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Learning across the curriculum

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Learning across the curriculum content, including the cross-curriculum priorities and general capabilities, assists students to achieve the broad learning outcomes defined in the NESA K–10 Curriculum Framework and Statement of Equity Principles and in the Melbourne Declaration on Educational Goals for Young Australians (December 2008).

Cross-curriculum priorities enable students to develop understanding about and address the contemporary issues they face.

The cross-curriculum priorities are:

  • Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories and cultures Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories and cultures
  • Asia and Australia's engagement with Asia Asia and Australia's engagement with Asia
  • Sustainability Sustainability

General capabilities encompass the knowledge, skills, attitudes and behaviours to assist students to live and work successfully in the 21st century.

The general capabilities are:

  • Critical and creative thinking Critical and creative thinking
  • Ethical understanding Ethical understanding
  • Information and communication technology capability Information and communication technology capability
  • Intercultural understanding Intercultural understanding
  • Literacy Literacy
  • Numeracy Numeracy
  • Personal and social capability Personal and social capability

The NESA syllabuses include other areas identified as important learning for all students:

  • Civics and citizenship Civics and citizenship
  • Difference and diversity Difference and diversity
  • Work and enterprise Work and enterprise

Learning across the curriculum content is incorporated, and identified by icons, in the content of the Geography K–10 Syllabus in the following ways.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories and cultures Hand - Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories and cultures learning across the curriculum icon

The study of Geography provides valuable opportunities for students to understand that contemporary Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities are strong, resilient, rich and diverse. It emphasises the relationships people have with places and their interconnections with the environments in which they live. The study of Geography integrates Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples’ use of the land, governed by a holistic, spiritually based connection to Country and Place, with the continuing influence of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples on places, including in environmental management and local and regional economies. Students learn that there are different ways of thinking about and interacting with the environment and how this can influence sustainable development. Geography provides opportunities for students to explore how the practices of Aboriginal Peoples, as the oldest, continuous cultures in the world, support the sustainable use of environments.

When planning and programming content relating to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories and cultures, teachers are encouraged to:

  • involve local Aboriginal communities and/or appropriate knowledge holders in determining suitable resources, or to use Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander authored or endorsed publications
  • read the Principles and Protocols relating to teaching and learning about Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories and cultures and the involvement of local Aboriginal communities.

Asia and Australia's engagement with Asia Flower with an a - Asia and Australia's engagement with Asia learning across the curriculum icon

Students learn about and recognise the diversity within and between the countries of the Asia region and how this diversity influences the way people perceive and interact with places and environments. Through the study of Geography, students have opportunities to develop knowledge and understanding of Asian societies, cultures, beliefs and environments, and the connections between the peoples of Asia, Australia, and the rest of the world. Throughout the study of Geography, students are provided with rich contexts to investigate the interrelationships between diverse places, environments and peoples in the Asia region, and are provided with opportunities to recognise Asia as an important region of the world.

Sustainability Leaves - Sustainability learning across the curriculum icon

The study of Geography provides students with opportunities to develop the knowledge, understanding, skills, values and attitudes necessary for them to act in ways that contribute to more sustainable ways of living. Students have opportunities to develop an understanding that sustainability is focused on environmental protection to create a more ecologically and socially just world and that sustainable living requires environmental, social, cultural and economic considerations, and informed action.

In Geography, students examine the effects of human challenges to sustainability, and strategies to address these. Students evaluate the effects of strategies on environments, economies and societies, and recognise that they can contribute to actions that support more sustainable ways of living.

Critical and creative thinking Gears - Critical and creative thinking learning across the curriculum icon

In Geography, students are provided with opportunities to develop critical and creative thinking as they investigate geographical information, concepts and ideas through inquiry-based learning. They develop and practise critical and creative thinking by using strategies that help them think logically when evaluating and using evidence, testing explanations, analysing arguments and making decisions, and when thinking deeply about questions that do not have straightforward answers. Students develop an understanding of the value and process of developing creative questions and the importance of speculation. Students are encouraged to be curious and imaginative in investigations and fieldwork and to think creatively about the ways that the places and spaces they use might be better designed, and about possible, probable and preferable futures.

Ethical understanding Scales - Ethical understanding learning across the curriculum icon

Geography provides students with opportunities to develop ethical understanding as they identify and investigate the nature of ethical concepts, values, character traits and principles, and how reasoning can assist ethical judgement. Ethical understanding involves students in building a strong personal and socially oriented ethical outlook that helps them to manage context, conflict and uncertainty, and to develop an awareness of the influence that their values and behaviour have on others.

Geography supports students to develop their own ethical understanding as they investigate current geographical issues and evaluate their findings against the criteria of environmental protection, economic prosperity and social advancement. These criteria raise ethical questions that students explore to develop informed values and attitudes and become aware of their own roles and responsibilities as citizens.

When undertaking fieldwork, students have opportunities to learn about ethical procedures for investigating and working with people and places. When thinking about the environment, students consider their responsibilities to protect other forms of life that share the environment.

Information and communication technology capability Computer - Information and communication technology capability learning across the curriculum icon

Students develop information and communication technology (ICT) capability by maximising use of the technologies available to them, adapting as technologies evolve and limiting the risks to themselves and others in a digital environment. Geography provides students with opportunities to locate, select, evaluate, communicate and share geographical information using digital and spatial technologies. They explore the effects of technologies on places, on the location of economic activities and on people’s lives and develop an understanding of the geographical changes produced by the increasing use of technology.

Intercultural understanding Globe - Intercultural understanding learning across the curriculum icon

The study of Geography provides students with opportunities to develop their intercultural understanding as they learn to value their own cultures, languages and beliefs, and those of others. They come to understand how personal, group and national identities are shaped, and the variable and changing nature of culture. Intercultural understanding involves students learning about and engaging with diverse cultures in ways that recognise similarities and differences, create connections with others and cultivate mutual respect.

Students are provided with opportunities to learn about the diversity of the world’s peoples, places and environments. As they investigate the interconnection between people and places and the meaning and significance that places hold, they come to appreciate how various cultural identities are shaped. Through opportunities to study the lives, cultures, values and beliefs of people in different places, students learn to appreciate and interpret different perspectives and to challenge stereotypical or prejudiced representations of social and cultural groups where they exist. Through studying people in diverse places, they are provided with opportunities to recognise their similarities with other people, better understand their differences, and demonstrate respect for cultural diversity and the human rights of all people in local, national, regional and global settings.

Literacy Book - Literacy learning across the curriculum icon

The study of Geography provides students with opportunities to develop literacy capability as they explore, discuss, analyse and communicate geographical information, concepts and ideas. They use a wide range of informational and literary texts, for example interviews, reports, stories, photographs and maps, to help them understand the people, places and environments that make up the world. They learn to evaluate texts and recognise how language and images can be used to make and manipulate meaning.

Students are provided with opportunities to develop literacy skills as they use language to pose distinctively geographical questions. They plan a geographical inquiry, acquire and process information, communicate their findings, reflect on their inquiry and respond to what they have learned. Students progressively learn to use Geography’s scientific and expressive modes of writing and the vocabulary of the discipline. They are provided with opportunities to comprehend and compose graphical and visual texts through working with maps, visual representations and remotely sensed and satellite images.

Numeracy Calculator - Numeracy learning across the curriculum icon

Students have opportunities in Geography to develop numeracy capability as they investigate concepts fundamental to Geography, including the effects of location and distance, spatial distributions and the organisation and management of space within places. They apply numeracy skills in geographical analysis by counting and measuring, constructing and interpreting tables and graphs, calculating and interpreting statistics and using statistical analysis to test relationships between variables. In constructing and interpreting maps, students work with numerical concepts of scale, distance and area.

Personal and social capability Two people - Personal and social capability learning across the curriculum icon

In studying Geography, students are provided with opportunities to develop personal and social capability as they engage in geographical inquiry, and develop an understanding of how geographical knowledge informs their personal identity, sense of belonging and capacity to empathise with others, as well as offering opportunities for contributing to their communities.

Inquiry-based learning in Geography provides opportunities for students to develop their capacity for self-management. It gives them a role in directing their own learning and in planning and carrying out investigations. It provides opportunities to express and reflect on their opinions, beliefs, values and questions appropriately. This enables them to become independent learners who can apply geographical understanding and skills to decisions they will have to make in the future. Through working collaboratively in the classroom and in the field, students are encouraged to develop their interpersonal and social skills, and to appreciate the different insights and perspectives of other group members.

Civics and citizenship Australia - Civics and citizenship learning across the curriculum icon

As students engage in learning in Geography, they have opportunities to develop the knowledge, understanding, skills, values and attitudes for responsible, informed and active participation in Australian society and as global citizens. Students explore ways they can shape their lives, value their belonging in a diverse and dynamic society, and positively contribute at a range of scales. Active citizens support democratic participation, foster individual and group involvement in civil society, critically question existing political institutions and social, economic and political arrangements, and facilitate democratic change.

Students are provided with opportunities to participate in decision-making and to exercise critical judgement about political issues. Comparisons with other civil societies encourage students to develop their understanding of the nature of democracy in Australia and in other countries. Students examine the role of citizens in the context of government systems and institutions as well as political and social life in Australia and other countries.

Difference and diversity Puzzle piece - Difference and diversity learning across the curriculum icon

Difference and diversity comprises gender, ethnicity, ability and socioeconomic circumstances. Geography is well placed to develop students’ knowledge and understanding of the difference and diversity among people within and between communities. They are provided with opportunities to identify and empathise with the varying perspectives of individuals and groups and attempt to understand the actions, values, attitudes and motives of people. Students are encouraged to value difference and to challenge social injustice that is caused by attitudes to difference. Students are encouraged to investigate how diversity contributes to a sense of community and identity, including national identity.

Work and enterprise Star - Work and enterprise learning across the curriculum icon

Geography provides students with opportunities to develop knowledge and understanding of employment as a factor contributing to patterns of internal and international migration. Students also recognise the role of employment in human wellbeing and development. Students explore the impact on people, places and the environment of business activities, including trade connections on local and global scales, the effect of production and consumption on the environment, and sustainable business practices. Students are also provided with opportunities to learn how organisations in Australia and overseas have a role in community action, such as environmental protection and conflict over land use.

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