New history curriculum

Media Release, The Hon John Howard MP, 11 October 2007; Media Release, The Hon Kevin Rudd MP
& The Hon Stephen Smith MP, 11 October 2007; The Age, Jewel Topsfield, 11 October 2007; The Age,
Farrah Tomazin, 11 October 2007; The Australian, Imre Salusinszky, 11 October 2007; Daily
Telegraph, Steve Lewis, 11 October 2007; Canberra Times, Andrew Fraser, 12 October 2007; The
Herald Sun, Jane Metlikovec, 12 October 2007

 

Prime Minister John Howard has released a Guide to the Teaching of Australian History in Years 9 and 10, which recommends that Australian history should become a compulsory, stand-alone subject for all students in years 9
and 10 from 2009.

The report was prepared by the Australian History External Reference Group following last year’s National History
Summit.

The guide organises Australian history into ten chapters: First Peoples, Early Encounters, British Colonies (1788-
1850), Emerging Nation (1851-1900), The New Commonwealth (1901-1919), The Roaring Twenties and Lean Thirties (1920-1938), World War II and Post-war Reconstruction (1939-1949), Building Modern Australia: Times of Prosperity
and Social Change (1950-1975) and Australia and the Shrinking Globe (1976-2000).

Each chapter contains ‘milestone events’, which include the Myall Creek massacre in 1838, the introduction of free
and secular education in Victoria in 1872, Papua New Guinea independence in 1975 and the 1999 Australia-led
intervention in East Timor, as well as biographies of important people during the period.

Students will also analyse each chapter through nine ‘perspectives’: Aboriginal, regional and global, biographical,
beliefs and values, economic, everyday life, gender, environmental and local.

Mr Howard has said that history was being taught ‘as some kind of fragmented stew of moods and events, rather
than some kind of proper narrative.’ He also plans to develop specific guidelines on outcomes and assessments and
to establish detailed curriculum resources for schools.

The Leader of the Opposition, Mr Kevin Rudd and The Opposition's Shadow Education Minister, Mr Stephen Smith,
have welcomed the release of the report saying that they ‘strongly believe that history, particularly Australian history,
is a very important part of the curriculum.’

One of Australia’s leading conservative historians, Mr Gregory Melleuish, who participated in last year’s history
summit, has criticised the outcomes, saying that ‘the problem with this sort of document is that it tells one very little
about how things will actually work in the classroom.’

For a copy of the report, click here.

 

 

Back to October News Archives   •   Back to News Page