian Academy of Social Science, and has served on the Australian Research Council College of Experts and the executive of the Australian Curriculum Studies Association.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 of 1 review
September 16, 2011
To begin at the beginning with this stuff it is important to understand where curriculum fits in and why it is both more important and not nearly as important as it might be sometimes made to look. I’ve been playing with a metaphor lately. It is of those strangely pixelated images you see of someone’s face and suddenly realise that the image is not just a single image, but is made up of pixels that are actually other images – other faces. Big picture are made up of lots of little pictures. Little pictures, in a sense, bleed and blend together to form the big picture. Well, education is like that too. And the three main ‘sub-pictures’ that bleed together to form education are curriculum, pedagogy and assessment. That is, what to teach, how to teach it and how to evaluate if it has been learnt.
Generally, people stress one of these three components as determining the other two. Today, in a world obsessed with neoliberal managerialism, assessment is seen as the essential basis of all education. In the US – unfortunately, an education system I knew more about before reading this book that I did of the curricula in the other Australian States, there is No Child Left Behind – high-stakes testing with the power to close schools and turn teachers and school administrators into liars and cheats. (What a remarkable boon for education that has proven!) The absurdity of the US education system ought to be self-evident as soon as I say that the US does not have a national curriculum. That it has a national means of assessing what is to be learnt, but no national curriculum to decide what needs to be learnt ought to provoke howls of laughter – that it doesn’t says something about the absurdity of our modern obsessions. Assessment in the US drives both curriculum and pedagogy, at least in lower class schools, to the extent where all that is taught is the basic numeracy and literacy that will be tested, or rather, how to fake an understanding of these on the particular multiple choice test that will be given. While those with the social, academic and cultural capital necessary to excel at school are greatly able to ignore any of the restrictions such tests might place upon their education.
Neoliberal obsessions with standardisation and measurement are likewise starting to constrain the Australian education system. This makes an odd contradiction, as most neoliberals will tell you that the benefit of capitalism is decentralised decision-making – decentralisation for business, standardisation for everyone else…
I struggled with this book, at least with the introduction. It was not the books fault, really, but a function of the fact I knew nothing at all about the curricula of other Australian states. I also knew nothing about their very different assessment regimes and therefore the impacts they have had over the years on how teachers in the various states have gone about their teaching. It literally took me until the excellent conclusion, something I’ve photocopied as I know I will need it again, before I knew enough to understand just how important this book actually is.
The word curriculum comes from Latin and means ‘running track’. This is an important etymology to know, because it helps us understand many of the metaphors associated with education. For example, running tracks have finishing lines. Running tracks are used for competitive races where there are winners and losers. Running tracks have fixed courses that have been predetermined, and generally predetermined by someone other than those who are doing the running. Running tracks have fixed paths that do not allow you to take detours, particularly not short cuts. If you would prefer an education system that developed teamwork, life-long learning based on a love of learning as a source of meaningful engagement with the world then a race track may not be your first metaphor of choice.
Australia is in the process of formulating and implementing a national curriculum. Many of the reasons given for implementing such a curriculum falls back on neoliberal justifications. Such a standardised curriculum will help Australia compete in the world economy, as we will have commensurable standards between our various states. A global economy is one in which workers move about to follow jobs, and if we are asking them to do this then their children’s education ought to be consistent no matter where they are receiving it, whether within 10 km of Bourke Street or the back of Burke. And as I mentioned with the US system, it is hard to measure how effective a system is at delivering education if you do not have pre-determined standards of what is to be learnt.
The metaphors here are of education being a kind of substance – something learners are lacking in and educators have in abundance. Education, then, is the measureable transfer of this substance from one over-full container (that which the teacher holds) to another empty container (that which the student holds). That this metaphor is the commonsense notion of how education works is a problem. I’m increasingly coming to the conclusion that when people talk of ‘commonsense’ I should be worried. What is commonsense is generally based on ignorance (and the more passionately stated, the greater the ignorance), it is generally self-serving, and it is almost always used by the Murdochs of the world to undermine reform.
One of the most surprising things I learnt from this book was just how innovative the Queensland curriculum is. This is the exact opposite of what I would have expected. It would be like someone from the United States learning that Alabama has the most progressive school curriculum in the nation. All other states have an examination at the end of high school (that finishing line we talked about earlier – NSW actually has two externally assessed exams, one in year 10 as well). This final exam is essentially a means of grading students to see if they are worthy of being accepted into university.
The problem is that between around 1970 and the mid-1990s the number of students remaining at school to reach this finishing-line doubled (from about 35% to over 70%). Not all of the students completing school have any intention of going on to university. Even as an aspiration the current government only expects 40% of 25-35 year olds to hold a bachelor’s degree by 2025 – clearly, even if this aspiration is achieved that would mean 35% of those finishing high school would not be on a pathway to university. But university entrance frames these exams and therefore also the curriculum that leads to this finishing point. This narrows the options that are available to students at school, generally focusing attention towards traditional subjects, that is, subjects with a long history and therefore subjects that are the most trusted by universities to deliver results that can be graded and compared. This produces some absurdities and limits the usefulness of education. For example, even students who wish to become lawyers end up taking subjects of virtually no use to their future careers. That is, they almost invariably study the most theoretical of mathematics subjects. Why? Not because they are ever likely to need calculus after their final exams, but rather because as a subject it is so lacking in any relation to the life experience of students that only those who can radically divorce learning from relevance can hope to succeed. That is, only those with financial and social capital concentrated in a middle class (and in Australia that increasingly means private) school – with the wherewithal to afford private tuition when this proves necessary – are able to meet the rigours of the curriculum.
In many ways, by Queensland avoiding an externally assessed exam at the end of schooling it also avoids some of these disadvantages. Queensland has a much broader range of subjects on offer right up until the end of school. Also, because assessment is teacher based this means the system must trust teachers to assess students. This caused problems when the system was initially introduced, but professional development, exemplar examples of student work and a dedicated profession has meant that when put to the test teacher assessment has proven much more rigorous and accurate than high-pressure final examinations.
Less surprisingly, South Australia is also a progressive state and much more likely to be concerned with equality of educational opportunity than other states have proven. This is a legacy going back a long way – South Australia prides itself on its ‘free-settler’ origins, but it also benefitted from the Dunstan Decade, ten years of enlightened and progressive government.
I was surprised to learn just how reactionary the NSW curriculum is. Their HSC (higher school certificate) prides itself on how difficult it is. In fact, for some subjects it has the distinction of being even harder than the International Baccalaureate. I wonder what people think high-stakes testing is a preparation for, exactly. It is like some terribly sick joke – ‘your whole life depends on how you do on this one exam, try to relax and enjoy your year.’
IB is an interesting aside here. If you wanted an internationally recognised, corporate approved curriculum, well, that one does seem ready made. But I guess we are still a little too blinded by the delusion that nation-states exist to go all the way to the end of the particular road we appear to be on. But not being one who is all that fond of standardisation I think greater diversity in curricula has merits.
The mistake would be to assume that there are simple answers or one ‘best’ way. As someone says at one point in this, while inquiry based studies (where students participate in rich tasks which fully engage them and that are intrinsically meaningful) are often seen as best – without foundation skills all crumbles to nothing.
I really learnt a lot from this book – it is essentially a series of essays written by people who have been intimately involved in the development of the curricula in the various states. As such it provides insights that are more generally unavailable on the history of curriculum in Australia. The point that is made by implication, if never overtly stated that I can recall, is that, like it or not, the single Australian national curriculum is going to end up being implemented differently in the various states. History has a momentum and the force of that momentum faces in the direction of the pedagogy teachers have learnt and applied in their classrooms within the systemic settings each state provides. Without seeing that curriculum is only one third of the picture that makes up education expectations of change are likely to be thwarted.
Generally, people stress one of these three components as determining the other two. Today, in a world obsessed with neoliberal managerialism, assessment is seen as the essential basis of all education. In the US – unfortunately, an education system I knew more about before reading this book that I did of the curricula in the other Australian States, there is No Child Left Behind – high-stakes testing with the power to close schools and turn teachers and school administrators into liars and cheats. (What a remarkable boon for education that has proven!) The absurdity of the US education system ought to be self-evident as soon as I say that the US does not have a national curriculum. That it has a national means of assessing what is to be learnt, but no national curriculum to decide what needs to be learnt ought to provoke howls of laughter – that it doesn’t says something about the absurdity of our modern obsessions. Assessment in the US drives both curriculum and pedagogy, at least in lower class schools, to the extent where all that is taught is the basic numeracy and literacy that will be tested, or rather, how to fake an understanding of these on the particular multiple choice test that will be given. While those with the social, academic and cultural capital necessary to excel at school are greatly able to ignore any of the restrictions such tests might place upon their education.
Neoliberal obsessions with standardisation and measurement are likewise starting to constrain the Australian education system. This makes an odd contradiction, as most neoliberals will tell you that the benefit of capitalism is decentralised decision-making – decentralisation for business, standardisation for everyone else…
I struggled with this book, at least with the introduction. It was not the books fault, really, but a function of the fact I knew nothing at all about the curricula of other Australian states. I also knew nothing about their very different assessment regimes and therefore the impacts they have had over the years on how teachers in the various states have gone about their teaching. It literally took me until the excellent conclusion, something I’ve photocopied as I know I will need it again, before I knew enough to understand just how important this book actually is.
The word curriculum comes from Latin and means ‘running track’. This is an important etymology to know, because it helps us understand many of the metaphors associated with education. For example, running tracks have finishing lines. Running tracks are used for competitive races where there are winners and losers. Running tracks have fixed courses that have been predetermined, and generally predetermined by someone other than those who are doing the running. Running tracks have fixed paths that do not allow you to take detours, particularly not short cuts. If you would prefer an education system that developed teamwork, life-long learning based on a love of learning as a source of meaningful engagement with the world then a race track may not be your first metaphor of choice.
Australia is in the process of formulating and implementing a national curriculum. Many of the reasons given for implementing such a curriculum falls back on neoliberal justifications. Such a standardised curriculum will help Australia compete in the world economy, as we will have commensurable standards between our various states. A global economy is one in which workers move about to follow jobs, and if we are asking them to do this then their children’s education ought to be consistent no matter where they are receiving it, whether within 10 km of Bourke Street or the back of Burke. And as I mentioned with the US system, it is hard to measure how effective a system is at delivering education if you do not have pre-determined standards of what is to be learnt.
The metaphors here are of education being a kind of substance – something learners are lacking in and educators have in abundance. Education, then, is the measureable transfer of this substance from one over-full container (that which the teacher holds) to another empty container (that which the student holds). That this metaphor is the commonsense notion of how education works is a problem. I’m increasingly coming to the conclusion that when people talk of ‘commonsense’ I should be worried. What is commonsense is generally based on ignorance (and the more passionately stated, the greater the ignorance), it is generally self-serving, and it is almost always used by the Murdochs of the world to undermine reform.
One of the most surprising things I learnt from this book was just how innovative the Queensland curriculum is. This is the exact opposite of what I would have expected. It would be like someone from the United States learning that Alabama has the most progressive school curriculum in the nation. All other states have an examination at the end of high school (that finishing line we talked about earlier – NSW actually has two externally assessed exams, one in year 10 as well). This final exam is essentially a means of grading students to see if they are worthy of being accepted into university.
The problem is that between around 1970 and the mid-1990s the number of students remaining at school to reach this finishing-line doubled (from about 35% to over 70%). Not all of the students completing school have any intention of going on to university. Even as an aspiration the current government only expects 40% of 25-35 year olds to hold a bachelor’s degree by 2025 – clearly, even if this aspiration is achieved that would mean 35% of those finishing high school would not be on a pathway to university. But university entrance frames these exams and therefore also the curriculum that leads to this finishing point. This narrows the options that are available to students at school, generally focusing attention towards traditional subjects, that is, subjects with a long history and therefore subjects that are the most trusted by universities to deliver results that can be graded and compared. This produces some absurdities and limits the usefulness of education. For example, even students who wish to become lawyers end up taking subjects of virtually no use to their future careers. That is, they almost invariably study the most theoretical of mathematics subjects. Why? Not because they are ever likely to need calculus after their final exams, but rather because as a subject it is so lacking in any relation to the life experience of students that only those who can radically divorce learning from relevance can hope to succeed. That is, only those with financial and social capital concentrated in a middle class (and in Australia that increasingly means private) school – with the wherewithal to afford private tuition when this proves necessary – are able to meet the rigours of the curriculum.
In many ways, by Queensland avoiding an externally assessed exam at the end of schooling it also avoids some of these disadvantages. Queensland has a much broader range of subjects on offer right up until the end of school. Also, because assessment is teacher based this means the system must trust teachers to assess students. This caused problems when the system was initially introduced, but professional development, exemplar examples of student work and a dedicated profession has meant that when put to the test teacher assessment has proven much more rigorous and accurate than high-pressure final examinations.
Less surprisingly, South Australia is also a progressive state and much more likely to be concerned with equality of educational opportunity than other states have proven. This is a legacy going back a long way – South Australia prides itself on its ‘free-settler’ origins, but it also benefitted from the Dunstan Decade, ten years of enlightened and progressive government.
I was surprised to learn just how reactionary the NSW curriculum is. Their HSC (higher school certificate) prides itself on how difficult it is. In fact, for some subjects it has the distinction of being even harder than the International Baccalaureate. I wonder what people think high-stakes testing is a preparation for, exactly. It is like some terribly sick joke – ‘your whole life depends on how you do on this one exam, try to relax and enjoy your year.’
IB is an interesting aside here. If you wanted an internationally recognised, corporate approved curriculum, well, that one does seem ready made. But I guess we are still a little too blinded by the delusion that nation-states exist to go all the way to the end of the particular road we appear to be on. But not being one who is all that fond of standardisation I think greater diversity in curricula has merits.
The mistake would be to assume that there are simple answers or one ‘best’ way. As someone says at one point in this, while inquiry based studies (where students participate in rich tasks which fully engage them and that are intrinsically meaningful) are often seen as best – without foundation skills all crumbles to nothing.
I really learnt a lot from this book – it is essentially a series of essays written by people who have been intimately involved in the development of the curricula in the various states. As such it provides insights that are more generally unavailable on the history of curriculum in Australia. The point that is made by implication, if never overtly stated that I can recall, is that, like it or not, the single Australian national curriculum is going to end up being implemented differently in the various states. History has a momentum and the force of that momentum faces in the direction of the pedagogy teachers have learnt and applied in their classrooms within the systemic settings each state provides. Without seeing that curriculum is only one third of the picture that makes up education expectations of change are likely to be thwarted.
Displaying 1 of 1 review