By Robyn Grace and Lucy Carroll
The Australian school science curriculum lacks breadth and depth, and provides little guidance to teachers about content, setting students up for failure against the world’s top-performing countries, a major study has found.
A major study benchmarking the nation’s science curriculum against seven comparable countries shows Australia has half the content of other education systems, omits or includes only a low level of some essential topics and teaches other content years later than in other systems. Victoria’s curriculum has even less content than the national one.
A major study benchmarking the nation’s science curriculum against seven comparable countries shows Australia has half the content of other education systems.Credit: iStock
The study by Learning First, an education consultancy that does policy work for governments, has called for an overhaul of the curriculum, saying the entire process of development and review has been “shockingly poor” and stands to broaden the gap between advantaged and disadvantaged schools.
NSW and Victoria adapt the curriculum for their own schools, but other states and jurisdictions follow the national version that sets out a baseline level of guaranteed learning content for all students.
In NSW, the latest science syllabus matches some of the higher-performing countries, but the study says Victoria, which is currently in the process of updating its curriculum, provides even less content than the already inadequate national document.
Schools in NSW are bringing in new syllabuses across all subjects following a once-in-a-generation review of the state’s curriculum that aimed to halt a two-decade slump in students’ results in international tests.
Its schools use NSW Education Standards Authority syllabuses and not the Australian curriculum.
Victoria is due to release its new science curriculum next year. Head of Learning First Ben Jensen said he hoped for a massive shift in the next version.
“It’s not good enough to leave it to Victorian teachers to try and fill the holes in the curriculum,” he said.
Learning First compared material in the science curriculum because it is broadly consistent from country to country and can be more easily categorised than subjects like English.
Curriculum critics
A study by education consultants Learning First benchmarked the Australian science curriculum against high-performing systems in England, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore, the US, and the Canadian provinces of Quebec and Alberta. Compared with those, the study found the Australian curriculum:
- Contains on average about half the science content of seven other high-performing countries in the first nine years of schooling
- Covers 44 science topics in the first nine years compared with an average of 74 topics
- Covers just five topics in depth in the first nine years compared with an average of 22
- Contains consistently poor sequencing of content, which research shows is vital for effective teaching and learning
The study compared Australia’s curriculum with those in England, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore, the US and the Canadian provinces of Alberta and Quebec.
It found the Australian science curriculum contained on average about half the content of the other countries over the first nine years of schooling, covering 44 topics compared with an average of 74.
Just five science topics are covered during the first nine years in Australia compared with an average of 22 in the other countries. The study also found consistently poor sequencing of content, which the research showed was vital for effective teaching and learning.
NSW’s new science syllabuses for years 7 to 10, introduced as part of the state’s curriculum overhaul, has 50 per cent more content, bringing it in line with curriculums in the highest-performing countries. Victoria has 6 per cent less than the national curriculum, which has 59 per cent less than the average content of other systems.
“The new NSW science curriculum is much more comprehensive than the national version and has addressed a lot of the flaws and is now more comparable with world-leading systems,” Jensen said.
“The quality of curriculum taught in schools has a massive impact on student learning. If the content is not in the curriculum, we are effectively saying that we are comfortable with a student going through school not learning it. When we do that, it hits disadvantaged students the hardest.”
A spokesperson for the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority said the science curriculum was endorsed by state and territory education ministers after a “significant review” that included feedback from subject, curriculum and teacher experts, as well as public consultation.
The review process also included international benchmarking, which found the Australian version was on par in terms of overall breadth, depth and rigour.
The Program for International Student Assessment (PISA), a triennial test of 15-year-olds in maths, reading and science, shows Australia’s performance in science had been in steady decline since 2012. The latest PISA results will be delivered on December 5.
Grattan Institute education program director Jordana Hunter said the Australian curriculum left vast gaps for teachers to fill in the blanks.
While the curriculum was only one factor driving Australia’s PISA decline, Hunter said top-performing countries placed a stronger focus on rigour and knowledge in their curriculums, and there was greater focus on a whole-school approach to lesson planning.
“The Australian curriculum provides broad direction only in most subjects, leaving the heavy lifting for teachers and opening up the potential for significant variation in quality and coverage from classroom to classroom,” she said. “The challenge isn’t just in science.”
A Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Authority spokesperson said the next version of the Victorian foundation to year 10 curriculum was being developed after revisions were made to the Australian curriculum.
The spokesperson did not answer questions about the content of the current curriculum or future revisions and said the VCAA would review Learning First’s report when it became available.
NSW education authorities said the state’s curriculum changes, announced in 2020 after a two-year review conducted by Professor Geoff Masters, provided a road map to rewrite its syllabuses “based in the latest evidence for how students learn”.
New NSW science syllabuses for primary students are due to be released in 2024, while years 7 to 10 will be available by the end of the year.
“We welcome this positive recognition of NESA’s approach to curriculum development,” a NSW Education Standards Authority spokesperson said.
“The end goal is always an up-to-date syllabus, founded in the latest research, that is teachable and practical, promotes depth of learning and that will support the best outcomes for our students.”
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