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Article Excerpt
This article explores some of the debates about the nature and purpose of education in the social sciences in the Australian curricula. It examines recent attempts in studies of society and environment and history curricula to prepare students for global citizenship and responds to neo-conservative critiques that our 'politically correct' curricula does not impart the 'truth' about our 'European' heritage. This article argues that while the neo-conservative discourse makes claim to traditional views of knowledge and rationality, its discursive field does not address the broader questions of what sort of education our students require for the twenty-first century.
Introduction
Few would doubt that the next generation of Australians will inhabit ethnically diverse, complex, globally-linked communities. As General Peter Cosgrove noted recently, the past one hundred years have seen:
the gradual transformation of Australia from an overwhelmingly Anglo-Celtic, homogeneous population ... to one of the world's most multicultural societies. (Cosgrove, 2003, p. 23)
The changing nature of Australian society and its connectedness to the global community will provide many opportunities for young Australians. However, recent events such September 11, the war in Iraq, the Bali bombing, the 2004 Boxing Day tsunamis and attacks in Madrid and London remind us that Australians must be prepared for an increasingly uncertain world. Education is one of the most effective means of preparing students for these local, regional and global challenges. Yet as Rizvi (2004, p. 157) reminds us, there is a lack of consensus on the implications of globalisation for education policy. In broad terms, globalisation describes the complex ways in which the lives of the world's people have become increasingly linked and new ways in which local and national communities relate to each other (Tikly, 2001). As Scholte (2000, p. 14) observes, globalisation can represent increasing progress and prosperity while others associate this process with deprivation and doom.
Despite the complexities of globalisation and debates about education policy directions, there is agreement amongst key stakeholders that education has to prepare young Australians to deal with its manifestations. Through the Australian Education Council (AEC), ministers for education from all state and territory governments have sought to define the common aspirations of their various systems, aiming at a consensus on the role of schooling in dealing with the challenges of globalisation. The AEC's Adelaide Declaration of National Goals for Schooling in the Twenty-first Century (MCEETYA, 1999) states that:
schooling should assist young people to contribute to Australia's social, cultural and economic development in local and global context. (p. 2)
However, others are threatened by 'the realities of new times' (Tudball, 2003, p. 2) and attempts by the education system to respond to local, regional and global realities via curriculum reform. Such reactivists look inward and argue that:
education provides a moral framework and a cultural context in which young Australians both define themselves and address the question: what constitutes the good life? (Donnelly, 2004, p. 6)
Critics such as Donnelly argue that the education system has been 'undermined by a series of ideologically driven changes' (Donnelly, 2004, p. 16). In particular, the Key Learning Area (KLA), Studies of Society and Environment (SOSE), has been targeted for critique and labelled 'politically correct'.
Such claims need to be interrogated for, as Kemmis (1990) reminds us, 'debates about curriculum reform reveal the fundamental concerns, uncertainties and tensions which preoccupy nations and states as they struggle to adapt to changing circumstance' (Kemmis, 1990, p. 82).
This article identifies four aspects of the neo-conservative critiques against SOSE (Bolt, 2000; Donnelly, 2004; Mason, 2000; Thomas, 2000). In doing so, it argues that such critiques are flawed in their assumptions and misrepresent the nature of the SOSE curriculum framework as a vehicle for preparing young Australians for the future. The first assumption makes claim to a rationality which assumes that students passively acquire knowledge by learning universal and fixed social truths. Second is the assumption that any curriculum which advocates critical inquiry and analysis undermines the well-being of society. A third assumption is that Australian culture and history is derivative of the United Kingdom and should remain so. The fourth assumption posits a passive view of citizenship; that is, it assumes students should be taught to maintain the status quo.
Such flawed assumptions ignore recent research on the benefits of meta-cognitive approaches to teaching and learning and do not prepare students for the complexities of the twenty-first century. They are evidenced in the following claims:
Whereas education was once based on the assumption that there are some absolutes (truth telling, equal justice for all and the need for tolerance and compassion) in the brave new world ... students are told that everything is tentative and shifting and that the purpose of education is to criticise. (Donnelly, 2004, p. 145) The European settlement of Australia is described as an invasion and Australia's Anglo/Celtic heritage is either marginalised or ignored ... the syllabus fails to make any mention of Anglo/Celtic figures, such as Captain Cook, Matthew Flinders, Edmond Barton or Sir Robert Menzies, who have made this nation what it is today. (Donnelly, 2004, p. 134) The syllabus is hostile to our society because it is based on the value of social justice where students seek to deconstruct dominant views of society ... This syllabus doesn't even pretend to hide its hostility to the traditional disciplines and knowledge which underpin the glory of Western culture ... (Bolt, 2000, p. 33) The curriculum substitutes propaganda and indoctrination for basic knowledge. It teaches our children the wrong lessons about the past. It teaches our children to be morally blind. (Mason, 2000, p. 13)
Such neo-conservative discursive critiques on recent curriculum reform can be analysed from various theoretical perspectives. Before such contexts are explored, it...
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