Australia's Education Minister Alan Tudge chose to single out proposed changes to the new school curriculum over references to Australia's colonisation by the British and the use of the word "invasion".
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The minister's criticism centres around two proposals for primary school humanities and history that involve the word "invasion".
It references "that people have different points of view on some commemorations" including that some "First Nations Australians regard 'Australia Day' as 'Invasion Day'". It also says that the colonisation of Australia by the British was "perceived by the First Nations Australians as an invasion".
But education expert Professor Sue Bennett preferred to comment on all the hundreds of pages of proposed changes to the curriculum, recently released by the body in charge of reviewing what Australian students are taught.
And the head of the University of Wollongong's School of Education liked the proposed revisions to the curriculum made by the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA), after a review of the core knowledge and skills taught from kinder to year 10.
"I actually have a lot of confidence in what is being proposed because it has already been through a really extensive consultation process," Prof Bennett said.
"The reason why I'm confident is because a lot of hard work has already been done by people who are really qualified with everyday experiences of the curriculum - so teachers, professional organisations who represent teachers and curriculum experts."
She felt the review had successfully reduced the content in the curriculum and improved the balance of the curriculum.
The proposals are not final, and are now open to public consultation and feedback until July 8 on ACARA"s website. The feedback will be used to develop final revisions, which will have to be signed off by the federal, state and territory education ministers.
Prof Bennett said the job of the review was to balance up the views of all the different stakeholders.
"Part of the process is that we need a curriculum that is keeping pace with changes in knowledge, keeping pace with changes in society and able to be reviewed and changed, rather than just kind of stagnating and not really reflecting our society," Prof Bennett said.
"I think on balance, it does do those things that it set out to do.
"It has clarified a lot of things. It has reduced duplication and it has built better connections between different areas of the syllabus.
"I think students, teachers and parents are all going to be the big winners out of this because this is a genuine engagement by different stakeholders whose perspectives are represented in changes to the curriculum.
"We now are in a cycle of review and that's what we need our curriculum to be.
"We need it to be something that can be updated and a whole lot of people give input into those updates and then we genuinely work out what is it that we need the curriculum to do - which is what do we need to be taught, at what stages of a child's education."
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Agron Latifi
Wollongong born and bred. I love reporting about the Illawarra region and have been doing it for more than 20 years. I've moved into sport recently after covering the education round for the last five plus years for the Illawarra Mercury. It's been a great pleasure.
Wollongong born and bred. I love reporting about the Illawarra region and have been doing it for more than 20 years. I've moved into sport recently after covering the education round for the last five plus years for the Illawarra Mercury. It's been a great pleasure.
