‘Declined significantly’: Australia’s education system has ‘very large problems’

Learning First Chief Executive Dr Ben Jensen says Australia has had “very, very large problems” with its national curriculum since it was introduced in 2010 as the performance of Australian students has “declined significantly”.

According to warnings from Australia’s official education research body, the nation’s school curriculum is too vague and is forcing teachers to invent their own lessons.

Data shows American students are taught four times as much biology as Australian children and science topics taught in Canada in year 7 are taught to Australians in year 10.

“What this shows is we actually have very, very large problems with our national curriculum,” Dr Jensen told Sky News Australia.

“We have half the content in the first nine years compared to other countries, we have less depth, less breadth of topics and some really poor sequencing of learning, which is so important for students.

“The curriculum is always the core of an education system and we have fundamental problems there that are going to be very hard for us to overcome if we don’t change the curriculum.”