"The review of the national curriculum at this point was premature," said Amanda Bichard, Acting Council President.

"Here in the ACT we are leading the way, but still we are only just beginning to see how the framework provided by the Australian Curriculum is being applied in classrooms by our education professionals."

"The curriculum has been a long time coming," explains Ms Bichard. "It has been carefully and painstakingly developed, with plenty of opportunities to give feedback, both to ACARA on the curriculum and via the ACT Curriculum Taskforce on how it is being implemented in the ACT".

"We have been very happy with how ACARA responded to feedback."

Initially, Council had reservations about the curriculum being too crowded, but Council was satisfied by how this was addressed by ACARA: allowing more choice and including both overviews and in-depth options so that teachers can adapt to the needs of their students.

Council also support the 'cross curriculum priorities' and 'general capabilities' which have been criticised in the Review of the Australian Curriculum. Council believes that a knowledge and understanding of Asia, indigenous issues and sustainability are important and should be considered when teaching in different subjects. Retaining them as cross-curriculum priorities is important to the education of the leaders of tomorrow.

Released October 13, 2014