Curriculum History and Financial Literacy

 

Reading articles and reports that are thirty years or older is very interesting when it discusses the curriculum and student needs during that time. A report by the National Research Council, Board on Mathematical Sciences and Their Applications, and Mathematical Sciences Education Board (1989) discussed how ‘traditional’ mathematics was expected to include algebra and introductions to calculus for the purpose of preparing students to be successful in university. However they found many students of the time were under prepared for the jobs available after school with those skills they had learnt. They felt students were definitely not prepared for jobs of the future and made the point that mathematics is no longer just a calculating and scientific skill, but contributes to all aspects of daily life including health and business.

These themes were extensively reviewed by Davis (2010) who specifically looked at how financially literate students were upon graduating high school. Unfortunately, many young people have money issues and debt that they cannot manage, commonly in the form of phone and travel bills. And a solution is to introduce more financial literacy into the curriculum. (I know this was something I wanted while I was in high school maths classes).

Davis (2010) explains the trends of the curriculum in Queensland from the 1860’s where public examinations were the focus of school and content learnt was based on previous exams so students could be directly successful at exams. The sole purpose was for students to be ready for the current workforce demands and to perform appropriately to that standard. In the mid 1960’s there was an increase in subject variety and diversification from traditional subjects like math, science and English, to having more elective choices and workforce specific skills including woodwork, metalwork etc. for students who were moving into the trade sector (Committee of Enquiry into Education in South Australia, 1971). In the 1970’s public examinations were abolished in Queensland with a move for more school-based assessments and a less prescriptive curriculum allowing teachers more choice of what to teach within subjects (Davis, 2010). In the 1990’s outcome- based standards were implemented as standards to determine whether students had met appropriate achievement levels at each grade (Davis, 2010). Finally, the development of the Australian Curriculum for F-10 was introduced in 2010 and has a large focus on real-life application of skills for future pathways (ACARA, 2022). You can see the development progress of curriculum and how these life skill issues were identified in the 70’s-80’s, and now they are more successfully being addressed within the modern day curriculum.

The focus of education dramatically shifted from being ready to complete the current work within known jobs, to expanding critically thinking and getting students prepared for jobs of the future and unfamiliar situations at work. The flexibility in the subjects available for students to study was a massive change in the 1970’s especially in the technical schools for trades. Davis (2010) questions the cause of poor financial literacy, as in the 1950’s-1960’s where students were only prepared for the common jobs available, they had limited further education and upskilling, and therefore never developed their understanding in this area. I think the traditional subjects still dominating the curriculum, even in the 1970’s-1980’s still lacked the financial literacy that students required from mathematics. What the current Australian Curriculum does well is having financial literacy applied in Humanities through business subjects, as well as mathematics (Australian Curriculum, 2022). This allows students to revisit and build upon knowledge each year within the curriculum, but also across multiple subjects, rather than only mathematics which increases linking/connecting ideas between areas and relating to real-life more complex situations.

I think the current curriculum has great intentions to increase financial literacy for students. The transition from traditional subjects to more variety is important for creating more relevant, real-life links to content for students’ future. I think a major limitation is that although financial literacy skills are included in the elaborations for mathematics and business topics, these a just suggested examples for teachers to use within the class. If a teacher had poor financial literacy or lacked confidence with the topic, they could provide other examples and not fully allow students to develop the necessary skills.

An example of this is in Year 7 mathematics (Australian Curriculum, 2022):

The content descriptors is: ‘use mathematical modelling to solve practical problems, involving rational numbers and percentages, including financial contexts; formulate problems, choosing representations and efficient calculation strategies, using digital tools as appropriate; interpret and communicate solutions in terms of the situation, justifying choices made about the representation’

With one of the elaborations including: ‘Modelling financial problems involving profit and loss, credits and debits, gains and losses; for example, holding a fundraising sausage sizzle and determining whether the event made a percentage profit or loss.’

This elaboration provides a great example that can be used in the class to demonstrate these life skills of financial literacy, but it is only useful if it is actually taught.

 

References:

ACARA. (2022). Review of the Australian Curriculum. Retrieved 1/11/22 from https://www.acara.edu.au/curriculum/curriculum-review.

Australian Curriculum. (2022). Year 7: Ecomonics & business and Mathematics. ACARA. Retrieved 29/10/22 from https://v9.australiancurriculum.edu.au/f-10-curriculum/learning-areas/economics-and-business-7-10_mathematics/year-7?view=quick&detailed-content-descriptions=0&hide-ccp=0&hide-gc=0&side-by-side=1&strands-start-index=0&subjects-start-index=0.

Committee of Enquiry into Education in South Australia. (1971). Education in South Australia. Government of South Australia. Specialty Printers Pty.

Davis, N. (2010). Are secondary students graduating with the financial skills they require? Charles Darwin University.

National Research Council, Board on Mathematical Sciences and Their Applications, and Mathematical Sciences Education Board. (1989). Everybody Counts : A Report to the Nation on the Future of Mathematics Education. National Academies Press.