Hasbeen,

So you are younger than your curmudgeonly attitudes suggest, I had you at mid-late 60's, egg on face my bad about the age reasoning.
I figured that your primary/secondary school days were late 50/60 as were mine .
I would point out that there have been significant advances in SCIENCE and consequences of science since then.i.e. Plate tectonics, computers, internet,remote sensing, micro electronics,TVs, microwaves etc. Approximately 60% of the jobs then no longer exist (e.g.I started an apprenticeship as a lithographic Camera operator).

Something in the order 50% of the jobs today didn't exist then. Arguably both some Physics and definitely applications thereof has Changed and continues to change daily. Hence my criticism of you "It's Rubbish!" statements without proof.

My point was clear the amount of *information* children/students today are expected to understand and cope with is several times more than and escalating daily .To suggest this isn't true flys in the face of 40 years of research.

Neither am I interested in running school for failed teachers etc
I was merely pointing out that there would be NO savings (your base logic) all your attitude does is move and increase the cost. *Both* sides of politics are guilty of the same instant answer superficial reasoning.

I stated my position clearly The new curriculum may go part way to solving the 'dog's vomit' problems between schools and states.

I agree with qanda's conclusion the "Proposed science curriculum (isn't) a disgrace" as such. But will do little for the raising of standards. There is simply too many other contributive unaddressed factors involved.

Conclusion: IMO If implemented your solution is a "disgrace" (ill considered, destructive) in that it will cause more pain and cost than it will solve. "Any plan is only as good/bad as the unintended ill consequences" E4

Well, at least one Nobel Prize winner agrees with me http://bit.ly/a9WTRa. Picks up on the "Science as a human endeavour" category.

"WA Nobel Prize laureate Barry Marshall has expressed concerns about the draft national curriculum for science, saying parts of it are vague, not evidence-based and pave the way for non-scientific elements to be taught in classrooms.

Dr Marshall, who in 2005 was awarded the Nobel Prize for medicine with fellow scientist Robin Warren, said the Science as a Human Endeavour category in the course could allow teachers to teach "all kinds of weird things which are not based on scientific evidence".

"I think that is the thin edge of the wedge," he said. "That human endeavour column is what worries me and it needs to be tightly controlled or scrutinised.""

BTW, Examinator, I'd be interested in any sort of vaguely plausible justification you could provide in real hard terms for your assertion that students need to know 300% more now than they used to 40 years ago.

There may have been some advances in quantum mechanics and a few more sub-atomic particles discovered, but that would be about it. Sure some jobs have become redundant, but you don't teach lithography in science, and the principles underlying lithography still rule.

I wonder,

Who are you Hasbeen?

Clear argument (and spelling) is not a strength of yours. For example

I really don't give a dam(n) what they do with the kids who don't wast to be there.

Then you say

The kids are not dispensable.We do not need them teachers to stuff up the lives of kids,

so do you give a damn or not ?

Is this you evidence? One of the kids who car pools with my youngest was complaining the tutors never answer the phone, are never in the office,

Possibly, probably the tutor is a sessional worker on a short-term contract and is somewhere else making a buck – conclusions based on anecdote.

I have read every text book that was evaluated,
And you are who? The text books that you wrote can be purchased where?

I was horrified to find how far the subjects had been stripped of all the hard bits. So what is the name of the book that you wrote with all the hard bits in?

It is just as well that the curriculum writers will not be paying any attention to the federal governments PR exercise of letting everyone comment

GrahamY, If science is not a human endeavour what is it?

qanda, pursuing conciliation between widely differing views, - Is this what they are doing?

The Australian government is damned if they do, and damned if they don’t. – Maybe it is just damned! Once again the Federal Government is not writing the curriculum. In reality they are responding to the demands of the peak bodies of the biggest corporations – maybe you need to have a look at them too.

Again we see Rudd, Gillard and Co offending both the ‘New Right’, and the ‘Old Left’. How so? As far as I know neither have any input into the curriculum. Thankfully.

What is your definition of new right and old left?

He’s right Graham, it does need to be tightly controlled.

_______

loadeddog

<< qanda, pursuing conciliation between widely differing views, - Is this what they are doing? >>

In my opinion, yes Peter.

They are trying to respond to many – not just “to the demands of peak bodies of the biggest corporations” as you claim. I am perplexed though, given your experience with the unions, why you should say this.

Loadeddog, I don't think anyone is saying science isn't a human endeavour, just that the study of it as a human endeavour is not a part of science education. It's sociology, or perhaps history.

If sciences like physics and chemistry were social sciences, then this approach might be relevant. In economics, where how economic principles work is interwoven with how people perceive them working, the history of economics is important - it's like a huge action research project. But science doesn't have a perception feedback loop like this - it works, whatever you think of it or believe it to be.