BACK to basics.
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The phrase just about every teacher wants to hear when a review of the national education curriculum is being discussed.
On early analysis, the review suggests a simplified version of the current curriculum which harks back to the key learning areas and queries attempts to implement broader contexts of study on a daily basis.
Should the recommendations be implemented, there will be fewer subjects in primary school education, where the core skills of English and mathematics must remain as central to the timetable.
There will be greater emphasis on improving course content, removing holes created by the need to cover great expanses of knowledge.
And there will be an investment in creating a vision which is worked towards at all age and learning levels.
Significantly, the review has identified that the curriculum has become too complicated for parents to understand.
This point, coupled with extraordinary differences in reporting on children, has created a sense of scepticism from parents around learning progress.
Any measures which are taken to revisit parent engagement should be encouraged.
The report also identifies a failure to cater for students with disabilities and suggests abandoning prioritising of racial perspectives in every subject – both areas which have been in the past, and likely to remain, difficult to manage.
The review does not forecast a stunning restructure of educational directions that so many feared it might.
Indeed, there have been few critics of the recommendations as proposed.
Instead there’s cautious support, with the states to examine the suggestions later on this year with a view to implementation in 2016.
Most importantly, the review must stick.
The ability of governments to ensure the overriding messages of the review filter down through the states and into the classroom may be the most challenging aspect of curriculum change.
Our ambitions to be a smart country must start in the formative years. Any steps which can help our children achieve better results are to be supported and applauded.