The misconceptions
In my work with teachers in curriculum and pedagogy over the years, I (Charlotte) have noticed that several misconceptions and assumptions about our Australian Curriculum: Science continue to circulate.
These misconceptions include:
The Science understanding strand is the only strand that must be planned for, taught, and assessed.
Content elaborations must be taught and assessed.
Each content description should be taught through a unit across a whole term.
The curriculum is the only thing that should be taught.
The goal of the curriculum is to prepare students for senior secondary science classes.
Each of these statements is not correct! So what is?
The truths
The reality is that teachers have more autonomy and flexibility in what and how they teach the Australian Curriculum v9 than they may realise.
1. The Science understanding strand is one of three strands that must be planned, taught, and assessed.
There are three strands in the Australian Curriculum: Science: Science understanding, Science as a human endeavour, and Science inquiry, and all three must be taught and assessed.
“Together, the three strands provide students with understanding, knowledge and skills through which they can develop a scientific view of the world. Students are challenged to explore science, its concepts, nature and uses through clearly described inquiry processes.” (ACARA, 2023)
Further, the three strands don’t need to be taught in isolation, indeed, they shouldn’t; they are written so that they may be taught in an integrated way.
2. Content elaborations need not be taught or assessed.
Content elaborations provide examples and valuable suggestions for the teaching of the related content description, but they don’t have to be taught or assessed. If a teacher reads the content description and isn’t sure what precisely to teach, the elaborations can give some guidance.
3. Content descriptions might be the focus of teaching and learning for a term, a week, or a single lesson.
How long is a piece of string? Some content descriptions describe challenging concepts that take a whole term for students to unpack and explore, while others might address an essential but straightforward concept that students can learn in a week or even a single lesson.
“Content descriptions are not all of “equal size”, so it's not expected that teachers will allocate equal time to each in their planning and teaching. While some content descriptions are so fundamental and critical to a student’s development they should be revisited and retaught numerous times during the year, others might only be taught in a few lessons.” (ACARA, 2023)
4. The Australian Curriculum is a floor, not a ceiling.
Got an idea you’re passionate about teaching, is of interest or relevance to students, or is related to students’ growth as individuals or a group? Go ahead and teach it!
The revised Australian Curriculum has less, and better-defined, content listed than previous versions. For some teachers and students, it is plenty to be going on with! But sometimes, to include all students or address their needs, it might be necessary to review past concepts and learning, or add extra learning goals and intents. And that’s fine! (And if you use advance organisers such as WALT and WILF, go ahead and include these as WALT and WILF goals too!)
5. The goal of the P-10 Australian Curriculum is to prepare students for life (including, but not only, work).
This is one we’re particularly passionate about…
The Australian Curriculum has been designed to meet the goals outlined in the Mparntwe Declaration. The curriculum should “enable all Australians to become confident and creative individuals, successful learners, and active and informed community members.”
There’s nothing in there about all of our students becoming scientists, or even all of them studying science in their senior years (as wonderful as that might be, especially if they are able to choose applied science subjects that address their needs and interests as learners).
This means that sometimes, there is work to do for the teachers of senior science subjects to ensure students are enabled to achieve their best in the senior science subjects. That’s ok. That’s part of teaching (and learning)! If the Australian Curriculum: Science has been effectively taught, mostly by teachers with enthusiasm and a willingness to learn themselves, then there shouldn’t be too much of a need for teachers of senior science subjects to do this work.
And a bonus misconception…
Science won’t prepare students to perform their best on NAPLAN… Not true!
Literacy and numeracy are, by definition, the capabilities that allow students to engage with meaningful contexts. These capabilities can’t be developed, practised, or applied without contexts (English and Mathematics skills can… but these are not capabilities. Hit me up in the comments if you disagree!).
Science is a great context for students to practise their literacy and numeracy skills, too. There are lots of opportunities for integrated teaching and learning with English and Mathematics, as well as Technologies, HASS, The Arts, HPE, and Languages!
NAPLAN test questions draw on contexts and content from across the curriculum to assess students’ literacy and numeracy capabilities. ACARA themselves say that the best preparation for NAPLAN is to teach the whole of the Australian Curriculum - all three dimensions - to all students.