ESSENTIAL LEARNINGS Curriculum for 21 st Century Schools

Purpose Why the change? What will schools look like? School stories.

Why the development of The Essential Learnings Framework? New Learning: A Charter for Australian Education, Australian Council of Deans of Education, 2001 “Leading Learning: An international perspective” IARTV, No 112, Feb, 2002

Knowledge today is: Highly situated Rapidly changing Diverse

The focus of learning needs to expand to include: Knowledge Sets and Capability Sets Located Learnings and Transferable Learnings Disciplined Learning and Reflexive Learning

The new learning will be: General in its focus About creating a kind of person Interdisciplinary in its nature

David Hanlon (DOE Director, Office for Curriculum, Leadership and Learning): Public education matters Learning has intrinsic merit Learning builds culture School..a place to develop critical literacy The social justice agenda A focus on thinking is a key purpose

We need to be positioning our children: To shape and change the world, to use wise intelligence To continue to learn, to combine learning,work and life for a happy future For an immediate start to post-school life that is optimistic not despairing

Issues What will the new learner be like? What will the role of the teacher look like? Teaching for deep understanding? ‘Thinking” - an explicit outcome. Schools – organisation???? What type of leading/learning culture? Relationships between schools and communities? Role of ICT? Assessment …and reporting?

Impact Emphasis on purpose. Purpose is explicit. Students need to learn in different modes…(Seaton research - School structure) Involvement of the students in designing the learning process

What does the learning need to be like? Emphasis on exit outcomes Active learning for intellectual quality Personal responsibility for own learning and behaviour Individual meaning and relevance Real-life purposes, roles and contexts Links with community for mutual capacity building Extension of pedagogical repertoires

Power ‘Power’ must operate in fundamentally different ways in learning environments Capacity rather than domination Purpose Having opportunities to negotiate learning that is useful now, as well as in the future Empowerment Viewing the world critically and acting independently, co-operatively, and responsibly

Assessment Evaluation practices tell both students and teachers what counts