AN OVERVIEW

The South Australian Curriculum, Standards and Accountability Framework describes the curriculum Key Ideas and Learning Outcomes all learners can expect their education to be built on.

Curriculum is, and needs to continue to be, more than ever before, dynamic.

• The increasingly varied and mobile profiles of the communities served by our schools and children’s services

• The changes in the drivers, patterns and opportunities in our economic structures

• The growth, accessibility and fluidity of knowledge and information

• Our improved understandings of learning and learners

• The appearance of new patterns of exclusion and discrimination in society and education—the persistence of old prejudices and alienations

• The expansion of the daily possibilities for teaching and learning activities

The curriculum must have a strongly centred core—a framework that informs and guides educators’ professional decisions.

Characteristics of the SACSA Framework

• Birth to Year 12

• One cohesive framework

• Encompassing a broad and balanced curriculum

• A framework, not the whole curriculum

Characteristics of the SACSA Framework continued

• Based on constructivist theories of learning

• Focus on outcomes

• For all learners and inclusive of all learners

• Refinement of the past while leading into the future

FEATURES OF THE FRAMEWORK

The SACSA Framework

CURRICULUM SCOPE

Key Ideas to be taught through the Learning Areas and interwoven with Essential Learnings, Equity Cross-curriculum Perspectives and Enterprise and Vocational Education.

STANDARDS

• Developmental Learning Outcomes (Birth to Age 5)

• Curriculum Standards (Reception to Year 10)

• Year 12 Standards

CURRICULUM ACCOUNTABILITY

For the government sector this component of the Framework describes the system’s Curriculum Accountability requirements.

CURRICULUM BANDS

• Early Years Band (Birth–Age 3, Age 3–Age 5, R–Yr 2)• Primary Years Band (Years 3, 4, 5) • Middle Years Band (Years 6, 7, 8, 9)• Senior Years Band (Years 10, 11, 12)

• The Curriculum Scope and Standards are organised in four Curriculum Bands, which are broad stages of learning within the birth to Year 12 continuum

• Introductions describe the key characteristics of learners and learning for each Band and the implications of these for the construction and delivery of curriculum

CURRICULUM SCOPE

The Curriculum Scope and Standards interweave:

• Learning Areas

• Essential Learnings

• Equity Cross-curriculum Perspectives

• Vocational and Enterprise Education.

Key Ideas and Learning Outcomes comprise the required elements of the SACSA Framework for all government schools and children’s services.

LEARNING AREAS

• These are constructions of knowledge or disciplines constructed by scholars, which have traditionally framed the curriculum.

• In the SACSA Framework the Learning Areas become more differentiated and specialised as learners move beyond the Early Years Band.

• Key Ideas comprise the fundamental concepts of a Learning Area (Birth–Age 5), or strand of a Learning Area (R–12) which are developed in complexity across the Bands.

ESSENTIAL LEARNINGS— BIRTH to YEAR 12

Essential Learnings describe the values, dispositions, skills and understandings that are considered crucial in the education and development of all learners in our care.

The development of these Learnings is an ongoing, lifelong process and occurs in every context of a learner’s life.

ESSENTIAL LEARNINGS— BIRTH to YEAR 12 continuedConnect the curriculum from Birth to Year 12.

Futures—develop the flexibility to respond to change, recognise connections with the past and conceive solutions for preferred futures

Identity—develop a positive sense of self and group, accept individual and group responsibilities and respect individual and group differences

Interdependence—work in harmony with others and for common purposes, within and across cultures

Thinking—be independent and critical thinkers, with the ability to appraise information, make decisions, be innovative and devise creative solutions

Communication—communicate powerfully using literacy, numeracy and information and communication technologies.

Literacy, numeracy and information and communication technologies

In the Essential Learning, Communication, the skills of literacy, numeracy and information and communication technologies are explicit and developmental throughout the Framework in all Learning Areas.

The Framework provides a basis for all educators to address these critical aspects of children’s and students’ education.

Links are made with the National Literacy and Numeracy Benchmarks and the Year 10 accreditation of Information and Communication Technologies Competencies.

Key Competencies

Key Competencies are included explicitly throughout the Framework.

KC1: collecting, analysing and organising information

KC2: communicating ideas and information

KC3: planning and organising activities

KC4: working with others in teams

KC5: using mathematical ideas and techniques

KC6: solving problems

KC7: using technology

EQUITY CROSS-CURRICULUM PERSPECTIVES

The SACSA Framework maintains and extends South Australia’s reputation and tradition for inclusive curriculum and practice.

The educational entitlements of groups of learners

Aboriginal learners and Torres Strait Islander learners

Learners from linguistically and culturally diverse backgrounds

Learners who have English as their second language

Learners with disabilities or learning difficulties

Learners from low socio-economic backgrounds

Particular groups of girls and boys

Learners from an isolated or rural background

Equity perspectives are represented across the curriculum

• Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples' perspectives

• Multicultural perspectives

• Gender perspectives

• Socio-economic perspectives

• Disability perspectives

• Rural and isolated perspectives

ENTERPRISE AND VOCATIONAL EDUCATION

This focus reflects the national and state education, training, work and lifelong learning priorities made explicit in the National Goals of Schooling which states that students leaving school should have:

“employment related skills, and an understanding of the work environment, career options and pathways as a foundation for, and positive attitudes towards, vocational education and training, further education, employment and lifelong learning…”. (MCEETYA 1999)

Vocational learning

• Key Competencies• Enterprise education• Career education• Work-based learning• Community-based learning

Vocational learning provides key and important contexts for general education, and so is an entitlement of all learners from Birth to Year 12 explicitly interwoven in the SACSA Framework.

Vocational Education and Training (VET)

In the school context this refers to nationally accredited and industry-specific entry level training programs which deliver competencies endorsed within the National Vocational Education and Training Framework and provide credentials within the Australian Qualifications Framework.

STANDARDS Developmental Learning Outcomes

(Birth–Age 5) Curriculum Standards

(R–10) Year 12 Standards

High expectations of all learners

A common reference point for assessing and reporting on learners’ achievement

A basis for tracking learners’ progress over time and across different educational sites

Draw attention to particular aspects of performance which are significant along the continuum from birth to Year 12; progress is important rather than notions of ‘pass’ or ‘fail’

CURRICULUM ACCOUNTABILITY

• provide a comprehensive account of the Developmental Learning Outcomes and Curriculum Standards achieved by learners

• explicitly account for the steps taken to improve Learning Outcomes.

The professional responsibility of educators, site leaders and state office personnel to:

Curriculum is dynamic. During implementation we will continue to learn about:

• constructivist approaches to teaching and learning

• Essential Learnings

• connections across Learning Areas

• smoothing the transitions between Bands

• Standards.

The SACSA Framework is:

• contemporary

• uniquely South Australian

• universal.

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS