New school curriculum favours Indigenous history

A review of the national curriculum will mean younger students will not learn about significant overseas commemorations.

A review of the national Australian curriculum will mean younger students will not learn about significant overseas commemorations. Picture: istock

Primary school students will no longer study internationally significant commemorations, such as Bastille Day, Independence Day in the US or Chinese New Year as a proposed new school curriculum switches to emphasise Australian, particularly Indigenous, history and events.

Instead, students will study the importance of Australia Day, ANZAC Day and National Sorry Day and will be taught for the first time that First Nations Australians perceived the arrival of the First Fleet as an invasion.

Revised Australian Curriculum documents released on Thursday reveal a swathe of changes that have been designed to incorporate Indigenous histories, cultures and perspectives into various subjects, including the humanities. At the same time, curriculum content has been cut dramatically, especially in history.

For Year 4 students, the requirement to study at least one world navigator has been replaced by the study of the significance of trade to First Nations People of Australia.

While in Year 5, the study of the nature of convict or colonial presence, aspects of the daily life of the inhabitants and how the environment changed will now focus on the effects of colonial presence on the natural environment and the lives of First Nations Australians.

Curriculum documents will also no longer reference the terms Aboriginal and Indigenous, which will be replaced by ‘First Nations Australians’ or ’Australian First Nations Peoples’, after an advisory group raised concerns about the “accuracy and adequacy” of the overarching themes of the current Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Histories and Cultures cross-curriculum priority.

Other feedback from the advisory group included that the current national curriculum did not include enough “truth telling” about the experience of First Nations Australians since the arrival of Europeans; placed too much emphasis on the period prior to contact with Europeans; failed to recognise that the First Peoples of Australia experienced colonisation ”as invasion and dispossession of land, sea and sky”; lacked mention of the Native Title Act 1993 as a law passed by the Australian Parliament that recognises the rights and interests of First Nations Peoples of Australia in land and waters according to their traditional laws and customs; did not mention the First Peoples of Australia being recognised as the world’s oldest continuing culture; and failed to showcase the sophisticated political, economic, and social organisation systems of the First Peoples of Australia.

The proposed new curriculum, which is open to public consultation for the next 10 weeks, also provides teachers with more guidance on how they can incorporate Indigenous perspectives into their subjects, including maths, science and English.