Thanks Graham.

A refreshing rejoinder to the proponents of one-size-fits-all.

In a generation, we've gone from having only 30% of Australian kids attempting senior high school, to over 75%. We've integrated special-needs kids into the mainstream classes. We've seen unprecedented diversity in the backgrounds of the kids. And yet some people still see merit in the one-size-fits-all, set-your-watch-by-what-they're-learning approach.

Why is the "party of small government" seeking to control what our kids learn? Those who seek centralisation and government control of the curriculum would have us believe their aim is to take politics out of education. Pull the other one, it's got bells on.

What absolute rubbish. The whole idea of a national curriculum is to ensure that all of our children learn a central core of knowledge, skills and understandings. Naturally there will be room for local learning and teacher initiatives.

Unfortunately the problems associated with Outcomes Based Education where teachers were handed the responsibility of developing their own "syllabus" to use to achieve the "Outcomes" has led to a too decentralised approach to curriculum. As a result far too many young people are leaving school without being able to do such basis things as compute mentally and write simple reports.

As we move back to a core of prescribed material to be taught with space left for local teacher initiatives our children will be the beneficiaries.

The national curriculum concept is not about forcing teachers to become robots but it is about ensuring that a central core of what kids should learn at school is covered in the curriculum.

As a person who spent 40 years in schools as a teacher and a principal I had plenty of space for innovation within the set syllabus that was in place prior to William Spady's Outcomes Based Education model being picked up throughout Australia. If we move back to a core syllubus model there will still be lots of room for teachers to put their own stamp and character into their work.

Unfortunately too many of the educated "elite" hate John Howard so much that they can't see the common sense of what he and others in Government are doing for this country.

Teachers have plenty of scope to drive their own agendas, and they all do, even in todays rigid teching methods.

Centralisation of curriculum and uniformed teaching is a good thing, I cant tell you how many times a teacher has pushed their philosophies and ideas onto me, only to find that i studied it and it wasnt in the test, and often i disagreed with it.

Remember their job is not to provide ideology, their job is to guide children through this particular level of learning.

We dont want a great divide to be created, with the teachers being the main difference in learning and competancy standards.

Yes there are some good techers out there, but there are plenty of fruit loops too.

Thank you Graham.

All of the common sense that the central government brings to its "control" of the education curriculum(a state power)is dissipated when it is used as a smokescreen for supercilious and superior judgement brought down upon the vast number of Australians who are not "suited" to be Australian (the un-Australians.) The prescriptions about curriculum are directed as though our educational values and traditions (particularly our non-sectarian public education values and traditions)are a tragic mistake.(Worthy of a black armband?)

What is personally offensive to me are the calculated slurs, the ongoing denigration and the incredible devaluing of my work as a teacher and of the relationships I have had with a great diversity of young Australians over four decades. Clearly the government is intent upon conflict and division within the nation. This is not the way to build an evolving curriculum of learning that will give our young people the learning experiences that will prepare them for the world of the twenty first century. Enough is enough.

A timely piece, Graham. It is particularly encouraging to see how the young teachers you write about are bringing together the traditional concern of English – the study of literature- with new, screen based literacies in such an engaging and vibrant way.

These snapshots from real English classrooms provide a telling rejoinder to the politically motivated windbaggery of certain media pundits, Julie Bishop and the PM, who have been pedalling the arrant nonsense that ‘Big Brother’ has replaced “good” literature in the nation’s classrooms.

Blake in Year 11? So much for the dumb-downed curriculum and falling standards. Coincidentally, Barry McGaw was on Radio National this morning, once again confirming the outstanding results being achieved by Australian students in international literacy testing. (How long before it is suggested in The Australian – not for the first time - that a test of reading comprehension is somehow ‘new age’ and ‘postmodernist’, as it is not a test of spelling, which is apparently the only real measure of literacy.)

By all means, let us have an open and rigorous discussion about a national curriculum. But its neo-liberal proponents need a better gambit than a manufactured crisis in the nation’s English classrooms- an argument which has been shaped around the fraught politics of federal and state relations

I agree that a national curriculum must not be restrictive as a robotic tight-jacket for teachers: fit only for the insane. It is possible to have the National Curriculum but it does have to be geographically flexible.

It is basic to teaching method in "action on reflection", and "assessing the response", to review the class progresses: if it is working or not.

A lesson plan cannot be that rigid if a teacher does not know the students and their backgrounds. I know phonetics were always popular in Victoria. I also know about schools desperately trying to teach Shakespear in underprivileged schools and in the bush. There have to be options in any curriculum to move the direction, if the kids do not respond according to your outcomes.

It takes creativity, spontaneity, and an awareness of special needs of the kids before any lesson plan works. The National Curriculum needs to take in account of what kids respond to, and what they reject. Kids will soon tell you if your lesson plan is rubbish.

BTW in Australia, we have some of the highest trained school teachers in the world. When I hear people parrot the need to "retrain", I just cringe. Again?

The UK would love to steal all our teachers.