Design and Technologies Curriculum Pre-Primary to Year 10

Design and Technologies

Design and Technologies Curriculum – Pre-Primary to Year 10

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Content

Rationale 5

Design and Technologies 5

Digital Technologies 6

Aims 7

Design and Technologies 7

Digital Technologies 7

Organisation 8

Content structure 8

Relationship between the strands 10

Knowledge and understanding 10

Processes and production skills 10

Year level descriptions 12

Content descriptions 12

Achievement standards 12

Glossary 12

Student diversity 13

Students with disability 13

English as an additional language or dialect 13

Gifted and talented students 14

Ways of teaching 15

Design and Technologies 15

Digital Technologies 17

Ways of assessing 20

General capabilities 22

Literacy 22

Numeracy 22

Information and communication technology (ICT) capability 22

Critical and creative thinking 23

Personal and social capability 23

Ethical understanding 24

Intercultural understanding 24

Cross-curriculum priorities 25

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories and cultures 25

Asia and Australia’s engagement with Asia 25

Sustainability 25

Glossary 26

Design and Technologies – Pre-primary to Year 6 scope and sequence 37

Design and Technologies – Year 7 to Year 10 scope and sequence 39

Digital Technologies – Pre-primary to Year 6 scope and sequence 41

Digital Technologies – Year 7 to Year 10 scope and sequence 44

Rationale

Technologies enrich and impact on the lives of people and societies globally. Society needs enterprising students who can make discerning decisions about the development and use of technologies, develop solutions to complex challenges and contribute to sustainable patterns of living. Technologies can play an important role in transforming, restoring and sustaining societies and natural, managed and constructed environments.

The Western Australian Curriculum: Technologies describes two distinct but related subjects:

· Design and Technologies, in which students use design thinking and technologies to generate and produce solutions for authentic needs and opportunities

· Digital Technologies, in which students use computational thinking and information systems to define, design and implement solutions.

In an increasingly technological and complex world, it is important to develop knowledge and skills to analyse and creatively respond to design and/or digital challenges.

Through the practical application of technologies including digital technologies, students develop dexterity and coordination through experiential activities. Technologies motivates young people and engages them in a range of learning experiences that are transferable to family and home, constructive leisure activities, community contribution and the world of work.

Technologies provides students with authentic learning challenges that foster curiosity, confidence, persistence, innovation, creativity, respect and cooperation. These attributes are necessary when using and developing solutions to make sense of complex ideas and relationships in all areas of learning. Technologies helps students to be regional and global citizens, capable of actively and ethically communicating and collaborating.

Design and Technologies

Knowledge, understandings and skills involved in the design, development and use of technologies are influenced by, and can play a role in, enriching and transforming societies and our natural, managed and constructed environments.

The Western Australian Curriculum: Design and Technologies actively engages students in creating quality designed solutions for identified needs and opportunities across a range of technologies contexts. Students consider the economic, environmental and social impacts of technological change and how the choice and use of technologies contributes to a sustainable future. Decision-making processes are informed by ethical, legal, aesthetic and functional factors.

Through Design and Technologies students manage projects, independently and collaboratively, from conception to realisation. They apply design and systems thinking and design processes to investigate ideas, generate and refine ideas, plan, produce and evaluate designed solutions. They develop their ability to generate innovative designed products, services and environments.

Digital Technologies

Digital systems are everywhere, mobile and desktop devices and networks are transforming learning, recreational activities, home life and work. Digital systems support new ways of collaborating and communicating, and require new skills such as computational and systems thinking. Technologies are an essential problem-solving toolset in our knowledge-based society.

The Western Australian Curriculum: Digital Technologies empowers students to shape change by influencing how contemporary and emerging information systems and practices are applied to meet current and future needs. A deep knowledge and understanding of information systems enables students to be creative and discerning decision-makers when they select, use and manage data, information, processes and digital systems to meet needs and shape preferred futures.

Digital Technologies provides students with practical opportunities to use design thinking and to be innovative developers of digital solutions and knowledge. Digital Technologies enables students to become innovative creators of digital solutions, effective users of digital systems and critical consumers of information conveyed by digital systems.

Aims

The Western Australian Curriculum: Technologies aims to develop the knowledge, understandings and skills to ensure that, individually and collaboratively, students:

· investigate, design, plan, manage, create and evaluate solutions

· are creative, innovative and enterprising when using traditional, contemporary and emerging technologies, and understand how technologies have developed over time

· make informed and ethical decisions about the role, impact and use of technologies in the economy, environment and society for a sustainable future

· engage confidently with and responsibly select and manipulate appropriate technologies − materials, data, systems, components, tools and equipment − when designing and creating solutions

· critique, analyse and evaluate problems, needs or opportunities to identify and create solutions.

Design and Technologies

Design and Technologies aims to develop the knowledge, understandings and skills to ensure that, individually and collaboratively, students:

· produce designed solutions suitable for a range of Technologies contexts by selecting and manipulating a range of materials, systems, components, tools and equipment creatively, competently and safely; and managing processes

· understand the roles and responsibilities of people in design and technologies occupations and how they contribute to society.

Digital Technologies

Digital Technologies aims to develop the knowledge, understandings and skills to ensure that, individually and collaboratively, students:

· use computational thinking and the key concepts of abstraction; data collection, representation and interpretation; specification, algorithms and implementation to create digital solutions

· confidently use digital systems to efficiently and effectively transform data into information and to creatively communicate ideas in a range of settings

· apply systems thinking to monitor, analyse, predict and shape the interactions within and between information systems and understand the impact of these systems on individuals, societies, economies and environments.

Organisation

Content structure

The Western Australian Curriculum: Technologies learning area comprises two subjects:

· Design and Technologies

· Digital Technologies

The Technologies curriculum is written on the basis that all students will study both Technologies subjects from Pre-primary to the end of Year 8. Within Design and Technologies (Engineering principles and systems; Food and fibre production; Food specialisations; Materials and technologies specialisations), students have the opportunity to study at least one of the contexts.

In Years 9 and 10 the study of Technologies is optional.

In Design and Technologies, it is desirable that schools provide students with the opportunity to engage with all contexts across Pre-primary to Year 10.

In Design and Technologies students learn about technologies in society through different technologies contexts (Engineering principles and systems; Food and fibre production; Food specialisations; and Materials and technologies specialisations) as they create designed solutions.

In Digital Technologies students are provided with practical opportunities to use design thinking and to be innovative developers of digital solutions and knowledge. Digital Technologies is a subject that has a specific curriculum and includes the practical application of the ICT general capability.

The syllabus for each of these subjects describes the distinct knowledge, understanding and skills of each subject and, where appropriate, highlights their similarities and complementary learning. This approach enables students to develop a comprehensive understanding of traditional, contemporary and emerging technologies. It also provides the flexibility, especially in the primary years of schooling, for developing integrated teaching programs that focus on both Technologies subjects and concepts and skills in other learning areas.

Figure 1: The relationship between key ideas and the Technologies subjects

Relationship between the strands

Knowledge, understanding and skills in each subject are presented through two related strands:

· Knowledge and understanding

· Processes and production skills

Teachers select technologies-specific content from the Knowledge and understanding strand and students apply skills from the Processes and production skills strand to that content.

The common strand structure provides an opportunity to highlight similarities across the two subjects.

Knowledge and understanding

Design and Technologies / Digital Technologies
Technologies and society
· the use, development and impact of technologies in people’s lives
Technologies contexts
· technologies and design across a range of technologies contexts:
§ Engineering principles and systems
§ Food and fibre production
§ Food specialisations
§ Materials and technologies specialisations / Digital systems
· the components of digital systems: hardware, software and networks and their use
Representation of data
· how data are represented and structured symbolically

Table 1: Outlines the focus of the knowledge and understanding across the two Technologies subjects

Processes and production skills

Design and Technologies / Digital Technologies
Creating solutions by:
· investigating and defining
· designing
· producing and implementing
· evaluating
· collaborating and managing / Collecting, managing and analysing data
· the nature and properties of data, how they are collected and interpreted
Digital implementation
· the process of implementing digital solutions
Creating solutions by:
· investigating and defining
· designing
· producing and implementing
· evaluating
· collaborating and managing

Table 2: Outlines the focus of the processes and production skills across the two Technologies subjects

Figure 2: The organisation of content in the Technologies curriculum

Year level descriptions

Year level descriptions provide an overview of the key concepts addressed, along with core content being studied at that year level. They also emphasise the interrelated nature of the two strands and the expectation that planning will involve integration of content from across the strands.

Content descriptions

Content descriptions set out the knowledge, understanding and skills that teachers are expected to teach and students are expected to learn. They do not prescribe approaches to teaching. The core content has been written to ensure that learning is appropriately ordered and that unnecessary repetition is avoided. However, a concept or skill introduced at one year level may be revisited, strengthened and extended at later year levels as needed.

Additional content descriptions are available for teachers to incorporate in their teaching programs. Schools will determine the inclusion of additional content, taking into account learning area time allocation and school priorities.

The additional content will not be reflected in the Achievement Standards.

Achievement standards

From Pre-primary to Year 10, achievement standards indicate the quality of learning that students should typically demonstrate by a particular point in their schooling. An achievement standard describes the quality of learning (e.g. the depth of conceptual understanding and the sophistication of skills) that would indicate the student is well-placed to commence the learning required at the next level of achievement.

Glossary

A glossary is provided to support a common understanding of key terms and concepts included in the core content.

Student diversity

The School Curriculum and Standards Authority is committed to the development of a high-quality curriculum for all Western Australian students that promotes excellence and equity in education.

All students are entitled to rigorous, relevant and engaging learning programs drawn from the Western Australian Curriculum: Technologies. Teachers take account of the range of their students’ current levels of learning, strengths, goals and interests and make adjustments where necessary. The three-dimensional design of the Western Australian Curriculum, comprising learning areas, general capabilities and cross-curriculum priorities, provides teachers with flexibility to cater for the diverse needs of students across Western Australia and to personalise their learning.

Students with disability

The Disability Discrimination Act 1992 and the Disability Standards for Education 2005 require education and training service providers to support the rights of students with disability to access the curriculum on the same basis as students without disability.

Many students with disability are able to achieve educational standards commensurate with their peers, as long as the necessary adjustments are made to the way in which they are taught and to the means through which they demonstrate their learning.

In some cases, curriculum adjustments are necessary to provide equitable opportunities for students to access age-equivalent content in the Western Australian Curriculum: Technologies. Teachers can draw from content at different levels along the Pre-primary – Year 10 sequence. Teachers can also use the general capabilities learning continua in Literacy, Numeracy and Personal and social capability to adjust the focus of learning according to individual student need.

Adjustments to the delivery of some practical aspects of lessons will be necessary to ensure some students with physical disability can access, participate, and achieve on the same basis as their peers. This might involve students using modified tools, materials or equipment to create solutions. Teachers may also need to consider adjustments to assessment of students with disability to ensure student achievement and demonstration of learning is appropriately measured.